An Iraqi says: How could life be better when ...

Ahmad, an Iraqi now living in London, makes a well stated case for how life is better in Iraq today, compared to Saddams rule. In Iraqi Expat, he says:

There are security problems in Iraq, created by many including those who made Iraq look secure and stable in the eyes of the world during Saddam’s rule; but were Iraqis really secure back then? If you think that when the security servicemen come to your house and wipe out your family is security, then Iraqis were secure! If you think that when the government terrorize people is security, then Iraqis were secure!

He lists a series of the atrocities endured under Saddam's regime. All of them, of a type that Westerners cannot imagine enduring.

I have now read many of the Iraqi's stories. I know I would have been killed early in Saddam's rule. I know myself well enough to know that blind rage at the evil of it would have gotten me killed. Ahmad ends, saying:

How could life be better when you have no hope?

Living hopelessly is much more destructive than any problem you see in Iraq today, and Iraqis were hopeless before the war. If you don’t see the possibility of a bright future for Iraq, if you have no hope today, then you must be either blind, short sighted or living in denial.