Some pics from the End Occupation of Iraq London demo

Contrary to mainstream media reports there were huge numbers on this march. Maybe not millions as in February but probably 100,000.

Aerial view looking towards Speakers Corner and Park Lane

There were many bands playing

Mood was vocal but good natured

Tanks were roaming the streets

View towards stage in Trafalgar Sq with Nelsons column and Big Ben in backgroun

The march started from Speakers Corner in Hyde Park and finished in Trafalgar Square where there were speeches by Tony Benn, George Galloway, George Monbiot, the widow of the Al Jazeera journalist murdered by US troops etc.

kriptick

Comments

Hide the following 19 comments

No way were 100,000 on that demo

28.09.2003 09:23

No way were there 100,000 people on that demo. Trafagar Square can only hold an absolute maximum of 50,000 including all the roads around it and the protesters did not occupy the whole of the saquare including the roads around it!

Even the February 15th demonstration was no way near two million. I saw both the countryside demos and the anti-war demos and timed the time they took from start to finish and they were both about the same size about 400,000 people!

You lot in the anti-war movement despite all your efforts failed to convince the majority of the population in Britain and America that the war was wrong! That was because the majority knew that the tyrannical regime of Saddam Hussein was so bad that it was worth a war to get rid of it!

Rockwell

What a sad person you are rockwell

28.09.2003 10:16

You give yourself away as a right saddo. You go on marches that you don't support and claim that you time how long it takes people to complete the route. Did you really go on both the countryside alliance and the anti war marches? How can you be at both the start and the finish of these events simultaneously? Anyone who's been on any march knows that there are thick bits and thin bits with correspondingly different speeds of progress. Do you take that into account or do you conveniently link up with a thick bit for the CA and a thin bit on anti war demos? And of course anyone who hangs around a site like this everyday, constantly sniping at everyone else, spewing out utter garbage of how Bush and Blair really "didn't want war" and that "people of Iraq have now been liberated and can look forward to democracy and freedom" is clearly deranged and just another social inadequate.

Jim

stop equating anti-war protest with support for murderers!

28.09.2003 10:16

Rockwell, do you really think that people who protest AGAINST the pointless death of Iraqis killed by 'coalition' forces are really going to be FOR the pointless death of Iraqis killed by Saddam?

Many (and let's not quibble about numbers) people on the march are there because they are against murderous regimes and practices full stop. This increasingly includes being against your own government if they persist in aiding and abetting the murder of civillians, either through warfare or through support of corrupt regimes (see almost the entire history of British and US foreign policy since, ooh, at least 1947). Have a look at Mark Curtis's outstanding 'Web of Deceit: Britain's Real Role in the World' if you don't believe me.

Every reasonable person (and that's got to be a lot of people) were anti-Saddam, including...the Left! Yes that's right. In fact, rather boringly, most people just don't like anyone who fucks over other people. It's about that simple.

Nobody is sad to see Saddam go - the UK and the US could have done this a long time ago if they had wanted to (supporting democratic movements within the country, not imposing sanctions, not, er, supporting Hussein when it suited them). But they didn't. The British public are glad that Saddam has gone (though where he is, exactly, remains a mystery - Rockwell, any ideas?), and so are the protesters. We just don't want people who have nothing to do with him getting killed. Get it?

Nina

Hmm.

28.09.2003 16:14

"Every reasonable person (and that's got to be a lot of people) were anti-Saddam, including...the Left!"

Anti-Saddam, and anti-removing-Saddam-by-the-only-means-possible. That's quite a position.

Colt

Question Time for Colt

28.09.2003 17:42

"Anti-Saddam, and anti-removing-Saddam-by-the-only-means-possible. That's quite a position."

Really? Are we to gather from this that you believe being anti-Blair (or anti any politician for that matter) requires one to be pro assassination?

Just asking.

W.B. Reeves

why is killing Iraqis the "only" way of removing Saddam?

28.09.2003 17:46

Why do you think that bombing Iraq (and oops, accidentally killing a few impoverished Iraqis along the way) was the only way to remove Saddam?

You (presumably) missed the bit about how the US and UK systematically failed (for at least twenty years) to support any kind of national pro-democratic uprising in Iraq, even after promising several times to help out, for example, the Marsh Arabs in the south after the end of the first Gulf war.

The US and UK also failed to back up several attempts at uprisings by the Kurdish population despite, again, pledging support then leaving them to their fate at the hands of Saddam (whilst, incidentally, allowing Turkish army and air force incursions against the very populations the so-called no-fly zones were allegedly designed to protect).

I'd say that these are complicated issues that certainly bring with them problems of their own, but as for the logic of 'sod helping them form their own democratic movements, let's just bomb a few villages and that should help', it makes no sense.

The only reason it looks like military intervention is the 'only means possible' is because the US and UK don't seem to be very keen on helping properly democratic uprisings under oppressive regimes. You have to ask yourself why.

Nina

Nina Is Correct

28.09.2003 18:11

Rockwell Nina is right.

First: Just becuase you are against war doesn't mean that you are Pro-Saddam. You might as well submit against war, for being against the killing of innocents.
The majority of people on the anti-war march were against the killing of innocents, that is against Saddams killing but also against the "colateral damage" (A stupid term which hides what it is; military stupidity and the death of civilians) of war.

Second: Before you call out your praise in this war for removing such an evil leader remember who supported him in the 80's when he was "our man" becuase he was killing Iranians. You see the US and UK governments are quite happy to deal with USEFUL dictators (Take a look at Suharto in Indonesia or better still read "The new rulers of the world by John Pilger) but as soon as they become useless then they are more than happy to remove them.
Saddams only crime (in the eyes of these governments) was that he invaded kuwait who happened to be a friend of ours, if he'd not done that then his regime could have happily carried on killing and touturing people. Whats a few iraqi's compaired to all that oil?

Third: War was not the only way to rid Iraq of Saddam, war is the most profitable though. There is no money to be made in supporting people to rise up against him, why else did daddy bush leave the people in Iraq who had risen up after the first gulf war and a better question for you, why wasn't Saddam removed in 1991 seening as we were already at war and the governments knew about all these crimes and Chemical weapons he has (or doesn't, depending on what you believe?)

Fourth: This goes back to the second point but who do you think gave him the information and support to develop the chemical/biological weapons? If having Weapons of Mass Destruction is reason for a war then i would like Britain to declare war on America (Seeing as it has the most in the world) just before it declares war on its self. Yes a little extreme i know but you can't take the moral high ground on WMD when we have them our selves.

We either rid the world of all oppressive regimes, wheres the war on Mugabe? Or Sharon? and we rid the world of all WMD, starting at home is a good idea.
Or we forefit the moral high ground and admit that what we are doing ammounts to nothing more than play groud bullying "We're bigger and stronger than you, so you'll live by our rules and we'll live by ours".

Marcos

Some answers

28.09.2003 18:19

Well, WB Reeves, if Saddam could be voted out, then I'd prefer that option. But given the less-than-democratic system goin' down in Iraq...

And calling Saddam a "politician" is sorta understating things, dontcha think?

Nina

Believe it or not, I'm angry as hell that past US and UK administrations didn't do more to help Iraqis. But an internal revolution was very unlikely to succeed. The one times that the Kurds went on the offensive, they drew against the weakest, least loyal Iraqi division. There was no way the Iraqis could have overthrown the gov't without Coalition help.

If you disagree, please outline a scenario in which that could happen.

Colt

Peace brother

28.09.2003 19:52

in the name of cultural tolerance i say we should respect other unique societies, and allow them to maintain their colorful heritage. its for the sake of diversity people! I mean hey, its not like more iraqis would have died had there been non-intervention. Sure Saddam is gonem, but now theres going to be mcdonalds and starbucks, which is a million times worse. Bottom line, there is never any justifiable reason to go to war, except if its against America or Israel, then its ok.

long live diversity!

ted

You people are idiotic wankers

28.09.2003 20:08

By participating in this idiotic anti-war/ anti-occupation protests, you only give the terrorists/guerillas/what-have-you more resolve to attack our troops, thereby making the objective of the coallition--TO BRING PEACE AND SODDING STABILITY TO THE DAMN PLACE-- impossible. Our troups can do that job and get out, but you are doing nothing but giving encouragement to the murderers. Right or wrong you blathering idiots, our troops are there. You are getting them killed. You should all be ashamed of yourselves.

GLS

reasonable point

28.09.2003 20:16

Well, Colt, I agree with you that internal revolution under Saddam was going to be very difficult, if not impossible. I also agree that without support from coalition forces this could not have happened. The point is that this kind of support WAS offered several times (to the Shiites and the Kurds) and then retracted, to the absolute devastation of those involved. This is why the coalition forces had to drop leaflets to the Shiites, promising that they wouldn't betray their promises 'this time'. Everyone knew that there was no way the Iraqis could have toppled Saddam without our help, that's precisely why it's so brutally disgraceful that support was pledged and then squandered.

Why was there was no sustained attempt to truly help internal self-determined revolt against Saddam on the part of the US and UK? I hope and pray that the Iraqis will be in a position to have some form of democratic and economic self-determination now Saddam is gone, but this seems quite distant at this point, what with all those contracts going overseas... yet again, there seems to be precious little commitment to any form of real, national, democracy.

Now, whilst I agree that the occupation may lead to an improvement in the lives of the majority of Iraqis (though as I write the coalition has yet to bring services back to their pre-invasion level, and seems singularly unconcerned with alleviating the massive health crisis, seemingly more interested in banning smoking in Baghdad hospitals...) the real problem has to do with the motivations and consequences of the occupation. Again, whilst a version of democracy may come to be in Iraq, it would be dangerously naive, given half a century of British and American foreign policy instructing us otherwise, to think that democratization was the reason for the invasion. If, along a far more plausible interpretation, we consider the possibility that, in light of the parlous state of the American economy and the looming economic rivalry with China, what is really at stake is the economic and political domination of the (oil-rich) Middle East, with the de facto expulsion of Russians, Chinese and French from Iraqi oilfields (involving rescinding contracts and defaulting on Iraqi debts), and possibile 'democratizations' of Syria and Iran, then we might begin to realise why opposing this occupation (which does not mean opposing the democratic self-determination of the Iraqi people, on the contrary) is an entirely rational response to the potentially cataclysmic consequences of this new phase in American foreign policy, openly outlined (we are not dealing with a conspiracy, far from it) in the texts of the Project for a New American Century).

So, whilst we cannot but hope that Iraq will improve its lot and its people find some form of democracy and sovereignty, we cannot avert our eyes from the bigger picture, i.e. from a systematic transformation in American foreign policy with blatant (and blatantly expressed) imperialist overtones. It is just as cretinous to volunteer the Iraqis for 'another Vietnam' as it is to think that free elections for Arabs is the utopian dream held by a gaggle of born-again militaristic fanatics who explicitly base their foreign policy on the necessity for America to be the world's sole superpower, its unquestioned political and economic hegemon. Astronomical rises in defence budgets are not intended to alleviate the sufferings of the imperial subjects (they never have been), but are instead linked to a very reasoned and systematic power-grab, aided and abetted by Blair's pseudo-ethical hallucinations. When a country is being privatized before it's even allowed to have public services, it hardly takes a genius to figure out the motivations...

Nina

Well...

28.09.2003 20:43

"Everyone knew that there was no way the Iraqis could have toppled Saddam without our help, that's precisely why it's so brutally disgraceful that support was pledged and then squandered."

Fair point (and we agree on this 100%), but why do you continue to question why the US/UK didn't try to start something that was 98% certain to end how it ended without Coalition assistance, ie, 10,000s dead?

I don't think we'll ever agree on the motives, though I'm far from trustful of the Bush administration.

Colt

There's lame, and then there is lame

29.09.2003 02:36

and pink and peach cardboard tanks are....lame.

Seriously lame.

But don't let that stop you. Plaese!

WowWowWow

No I don't go on any anti-war marches or demonstrations

29.09.2003 09:47

I don't go on any anti-war marches of demonstrations. I saw coverage of it on the TV! From the TV pictures and no way were there 100,000 people there. Trafagar Sqaure looked half empty!

Rockwell

Anti War Doesn't Mean Dictator Support?

29.09.2003 18:20

I can understand people not supporting the war AND also not supporting murderous dictators. I know people who are anti-war AND anti-murderous regimes. I was almost one myself.

The people I know, veterans of other marches and protests, refuse to take part in any of the current anti-Iraq war protests because there was never a mention of what Saddam was doing, or had done, to his people. Nobody seemed to care about the suffering of the Iraqis under Saddam.

Now that Saddam is gone, I look to see if the anti-war marchers will mention the people being killed by other murderous regimes and I see none mentioned. War isn't just waged by tanks and guns, it's also waged by torture and slavery. War is being waged in Sudan and N. Korea, to mention just two places. (There are at least 30 countries where war is being waged on innocent citizens.)

If you are against war, be against all war. The life of a Sudanese person is just as precious as the life of an Iraqi. It would be good to raise peoples' awareness about all the countries where war is being waged. Put pressure on the global community to stop these wars.

.

29.09.2003 20:00

I wouldn't waste your (valuable ;-) time, CJ.

Anti-war is becoming a ridiculous term for those campaigning against a campaign to get rid of someone who's at war with his own people. Can anyone really imagine these people supporting Churchill's declaration of war in September 1939? It's just the Poles, there's no evidence that Hitler's a threat to us.

Colt

democracy means for all

30.09.2003 01:55

"Now that Saddam is gone, I look to see if the anti-war marchers will mention the people being killed by other murderous regimes and I see none mentioned. War isn't just waged by tanks and guns, it's also waged by torture and slavery. War is being waged in Sudan and N. Korea, to mention just two places. (There are at least 30 countries where war is being waged on innocent citizens.)"

Good God, y'all! Because clearly nobody on the march cares anything about the Palestinians, the Israelis, the North Koreans, the Sudanese, the East Timoreans, the Kurds, etc. etc.

Your target is entirely suspect. You attack the people who want to see democracy for the Iraqis because they're not simultaneously marching under the banner of every other person who's suffering under an oppressive regime.

Disappointly for you, the point is THEY ARE! There is no kind of pointless fetishism at work. People who march against the policies of their government (i.e. against Blair's policy over Iraq) are NOT supporting one population who are being fucked over by a ruthless regime to the exclusion of others. People are currently angry about Iraq because we have a direct role in the on-going slaughter of the civilian population and the overt attempt to gain control of the country's national resources (i.e. oil) for the sake of American (for the most part) political and economic hegemony.

If you really want to be angry about one-sided support for chosen regimes then be angry against Blair, against Bush. They are the ones who undermine a universal commitment to democratic reform.

If you are personally angry (as you should be) by the 'torture and slavery' carried out in the name of your country, then direct your anger towards those that instigate and support it. As for who these people are, I'll give you a clue....it's not the "anti-war" protesters.

If you have any illusions about the 'democratic' motives - as opposed to rhetoric - of our glorious leaders, please consider their current policies with regard to oppressive central Asian regimes, Pakistan, Indonesia, Kuwait, Israel (the true vanguard in flouting UN resolutions and non-proliferation treaties, putting Iran to shame in this respect), or, spend a little of your time reading up on 50 years of our active support of tyrants, torturers and murderers, chief amongst whom Saddam Hussein himself.

Do you really think that all of a sudden notorious and immoral anti-democrats like Rumsfeld have suddenly been converted to the cause of equality, dignity and justice? If the anti-war movement has a real strength it's precisely that of having learned from half a century of brutal policies cloaked in the same language of "rights", "democracy", "freedom" (need you be reminded that the Nicaraguan Contras and... Bin Laden were very recently praised by the American elites as... freedom-fighters?).

"If you are against war, be against all war." Yes, absolutely. Those campaigning for peace (yes, without qualification) are hardly going "oh we like the Iraqis but not, er, anyone else". Redirect your anger towards those who deserve it.

Nina

against occupation

30.09.2003 10:14

You has massive demo against occupation last saturday. We had also demo in Helsinki, Finland.
Here is photos from our demo and around the world:

http://www.sosialistiliitto.org/kuvat/2709/

Juhani

Juhani

world wide wankers

09.10.2003 14:38

Judging from the above pro-war comments, I'm guessing a link to this thread has been posted to Little Green Footballs or some similar right-wing mutual masturbation society.

How brave they all are on the anonymous internet! Notice you never see them marching or arguing their case in the real world though. Someone might shout at them. Diddums.

;-)