The Bone Clocks

FLANKED BY THE Stars and Stripes and the widely reviled new Iraqi flag, Brigadier General Mike Klimt gripped his lectern and addressed a press room as full and wired as I’d seen it since Envoy L. Paul Bremer III announced Saddam Hussein’s capture to loud cheers last December. We had hoped that Envoy Bremer would make an appearance today, too, but the de facto Grand Vizier of Iraq has cultivated an imperial distance between himself and a media that daily grows ever more critical and ever less “post–9/11.” Klimt referred to his notes: “The barbarity we saw in Fallujah on March 31 runs counter to any civilized norms in peacetime or wartime. Our forces will not rest until the perpetrators have been brought to justice. Our enemies will come to learn that the Coalition’s resolve is strengthened, not weakened, by their depravity. And why? Because it proves the evildoers are desperate. They now know that Iraq has turned a corner. That the future belongs not to the Kalashnikov but to the ballot box. And this is why President Bush has pledged his ongoing full support to Envoy Bremer and our military commanders for Operation Valiant Resolve. Operation Valiant Resolve will prevent the dead-enders of history from terrorizing the vast majority of peace-loving Iraqis, and move this nation closer to the day when Iraqi mothers can let their children play outside with the same peace of mind as American mothers. Thank you.”

“Clearly,” Big Mac muttered in my ear, “General Klimt’s never been a mother in Detroit.”

Shouts broke out as Klimt agreed to take a few questions. Larry Dole, an Associated Press guy, won the verbal brawl for attention: “General Klimt, are you able to confirm or deny the figures from Fallujah Hospital, claiming that six hundred civilians have been killed in the last week, with over one thousand seriously wounded?”

The question generated a buzz; the U.S. doesn’t, and probably couldn’t, keep a record of Iraqis killed in crossfire, so even to ask the question is an act of criticism. “The Coalition Provisional Authority,” Klimt lowered his head bullishly at Dole, “is not an office of statistics. We have a counterinsurgency to prosecute. But I say this: Whatever innocent blood has been spilled in Fallujah is on the insurgents’ hands. Not ours. When a mistake is made, compensation is paid. Thank you.”

I did a piece about compensation for Spyglass:Blood money payments had fallen from $2,500 to $500 per life—less than a visit to an ATM for many Westerners—and the untranslated English legalese of the forms was as comprehensible as Martian to most Iraqis.

“General Klimt,” said a German reporter, “do you have sufficient troops to maintain the occupation or will you ask Defense Secretary Rumsfeld to supply more battalions for these widespread revolts we are seeing all over Iraq?”

The general swatted away a fly. “First, I dislike this ‘occupation’ word; we’re engaged in a ‘reconstruction.’ And these ‘widespread revolts’—have you actually seen them with your own eyes? Have you been to these places yourself?”

“The highways are too dangerous, General,” answered the German. “When did youlast tour the provinces by car?”

“If Iwas a journalist,” Klimt smiled on one side of his face, “I’d be careful about confusing hearsay with reality. Security isreturning to Iraq. One last question, before—”

“I wanted to ask, General,” veteran Washington Postman Don Gross got in first, “whether the CPA now concedes that Saddam Hussein’s weapons of mass destruction were imaginary?”

“Ah, this old chestnut.” Klimt drummed on the side of the lectern. “Listen, Saddam Hussein butchered tens of thousands of men, women, and children. If we hadn’t toppled this Arab Hitler, he would’ve slaughtered tens of thousands more. To my mind, it’s the pacifists who would have done nothing about this architect of genocide who have the case to answer. What stage had his program of building weapons of mass destruction reached? We may never know. But for the ordinary peace-loving Iraqis who want a better future for their families, it’s an irrelevance. Okay, we’ll wrap it up here …” More questions were called out, but Brigadier General Mike Klimt exited in a snowstorm of flashlights.

“And the moral of the tale is,” I smelt hash browns and whisky on Big Mac’s breath, “if you’re after news, avoid the Green Zone.”

I switched off my recorder and shut my notebook. “It’ll do.”

Big Mac sniffed. “For an ‘Official Bullcrap Versus the Facts on the Ground’ piece? You still planning a little drive out west?”

“Nasser’s got the hamper packed, ginger beer, the lot.”

“Likely there’ll be fireworks to go with your picnic.”