The Battalion. (College Station, Tex.) 1893-current, March 31, 2003, Image 1
Volume 109 • Issue 122 • 12 pages Texas A&M University www.thebatt.com Monday, March 31, 2003 One Spirit. One Vision jProgress Report: mm College of Agriculture $140 million $35.6 million Corps of Cadets $35 million $10.6 million College of Engineering $210 million $89.5 million College of Liberal Arts $35 million $16.5 million I2tliMan Foundation $100 million $80.2 million RUBEN DI-LUNA • THE BATTALION Source: TEXAS A&M FOUNDATION Nye: Campaign will reach goal By Brad Bennett THE BATTALION Despite an economic slowdown, Texas A&M Regent Erie Nye said Friday that the One Spirit, One Vision fundraising campaign will reach its $l billion goal. “People give because they care,” Nye said. “It is easier to raise money in boom times. But I’ve found people don’t quit giving when the economy is struggling.” More than 700 donors were given the oppor tunity to ask questions and air concerns during a special Board of Regents meeting at The Zone in Kyle Field Friday afternoon to kickoff the public phase of One Spirit, One Vision. A&M President Robert M. Gates said the campaign, now in its third year, has raised $511 million in gifts and pledges as of March 2003. Gates and Robert Harvey, Class of 1977, and vice chair of the campaign, answered ques tions from donors who wanted to know how the money would benefit students. “The first priority established by this cam paign is to increase the number of faculty,” Gates said. Gates said A&M has fewer tenured professors See Campaign on page 2 Di partmevt of Defense feedom is the multi- iberate the Iraqi peo- is of mass destruction iam Hussein. for ghdad d 3rd Amiored Cavalry nts of the 4th Infantry on Thursday from Fort ; ships carrying thedivi- all be there until about owned an Army Apache U.S. drone aircraft, but o ffi c ial s con fi rmed only of a reconnaissance hey said footage of a \pache shown on Iraqi television was of an ml was lost during fight- day. After curtailing because of to blinding is and thunderstorms, anes intensified their hursday as the weather They flew more than missions across Iraq, ial focus on Republican rces ringing Baghdad, aid. omenici, R-N.M., what would do once they sld answered by allud- a Basra, Iraq’s second- tliere have “aid siege, uprising by the city's )th Basra and Baghdad ons. “And they are not egime,” Rumsfeld said, tnd they are in the pres ting us.” He said that population is Shiite, d to be fearful of them »id. Rumsfeld said he sts to shoot any Iraqi to surrender and those >. forces. d by police cts in the assassination iment said. ie gang that has been stry said in a statement e killed in an ensuing atement said, layed in the assassina- : followed the Djindjic OQS RY T/ON irch 31 p.m. 11 1 er.tamu.edu Veterans urge troop support By Rolando Garcia THE BATTALION Americans must present a mited front in support of the tonflict with Iraq because inti-war demonstrations can slowly erode soldiers’ morale, a Vietnam war veter- mtold students and commu nity members gathered for a pro-war rally Sunday. “There’s a time to protest, hit when the shooting starts, »e all need to support the loops,” said Mike Southerland, a Bryan business man and Vietnam veteran. About 50 people gathered lithe Academic Plaza at a ally organized by the Texas A&M chapter of the Young Conservatives of Texas to show their support for American forces in Iraq. The right to demonstrate igainst the war should not ttcuse Americans from their obligation to support forces in the field, Southerland said. “For 30 years, nobody ever publicly thanked me for my service,” Southerland said. And there was always a question in my mind as to whether we did the right thing.” Vocal anti-war protests not only degrade soldiers’ morale on the frontlines, but feelings of doubt can linger long after the fighting has stopped, Southerland said. “It’s always in the back of your mind, what are we doing here?” Southerland said. “It may not come to fruition then, but it does affect you.” Richard Stadelmann, a philosophy professor at A&M. also addressed the rally and defended the deci sion to invade Iraq against critics who claim it is an unwarranted act of aggres sion. The war, Stadelmann said, is the final phase of an effort to disarm Saddam Hussein that began with the Persian Gulf war ceasefire agree ment. If Iraq is allowed to continue stockpiling weapons of mass destruction, those weapons will likely fall into the hands of terrorists, Stadelmann said. See Rally on page 6 Big Event 2i®3 6,500 students participated Completed 700 jobs Jobs included painting houses and cleaning yards in the Bryan-Coliege Station area Source: Big Event Committee T RAVIS SWENSON • THE BATTALION 6,500 students fill Big Event kickoff By Lauren Smith THE BATTALION For students in the Sports for Kids organiza tion, the volunteer service job they completed as part of Big Event was a perfect fit for the mission of their organization. “Our mission in Sports for Kids is to give under privileged children the opportunity to participate in sports,” said Jenny Baker, an executive director of Sports for Kids. “Our job on Saturday was to paint Bryan’s Boys and Girls Club, a facility that SPK members visit every Friday to play or read to the chil dren there.” Picking out the colors that would cover the walls of the facility was no easy task, Baker said. “We hand-picked the colors because we wanted those kids from often bro ken homes to have a bright, happy place to come to,” she said. “Many of the chil dren spend more time here than they do at home, which sometimes is a very good thing.” The children of the Boys and Girls Club will provide the finishing touches to the SPK members’ five-hour paint job by painting sten ciled hand prints throughout the room. Although Saturday brought cold winds, 6,500 students still huddled together on O.R. Simpson Drill field for the 8 a.m. kickoff of the campus-wide service project, Big Event. “Through interacting with the kids while we were working and seeing their faces as the play room transformed, getting up at 7 and losing a Saturday defi nitely did not seem impor tant anymore,” Baker said. See Event on page 2 Primping the pooch RANDAL FORD • THE BATTALION Dog shower Besty Keith performs final touches on her English Springer Spaniel, Carson before the Springer Spaniel contest at the Brazos Valley Kennel Club dog competition at the pavilion off of Highway 6 and Tabor Road. The Brazos Valley Kennel club competition was host to more than 50 breeds competing this past Saturday and Sunday. Iraqi Shiites flee, await Saddam’s fall By Mark Fritz THE ASSOCIATED PRESS Thousands of Iraqi Shiites who fled into Iran to escape repression by Saddam Hussein are poised to return home if the dictator is dethroned, with some bringing extra baggage: strong anti-American sentiment. Paramilitary units of Iraqi expatriates are already posted in their home country, and Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld warned last week that they will be considered just another U.S. enemy if they enter the fray. The Iran-based guerrillas, called the Badr Corps, have openly deployed in the Kurdish territories of northern Iraq and have been crossing back and forth into southern Iraq since 1980, when Iran and Iraq began an eight-year war. Abu Islam, spokesman of the Supreme Council of Islamic Revolution in Iraq, denied that Iran-based forces have entered Iraq since the current war began, but said Badr guerrillas are based throughout that country. Some are even officers in Iraq’s reg ular army, he said Sunday. Iranian government spokesman Abdollah Ramezanzadeh was quoted by the official IRNA news agency as saying, “Tehran does not allow any military activities on its (Iraq) border in favor or against any of the belligerent parties.” The Badr Corps’ numbers swelled in 1991, when Saddam crushed a Shiite upris ing in southern Iraq in the wake of the Persian Gulf War. The group claims to have 10,000 fighters and has said for years that it has spread guerrillas throughout Iraq in anticipation of a revolution. Unlike the two million Afghan refugees in Iran, where life is vastly better than in their bombed-out country, the roughly 200,000 Iraqi expatriates seem eager to return to their homeland post-Saddam. “The Iraqi refugees overwhelmingly say if Saddam Hussein falls, they will go back immediately,” said Bruno Jochum, head of the Doctors Without Borders humanitarian mis sion in Iraq. “On the one side, they will be pretty happy to see the current regime fall but they are absolutely against any American administration.” Apparently worried that the Shiite rulers of Iran are seeking to extend their influence in Iraq, where a majority of people are Shiites, Rumsfeld warned Tehran on Friday to stay out of the war. He said any combatants entering Iraq not under U.S. control “will be taken as a potential threat to coalition forces. This includes the Badr Corps, the military wing of the Supreme Council on Islamic Revolution in Iraq.” The Supreme Council — the biggest Iraqi opposition group — is based in Tehran and See Shiites on page 2 Iraq gives $34,000 to suicide bomber s family By Hamza Hendawi THE ASSOCIATED PRESS BAGHDAD, Iraq — Iraq gave $34,000 to the family of an Iraqi army officer who killed four U.S. soldiers in a suicide attack, and the leader of the militant group Islamic Jihad said Sunday its vol unteers had gone to Baghdad for similar bombing missions against the “American invasion.” Ail Jaafar al-Noamani, a non commissioned officer with sever al children, was posthumously promoted to colonel and awarded two medals for the attack in Najaf that killed the unidentified Americans, Iraqi state television reported. His family reportedly was given a fortune by Iraqi stan dards: 100 million dinars, the equivalent of $34,000. In the Israeli coastal town of Netanya on Sunday, an Islamic militant blew himself up in a crowded pedestrian mall, wound ing 30 bystanders in what Islamic Jihad called “a gift to the heroic Iraqi people.” Ramadan Shallah, Islamic Jihad’s leader in Damascus, Syria, also said the group already had “martyrdom seekers” in Iraq. “This is fulfillment of the call of sacred duty ... an opportunity for Jihad and martyrdom is avail able now for the Islamic nation,” he said. “We say to all sons of Jihad and supporters, to our nation, our people, wherever they are, that whoever is able to march and reach Iraq, Baghdad, Najaf and blow himself up in this American invasion. ... This is the climax of Jihad and climax of martyrdom.” Shallah urged “the entire (Islamic) nation, including the Jihad and resistance in Palestine, if they were able to get there, to fight side by side with the Iraqi people against this butcher Bush.” Iraqi Vice President Taha Yassin Ramadan indicated Saturday’s attack in Najaf was “just the beginning” and even raised the specter of terrorism on U.S. or British soil. “We will use any means to kill our enemy in See Bomber on page 6 KTR CAMPUS Iraqi civilians survey the damage to a market in Baghdad, Iraq, March 29. Iraqis said an air raid on a Baghdad market on Friday evening killed dozens of civilians.