The curator of the British Museum is attacking U.S.-led forces in Iraq for having “irrevocably contaminated” the ancient ruins of Babylon:

John Curtis, curator of the British Museum’s ancient near-east department, said the coalition, which had used the old city as a base since invading Iraq in 2003, had seriously compromised future scientific research at the site.

“It is regrettable a military camp of this size should then have been established on one of the most important archaeological sites in the world,” he said. “This is tantamount to establishing a military camp around the Great Pyramid in Egypt or around Stonehenge in Britain…”

“This is extremely unfortunate from an archaeological point of view, as previously undisturbed archaeological deposits on the site will now be contaminated.”

Good Lord, you would think we had dropped a sarin bomb on the place from Curtis’ caviling about “contamination.”

As the BBC article points out, US military spokesman Lieutenant Colonel Steve Boylan said coalition forces had done their best to safeguard Babylon. “There is no perfect solution. We do everything we can to protect the site and we continue to do so,” he said.

In fact, construction work had been frozen in Babylon since June last year when the US military ordered a halt to projects because of concern about damage to the archaeological treasures. Before that, the BBC reports, US-led forces had consulted the Babylon Museum director about any work needed to be done around the ruins, according to Boylan.

And if not for the American presence at Bablyon, the site would have been completely ravaged by looters.

The thanks we get, huh?

(Hat tip: Mike Anderson, who reminds us about the Taliban’s destruction of ancient Buddhist monuments in 2001.)

Update: A reader notes…

The British Museum should be finding a way to return the Elgin Marbles to Athens. The British, French and Germans are the world’s biggest looters of archaeological sites.

Touch�.