Disneyland Baghdad: The Other Happiest Place on Earth…

Believe it or not, Mickey’s Disney-friends are off to join the cause in Iraq. An American development firm based in Los Angeles is spearheading the multi-million dollar “Baghdad Zoo and Entertainment Experience,” a 50-acre amusement park that will feature a skateboard park, rides, a concert theater and a museum. The park is being designed by Disney’s “Imagineering” pioneers, Ride and Show Engineering (RSE).

Llewellyn Werner, chairman of C3, the Los Angeles-based holding company for private equity firms that’s funding the Pentagon-backed project, admits he’s facing certain unusual obstacles - namely, insurgent attacks and looting.

The story hit the news this past April, but a new Facebook group created by Rudy Duboille out of France “Non à Disneyland en Irak - Go Home !” is bound to stir some notice on the social media network.
Nonetheless, it’s doubtful American policy-makers will take much notice, considering the 200,000 American government-sponsored skateboards already shipped to Iraq for assembly to promote the new skateboard park opening in advance of the complete “Baghdad Experience.”

Whether or not the skateboard PR stunt will win the hearts of Iraqi children remains to be seen, considering the actual experiences of Iraqi civilians since the current occupation began in 2003.

The 50-acre swath of land sits adjacent to the Green Zone and encompasses Baghdad’s existing zoo, which was looted, left without power and abandoned after the American-led invasion in 2003.

As of Wednesday, June 11, 2008, at least 4,095 members of the U.S. military have died in the Iraq war since it began in March 2003, according to an Associated Press count.

Although the US military doesn’t keep an official body count of Iraqi casualties, legitimate independent studies cited by
the BBC News, including Iraq Body Count and the peer-reviewed Lancet Medical Journal, put the civilian casualties at close to 1 million or more.

Considering these numbers, the Iraqi’s could use a little American-style diversion…

As The Times of London reports:

Mr Werner, who has been sold a 50-year lease on the site by the Mayor of Baghdad for an undisclosed sum, says that the time is ripe for the amusement park. “I think people will embrace it. They’ll see it as an opportunity for their children regardless if they’re Shia or Sunni. They’ll say their kids deserve a place to play and they’ll leave it alone.”

Ali al-Dabbagh, a spokesman for the Government, is equally optimistic: ‘There is a shortage of entertainment in the city. Cinemas can’t open. Playgrounds can’t open. The fun park is badly needed for Baghdad. Children don’t have any opportunities to enjoy their childhood.” Mr al-Dabbagh added that entry to the park would be strictly controlled.

Now that’s what I call spreading the American Dream (albeit in a Hunter S. Thompson Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas: A Savage Journey to the Heart of the American Dream kinda’ way…).

Doesn’t everyone deserve just a little slice of the Happiest Place on Earth…?

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