For some reason Wifey and I were wusses last night and passed out at 9 pm which means I've been up since about 7am. (That's EST) I'm watching something on National Geographic channel about these soldiers who's job is to find all of these treasures that were looted from the Iraqi national museum. Some stories were swapped about looters trying to get treasures.
Some people stole artifacts to keep them safe from people that would melt down gold or sell the artifacts illegally. They gave large portions of the museum back after Iraq's violence died down a little.
Another group tried to chip chunks off of an ancient Sumerian wall. A guard saw them and tried to scare the group off by shooting his machine gun into the air. Unfortunately for him, they came back a couple minutes later with their own machine guns and started firing at his trailer. He was out of bullets. (Mostly because he was an idiot and shot all his ammo into the sky. I say shoot to kill. And those bullets have to come down at some point. Think about the people a couple miles away having a sweet BBQ and then bullets start raining down, impaling Aunt Susan's lung.) They made off with 1.5 of 4 giant walls. Total value $550,000,000.
Suddam apparently took some stuff from the national museum before he went into hiding and before Bagdad was captured by America. The main point of the show is to find this golden bulls head that goes on a triangular statue. He took it to the national bank, which is largely underwater. The soldiers rent a pump, and pump out the basement. They found the supposed vault that Saddam hid this head. They found some museum boxes, but can't open them until they get permission from the museum, bank, and pentagon. However they do find enough money in the reserves to pay anyone on Iraqi payroll for three full months. Finally they open the box and its a happy day. They not only find the bulls head, but tons of gold bars, an Egyptian princess statue, a crown, and a priceless bowl that was lost during the first Persian Gulf war.
So I started thinking, in a chaotic situation what would I do. Would I loot for personal gain or would I loot to save objects? I would like to think my head would be working enough to decide this, but I have a feeling I would go into self preservation mode. (AKA, the fetal position) I would travel through basements, abandoned streets, and would try to get behind attacking forces so I could assumingly run from the conflict and escape bombardment.
I would like to think that I could drop-kick an enemy combatant, take his weapon and wage a one man, Chuck Norris like war, but lets be honest. I'm too much of a wiener. I would probably be huddled in a basement near my pile of poo that was created after the first bombs dropped.
I don't think I would do well, but again I can't say for sure unless the situation presents itself. (Which I hope it never does) I'm hoping human instinct will kick in and I would make it.
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