There seems to be some well-founded speculation that more than a bit of the looting was done well prior to the liberation of Baghdad by Ba'athist Party members for their own personal gain.

Always two sides to every story. Here is a report from The New Republic -

"One friend told me that the looting of the National Museum--something that cut deeply into me--was the work of newly deposed Baathist officials, who had been selling off our patrimony as they saw their days were numbered. As the regime fell, these (ex-)Baathists went back for one last swindle, and took with them treasures that dated back 9,000 years, to the Sumerians and the Babylonians. One final crime perpetrated by Saddam's thugs."

http://www.tnr.com/doc.mhtml?i=iraq&s=diary041403

I'm sorry, but the hand-wringing about the Iraqi museum artifacts is a little much. Sure, let's do everything to save them while we are at the same time finishing off the Fedayeen, stopping looting, providing humanitarian assistance to the whole country, restoring water and power, attending to civilian casualties, avoiding all the mosques, ushering in a new government, finding the war criminals etc. etc., all with a deft, unobtrusive hand and exquisite cultural sensitivity and all with the world second-guessing at every turn. I suppose within a few days the world will be screaming at the Americans because the kindergartens aren't reopened yet.

Sorry. I know it is important, but I'm still raw that the world shrugged off the discovery of the children's prison so quickly. Sort of like being horrified at the WTC 9/11 attack because it flooded the Guggenheim!

I think the one thing that makes the Iraqis loot their national properties is a little different from just economic poverty, it's "cultural poverty." This issue will threaten the future of Iraq. They don't seem to be able to keep the democracy after coalition forces' departure. I'm really worried. May be the Iraqis are not as educated as we assumed they were.

I'm glad I read this thread. It hadn't ocurred to me that the worst looting was done by the Baathist thugs on their way out of town.

Reminds me of a similar crime perpetrated by the Nazis in the closing days of WWII. They packed a train full of treasures taken from the Jews in the camps. I think it was dubbed the Gold Train or something like that. Anyone remember?

That said, it wouldn't have been hard to park an Abrams tank at the front door to the Museum. That would have discouraged most of the "common" looters.

Joe:
There's also a non-binding convetion from UNIDROIT: the 1995 UNDROIT convention againstillegally exported cultural object
http://www.unidroit.org/english/conventions/c-cult.htm
That's something to look into and apply if possible
xavier

I'm probably one of the blogospherians Joe spoke of. Although buildings can be rebuilt, this stuff is gone, gone, gone. It never occured to me that the looting may have just been a cover for the outright theft that possibly occured weeks before the city fell. I remember two pictures, one of a man carrying the head away off the Saddam statue that was torn down in Baghdad, and the other of a boy carrying away a gilded sink. I thought both just wanted a souvineer. We westerners have so much I can't relate to the feelings of people who have had nothing for as long as they've lived.

I too am one of the bloggers who is disgusted at the looting.

Perhaps a more nuanced view of some of the "appropriation" may emerge, but I disavow the idea that being anti-looting somehow means you give Saddam's crimes a miss. I sure didn't.

The National Museum is a combination of the Guggenheim, the Met, the Modern and the American Museum of Natural History. If they were destroyed, it would be a cultural disaster.

I'd like to see PROOF that the National Museum was sacked by Baathists. It's just too convenient to believe. Likewise the Jonathan Foreman article glosses over the destruction of the Museum in one sentence in the middle of the article.

Lastly I think that the 9/11-Guggenheim analogy is flawed. 9/11 was an attack. Getting rid of Saddam was a good thing. It was followed by bad things. That doesn't vitiate the fact that deposing Saddam was a good thing.

There was no shortage of weapons in Iraq. If the trustees of the museum and it's curators cared so much about the artifacts they should have been guarding them. Where were the Iraqi guards who guarded the place during Saddam's regime?

I read of a hospital where those who worked in it guarded it against looters. Why were the museum people unwilling to do the same?

Self government is possible when people are willing to organize for their own defence. Is it possible that the calls for self determination by the Iraqis is premature?

Or have these events taught them a lesson?

We shall see.

The Iraqis looted their own museum and now it is America's fault? (Baathist Iraqis or orinary citizens what is the diff? Other than politics.)

Are we going to have to be their daddy forever? Is that what they really want?

They don't want America running their country they say. Fine. Then it is up to the Iraqis to investigate the looting and punish the looters.

They want to run their own country? Excellent. Here is a good place to start.

Fox news reports that some British archeologists who saw the displays after the museum re-opened said that many of the artifacts were reproductions.

If this is the case the "looting" was probably a coverup for the real crime.

For a more upbeat "analysis" of looting, see my post: "LIKE, MAN, IT'S SO, LIKE ... SURREAL!"
(Monday, April 14, 2003)

Malthusiast, you have a good site - and a poetic bent I see. The URL he refers to is right here, but I much prefer this post of free verse tied to a picture.

JK, Very kind of you! Best, M

Two points:
1. the vaults were unlocked, not broken open.
2. the museum (and some hospital) looting happemed before we even crossed the bridges.

*LOOTING*
He does not come right out and say it, but reporter's story points out that yes, hospital looting preceded coalition arrival. Also gives lie to Fisk about no response to news of hospital looting - as soon as reported, four Humvees dispatched. - "I went back to the Palestine and explained the situation at the Al Wiya to the Marine commander in charge, Lieutenant Colonel McCoy, a big strapping man who listened carefully. I told him that there was a British citizen there, a man who had been wounded when the American tank fired on the hotel. He and a junior officer pulled out a military map of Baghdad and I tried to show them where they should go. It seemed difficult to explain, so Sabah and I and a Frenchman working for Première Urgence, an organization that supplies emergency aid to hospitals, led a convoy of four or five Humvees to the hospital."
*AND* Slightly older report by same guy, before airport taken

*NYTimes - Pillagers Strip Iraqi Museum of Its Treasure*
As reporters returned from the national museum to their hotels beside the Tigris tonight, marines guarding the hotels were caught in a heavy firefight with Iraqis across the river, and the neighborhoods erupted with tank and heavy machine-gun fire. Western television cameramen who went onto the embankment beside the Palestine Hotel to film the battle were pulled from danger by helmeted marines who dragged them down behind concrete parapets and waved to reporters on the hotel's upper balconies to get down.