Blood for Money

African American Marine among first to die in Iraq conflict - Family and Black community challenge politicians on war aims

Staff Sgt. Kendall D. Waters-Bey

A Black US Marine plunged to his death in the Iraq desert in an obsolete CH-46 Sea Knight helicopter flying troops to forward positions. He was among 12 servicemen - eight British commandos and four US Marines - who died Thursday 17th March 2003 when the helicopter crashed and burned south of Umm Qasr, an Iraqi town near the Kuwait border.

It was Day 1 of the conflict and history will record the name of Staff Sgt. Kendall D. Waters-Bey as the first African American to die in the Iraqi conflict. His death was, however, not without significance, historically and politically.

Like all Black Americans, Waters-Bey shares a more than 200-year-old military history (from Crispus Attucks, first to die in the Boston Massacre that triggered the Revolutionary War, to Gen Colin Powell in the Gulf War) of Blacks who fought to become full citizens of America by dint of risking their lives or dying for their country.

The 29-year-old Marine from Northeast Baltimore joined the corps while still in his teens and leaves behind a wife and family that mourns his loss. But, in their grief, they question the necessity of the conflict with Iraq, the Baltimore Sun reports. In doing so, they have taken Waters-Bey's death and the war in Iraq deep into political realms most Americans are afraid to enter.

Nokia, one of his sisters, told newspapers of her anger at President Bush for sending her brother to die in an unjust and pointless war. "This war is all about oil and money," said Nokia. "But he [Bush] has already got oil and money. It's about greed… He ought to send his daughters over there to fight; see how long they'd last over there."

Michelle Waters, his eldest sister, criticized the US government for starting the hostilities. "It's all for nothing, that war could have been prevented," she said when interviewed in the living room of the family home, tears running down her cheeks. "Now, we're out of a brother. [President] Bush is not out of a brother. We are" she said.

The Marine's father, Michael, when told of the age and troubled history of helicopters like the one Waters-Bey was flying in said: "The US government owes me an explanation". He told reporters he did not support the war.

Though Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld expressed his condolences during a televised Washington news conference, the soldier's family was not convinced of his sincerity. Another sister, Sharita, 23, said: "His talk was just a show. They don't care. If they really cared. They (Bush or Rumsfeld) would call or send something."

The family's neighbours in their stable hardworking Black community were equally unconvinced by the politician's praise for Waters-Bey's "sacrifice fighting for freedom abroad".

Many believe the Marine died for oil prices. "If we lose this war, oil will be $100 a barrel, and if we win, it will be $25 a barrel," said a veteran of the Vietnam War who lives down the block. Waters-Bey "was a really nice guy, and its really a shame he died because I don't think this war was necessary."

A 70-year-old Korean War veteran who lives near the family home, said he doubts the government's assertions that the United States had to go to war to protect itself from Saddam Hussein's weapons or to help the Iraqi people.

"They (the government) say he is a threat, but it seems the biggest threat is North Korea," said the veteran, a retired Postal Service supervisor. "Now North Korea got all those nuclear weapons and are talking junk, and we aren't doing anything about it. And they sure aren't helping those people starving in Africa. If the oil wasn't in Iraq, we wouldn't be there."

These remarks by bereaved relatives are not the customary flag waving reactions usually reported by the US government and media. They underscore a widely held view in many Black class communities that their youth are dying in an unjust war - dying for "oil and money", - not in the professed noble cause to make the Middle East safe or to free an oppressed people.

Sources include the Baltimore Sun, AP Online, John P Davis, ed., The American Negro Reference Book, and Lt Col Rtd Michael Lee Lanning, author of The African American Soldier