As of late last week, the Iraqi soccer team continued to accomplish amazing things at the Athens Olympics, making it to the quarterfinals against Australia.  The Iraqis, however, are using their celebrity status to oppose their country’s hard won freedom.  At a campaign appearance in Oregon, President Bush correctly observed, “The image of the Iraqi soccer team playing in this Olympics [is] fantastic, isn’t it?  It wouldn’t have been free if the United States had not acted.”  While true, such rhetoric makes Iraqi midfielder Salih Sadir angry.  “Iraq as a team does not want Mr. Bush to use us for the presidential campaign,” he insisted, later adding, “I want the violence and the war to go away….  We don’t wish for the presence of Americans in our country. We want them to go away.”

Sadir’s comments reveal a lack of gratitude that is in direct contradiction to the team.  According to Sports Illustrated, “To a man, members of the Iraqi Olympic delegations say that they are glad that former Olympic committee head Uday Hussein… is no longer in power.  But they also find it offensive that Bush is using Iraq for his own gain when they do not support his administration’s actions.”  Like many elements of our own country, it seems the Iraqis want to have it both ways.  The problem is, they can’t.

Midfielder Ahmed Manajid told reporters that he would be a rebel militant if he had not been on the soccer team because coalition forces killed his insurgent cousin.  This is the violent cycle that must be stopped if the Iraqis truly want peace.  The coalition has repeatedly offered cease-fires to Muqtada al-Sadr and other insurgent leaders in an effort to move the peace forward.  These militants have accepted the cease-fire only long enough to regroup and initiate a new wave of attacks.  Nevertheless, Manajid insists, “I want to defend my home. If a stranger invades America and the people resist, does that mean they are terrorists?  Everyone [in Fallujah] has been labeled a terrorist. These are all lies. Fallujah people are some of the best people in Iraq” [brackets in original].  The Americans freed the city and have largely remained on the outskirts since doing so.  If the people of Fallujah are really “the best,” then they need to root out the terrorists who are giving the city its bad reputation and who prevent the country from having a real, meaningful peace.  But, members of the interim government, not the coalition, offered the most recent cease-fires that al-Sadr accepted and then discarded.  So from what is Manajid really defending his home?

Adnan Hamad, Iraq’s soccer coach, is even more blunt in his criticism of America’s inability to wave some mystical magic wand and make Iraq a peaceful country: “The war is not secure.”  There’s a reason for that: building a democracy, and the free society it supports, takes time.  Unfortunately, too many Iraqis and Americans fail to grasp such a simple concept.  Islamic fundamentalists loyal to the Saudi Arabian and Iranian regimes attack the fledgling democracy because they are terrified of what a truly free Iraq could mean for their own regime’s future.

The real problem is the Iraqi people have more in common with Americans than either side is willing to admit.  Like far too many Americans, too many Iraqis lack the personal responsibility to see that the success of their country’s government is directly dependent upon their efforts.  The security of Iraq is the direct responsibility of every single Iraqi person.  Even if the United States were somehow inclined to construct a utopia ready for the Iraqis to move into, it would never succeed if the Iraqis are unwilling to do the work to maintain it.

Any member of the soccer team has the opportunity to break this cycle and move Iraq to the future by offering their support for the new Iraqi government.  Sadir, Manajid, Hanad, and the rest of the soccer team are heroes to the Iraqi people, whether they get a gold medal or not.  They are now role models to hundreds of thousands of Iraqis.  If this status is ignored or misused, it will be at the detriment of all of Iraq.  These national heroes can help their country break the cycle of violence that soccer, the Olympics, and America allowed them to escape from.

The sooner they understand their celebrity status and capitalize on the positive effect it can have on their people, the sooner they will get what all Iraqis, and all Americans, want: the coalition out of Iraq.

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