Embassy News
Ambassador Crocker's Independence Day Remarks
July 2, 2008
I'd like to thank Annamaria Crider for a magnificent rendition of the National Anthem -- that's the kind of thing that normally you'd have to pay 25 bucks for a seat at a major ballpark to hear. And thanks to Christian Lilley and the wonderful folks from MWR for putting all this together, and the 4th ID Band in non-regulation headgear. And thanks to all of you for being here today for our Fourth of July birthday.
I would just note following on Christian's remarks the fact that this is a community event because we're not having a Fourth of July representational event. What we've decided to do this year is to move our national day representation event to Election Day. So this means having the national day reception to mark our national elections in November, and we will be doing that at the New Embassy Compound. As you know we are transitioning now to the new Embassy and that will mark an important transition for Iraq as well. So for those of you who are accustomed to working extremely hard to support national day receptions you've got a stay but it's not an amnesty.
We mark the Fourth of July as our Independence Day, the day of signing the Declaration of Independence, July 4, 1776. But we often don't reflect just how hard the struggle was after that. And I think a brief reflection on our own early history helps place Iraq's own struggle to establish a self-governing, free and democratic state in a broader perspective.
We gather together today five years after the liberation of Iraq. Five years after the signing of the Declaration of Independence we fought the final major battle of our own War for Independence -- it took that long -- the victory over British forces at Yorktown. It was in 1781. It was also in 1781 that the states finally ratified the Articles of Confederation, but as we all know that early attempt at a federal structure didn't quite work for us. So it was a full eight years later, 13 years after the signing of the Declaration of Independence, that the Constitution of the United States was finally ratified in 1789. So Iraq's transition measured against our own has been startlingly rapid in every sense.
And in 1789 we didn't exactly have it right either. We kicked a few of our issues down the road, issues like states' rights, like slavery.
So that's another thing to keep in mind. In one respect you could say that Iraq's establishment as a modern state, the state that formed after World War I, and the collapse of the Ottoman Empire, took place in 1921. That was 87 years ago. 87 years into American history it was 1863. And today, July 2, 1863, 145 years ago, was the second day of the Battle of Gettysburg.
So by any measure Iraq has come a very long way. As the twists and turns of our own history strongly suggest, Iraq has a long way to go. And the future nature of the Iraq of today is something we cannot read with great clarity from where we and Iraqis sit today. But what maybe we have established is to give them the opportunity to develop a free democratic state founded on basic principles that are so close to American hearts. As we look at our history and Iraq's recent history we are reminded again that, as the saying goes, "freedom is not free." There have been Americans in our history who have stepped forward to fight and die for the principles that established our country and which we hold so dear today; thousands of Iraqis have done the same.
Those Americans who fought for our country in 1776 wrote our history, and chapter after chapter has been written since. You here in Iraq today are writing history for America, you're writing history for Iraq, you're writing history for the world. You are writing for future generations to read that the principles that led to the establishment of the United States of America 232 years ago are principles for people everywhere, for all men and women at all places, at all times. How those principles are translated will vary from place to place, but the basic freedoms that we stood for in 1776 still stand as a beacon and as an aspiration around the world.
We talk about America's Greatest Generation, that generation that fought World War II. Those of you who are in this fight in Afghanistan and Iraq are America's newest Greatest Generation. They stand for the same principles and the same ideals as those who came before them also stood.
I mentioned the Battle of Gettysburg. It's worth noting today what Abraham Lincoln said 145 years ago when he paid a visit to the National Cemetery at Gettysburg:
"We here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain—that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom—and that government of the people, by the people, and for the people, shall not perish from the earth."
Those words were true in America in 1863, every one of them is true today in Iraqi in 2008. For Iraqis, for Americans, we are determined that the sacrifices we both have made will lead to a new birth of freedom, and that truly government of the people, by the people and for the people shall not perish.
I couldn't be prouder or more grateful to have all of you here, with me, to carry forward this fight. Most of you are away from family, from home, from friends, from all the events that make life in America special and that make our Independence Day so special.
But I can assure you that as you go forward with your lives, as you return to the United States, for every coming Independence Day, if you have a bit of difficulty remembering just where you were and what you did, none of us will have the slightest difficulty remembering where we were or what we were doing on Independence Day 2008. Thank you, Americans, and Happy Birthday.