Cherokee Sage Woman

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On the 2,000th US Death in Iraq
By Fernando Suarez del Solar
t r u t h o u t | Letter

Wednesday 26 October 2005

Yesterday, October 25, 2005, the toll of US fatalities in Iraq reached the significant number of 2,000. On March 27, 2003, just seven days after the illegal occupation of Iraq began, the fifth US casualty (and the second Latino) fell - my son Jesús Alberto Suarez del Solar Navarro. Now, two years and seven months later, we have reached 2,000. 2,000 young people, each with a dream, each with enormous potential, each manipulated and deceived for immoral reasons by the group of powerful men who dragged us into a criminal war. 2000 families destroyed, 4000 parents devastated, with their most precious treasure - their children - torn from them. And who cares? Who cares about these young people who are dying? Only the families care, it seems, since Bush's criminal government continues with its rhetoric about how Iraq is better off and how we will not leave until the mission is completed. What mission? The personal agenda of a ruling clique, because clearly there is no humanitarian mission in Iraq. When I learned that we had reached the awful figure of 2,000, I wept. I wept because the pain of knowing that another young American had died reminded me of my own tragedy and my own pain. I thought about his parents, his mother who must feel the ache in her soul knowing that her son died in an unnecessary war, and his father who, like me, was proud of his son and of his nation. And unexpectedly his nation betrayed him, and his son was gone.

I do not know if Bush in his self absorption and his feigned Christianity understands the tremendous suffering he is causing - the families' anguish, the harm to our nation that he has placed in even greater danger. But I am sure about one thing. Bush will receive his punishment, a punishment that will make him cry tears of blood as my family and 1999 other families are shedding as they remember their lost children.

How much more blood will it take to end this criminal war? How many more Iraqi children have to die? How many more brave young Americans will have to make the ultimate sacrifice? How many more parents will have to weep for their sons and daughters? Who can answer me? Who?

We must demand that the lies and the dying stop today.

End the occupation of Iraq and bring our troops home now.

End the occupation of Iraq. Bring our troops home now.

Fernando Suarez del Solar, father of Jesus Suarez del Solar.

www.guerreroazteca.org.