Message #25371

[Bianca]

As soon as they could, the United States and its allies moved in to regenerate the marshlands and assist the people. The U.S. Agency for International Development and others are training Iraqis, equipping them--helping them help themselves. One prominent group is called Eden Again, and two of its guiding lights are Azzam Alwash and his wife, Suzie Alwash. Both are Ph.D.-holding environmental scientists. He is an Iraqi who grew tip in Nasiriyah, the son of an irrigation engineer; she is a Texan.

Suzie Alwash reports that about 40 percent of the marshlands have been reflooded. And about half of that has been revegetated: "It's amazing, when you look at pictures of the place, from month to month, how last this stuff is revived." Some areas will never be revived, but the Mesopotamian Marshlands will again have a life. Another scientist--Thomas L. Crisman, a wetlands specialist at the University of Florida--says that he doesn't like to use the word "restoration": "'You're not God; you can't put it back." He prefers "rehabilitation," arguing that, with time and smarts, reasonable goals can be obtained.
 
As with Iraq at large, not all has been well in the marshlands since Liberation Day. Numbering about 500,000 mid-century, the Marsh Arabs were maybe half as many by the time of the 1991 war. After Saddam's depredations, those in the area dwindled to about 75,000; the others were dispersed or killed. According to Suzie Alwash, some 100,000 Marsh Arabs have returned since the liberation: from the towns, cities, and camps of their exile. (Some went to neighboring Iran.) Different Marsh Arabs want different things: Some want a more modern life, tired of the reeds; some want to farm, instead of coping with the fish and water buffalo. There are problems with the water: very salty, not as life-giving as it was. Turkey's dams affect southern Iraq, and water politics are always sticky.