[wideawake]

"What did they do first?" asks Hashem Marmala, a 30-year-old waiter. "They went for the oil. People are starving in the cities, and they were concerned about Rumaila," he says, referring to the southern field that pumps up to 60 percent of Iraq's oil.

Idiot. With the Rumaila oilfields destroyed, a temporary shortage of supplies would have become months of famine.

[SquirrelKing]

"It was a matter of money," says the 34-year-old car detailer, who left his native Basra, Iraq, for Jordan in 1994. She wanted a bigger house and a car, possessions then well beyond his means.

Has he stopped to think of who was controlling every nickel and dime in Iraq up to now? His beloved Uncle Saddam was then doling it out to France and Russia for more toys.

"Are ye daft, Man? Think!"