[Rahul reads] The Empire issue by The Nib (Volume 3)

Like with the Death issue, I loved the Empire Issue. Interestingly, it wasn't just about colonial empires - it as also about digital empires and media empires!

The story that scarred me the most is about The Highway of Death.

The Highway of Death is a six-lane highway between Kuwait and Iraq, officially known as Highway 80. It runs from Kuwait City to the border town of Safwan in Iraq and then on to the Iraqi city of Basra. The road was used by Iraqi armored divisions for the 1990 invasion of Kuwait.

During the American-led coalition offensive in the Persian Gulf War, American, Canadian, British, and French aircraft and ground forces attacked retreating Iraqi military personnel attempting to leave Kuwait on the night of February 26–27, 1991, resulting in the destruction of hundreds of vehicles and the deaths of many of their occupants. Between 1,400 and 2,000 vehicles were hit or abandoned on the main Highway 80 north of Al Jahra.

If I remember correctly, the Highway of Death/The Persian Gulf War also made a brief appearance in the previous Death issue. I've been lucky enough to live in a country that is politically stable (when compared to the rest of the world) because I dare not imagine what my life would be like if I were to live in a warn-torn country, having to fight for water and rations on a daily basis, and barely getting any necessary medical attention.

The story that is making me examine everything physical around me critically is on decolonizing our lives (see link below).

Sadly, like before, the Empire issue page on The Nib site is a 404 - https://thenib.com/series/from_the_empire_issue/. The Wayback Machine/Internet Archive come to the rescue again but accessing the pages via the archived site is slow so below are the publicly available comics from this issue.

The feature comics aren't free to read so, like before, you could still buy a digital copy online if you're interested.

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