"Iraqi Police Report Details Civilians' Deaths at Hands of US Troops
    By Matthew Schofield
    Knight Ridder Newspapers

    Sunday 19 March 2006

    Baghdad, Iraq - Iraqi police have accused American troops of executing 11 people, including a 75-year-old woman and a 6-month-old infant, in the aftermath of a raid last Wednesday on a house about 60 miles north of Baghdad.

    The villagers were killed after American troops herded them into a single room of the house, according to a police document obtained by Knight Ridder Newspapers. The soldiers also burned three vehicles, killed the villagers' animals and blew up the house, the document said.

    A U.S. military spokesman, Major Tim Keefe, said that the U.S. military has no information to support the allegations and that he had not heard of them before a reporter brought them to his attention Sunday.

    "We're concerned to hear accusations like that, but it's also highly unlikely that they're true," he said. He added that U.S. forces "take every precaution to keep civilians out of harms' way. The loss of innocent life, especially children, is regrettable."

    Accusations that U.S. troops have killed civilians are commonplace in Iraq, though most are judged later to be unfounded or exaggerated. Navy investigators announced last week that they were looking into whether Marines intentionally killed 15 Iraqi civilians - four of them women and five of them children - during fighting last November.

    But the report of the killings in the Abu Sifa area of Ishaqi, eight miles north of the city of Balad, is unusual because it originated with Iraqi police and because Iraqi police were willing to attach their names to it."

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20060321/ts_nm/iraq_dc

http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/032006B.shtml

it looks like the consequences of bush's splendid little war just keep getting worse. it was probably only a matter of time before things like this started happening, now that this thing's dragged into its fourth year and is just spinning in place, with the only evident "progress" being its death toll. the worst thing about it is if these allegations turn out to be true, these guys will end up back in the US, after being sent to this war and being driven to do these horrible things. and they'll end up making america a harder place to live in, too.

i dunno, what's the way out of this thing?

I read this in the Toronto Star this AM

The clearest solution is for the Americans to pull out, or at least set a date for doing so. Their departure cannot possibly make matters any worse. At the very least, it will reduce terrorism, certainly Muslim radicalism, not just in Iraq, but everywhere.

If the other Arabs are worried about the division of Iraq into cantons, let the Arab League or the 57-member Islamic Conference broker peace between the factions, or send a peacekeeping force for a limited period.

-But that can be a scary prospect as well....can Superman just fly around the planet and make time go backwards?

You know who should be the happiest?

The Kurds, it's pretty obvious they're gonna get there own nation now.

You know who should be the happiest?

The Kurds, it's pretty obvious they're gonna get there own nation now.


the Turks may have something to say about that....

I just can't stand this.  I remember Viet Nam, and this is it all over again. 

the Turks may have something to say about that....


Probably... which is why Greece needs to finish off Turkey.

Questions about the incident focus on diverging U.S. military and Iraqi police accounts of the raid, which happened around 2:30 a.m. on March 15 on a house about 60 miles north of Baghdad. Both sides and neighbors agree that U.S. troops were involved in a firefight with a suspected member of al-Qaida in Iraq.

But the U.S. account gave the death toll as four and said the house collapsed from the heavy fire it took during the fighting. The al-Qaida suspect was found alive in the rubble and arrested, the U.S report on the incident said.

Iraqi police, however, contend that U.S. troops gathered 11 people in the house into a single room and executed them, before destroying the house as they left the area.

That is taken from the San Jose Mercury News, which is hardly a Right-Wing paper.

http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercurynews/news/special_packages/iraq/14153500.htm

I say that before anybody goes around screaming that US Marines are killing people out of hand, that we should wait for some facts.  And if they are guilty of what is alleged, I will be one of the first in line to string them up.

My questions go right back to logic.  Why would they execute 4-11 people, and then take away a living al-queda suspect?  If anything, I wouild have expected a charge that they killed the suspected terrorist.  Executing women and children simply does not make sense, when you leave with a live captive.

And considering he was captured in the house after a firefight, who is to say who was shooting at whom?  This would not be the first time that women and children were active participants in this kind of action.  Especially if they were harboring a known terrorist.

well, the problem with 'waiting until all the facts are in' is that that day will probably never come. The pentagon's been real big on investigating itself lately (c.f. the abu ghraib investigations and the numerous checkpoint shooting investigations that not a lot of people in the civilian world are taking very seriously). I rather think that we'll see a whitewash with this as we've seen with so much else about the iraq war.

well, the problem with 'waiting until all the facts are in' is that that day will probably never come. The pentagon's been real big on investigating itself lately (c.f. the abu ghraib investigations and the numerous checkpoint shooting investigations that not a lot of people in the civilian world are taking very seriously). I rather think that we'll see a whitewash with this as we've seen with so much else about the iraq war.


In other words, damn the facts, they are guilty.

*shakes his head and wanders away from this discussion*

And I thought Liberals cared about the rights of the people, and that you are innocent until proven guilty.  I guess if you are White, Conservative, Republican, or a member of the military that does not apply.  Then you are guilty, and even if proven innocent you are still guilty.

In other words, damn the facts, they are guilty.
no, that's a strawman paraphrase. not what i'm saying at all. i just don't think it's legitimate to have an organization investigate itself.

but you know, have it your way. Accountability has always been a real talking point among republicans, but when it comes to actually PRACTICING it, suddenly you see lots of equivocation, prevarication, and conflict of interest. Funny, that.


*shakes his head and wanders away from this discussion*

wise thing to do when you don't have a leg to stand on. :)

In other words, damn the facts, they are guilty.


the worst thing about it is if these allegations turn out to be true, these guys will end up back in the US, after being sent to this war and being driven to do these horrible things. and they'll end up making america a harder place to live in, too.