tfprojectviewer

4 rats holed up. 120 Yanks blasted their hidey-hole for 4 hours. Ha! We showed them! DEAD! Hooray, hooray! Wave the flags!
BUT...
What would our perception be if it were 4 US GI's who held out for 4 hours against a constant barrage? We would literally award them medals.

What would I draw if I were an Arab political cartoonist? Images of "The Alamo" keep coming to mind.

They were surrounded by an overwhelming force. Couldn't we smoke them out with tear gas or stink bombs or something? Couldn't we have started pulling down the walls after shutting off the utilities? If they kept shooting after they were fully exposed we could knock them senseless with our rubber bullets. What about waiting a week and starving them out? Flooding them? Etc. Etc.

Sadam's sons are corpses. We have DNA evidence - oops, that isn't completely convincing (remember OJ?). A captured General who said the pictures were them - oops, jail house informants sometimes have ulterior motives.

I wanted to see them in handcuffs. Dirty, grimy, maybe even bewildered. Heads low or held high, it wouldn't matter - and bullies usually cave when they face superior numbers. I wanted the Arab world to see them in handcuffs - no lingering doubts possible. And just maybe we get to learn something useful about Sadam.

Sty

All of the Saddams lackeys would be IMO much more useful alive, humiliated, interrogated and put into international war crimes court.

It's such a waste to kill people. Especially high ranking ones.

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Sty

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Phaenx

We wanted them alive too, that's why we spent 6 hours trying to talk them out.

Also, we had dental maps and titanium rods as well as DNA to identify them with.

And again: GOOD RIDDANCE.

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Lebell

They had no intention of being taken alive.

Expect the same when we catch up with Saddam.

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Pennington

I'm just upset that they killed the grandson. A 14 year old can't be considered to have full formed ideological beliefs and was probably just following his father. He was the last one to die and probably would have been the easiest to capture. And i highly doubt any court would find a 14 year old guilty of war crimes.

Peetster

I doubt the 4 US GI's would be infamous for hideous torture chambers, abusing power and squandering the country's resources at the expense of the citizens' lives. Bad analogy.

Pennington

And the Americans at the Alamo didn't abuse their superior firepower to kill hundreds of Indians, destroy the natural ecosystem for furs and kill dozens of Mexicans who lived in the areas that they wanted to declare independent??

Regardless of their warcrimes, they will be remembered as fighting for "their" country against an invading force and dieing doing so. If their government was still in place, in 50 years they would probably be seen as heroes.

debaser

Hold on, there were 4 men killed. Everything I have read stated that there were more people than that at the compound. The reason it took so ong is that they were waiting for TOW equiped HMMWVs to arrive so they could breach the wall. Once they arrived it was over in a matter of minutes.

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The_Dude

i really doubt that the bush adminstration wanted 'em alive.

capturing them alive would even more question their status as under the geneva convention and it would be very unlikely if gwb could call 'em "illegal combatents".

ok, here's what happened to the little kid.

they sent missles into the building (TOW's) and they think it killed the 3 adults.

so, the troops storm in and go upstairs and the lil dude sprays them with ak47.

so, i dont blame 'em in acting in self defense. but shouldnt they have at leasted smoked the place or flashed it before entering? something to disable the suspects?

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sportsrule101

http://www.msnbc.com/news/870749.asp

here they are

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Lebell

...and so the Monday morning quarterbacking continues...

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The_Dude

pretty graphic

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reconmike

Did anyone want them alive?

They were not illegal combatants, they were combatants and died as such.

If caught alive they would have been tried as murderers, common criminals.

A little kid (14) with an ak flashing deserved to die also.
I can see him as a Hitler youth type pledging his life for the cause, well I hope your grand-pa is next , time to reunite the whole hussien family.

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The_Dude

what do you expect?? u just watch your dad and uncle die in front of you....

i'm not defending the guy, but i can understand

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Dragonlich

Bullshit. Capturing them alive would have made them *CRIMINALS*, not POWs. They'd be put on trial for crimes against humanity, and eventually executed by the Iraqi people.

Charlatan

This raises an interesting question (a moot one but interesting nonetheless): If they had been captured alive under whose law would they have been tried? Iraqi, US (is there a difference these days) or the World Court?

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debaser

I am curious what they will do with the bodies....

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tv.

hooray!

blackdas

I don't think its them considering that it doesn't look anything like them...

Dragonlich

Doesn't really matter. Previous experience (Nurenburg) has shown that they can be held indefinately *until* such matters are sorted out. I'd guess they'd have been tried using Iraqi laws (post-Saddam), or using a UN court, although that last option seems unlikely given the US/UN relationship.

Zeld2.0

Well US/UN relationship got better lately - hell the US actually let the UN in so you enver know nowadays.

Sty

But in the end, an International war crimes court, as far as I know, is still very efficient institution and punishes the criminals very hard. I would have liked to see them judged there, before the eyes of the world. Iraq court would be almost as good. Please correct me if I'm wrong with the war crimes court.

Now that they're dead, they have become almost useless. A dead body has a very limited set of options to be used FOR the Iraq.

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Sty

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Dragonlich

You're wrong on the war crimes court, but only in one respect: they do not punish that hard. At least they do not give people the death penalty, unless the UN would change it's mind.

The_Dude

no, they dont give the death penalty, but the punishments are hard.

look @ milosovic

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Dragonlich

What about him? He's not even been punished yet. He's still on trial, and still annoying the hell out of the judges.

The_Dude

a fair trial too i must say, and not a military tribunal where your status is still in doubt after an innocent verdict.

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Dragonlich

Fair? I doubt Milosovic agrees with you, given that he refused to even recognize the legality of the court. And his status would also still be in doubt if found guilty - after all, who is to say some random country (Serbia) won't put him on trial afterwards?

This court is no more fair than any military tribunal; ask the US government... they won't support the new UN war crimes tribunal because of it.

And while we're on the subject - what is "fair" anyway? Fair for whom, and based upon which cultural system? Military courts would certainly be more fair than Sharia courts in former Afghanistan, for example. How do you know whether the inmates at G'bay wouldn't want a military trial? Hell, they might prefer an (unfair) Islamic court for all we know...

thedrake

Milosovic is insane, he obviously thinks genocide is okay, as long as he is not out of jail and still on trial, he is not doing any harm to anyone.

crewsor

I read the bodies are being kept at the airport untill they are claimed by "family members".

I think they got just what they deserved and probobly wanted rather than being captured.

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