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Last Updated: Jul 20, 2008 - 6:21:58 AM |
So Much for the 'Looted Sites'
This, according to a report by staff writer Martin Bailey in
the July issue of the Art Newspaper. The article has caused confusion,
not to say consternation, among archaeologists and has been largely
ignored by the mainstream press. Not surprising perhaps, since reports
by experts blaming the U.S. for the postinvasion destruction of Iraq's
heritage have been regular fixtures of the news.
Up to now, it had seemed a clear-cut case. It stood to reason that a
chaotic land rich with artifacts would be easy to loot and plunder.
Ergo, the accusations against the U.S., the de facto governing
authority, had been taken on faith. No one had bothered to challenge
the reports, the evidence or the logic, not least because many ancient
sites were in hostile terrain and couldn't be double-checked. By
implication, the U.S. had been blamed for that too: After all, the
presiding authority is effectively responsible for allowing no-go areas
to exist where such things can occur.
Yet, paradoxically, there always was thought to be enough evidence to
adduce blame. "We believe that every major site in Southern Iraq is in
serious danger," Donny George, the former head of the Baghdad Museum,
was quoted as saying in the New York Times in 2003. A recent book by
Lawrence Rothfield of the University of Chicago's Cultural Policy
Institute carried the estimate that, every year, roughly 10% of Iraq's
heritage was being destroyed.
One of the foremost specialists who went on the trip, Elizabeth Stone
from Stony Brook University, actually quantified the damage with the
help of satellite images -- just before going. Alarmingly, and
prematurely it seems, she concluded that nearly 10 miles of land had
been looted and hundreds of thousands of objects had been taken.
Confident statistics of this kind have been regularly tossed around,
yet one wonders how such calculations can be made, not least by viewing
the remains of illicit digs from satellite pictures. When looters
attacked the Baghdad Museum in 2003, the news media put the number of
destroyed and looted objects at 170,000 -- a figure equal to the entire
collection. It emerged later that most of the important pieces had been
successfully hidden away. Others were soon found. The number of missing
objects that is cited has since fluctuated between 3,000 and 15,000,
with the figure never taking into account the systematic semiofficial
looting and frequent substituting with fakes that occurred in Saddam's
time.
Considering the political impact of such data, one would expect the
experts to approach the subject with scientific circumspection, using
numbers sparingly and conservatively. Too often they seem to have done
the reverse. So now, as a matter of course, their method, their probity
in sifting the evidence -- do they have a political agenda? -- has come
into question.
It's a question that equally hangs over the deliberations of a meeting
that took place recently in Dublin of the World Archeological Congress.
The members reportedly considered a lengthy statement urging colleagues
to refuse any military requests for a list of Iran's sites that should
be exempt from possible air strikes. Finally they settled for a shorter
July 11 press release. Among other things, the final press release says
that WAC "expresses strong opposition to aggressive military action . .
. by the U.S. government, or by any other government." The release
quotes WAC's president as saying that WAC "strongly opposed the war in
Iraq and . . . we strongly oppose any war in Iran" and that "any
differences with Iran should be resolved through peaceful and
diplomatic means."
If as scholars, archeologists take a priori public positions on
political matters, what are we to make of the field-data they produce?
How impartial can it be? And with their own credibility marred, who is
there left as an impartial body of experts for the public to turn to?
The archaeologists' mission to southern Iraq took place in early June.
Besides Prof. Stone, the experts included John Curtis, head of the
British Museum's Middle East Department; Paul Collins, a Mesopotamia
specialist at that museum; a top German expert; and Iraqi experts. It
was conducted through the British military, which is in charge of the
area, using a helicopter and armed escorts to visit the locations. They
included such celebrated "cradle of civilization" sites as Ur, Eridu
(the earliest Sumerian city), Warka (Sumerian Uruk), Larsa (a
Babylonian city), Tell el-Ouelli (ancient Ubaid) and Tell el-Lahm (an
Assyrian site).
According to the Art Newspaper article, "The international team . . .
had been expecting to find considerable evidence of looting after 2003
but to their astonishment and relief there was none. Not a single
recent dig hole was found at the eight sites, and the only evidence of
illegal digging came from holes which were partially covered with silt
and vegetation, which means they [were] several years old."
Furthermore, the most recent damage "probably dated back to 2003," to
just before and after the invasion when the Iraqi army maneuvered for
the allied attack. (According to other experts, looting probably took
place when the Iraqi army first moved out of areas near sites to
counter the invasion.)
Neither the British Museum pair nor Prof. Stone responded to my calls
seeking comment. The British Museum press official for the Middle
Eastern department cautioned that the official report had not yet been
compiled, but it seemed that the article was generally accurate.
Certainly none of the experts have denied any of it. In the article,
Dr. Curtis "admits that he was 'very surprised' at the lack of recent
looting, but stresses that . . . 'it may not be typical of the country
as a whole, and the situation could be worse further north.'"
No doubt. But how could previous assessments have been so wrong, and
why would one expect anything to be worse elsewhere? In phone
conversations with me, both Donny George and Lawrence Rothfield argued
that the eight sites were all known to be well-protected. Dr. George
was able to itemize each one: "Ur was an Iraqi airbase and then a U.S.
airbase. Uruk Warka was protected by guards from nearby tribes -- we
always knew that. Ouelli is largely prehistoric and of no use to
looters. . . ." And so on. But Dr. George, perhaps the world's leading
authority on the subject, also conceded that the greatest damage done
by looters had generally occurred in the 1990s, in Saddam's time. Prof.
Rothfield said that the no-fly zones back then had allowed illicit
digging to occur.
The mission also refuted the welter of news items we've all become
familiar with accusing allied forces of damaging ancient sites with
emplacements, tank tracks and the like. According to the Art Newspaper
report, "little damage was . . . caused by coalition forces." Much of
it was done by Saddam's forces.
One is left with these questions: If the visited sites were known to be
well-protected, why did the team choose only those sites, and why were
team members surprised at the lack of damage? It has been hard to get
convincing answers. Some have speculated that, to get further
cooperation, the visitors made a tacit deal with the British
authorities not to raise a scandal. Dr. George felt that perhaps the
eight were the only sites with adequate security, while he couldn't
explain the surprise expressed by the experts. He warned against
putting too much faith in newspaper reporting. Quite right.
But it is all a far cry from the hitherto prevailing impression abroad
in the world that the invasion has directly led to the mass destruction
of Iraq's archaeological heritage
Source:Ocnus.net 2008
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