SDF family members are agonizing over their loved ones having to go to Iraq

Residents of Asahikawa City in Hokkaido are deeply concerned about Ground Self-Defense Force 2nd Division personnel stationed in their city, because they will be the first SDF unit to be dispatched to Iraq. Akahata on November 18 reported how apprehensive family members are about their loved ones in the SDF.

A woman, whose daughter is married to a SDF member, expressed how much her family was shocked to hear that her son-in-law will be sent to Iraq. She said, "My daughter threw up many times and lost several kilos. Her face turned pale. Her husband doesn't explain anything to her, only saying, 'I have to follow orders.'"

"I want to ask Mr. Koizumi, 'Do you have any idea how much we are suffering? If you tell our family members to go to Iraq, why don't you send your own son?'," she said with anger.

A woman in her 70s said she could not sleep at all for three days after her son, a local SDF member, told her that he had been ordered to go to Iraq.

"I cannot find the words to describe the atmosphere we had in the house around the time when the SDF held interviews to select members to go to Iraq," said a mother of three little children. Her husband was not included among the members for the Iraq mission this time.

She added, "Our little son asked his father, 'Dad, will you go to war?' My husband told us if ordered, he has to go. But families can never understand such reasoning." (end)