[Rictor]

Nope, not a thing...

[Deepblue]

B.. B... B... Bogus!

[Rictor]

You're right. I guess an internationally syndicated journalist, who has spent time in Iraq covering the war, intervieiwing Iraqis, who happen to live there, simply can't compete with you.

It's not true becasue....because...because I don't want it to be. Despite the fact that I have not one single bit of information, either to confirm or deny this story, I will choose to label it as false, just for the hell of it.

Something like that?

[Swamp_Thing]

Originally posted by Deepblue
B.. B... B... Bogus!

We´ve all heard, and seen evidence to this. Why some people still refuse to believe this actually happened, is beyond me. You don´t need to believe anyone´s word for it, just watch one of the hundreds of video footage that are out there.
Obviously, those who are dead set on refuting the truth of this, will go on and just claim these videos are fakes anyway, so i guess i´m wasting my latin saying this.

[Omniscaper]

I guess EVEYONE involved with the US military are murderers who all are after terrorizing children.

[Lt.Cannonfodder]

Originally posted by Omniscaper
I guess EVEYONE involved with the US military are murderers who all are after terrorizing children.

Of course not. But war is hell and some people seem to deny the fact that both sides do commit horrible crimes.

[Rictor]

That's good thinkning Omni. By generalzing every statement, you can easily deflect any criticism. Its just like those people who say you're a homophobe when you fire a gay from his job for completely unrelated reason. This way, everyone who shows even the slightest opposition to the very real crimes being perpetrated in Iraq in an anti-American. It seems to me that you hold a view in which the US army can do no wrong, ever. Anyone that claims otherwise is unreliable. So, instead of facts supporting conclusions, a pre-determined conclusion is used to selectively pick facts that support it.

Yes, both sides are commiting attrocities, and they are both wreong to do so, but with one crucial difference: one side started it.

[Fineus]

Calm down Rictor, and indeed everyone else. Try and be nice to eachother and discuss it rather than playing making rash remarks.

[aldo_14]

It should probably be added that 'he started it' is seldom a good justification for anything.

[Rictor]

I am calm. CAAAAAAALM!!!!

And its not so much a justification as it is a circumstance that should be considered (as in, Side A is not excused becasue Side B started it, but Side B bears a heavier responsibility).

[aldo_14]

Originally posted by Rictor
I am calm. CAAAAAAALM!!!!

And its not so much a justification as it is a circumstance that should be considered (as in, Side A is not excused becasue Side B started it, but Side B bears a heavier responsibility).

Considered as what, though?  I'd scarcely consider it as mitigating circumstances; right or wrong as the war may be (and you know I'm on the 'wrong' side of it), that has no bearing on the legality individual acts of soldiers or insurgents (to use the generic term).

Now, if it's policy - be it the abuse at Abu Ghraib or terrorism campaigns against Shia Muslims - then that's a 'war' issue.  But in these terms, it's an issue of individual crimes and individual conduct - unless you can say (and prove) this is/was a policy decision.

IMO, by bringing in the issue of who did what first, you risk excising the 'other' side (in whatever conflict or issue) of some or all of the blame for their own actions, whether you intend to or not.  Kidnapping and killing foreign workers (for example) is no more justifiable and no less a crime than executing a POW; regardless of which order they occur in.

[Grug]

Sigh, another political thread eh?

It should be noted that America never signed the treaty banning certain illegal weapons in war. Such as napalm, which is commonly used and usually civilians suffer because of it.
Yet on the other hand, suicide bombers arn't very picky on who they kill either. Mind, most in Iraq have been aimed at military convorys, and embassies. That's a slight up on targeting complete civilian facilities such as the Bali bombings etc.

[vyper]

Teh link... eet does nothing!

[Janos]

The link does not work, which is nice because we were generously given enough information, like selected parts of the article in question, in the thread itself, and thus we don't have to blind-click on weirdo links in order to be able to discuss.

edit:

Stories from Fallujah

These are the stories that will continue to emerge from the rubble of Fallujah for years. No, for generations…

Speaking on condition of anonymity, the doctor sits with me in a hotel room in Amman, where he is now a refugee. He’d spoken about what he saw in Fallujah in the UK, and now is under threat by the US military if he returns to Iraq.

“I started speaking about what happened in Fallujah during both sieges in order to raise awareness, and the Americans raided my house three times,” he says, talking so fast I can barely keep up. He is driven to tell what he’s witnessed, and as a doctor working inside Fallujah, he has video and photographic proof of all that he tells me.

“I entered Fallujah with a British medical and humanitarian convoy at the end of December, and stayed until the end of January,” he explains, “But I was in Fallujah before that to work with people and see what their needs were, so I was in there since the beginning of December.”

When I ask him to explain what he saw when he first entered Fallujah in December he says it was like a tsunami struck the city.

“Fallujah is surrounded by refugee camps where people are living in tents and old cars,” he explains, “It reminded me of Palestinian refugees. I saw children coughing because of the cold, and there are no medicines. Most everyone left their houses with nothing, and no money, so how can they live depending only on humanitarian aid?”

The doctors says that in one refugee camp in the northern area of Fallujah there were 1,200 students living in seven tents.

“The disaster caused by this siege is so much worse than the first one, which I witnessed first hand,” he says, and then tells me he’ll use one story as an example.

“One story is of a young girl who is 16 years old,” he says of one of the testimonies he video taped recently, “She stayed for three days with the bodies of her family who were killed in their home. When the soldiers entered she was in her home with her father, mother, 12 year-old brother and two sisters. She watched the soldiers enter and shoot her mother and father directly, without saying anything.”

The girl managed to hide behind the refrigerator with her brother and witnessed the war crimes first-hand.

“They beat her two sisters, then shot them in the head,” he said. After this her brother was enraged and ran at the soldiers while shouting at them, so they shot him dead.

“She continued hiding after the soldiers left and stayed with her sisters because they were bleeding, but still alive. She was too afraid to call for help because she feared the soldiers would come back and kill her as well. She stayed for three days, with no water and no food. Eventually one of the American snipers saw her and took her to the hospital,” he added before reminding me again that he had all of her testimony documented on film.

He briefly told me of another story he documented of a mother who was in her home during the siege. “On the fifth day of the siege her home was bombed, and the roof fell on her son, cutting his legs off,” he says while using his hands to make cutting motions on his legs, “For hours she couldn’t go outside because they announced that anyone going in the street would be shot. So all she could do was wrap his legs and watch him die before her eyes.”

He pauses for a few deep breaths, then continues, “All I can say is that Fallujah is like it was struck by a tsunami. There weren’t many families in there after the siege, but they had absolutely nothing. The suffering was beyond what you can imagine. When the Americans finally let us in people were fighting just for a blanket.”

“One of my colleagues, Dr. Saleh Alsawi, he was speaking so angrily about them. He was in the main hospital when they raided it at the beginning of the seige. They entered the theater room when they were working on a patient…he was there because he’s an anesthesiologist. They entered with their boots on, beat the doctors and took them out, leaving the patient on the table to die.”

This story has already been reported in the Arab media.

The doctor tells me of the bombing of the Hay Nazal clinic during the first week of the siege.

“This contained all the foreign aid and medical instruments we had. All the US military commanders knew this, because we told them about it so they wouldn’t bomb it. But this was one of the clinics bombed, and in the first week of the siege they bombed it two times.”

He then adds, “Of course they targeted all our ambulances and doctors. Everyone knows this.”

The doctor tells me he and some other doctors are trying to sue the US military for the following incident, for which he has the testimonial evidence on tape.

It is a story I was told by several refugees in Baghdad as well…at the end of last November while the siege was still in progress.

“During the second week of the siege they entered and announced that all the families have to leave their homes and meet at an intersection in the street while carrying a white flag. They gave them 72 hours to leave and after that they would be considered an enemy,” he says.

“We documented this story with video-a family of 12, including a relative and his oldest child who was 7 years old. They heard this instruction, so they left with all their food and money they could carry, and white flags. When they reached the intersection where the families were accumulating, they heard someone shouting ‘Now!’ in English, and shooting started everywhere.”

The family was all carrying white flags, as instructed, according to the young man who gave his testimony. Yet he watched his mother and father shot by snipers-his mother in the head and his father shot in the heart. His two aunts were shot, then his brother was shot in the neck. The man stated that when he raised himself from the ground to shout for help, he was shot in the side.

“After some hours he raised his arm for help and they shot his arm,” continues the doctor, “So after awhile he raised his hand and they shot his hand.”

A six year-old boy of the family was standing over the bodies of his parents, crying, and he too was then shot.

“Anyone who raised up was shot,” adds the doctor, then added again that he had photographs of the dead as well as photos of the gunshot wounds of the survivors.

“Once it grew dark some of them along with this man who spoke with me, with his child and sister-in-law and sister managed to crawl away after it got dark. They crawled to a building and stayed for 8 days. They had one cup of water and gave it to the child. They used cooking oil to put on their wounds which were of course infected, and found some roots and dates to eat.”

He stops here. His eyes look around the room as cars pass by outside on wet streets…water hissing under their tires.

He left Fallujah at the end of January, so I ask him what it was like when he left recently.

“Now maybe 25% of the people have returned, but there are still no doctors. The hatred now of Fallujans against every American is incredible, and you cannot blame them. The humiliation at the checkpoints is only making people even angrier,” he tells me.

“I’ve been there, and I saw that anyone who even turns their head is threatened and hit by both American and Iraqi soldiers alike…one man did this, and when the Iraqi soldier tried to humiliate him, the man took a gun of a nearby soldier and killed two ING, so then of course he was shot.”

The doctor tells me they are keeping people in the line for several hours at a time, in addition to the US military making propaganda films of the situation.

“And I’ve seen them use the media-and on January 2nd at the north checkpoint in the north part of Fallujah, they were giving people $200 per family to return to Fallujah so they can film them in the line…when actually, at that time, nobody was returning to Fallujah,” he says. It reminds me of the story my colleague told me of what he saw in January. At that time a CNN crew was escorted in by the military to film street cleaners that were brought in as props, and soldiers handing out candy to children.

“You must understand the hatred that has been caused…it has gotten more difficult for Iraqis, including myself, to make the distinction between the American government and the American people,” he tells me.

His story is like countless others.

“My cousin was a poor man in Fallujah,” he explains, “He walked from his house to work and back, while living with his wife and five daughters. In July of 2003, American soldiers entered his house and woke them all up. They drug them into the main room of the house, and executed my cousin in front of his family. Then they simply left.”

He pauses then holds up his hands and asks, “Now, how are these people going to feel about Americans?”

sorry

[Swamp_Thing]

Originally posted by Rictor
Yes, both sides are commiting attrocities, and they are both wreong to do so, but with one crucial difference: one side started it.

I don´t place much importance on who started or not. Sure, the US started an illegal war, and all that stuff, but that is hardly relevent to this issue. What is relevent, is that the US constantly places itself above all criticism,  with the "we are morally superior" attitude, when the facts on the ground speak a diferent truth. That´s what´s so blood boiling.
Bush´s speeches are riddled with dozens of references to "freedom", "liberties", bla bla bla yadda yadda yadda. But what they do on the ground is completelly opposite.
Obviouslly we cannot point the entire US army as guilty on this. But nor can we dismiss the fact that there is a large portion of the troops and their high ranking officers that condone and perpetrate such acts, with total and complete impunity.

If these acts were being commited by, for ex. the north koreans, would anyone be having this discussion? Hardly. Because we sort of expect such brutality from them. After all, an "evil" regime and all. But the US is not the country one would expect to see involved in this. That´s why most people are having a hard time swallowing this. Because the US spends its time preeching to others what they should and should not do.
In the wise words of... uh... somebody, "practice what you preech".

[Deepblue]

It's bogus based on the braod generalizations the article makes, not based on individual actions.

[Flipside]

It's not a question of who was a big enough coward to start it, it's a question of who has the courage to stop first.

One thing leaps to mind though, if this doctor had spoken of Terrorist atrocities, as a professional individual, I wonder if everyone would be in such a rush to be sceptical?

[vyper]

Deep, will you at least entertain the possibility that these things happened?

[Deepblue]

Yes, but the article makes it sound like policy.

[Deepblue]

Dude, that story is kinda inconsistent, if the "doctor" is sitting there watching this family getting mowed down why is he not mowed down with them? And why is a doctor investigating this instead of treating the sick or wounded? The story just doesn't make sense. And why the hell are the soldiers yelling out "now" when that tactically makes no sense considering it would give away there position and warn their targets? Yes I can entertain the thought, but the more I read the story the less credible it seems.