Haditha - worse than we were told
As bad as the things they told us about Haditha were, details emerging about what really happened are even worse.
The attack on the Iraqis began after the roadside bomb blew up one of four Humvees the marines were traveling in on Nov. 19, 2005. Minutes after that, the report portrays Sergeant Wuterich, the squad leader, and Sergeant Dela Cruz as killing five men who had nervously piled out of a taxi that had stopped near the marine convoy, the officials said.
The men “were shot by Wuterich as they stood, unarmed, next to the vehicle approximately 10 feet in front of him,” the report said, according to a person who has read it.
Sergeant Dela Cruz said that as he approached the taxi, he saw some men standing near it with their hands in the air, officials said. After Sergeant Wuterich shot them, he continued shooting as they lay on the ground, and later urinated on one of them, an official said.
The marines, taking small arms fire from several locations near homes on either side of the convoy, attacked a home nearby, killing six people, including a young boy, a woman and two elderly people, none of them armed, the report said, according to officials and people who have read it.
The report said that marines told investigators who interviewed them months later that they believed they had permission from their superiors to fire at will inside that home and a second home they raided minutes later, officials said. They said an officer, First Lt. William Kallop, who arrived with other marines after the roadside bomb to support the squad under fire, told them to commandeer one of the homes.
In one of the houses the marines raided, the report said, a 13-year-old girl, Safah Yunis Salem, said she survived by pretending to be dead after marines killed several family members, including her 3-year-old sister and 5-year-old brother, government officials said.
NOTHING, BUT NOTHING can even begin to justify this kind of barbarism.
You don't shoot "at will" unarmed civilians in their homes EVEN if you are ordered to do so.
You don't shoot and kill women and children. some of whom are only three years old EVEN if you are 'given permission.'
And finally, YOU DO NOT SHOOT PEOPLE WHEN THEY ALREADY LAY DEFENSELESS ON THE GROUND AND THEN PROCEED TO URINATE ON THEIR DEAD BODIES.
I'm sorry, BUT, THIS IS INHUMAN.
AND I cannot take this anymore.
The American government - OUR GOVERNMENT - is nothing short of EVIL for sending armed and dangerous young men to invade and occupy a nation that NEVER POSED ANY THREAT TO OUR COUNTRY - and filling them with such hate and prejudice that they are ready, willing, and indeed DO COMMIT war crimes and CRIMES AGAINST HUMANITY in our name.
ENOUGH is ENOUGH.
Convicting and punishing these young, drugged up maniacs is NOT ENOUGH!
Any self-respecting human being with an ounce of decency in their soul must DEMAND that our government pull American troops out of Iraq - NOW!
AND IMPEACH THE BASTARDS WHO SENT US TO WAR BASED ON LIES!!!
... if only we can shake people out of their apathy and realize what is going on in Iraq. The whole war has been one giant tragedy for the general population, and is only causing hatred against America. Not, not because America is free. Because it is committing war crimes. This is so serious.
I posted it there today because there were techinical difficulties this morning.
Everyone in the world must hate us now.
If anyone plans to travel, I would do it without an American passport, if you can.
Hi Qrs and Everyone ! Good to be back from my sabbatical holydays ( both sacred and profaned ). We are now quite past the Eid, and the Epiphany, but I must say that every day is an epiphany at this hotspot. Thank you, Qrs- for navigating the far flung Isles of Langerhans to get me back through the firewall, where the truth can set me free again. I hope you all enjoyed my welcome hiatus while it lasted, as I have really steamed up quite a load since the last one, so rinse out your earplugs before you stick 'em back in. Which reminds me, concerning Haditha, ( of which it was entirely a lucky journalistic fluke that our lovingly embedded TIME ever let this out of it's bag to begin with ) do any of you great posters out there wonder if, in the wake of the Lancet Study,( which posited 650 sum thousand civilian deaths in Iraq ) that this horrific modus operandi described above must almost necessarily now be quite systematic, if not systemic, in order to account for such a colossal slaughter ?
Don't know who you are or where you've been, but welcome back.
Regarding if there were many 'Hadithas' to cause 650,000+ civvie deaths, the answer is no.
You see, what happened in Haditha was a war crime because it was done by soldiers shooting people while documenting what they were doing. But when you bomb whole towns/villages from the sky, that's totally legit. I'm being sarcastic. Forgive me.
Some handle ya got there, Zonkey ! I've read many of your postings with interest, you appear to be a reasonably well informed whippersnapper. Thusly I forgive and exonerate you fully of your sarcasm, which is borne of resentment, which I believe to be a valid sentiment in this day and age, but preferably to be dispensed with ASAP. You seem to expound the idea that war criminals are only guilty of war crimes if they get caught, or better yet, incriminate themselves. Point taken. But what happens when, as Qrs describes, war crimes are wholly sanctioned, to be committed at will ? Or executed at the whim of a total misconstruement of anything resembling rules of engagement ? Does that fundamentally negate the inherent evil of the act itself ? I think not. We are now in a morally bereft environment where those unfortunate souls enlisted unwittingly in Satan's service are not considered guilty of anything until rendered and scapegoated by the very 'higher -ups' who ordered such deeds from the start ( which will indeed be a cold day in Hell ) That leaves the entire gray area of opportunity for mass genocide wide open, while we scratch our heads and wonder how to nail a half dozen of these poor jokers, as if that could ever put any stop to this whole madness. And since we can't seem to even accuse our sacrosanct military of anything, since we are all on "God's" side, we must wait for a total fluke like Haditha, where somebody lucked out with a camera, to hardly make a crack in the whole sick facade. To begin to think of Haditha as an isolated incident in this mass genocide is absurd, no matter how many thousands have been wiped out by any other diabolical means. It seems to me highly unlikely, and more of the nature of our completely hypocritical national conscience, to seek a moral safe haven in that convenient lie. Do you also perhaps recall, at this late date, the massacre at Ishaqi, where our filthy blood streaked hands were shamefully exonerated, before you could say cat dancing ? Come now, my friend, though it may be the hardest pill to swallow, it will set you free. I will only reiterate in passing, that I was referring not so much to the ethical question, which should be self evident, but to the frequency of occurrence of a very similar "modus operandi", which is, quite simply, WHOLESALE SLAUGHTER. Thanks for your sarcasm, Monkey Zerg.
I see you're back, in full throttle - welcome, welcome.
I'm sorry that you returned to a few glitches in the system, but it's all part of our growing pains here at WUFYS.
As you can see, while you were gone, a number of learned contributors have joined the dream team.
And we can only hope that many more will come into the fold.
We need all the help we can get - we're up against an army of madmen, just itching to take the world down a blood-soaked path of death and destruction.
This Haditha incident is no doubt just one of many like it. I remember, upon first reading it, I concluded that the soldier who everyone thought was a lunatic and a fraud, was telling the truth after all.
Qrs: Thanks so much for that warm welcome ( I thought for a while you had me blackballed ) and your blinding flashback to the soldier video. That was something, when I first encountered it,( before I ever came aboard here ) which turned my head around about 180 degrees. I was not so surprised, however, to notice that you were right on top of it, all the way back in May. So, for all you stalwart souls out there who have never seen it ( that might include you, Monkey Zerg ) QRS SAYS : THIS LINK IS A MUST SEE !!! And Quasimodo couldn't agree more, so CHECK IT OUT, PEOPLE !
"Support our troops!" no longer has any meaningful meaning. It's always been about black-mailing acquiescence out of the general population. Send the troops to the wrong place for the wrong reasons, and know it, but hey America, still support them! What did they ever do to warrant the withdrawal of your support?! (:idiot-eyes emoticon:)
I don't care how many or few elites control America, if Americans are too stupid to know to back out of Iraq, then they deserve to lose their nation. If the US attacks Iran, or joins Israel in an attack on Iran then they WILL lose their nation. If the US attacks Iran, I will want to see America dismantled, never to pose a threat to other peoples again. But no-matter what I think, a nation that can't stop itself from repeatedly doing colossal wrong has no future as a nation. A nation that repeatedly does colossal wrong to other peoples never actually was a nation to begin with - only a conglomeration of illusions and desires.
So there won't be much to mourn, when you look at it that way.
I guess what I'm saying is, the hard question is being asked right now, and America in response is collectively blubbing its bottom lip (present company excepted). Not the response any of us doing the looking are looking for.
Quite tragically put. It would appear our beloved nation is quite capable of dismantling itself from within, with no outside help whatsoever, and is well on the way to finishing the job of deconstruction.
Good to hear that you forgive my sarcasm. And just to make clear, my sarcasm was to point out the tragedy of how war crimes are only treated as such when done by foot soldiers and documented.
So I do not believe "the idea that war criminals are only guilty of war crimes if they get caught, or better yet, incriminate themselves."
To throw away the sarcasm, the whole Iraq war is a war crime, and the people who pushed for it and planned it should be tried and hanged as responsible for all the destruction and death committed. The foot soldiers are only guilty of committing crimes that are the symptoms of the war crime. The cause lies not in Iraq the Iraqi battlefield itself.
I agree with all your deductions, just wanted to make myself clear.
(ps MonkeyZerg, it stuck, don't ask :P )
Monkey Zerg..........That was very well and succinctly said, and in a spirit of Truth, forsooth, have ye said it ! I dare say that I couldn't have summed it up any better myself if I tried. Your rejoinder is much appreciated, but please don't lose your sarcastic edge, if you can help it, and least of all, on my account.