Seven Oaks Magazine.

The 2004 Vancouver International Film Festival hosted the international premiere of Baghdad Blogger, a series of videos shot by a young Iraqi man who calls himself Salam Pax. The VIFF tells us that Salam’s “heritage makes him a particularly articulate and informed commentator on the key role of the Shia in the future.”

These video blogs take us through Iraqi life from the time of Saddam Hussein’s arrest in December 2003 until the last entry shot just four weeks ago.

Salam starts his first video entry with the arrest of Saddam Hussein and his treatment in the custody of US forces. What do Iraqis think of this, he asks his friends and family. In English and in Arabic with subtitles, each person interviewed disapproves of the way the former dictator is treated by the US – they are offended as human beings, as Muslims, as Iraqis - and demand a fair and public trial for the dictator.

Salam, elsewhere generously described as “refreshingly irreverent,” overrides the consensus of everyone he’s interviewed, and in his fluent English says: “He looked like a bum.” An easy laugh at the VIFF.

The famed blogger agrees that there should be a public trial, but only if Saddam is not allowed to speak his “nonsense.” I wonder if this nonsense includes information about US support for Saddam’s regime during the 1980s. Freedom and democracy, American-style.

Salam sets out to answer the question: Was it worth it? His answer: “It was totally worth it.” The US has brought democracy to Iraq. To prove it he shows us bank tellers on a demonstration for the first time, cites an increase from five to 150 newspapers in Iraq, and shows us Iraqis buying satellite dishes for their TVs. Salam forgets to mention US troops firing on peaceful demonstrators in Fallujah in the spring of 2003 and shooting civilians at checkpoints throughout Iraq. He doesn’t tell us that the US has shut down newspapers and TV stations not friendly to the occupation or interim government. He doesn’t tell us of the US targeting of Arabic-language news channels Al-Jazeera and Al Arabiya. And this is freedom and democracy, American-style.

Salam Pax supported the war and the invasion of Iraq, because, he argues, the only way to get rid of Saddam was by foreign intervention. He offers the failed 1991 uprising as an example of the inability of the Iraqi people to remove the regime. Again, Salam forgets to mention, or perhaps is unaware, that the US and allies allowed Saddam to use his army and helicopters through their lines to crush the uprising.

Salam says he opposes the US occupation, but argues that US troops are needed for security and stability at the birth of the “new Iraq”. I’ve heard this argument before – it is the one made by the Bush administration.

Islamic fundamentalism is also a theme throughout Salam Pax’s video blogs. He expresses his fears and concerns of the possibility of an Islamic republic in Iraq – concerns I share.

Unfortunately, Salam does not consider why somebody like Muqtada Al Sadr has become so powerful and influential. It is as though the recent Najaf crisis has sprung from thin air. No mention is made of the closure of Al Hawza (Muqtada’s newspaper), nor of the arrest of several of his followers. He opts instead for calling Muqtada another Saddam, the Mahdi army another Baath Party (an irony and an insult, given the struggle of the Shia Muslims under Saddam).

The viewer is treated instead to this “articulate and informed” commentary: Eyad Allawi and his government are doing their best to secure and rebuild Iraq, while radicals like Muqtada and his Mahdi army are standing in the way of progress and democracy.

While Salam outlines Muqtada’s background (the son a prominent Shia cleric) we are not told of Allawi’s: a former Baathist, Mukhabarat agent, MI6 and CIA asset. The Mahdi army is reduced to a simplistic group of troublemakers and religious fanatics. There is no mention made that the army was formed to fill the gap in law and order created by the US invasion, formed by poor and unemployed Iraqis who were put out of work by sanctions, war, imported labour, and by dissolving the Iraqi army and security forces. They are people who chose to stand up to the occupier instead of getting tattoos and satellite TV.

In Baghdad Blogger we see the transformation of Iraq through the eyes of Salam Pax. His camera captures other points of view, unanimous in their opposition to the ongoing occupation. We hear an Iraqi woman refute the false choice that Blair and Bush continue to peddle: we don’t want Saddam and we don’t want a US occupation - why is that so difficult for you to understand? But these Salam easily dismisses – these are the views of simple, backward, “bitter” Iraqis.

After the screening, Salam Pax is in the theatre to answer questions. I ask him, “Salam Pax, who are you? Who is this young Iraqi man with TV western values and pro war views? A man who calls the UN-US sanctions that devastated the whole of Iraq ‘smart sanctions,’ who fails to mention or show civilians and children shot by US troops in Iraq. Who is this person that went back to Iraq in 1996 and was able to communicate to the outside world in the midst of war with no suspicion or trouble? Who is this unemployed architect who goes into a shop to buy large quantities of alcohol for Ramadan and pays with US dollars?” A VIFF moderator informs me that this was not a political debate, not a political film. Salam Pax is not trying to represent the Iraqi people; he is one of 25 million Iraqis.

I am one more. I’ll answer Salam’s question: was it worth it? 30,000 Iraqis dead, a whole new generation of hate, chaos throughout the country. If I agree with Salam, then I am also agreeing with Madeleine Albright, who believes that 500,000 dead Iraqi children due to sanctions was a price worth paying. No, Salam, it was not worth it.