The US military is investigating an incident in which it is claimed 11 Iragi civilians were delibrately killed by US troops.  The BBC has obtained video footage which challenges the US account of events in the town of Ishaqi in March.  The US authorities said they were involved in a firefight after a tip-off that an al-Qaeda supporter was visiting a house.  According to the Americans, the building collapsed under heavy fire killing four people - a suspect, two women and a child.  But a report filed by Iraqi police accused US troops of rounding up and deliberately shooting 11 people in the house, including five children and four women, before blowing up the building.


The full report can be read here

ever since the war started i've been reading reports of british military people retiring because they're not keen on working alongside americans -- i think the first i heard of it was during afghanistan when the military used fuel-air explosives, which are definitely weapons of mass destruction and kill wholesale, in a particularly unpleasant fashion, and i remember reading recently of more british resignations over talk of the americans being so ruthless in their approach to the iraqis on the ground.

i love my country but i find nothing to love in this current administration, or in the gung-ho culture that's cultivated in the military that leads to stuff like this.there's this worship of ruthlessness in certain quarters of america right now, and it dates easily back to reagan, that's ripping the country's morals apart.

Have we learned nothing from Vietnam? As I said on another threat, civilian massacres are the inevitable result of this kind of endless and chaotic occupation. I can neither condone nor condemn the soldiers themselves. If I was stuck over in Iraq in the 120 F heat with an IED around every corner, what would I do? What would I be capable of?
If we don't want to see more of these atrocities, we're just gonna have to get out of there.

the government doesn't care about these massacres. Nor, I think, do the people who say hey, let's wait until the facts are in, or the people who say there's no such thing as antiarab racism even when these marines are calling these women and children "hajis" as they pull the trigger. Engendering racism is the main way you brainwash soldiers to be able to do stuff like this. the victims are "hajis" or "slants" or "gooks" rather than human beings.

the government doesn't care about these massacres. Nor, I think, do the people who say hey, let's wait until the facts are in, or the people who say there's no such thing as antiarab racism even when these marines are calling these women and children "hajis" as they pull the trigger. Engendering racism is the main way you brainwash soldiers to be able to do stuff like this. the victims are "hajis" or "slants" or "gooks" rather than human beings.

^ I agree. I don't know who has said there is no such thing as anti-Arab racism, but for every bigoted a-hole thing there is to say, you can bet there's some bigoted a-hole pundit saying it!

"I think that it is sick, that it is sad, and it is serious."
"It's impossible for words... to describe... what is... necessary... to those... who do not know... what... horror means.    Horror."

Original Inspiration:  T.S. Eliot, The Hollow Men
1970s:  Francis Ford Coppola, Apocalypse Now
1980s:  Shriekback, Nemesis

I'm a civilian, not a Marine.  Not having experienced combat beyond an FPS screen (gaming recommendation: Operation Flashpoint), I've had glimpses at understanding, but I don't, and Dobbs willing, never will, grok in its fullness. 

I've spoken to two Marines in a position to understand (and grok in its fullness) the sort of thing that is alleged to have happened.  It's plausible and possible that the allegations are false.  It's also plausible and possible that there exist some ex-Marines (I use that term very deliberately) who will be very grateful if they get to finish out their time in Leavensworth.

I trust the Marines and most of their chain of command.  As a civilian, I have that privilege and am grateful to them for it.

We live in very interesting times.

^ "The dividing line between good and evil runs through every human heart."
                                          --Alexander Solzhenitsyn

And every means every.

And to all those who think upon hearing about one African tribe massacring another with machetes, "Oh, I could NEVER do such a thing!" You'd be surprised given the right set of circumstances how quickly you could reduce yourself to a killing machine.

War really is hell. War is insanity. War is mass psychopathology. Let's not kid ourselves into pretending their guys are subhuman insurgents and our guys are angels of liberty. It ain't like that. Guys like Jack Murtha and Wes Clark know this because they've been there. Guys like George Bush and Sean Hannity have never been there and prove to remain in denial. When guys like Murtha and Clark say it's time to get out, the right-wing idiots call it "cut and run." It is not military surrender so much as acknowledging we've chosen and impossible mission. Military prowess, hell, we could nuke Iraq until it was flat as a parking lot and there was no one left to complain. The rest of the world knows it. Pulling out of Iraq would be a spoiler for the neo-con dream of destabilizing the Middle East until we have no choice but to stay there forever.

Remember, the only Lieutenant who committed atrocities in Vietnam was John Kerry. That's because 35 years later he was running for president as a Democrat.

  Hi all...

  When Negroponte was appointed ambassador to Iraq it was a clear signal, in my mind, that atrocities and supporting atrocious behaviour was the new policy. Negroponte left Honduras under a cloud of suspicion several years ago after ushering in a wave of brutal clandestine killing that touched off civil unrest.

  http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=04/04/20/1411203

   Hi all...

   When Negroponte was appointed ambassador to Iraq it was a clear signal, in my mind, that atrocities and supporting atrocious behaviour was the new policy. Negroponte left Honduras under a cloud of suspicion several years ago after ushering in a wave of brutal clandestine killing that touched off civil unrest.

   http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=04/04/20/1411203

Oh, that guy!
Just like blowflies, where there's Negroponte, there's death!
::)