stevo

not sure about what? And no, I am serious.

aliali

I agree, there is no reason to insult this man by calling him dumb. He was in a hot zone and dealing with an unpredictable enemy. I don't know if he should be subject to discipline or not. I believe that an investigation should take place and should be conducted by people who know about the operation, the information avail. to the soldier that day, and the reasonable perceived risks to the soldier. I don't know if there would have been an investigation without the camera, but I doubt it.

But if you want to think of more names to call this guy, just remember, he probably voted for Bush.

Pacifier

well, I don't think it is very smart to commit war crimes in front of a camera, but you sure can disagree with me.

__________________
"It seems to me that the idea of a personal God is an anthropological concept which I cannot take seriously. I also cannot imagine some will or goal outside the human sphere. Science has been charged with undermining morality, but the charge is unjust. A man's ethical behavior should be based effectually on sympathy, education, and social ties and needs; no religious basis is necessary. Man would indeed be in a poor way if he had to be restrained by fear of punishment and hope of reward after death
— Albert Einstein

stevo

What about fighting from a mosque, is that not a war crime? What about blowing up innocent civillians, is that not a war crime? what about pretending to surrender and then opening fire, is that not a war crime?

The anti-war crowd likes to paint the picture that it is the Americans commiting the war crimes. I don't think I've heard from one news outlet criticizing the constant war crimes committed by the enemy. Open your eyes.

Pacifier

war crimes committed by the other side don't justify any war crime the US commits.
The US millitary should have higher morale standards than terrorists.

__________________
"It seems to me that the idea of a personal God is an anthropological concept which I cannot take seriously. I also cannot imagine some will or goal outside the human sphere. Science has been charged with undermining morality, but the charge is unjust. A man's ethical behavior should be based effectually on sympathy, education, and social ties and needs; no religious basis is necessary. Man would indeed be in a poor way if he had to be restrained by fear of punishment and hope of reward after death
— Albert Einstein

SilverScooter

exactly! good god, exactly.

we have a volunteer army and it's absolutely ridiculous (and borderline disrespectful) to twist our soldiers' motives while they're overseas doing their jobs. if there are people who choose the armed forces solely for the paid education and job security it offers, then they made the wrong decision. it seems as if those who enlisted during peacetime are longing for the days when they could make an empty commitment and never see action. today's recruits all know what they're getting into, and support the cause more than past recruits. to say that we're sending poor kids into a war is extremely nearsighted and depicts a world where service is compulsory in the absense of money and opportunity. the truth is, the armed forces are not the sole source of money and opportunity for the non college bound crowd, service is an option, not the option.

__________________
and that's the end of that chapter...

roachboy

how exactly do you know what motivations are in other people?
seriously--what puts you in a position to **know** how people sent to iraq feel about being there? do you really think that volunteering for the armed forces prevents those who do it from coming to the conclusion that they have been sent into harms way on absurd grounds?
do you really think that the chaos on the ground in iraq is somehow not something that would change anyone's mind about the situation there?
on what possible basis?

short of atual evidence and/or a rationale for your argument, it seems to me that yours is the patronizing position.

commentary on fallujah later, once it becomes cleare what went on. so far, it is pretty obvious that the claims about precision targeting were false, the number of civilian casualties quite high, and the publicly presented logic of the operation was more about the persistence of the apparent illusion that the americans are facing a vertically organized force in iraq that is at that level at least like their own than it was about anything to do with the actual operation.

it seems to me that the americans are headed down the path the french went down in algeria.

__________________
a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle
spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear

it make you sick.

-kamau brathwaite

daswig

Heh. From the article you posted:

That means that only 15 of them were stupid enough to still have their foreign ID on them. Why would an insurgent ditch their foreign ID? Well, who knows. Maybe they would rather go to an Iraqi POW camp than Gitmo.

It's like the old Robin Williams bit from "Good Morning Vietnam"..."we go around and ask people if they are Charlie. If they say 'yes', we shoot them." Should it be a big surprise that they are saying "no"?

daswig

Established by whom? Ever hear of Leon Klinghoffer?

Did Saddam have anything to do with 9/11? Probably not, despite the fact that he pretty much tried to claim he did/steal Al Queda's thunder.

<img src="http://www.factsofisrael.com/en/images/articles/3rd-infantry-saddam-911.jpg" /img

Did Saddam have a LONG history of supporting terrorism? He sure as hell did.

Coppertop

It's called the 9-11 commission. I'd certainly give them more weight than a mural. Yes, Hussein has long since supported terrorism. But so has the US if you study its history.

aliali

And if they had found a weapon on him or if he had been boobytrapped or if shooting him was found to save the life of the soldier next to him or simply if he is found to have acted appropriately under all circumstances by a proper investigation? Not having been there, don't you think you are a little quick to judge him as both a war criminal and a dummy to boot?

Superbelt

What does that poster prove other than Saddam took pleasure in our tragedys?

He and Al Qaeda were enemies. Osama wanted to see Saddam deposed so the secular dictatorship of Iraq could become a fundamentalist theocracy.

The 9/11 report, as posted above, even reinforces this.

happyman

You can tell where someone is from by using more than just ID. It's hard to hide things like regional accents, lack of knowledge of local dialects, things like that. You can even start by finding out which dialect of arabic they speak.

tecoyah

Which would be of great use to the seven U.S soldiers in Iraq that actually speak the language.

Note Sarcasm

__________________
Holding onto anger is like grasping a hot coal with the intent of throwing it at someone else; you are the one who gets burned. - Buddha

D Rice

I am with you stevo.
http://reuters.myway.com/article/200...GATION-DC.html
U.S. Marines Rally Round Iraq Probe Comrade


Email this Story

Nov 16, 10:36 AM (ET)


A series of television pool images shot by NBC shows a U.S. Marine shooting dead a wounded and...
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By Michael Georgy

FALLUJA, Iraq (Reuters) - U.S. Marines rallied round a comrade under investigation for killing a wounded Iraqi during the offensive in Falluja, saying he was probably under combat stress in unpredictable, hair-trigger circumstances.

Marines interviewed on Tuesday said they didn't see the shooting as a scandal, rather the act of a comrade who faced intense pressure during the effort to quell the insurgency in the city.

"I can see why he would do it. He was probably running around being shot at for days on end in Falluja. There should be an investigation but they should look into the circumstances," said Lance Corporal Christopher Hanson.

"I would have shot the insurgent too. Two shots to the head," said Sergeant Nicholas Graham, 24, of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. "You can't trust these people. He should not be investigated. He did nothing wrong."

The military command launched an investigation after video footage showed a U.S. Marine shooting a wounded and unarmed man in a mosque in the city on Saturday. The man was one of five wounded and left in the mosque after Marines fought their way through the area.

A pool report by NBC correspondent Kevin Sites said the mosque had been used by insurgents to attack U.S. forces, who stormed it, killing 10 militants and wounding the five. Sites said the wounded had been left for others to pick up.

A second group of Marines entered the mosque on Saturday after reports it had been reoccupied. Footage from the embedded television crew showed the five still in the mosque, although several appeared to be close to death, Sites said.

He said a Marine noticed one prisoner was still breathing.

A Marine can be heard saying on the pool footage provided to Reuters Television: "He's f***ing faking he's dead."

"The Marine then raises his rifle and fires into the man's head," Sites said.

NBC said the Marine, who had reportedly been shot in the face himself the previous day, said immediately after the shooting: "Well, he's dead now."

THOROUGH PROBE PROMISED

The Marine commander in Falluja, Lieutenant General John Sattler, said his men followed the law of conflict and held themselves to a high standard of accountability.

"The facts of this case will be thoroughly pursued to make an informed decision and to protect the rights of all persons involved," he said.

Marines have repeatedly described the rebels they fought against in Falluja as ruthless fighters who didn't play by the rules. They say the investigation is politically motivated.

"It's all political. This Marine has been under attack for days. It has nothing to do with what he did," said Corporal Keith Hoy, 23.

Rights group Amnesty International said on Monday both sides in the Falluja fighting had broken the rules of war governing the protection of civilians and wounded combatants.

Gunnery Sergeant Christopher Garza, 30, favored an investigation but like other Marines said the Pentagon should weigh its decision carefully.

"He should have captured him. Maybe the insurgent had some valuable information. There may have been mitigating circumstances. Maybe his two buddies died in Falluja," he said.

Sites said: "I have witnessed the Marines behaving as a disciplined and professional force throughout this offensive. In this particular case, it certainly was a confusing situation to say the least."

The U.S. military has been embarrassed by scandals in Iraq, most prominently the Abu Ghraib affair in which at least eight U.S. soldiers have been tried or face courts-martial over the abuse of prisoners at the jail outside Baghdad.

There have also been several cases in which soldiers have been charged with wrongfully killing Iraqis during operations.

Ms.VanHelsing

The lessons of war are never learned. So it was in the times of Egypt, Greece and Rome . All through history the greed, cruelty and savagery of man is written in the blood of the children. So it is now. And so it will be in the far reaches of yet uncharted space.We continue to bear witness to the insanity of mankind.There is never true peace in this plane. Don't delude yourself into thinking that when this war is finished another will not begin. Is there any hope for mankind?

__________________
Ms.VanHelsing

Epiphanies

I can't believe you just called this soldier dumb. I thank god for every man and woman that has chosen to serve and provide the blanket of freedom that so many in this country take for granted.

"War is an ugly thing, but not the ugliest of things. The decayed and degraded state of moral and patriotic feeling which thinks that nothing is worth war is much worse. The person who has nothing for which he is willing to fight, nothing which is more important than his own personal safety, is a miserable creature and has no chance of being free, unless made and kept so by the exertions of better men than himself." John Stuart Mill

__________________
"You are my density...I mean, my destiny." -- George McFly

Mojo_PeiPei

Wanna look at Saddam links to Terrorism and Al Qaeda collaboration, read up on Somalia.

__________________
To win a war you must serve no master but your ambition.

almostaugust

Yeah, the lessons are never learnt. Everytime we make pledges to not forget the horror of war, and everytime we run back into it. We dont learn anything, we are stupid dumb creatures on that level. Its sickening.

__________________
'And it's been a long December and there's reason to believe
Maybe this year will be better than the last
I can't remember all the times I tried to tell my myself
To hold on to these moments as they pass'

Ms.VanHelsing

That's right. History proves it over and over again. I feel so damn lucky to live here in Vancouver Canada. About as far away from war as one can get. I feel very blessed and fortunate that I am not in the midst of something as horrible as war. Many thousands of Canadians including my own Father gave up their precious lives so that I could be here today . I feel very sad that they had to die because of that piece of s--t Hitler.

__________________
Ms.VanHelsing

tellumFS

I don't agree with what the soldier did...two wrongs do not make a right. He should be investigated for killing an unarmed, injured man inside of a mosque.

That said, I understand why he may have done it. Combat, especially when the enemy is doing things like hiding in mosques and pretending to be wounded or blowing themselves up after they've been wounded makes people do things very quickly. In his eyes, he probably thought he was saving the lives of himself and the others with him. Personally while I cannot imagine taking someone's life, I can't say I wouldn't have done differently if in his situation.

arch13

Stevo, as it was said by Thomas Jefferson, "You right to free speach end's where my fist touches your nose."
I have a god given right, not a right given by the US government, but a God given right to say what I feel. Likewise, you have a god given right to disagree and say what you feel.

I know many soldiers, and amongst them all I can give you the common reaction to your post, "He thinks every soldier is a hero who can do no wrong?!"
To re-itinerate, not ever soldier performs nobel actions, and in any group there are bad apples who should be removed from the gene pool. I make no judgement on this soldiers actions, but I truly hope you do not beleive that all military personel are are above reproach or questioning.
There where soldiers in Vietnam who handed live grenades to small children in ally villages and walked away before they exploded. Their justifacation? "They all looked the same to me."
Again, there are bad apples in any group of people and no man is inherantly above reproach for their actions, military included.

Do you think that questioning the actions of a soldier is akin to failing to support our troops? Becuase that statement is one that no true republican who cares for our country would ever say, nor would a democrat. Supporting our soldiers does not mean that we turn a blind eye to behavior that is not in line with our countries honor or meaning as laid out by our forfathers.

Being a soldier means that you must make hard choices regarding your actions that must be made quickly. That is what they are trained to do. Never has that meant that they where no accountable for their actions to both the American people and their superior officers. You simply choose to forget that our country did jail it's own for sick actions during WWII and that often soldiers who commited such actions where "killed by a misfired round" or other such things by their peers.

As for your portrait of the camera man, would you prefer he turned the camera off?
"Out of sight, out of mind" right Stevo?
Again, a soldier who performs actions inconsistent with what we stand for is no soldier at all as he failed to uphold our honor. It is not the job of the media to hid the actions of war, it is their job to show all of it, even the parts you think shouldn't be shown. The soldier didn't have the right to assume that his actions would not be videotaped. he was fully aware there was an embedded cameraman in his unit.

__________________
Seen on an employer evaluation:

"The wheel is turning but the hamsters dead"
____________________________
Is arch13 really a porn diety ? find out after the film at 11.
-Nanofever

Ustwo

Ironicly the solider did the same thing Kerry did in Vietnam

Shot an unarmed, wounded man.

I do have a problem with the Iraq incident though.

Shooting was too good for him.

__________________
Agents of the enemies who hold office in our own government, who attempt to eliminate our "freedoms" and our "right to know" are posting among us, I fear.....on this very forum. - host

Obama - Know a Man by the friends he keeps.

Manx

So I guess Kerry wasn't lying about war crimes in Vietnam.

I was thinking something similar. It's too bad the soldiers weapon didn't explode on him.


Oh my. How outrageous. It's funny how we here on TFP can get away with saying anything about someone fighting against a U.S. soldier, like, you know, dying being too good for them - but if someone says something about a U.S. soldier, it's shocking and disgusting.

host

Ustwo, I would greatly appreciate it if you would refrain from posting
unsubstantiated and false garbage in your posts on threads that I initiate.
It is a blatant falshood that Senator Kerry "shot an unarmed. wounded, man":
The newspaper that William Rood is employed as an editor by.....the Chicago
Tribune, endorsed Bush for president approximately 8 weeks after Rood
published his first person account of the incident that Ustwo referred to,
in Rood's first public statment about that matter in 35 years.

hammer4all

Video of our latest war crime here:

http://www.democracynow.org/article..../11/16/1611204

And another war crime here:

http://www.empirenotes.org/november04.html#13nov041

Boy don't we look hypocritical demanding our enemies abide by the Geneva Conventions while we frequently ignore them.

Then again, those treaties never made much sense to this administration.

http://www.workingforchange.com/comic.cfm?itemid=17155

daswig

I realize you're not a lawyer, so you're probably not aware of this. POW protections under the Geneva Conventions don't apply to enemy combatants of the type we're encountering in Fallujah. They don't have a proper command structure, they don't have identifying insignia, et cetera. There's a whole list of qualifications that a person must meet to get POW status, and these people ain't doing it. As such, they don't get the protections we normally think POWs would get. In your other "war crime", they are indeed allowing people that they KNOW are civilians (women and children) to leave. It's the people that they think are insurgents (men in that certain militarily-useful age group) that they're not allowing to leave.

daswig

Superbelt, look, it's very simple. DId Saddam support terrorists that killed Americans? The answer is indisputably "yes, he did". This is a war on terrorism. That's ALL terrorism, not just the one particular terrorist attack on 9/11. Saddam was INDISPUTABLY a player. He both sheltered and funded terrorist groups. Groups, I might add, that were indeed responsible for killing Americans. The fact that Saddam didn't order 9/11 is irrelevant. He supported other terrorists, and for that he deserves to die.

Mephisto2

Complete bunkum, as usual.

The Qur'an does not promise anyone 72 virgins if they martyr themselves. The Haddith, which is just a collection of proverbs and is not considered a holy book, has the following:

"The least [reward] for the people of Heaven is 80,000 servants and 72 wives, over which stands a dome of pearls, aquamarine and ruby."

This comes from a collection known as the Sunan al-Tirmidh.

Oh, and for interest's sake, a recent book by Christoph Luxenberg (Die Syro-Aramaische Lesart des Koran), available only in German, argues that the translations of the original phrases used in the Qur'an and the Haddith were actually incorrect. Instead of "wives" (or "virgins"), the Arabic word houris actually refers to food; chilled raisins actually.

Luxenberg's book has been enthusiasticly received, particularly among those scholars with a knowledge of several Semitic languages at Princeton, Yale, Berlin, Potsdam, Erlangen, Aix-en-Provence, and the Oriental Institute in Beirut. It's also been roundly criticised by many Qur'anic scholars, so I'm not siding with it one way or another.


So, please, enough of this "72 virgins" nonesense. It's not in the Qur'an. It's a fundamentalist intepretation. And it could be a mistranslation in any case.

EDIT: I also forgot to mention that, even if we accept the statement as a true tenet in Islamic religious dogma, it is not limited to those who martyr themselves. It's actually applicable to ALL MUSLIMS.

How many people here believe the world was really created in six days and that women sprang from Adam's rib?


Mr Mephisto

host

<h2>Heil Bushler ! Sieg Heil, Mein President !,</h2>

Mephisto2

I dislike Bush, but I find this tasteless.

You do everyone a disservice by comparing Bush to a Nazi.


Mr Mephisto

host

Mr. Mephisto, with all due respect......you don't live here. My view is that
Bush & Co. have distorted the justification for war, and isolated the mindset of the American people from that of the rest of the world with a similar ruthless
efficiency and disregard for truthfullness and the principles of justice as Hitler
and his Nazi party did in 1939. Dazwig's mindset, to me, is evidence of Bush's
success.

Bush is, in some ways, an even more pathetic example of a leader transforming a large,and formerly democratic nation into an aggressive, rogue,
dictatorship than Hitler was, since Hitler did not have himself as a model
to learn from, and recognize as evil and immoral, and Hitler did not grow
to maturity in a country reknowned for it's bill of rights, adherence to the
tenants of international law, and an honest broker in international diplomacy.

Mr. Mephisto, given the ways Bush has changed the course and reputation
of our nation, how long, especially if you believed that he has never been
legitimately elected to the office he holds....would you resist becoming
increasingly outraged and radicalized? I will gladly suffer the criticism that
I make harsh, distasteful, and offensive statements about this dishonorable
president, if time proves that I am mistaken about his nature, and the
purpose of his regime. It is better that I attempt to incite others to watch
this man and his government more closely, and with more suspicion, now,
when there are still no barriers to discussing the comparison

tecoyah

Heil Bushler ! Sieg Heil, Mein President !,


I do live here............and this was pretty much flamebait.

Opinion is one thing, stirring up the coals is another.

While I do realize you are making a point , and can respect the position, I request you attempt to do so in a way that is less........inflamatory.

Thanx

__________________
Holding onto anger is like grasping a hot coal with the intent of throwing it at someone else; you are the one who gets burned. - Buddha

Mephisto2

One doesn't have to live in the US to find a statement belittling the evil of Nazism and, by implication the Holocaust, tasteless.

I agree with the vast majority of what you say host. Just this time I think it was an unfortunate statement.

Mr Mephisto

Pacifier

I agree with a lot of what you said host, but I think a the "Hitler" comparison is not good in a discussion. I also think it is a bit off, Bush is no Hitler, not yet.
But, like I said, I agree with a lot of what you said, Bush uses a lot of those old tactics and it is scary.

__________________
"It seems to me that the idea of a personal God is an anthropological concept which I cannot take seriously. I also cannot imagine some will or goal outside the human sphere. Science has been charged with undermining morality, but the charge is unjust. A man's ethical behavior should be based effectually on sympathy, education, and social ties and needs; no religious basis is necessary. Man would indeed be in a poor way if he had to be restrained by fear of punishment and hope of reward after death
— Albert Einstein

Kadath

Consider the Contras and Sandinistas

"Simultaneously, the U.S. administration of Ronald Reagan began organizing remnants of Somoza's National Guard into guerrilla bands known as "Contras" (short for "contrarevolucionarios", or counter-revolutionaries) that conducted terrorist attacks on economic and civilian targets."

__________________
it's quiet in here

Lebell

__________________
"Of all tyrannies, a tyranny exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It may be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron's cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end, for they do so with the approval of their own conscience." – C. S. Lewis

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roachboy

i continue to find it fascinating how right discourse manages to divet debate into strange, irrelevant areas.

the fixation of the moment is the footage of a marine killing what appears to be an unarmed iraqi.

the larger problem, of what the hell the americans are doing in iraq in general and in fallujah (now mosul) in particular goes unaddressed.

it is clear that the americans hoped to smash a central node in what they imagined to be the resistance. it is also clear that they did not manage it.
the assault on fallujah was marketed domestically as a precision attack. it is clear now that it was not.
it was marketed as an attempt to bolster the scheduled elections in iraq--there have been reports circulating from time to time of late saying that elections could well not happen as scheduled and would not be understood as legitimate if they did.

interesting situation, isnt it?

i still maintain that the americans are sliding well into a situation parallel to that france faced in algeria. same kind of assymetries in organization (vertical military vs. horizontal resistance)...same kind of tactics (declare war on an entire people, systematic use of torture justified on exactly the same grounds the right is now using) incoherence on the ground coupled with a gradual erosion of political position.

one result of this was a drastic polarization of political opinon in france.
by the time the fourth republic fell in 1958, france was on the edge of civil war.

at the time, for the right there were no war crimes, there was no torture.
for the left, both were abhorrent.
the right tried to enforce views of the actions in algeria almost exactly parallel to what you are seeing now--how to question the motives of "our boys"?

one more parallel: le pen surfaced in part on the basis of a right revisionist "history" of algeria--he was himself a paratrooper who engaged in well-documented acts of torture at the time. for le pen, it was a patriotic struggle blah blah blah---sound familiar?

you would think people would take the rare occaisions when something can actually be learned from the past.
but no.



the french right slid dangerously close of fascism during this period--you know about poujadisme?
same thing seems to be happening in the states.
however, in neither case did recourse to hitler make any analytic sense.
in neither case did recourse to hitler make any sense politically.
all it does is spike consideration of a real problem.

so far as i am concerned, arguments about the relation to both positions to a variant of fascism is fair game.
but it should be obvious that prudence is in order if we are going to head toward that space. highly inflammatory area--and no conservative will want to hear any of it. but then again, the constituency to whom that ideology has appealed historically did not want to hear it either. they do not like their politics to be named.

so it would seem that any such argument would have to be made carefully and in an analytic register.
i think there is a strong argument to be made.

__________________
a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle
spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear

it make you sick.

-kamau brathwaite

Ustwo

You know when lefties start to condemn the murder of Margaret Hassan with the same self righteous fervor they are condemning this young marine then I might take note of what they are saying.

The same goes for the Arab media as well.

__________________
Agents of the enemies who hold office in our own government, who attempt to eliminate our "freedoms" and our "right to know" are posting among us, I fear.....on this very forum. - host

Obama - Know a Man by the friends he keeps.

Manx

Do you really see no difference? Is it not apparent that a soldier acting on the "lefties" behalf requires derision when he abuses the power he has? Is it not apparent that "lefties" do not support Margaret Hassan's murder? Is it not apparent that whether the "lefties" yell loudly for the condemnation of Margaret Hassan's murderers, that it will make no difference because those murderers are not beholden to the "lefties"? Is it not apparent that the soldier is beholden to the "lefties" because he is officially sanctioned to act on their behalf?

When the righties stop attempting to equalize and justify the henious acts of our gov't and troops with the henious acts of others, I might take note of what they are saying beyond my obvious incredulity that they could even be thinking it.