CSotD: It’s not Politics. It’s History. With extra Bac-Os
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My trip back a half century the other day sparked some curiosity, and when I did a little poking around this morning, it turns out that a quarter century ago today, papers were covering the news that Saddam Hussein had announced his withdrawal from Kuwait.
So here are some cartoons from that date, and let me explain that this does not break my Lenten political-cartooning fast because they are history, not politics.
It's sort of like having Bac-Os on your salad on a Lenten Friday: They may taste like meat, but they're soy, so you're only fooling your tongue and your soul is covered. (I never bought that argument, but perhaps you will.)
In any case, the war had gone remarkably well from the perspective of the US-led coalition, which included Britain, France, Germany, the Soviet Union, Japan, Egypt and Saudi Arabia, operating under a mandate from the UN.
The announced withdrawal came only three days into the ground attack, though air strikes — the term was "Shock and Awe" — had begun January 17.
So cartoonists had time to draw, and most of the response was jubiliation. Though the actual news of withdrawal was a little fresh to be a topic, the pending outcome had been clear enough that this Bruce Beattie piece already mocked Saddam Hussein's declaration that Kuwait was no longer a sovereign nation but was now Iraq's 19th province.
Gary Brookins was also able to see which way the wind was blowing in this Desert Storm.
Steve Sack had managed to anticipate the moment, as had …
and Don Wright
Dick Wright commented on Saddam Hussein's complaints about the air war …
… while Ed Stein condemned Scud attacks on Israel, most of which, it should be pointed out, were either off-target or intercepted.
Jim Berry noted the odd, addictive nature of this TV war. People say that Vietnam was seen on TV, but Vietnam was filmed, not taped, and in an era when satellite transmission was quite limited.
Most Vietnam footage had to be flown out and processed before it was broadcast, and, while 24 or 48 hours wasn't a lot of time in 1968, we got to watch Desert Shield and the miniwar that followed live.
In fact, this was the war that built CNN, not so much because they were the only ones going live from the Middle East, but because the networks fumbled and stumbled in their coverage.
My son — who later got a much closer view of the Gulf — called from his college dorm and asked me to hold the phone up to CNN because they didn't have cable and were fed up with the networks' cycle of reporting and clarifying and re-stating and re-clarifying.
Garry Trudeau suggested that it might not have been entirely the media's fault, since there was a fair amount of spin being generated. The military was, for instance, all in favor of providing access to video of the new "smart bomb" technology, but did not want video coverage of things like soldiers' coffins coming home.
Nor were many people back home anxious to hear criticism of the war, as this news story indicates: A college cancelled Father Berrigan's classes on war and peace because there was a war.
In the wake of the surrender, there was much talk of how this had removed the stigma of Vietnam, to which I believe it was disabled Vietnam vet and former Secretary of the Navy Jim Webb who remarked that, if the North Vietnamese had all been gathered up in the middle of a desert, that war might have been equally brief and successful.
Whoever said it, the remarks were not appreciated at the time nor repeated thereafter.
And Jeff MacNelly asked a question that might have become even more interesting had he added a second panel with the signs swapped.
In fact, that one could be something of an evergreen, and …
… lest we forget, there were other things going on besides the war. This Pat Oliphant piece hasn't gone out of style in the last 25 years, either, though the situation didn't have, at the time, the blessing of the Supreme Court.
Nor did the cheerful analysis in that refer line at the top of the Kerrville Daily Times keep Cal Grondhal from commenting on the economic woes of the moment.
The strange thing is how much both the war and the financial downturn have since come to seem like movie trailers for full-length features yet to come.
Ah, but now I'm slipping out of "history" and beginning to turn those Bac-Os into real meat.
So here's your non-political moment of zen
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