I nearly choked on my cereals as I was reading a major article this morning on the UK Independent titled "A dead Iraqi is just another dead Iraqi". I was about to start writing another one of my series of "In Vino Veritas", to be posted tonight, but after reading the article I no longer had the energy nor the gumption to proceed. I felt sick. I couldn't move. I became angry and wanted to throttle the nearest neocon, but, as you know, my arms do not have the necessary reach to cross the Atlantic so I gave up my anger and stared at the cloudy skies for what seemed an eternity.
I am not a violent person nor do I have a bad temper, in fact quite the contrary. I'm mostly a pussycat but this morning I felt pure anger, anger that was so malevolent it scared me, and that anger was directed squarely at the incompetent idiot in the White House, for having started this completely unnecessary and costly war.
Follow me over the bump.
The article in question can be read in its entirety here: http://news.independent.co.uk/...
We knew Centcom "doesn't do body counts" but this is repulsive.
It is an axiom of American political life that the actions of the US military are beyond criticism. Democrats and Republicans praise the men and women in uniform at every turn. Apart from the odd bad apple at Abu Ghraib, the US military in Iraq is deemed to be doing a heroic job under trying circumstances.
That perception will take a severe knock today with the publication in The Nation magazine of a series of in-depth interviews with 50 combat veterans of the Iraq war from across the US. In the interviews, veterans have described acts of violence in which US forces have abused or killed Iraqi men, women and children with impunity.
I'm not about to diss on the US army either. I know enough from my father, uncles and cousins (all have served in WW2 and Algeria) how war is. It is atrocious. It is highly risky, lives are lost without notice, and most soldiers, in the thick of it, would rather be at home with their loved ones.
Through a combination of gung-ho recklessness and criminal behaviour born of panic, a narrative emerges of an army that frequently commits acts of cold-blooded violence. A number of interviewees revealed that the military will attempt to frame innocent bystanders as insurgents, often after panicked American troops have fired into groups of unarmed Iraqis. The veterans said the troops involved would round up any survivors and accuse them of being in the resistance while planting Kalashnikov AK47 rifles beside corpses to make it appear that they had died in combat.
We knew, up to a point, how bad this war is. What we don't know is how horrific it really is. The average soldier is not about to invoke the Geneva convention when being fired upon by persistent snipers, or maimed by an IED, or taken hostage to be decapitated at a later date. No, not in this war. This is as dirty as it gets, particularly in the light of not knowing who your enemy is, what the mission is and its objective.
There were also deaths caused by the reckless behaviour of military convoys. Sgt Kelly Dougherty of the Colorado National Guard described a hit-and-run in which a military convoy ran over a 10-year-old boy and his three donkeys, killing them all. "Judging by the skid marks, they hardly even slowed down. But, I mean... your order is that you never stop."
It gets worse, much worse. That fucking fake cowboy in the WH does not have blood on his hands, he's swimming in it!
'Every person opened fire on this kid, using the biggest weapons we could find...'
"Here's some guy, some 14-year-old kid with an AK47, decides he's going to start shooting at this convoy. It was the most obscene thing you've ever seen. Every person got out and opened fire on this kid. Using the biggest weapons we could find, we ripped him to shreds..."
A.J.P. Taylor famously described wars as being like traffic accidents. He has a point. Accidents, on the whole, are preventable but try and tell that to Commander Guy who reminded us with his trademark smirk that ""I believe we can succeed in Iraq and I know we must." The words of a busted automaton, IMO.
"I guess while I was there, the general attitude was, 'A dead Iraqi is just another dead Iraqi... You know, so what?'... [Only when we got home] in... meeting other veterans, it seems like the guilt really takes place, takes root, then."
Amen. This futile war must end. Impeachment must take place. Proper reparation must follow.
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