Date Posted:15:16:45 06/24/06 Sat Author: Freida Pane Subject: Yes I agree. I said that in my hit record. In reply to:
Ry
's message, "Bring the troops home NOW !" on 05:41:55 06/24/06 Sat
>The accounts are brutal: An Iraqi man dragged from his
>home, executed and made to look as if he were an
>insurgent. Three prisoners killed by their Army
>captors. A team of revenge-seeking Marines going home
>to home, shooting down unarmed Iraqi men, women,
>children.
>
>The recent flurry of accusations against U.S.
>servicemen has stunned military analysts and experts.
>Many see a critical new point in the war — though few
>agree whether it shows the toll of combat stress,
>commanders resolved to stamp out war crimes, or, as
>some claim, an overzealous second-guessing of the
>troops.
>
>But the number and gravity of the latest allegations
>have drawn the greatest outcry against U.S. military
>actions since the Abu Ghraib prison abuses.
>
>“All of a sudden there seem to be charges right and
>left,” said Loren Thompson at the Lexington Institute,
>a defense think tank in Arlington, Va. “It clearly has
>happened in some cases. But it’s hard to tell whether
>this is a pattern of wrongdoing on our part or just a
>pattern of closer supervision.”
>
>List of alleged incidents
>So far, none of the troops accused in the latest cases
>has even been tried:
>
>On Friday, a Pennsylvania National Guard spokesman
>said two Guardsmen were being investigated in
>connection with the shooting death of an Iraqi earlier
>this year.
>On Wednesday, seven Marines and one Navy corpsman were
>charged in the April shooting death of an Iraqi man in
>the town of Hamdania. Charging documents claim the man
>was taken from his home, forced into a hole, shot and
>left with a stolen AK-47 near him to make it look as
>if he fought the troops.
>On Monday and Wednesday, three soldiers and a
>noncommissioned officer were charged in the May deaths
>of three unarmed Iraqis in military custody in
>Salahuddin province. A Pentagon official told The
>Associated Press that the detainees were shot while
>trying to flee.
>Those accusations come a few months after another
>disturbing charge — that in Haditha, a town in the
>Sunni hotbed of Anbar province, members of a Marine
>unit killed up to two dozen unarmed Iraqis in and
>outside their homes after a roadside bomb killed one
>of the troops. Neighbors told the AP that a small
>group of Marines went house to house over three hours,
>while others stood watch.
>
>The death penalty is a possible punishment in at least
>some of these cases.
>
>Combat stress theory
>One view is that, if proven true, these incidents
>reflect the toll Iraq has taken on U.S. troops. Since
>2003, they have dealt with constant heat and filth,
>blurred lines between civilian and enemy, and
>insurgents who rely on dirty tactics like suicide and
>roadside bombs, lack of uniforms and beheadings.
>
>“This is one of the nastier kinds of fights you could
>be in,” said Michael O’Hanlon, a defense analyst at
>the Brookings Institution. American troops “obviously
>lost a lot of their own compatriots, a lot of them
>have been there a number of times. Morale is still
>pretty strong, but I would think there’s a
>psychological toll.”
>
>Some say that’s to be expected, but criminal behavior
>still must be prevented: War crimes are an indictment
>of leadership.
>
>“It’s symptomatic of a combat stress management system
>that has failed,” said John Pike, director of
>Globalsecurity.org, a Washington-based military think
>tank.
>
>“Anybody who contemplates a decision to use force,
>anybody who contemplates putting boots on the ground
>has to understand that part of what they’re assuming
>responsibility for is stressed-out soldiers are going
>to massacre civilians. It just comes with the
>territory.”
>
>Still, Pike said that even if true, the number of
>abuse cases isn’t shocking, given the number of troops
>and three-plus years of combat: “If this is the worst
>that the troops have done, the chain of command would
>appear to have done a pretty good job.”
>
>Blind eye opens
>Others see a more emphatic message from military
>leaders to the troops and their field commanders.
>
>“The system which tended to turn a blind eye is now
>looking harder,” said Anthony Cordesman, a former
>Pentagon analyst. “Incidents which in the past
>might’ve been covered over or dodged are now leading
>to formal accusations.”
>
>Others closer to the accused are bitter over what they
>see as a shift from the leaders in Washington.
>
>“There seems to be a rush to judgment,” said Charles
>Gittins, an attorney who successfully defended former
>Marine 2nd Lt. Ilario Pantano, who was acquitted of
>murder after he shot two Iraqis and left a warning
>sign on their corpses. He argued self-defense.
>
>“The war’s being run from the Pentagon and the
>Pentagon’s moving with the 24-hour news cycle. There’s
>a tendency to charge first and let the facts play
>themselves out later,” Gittins said. “Back the
>soldiers!”
>
>‘Nobody’s running amok’
>Pantano warned against sweeping conclusions. “Nobody’s
>running amok and being barbarians.
>
>That’s so inaccurate,” he said. “The real jeopardy is
>there’s so much blowback every time you use force that
>troops are dying from hesitation.”
>
>And the latest accused soldiers have yet to be fully
>heard.
>
>In Charleston, S.C., the mother of 21-year-old Pfc.
>Corey R. Clagett — one of four charged with killing
>prisoners last month — said she spoke to her son by
>telephone. “He said, ’Mom, this is Corey. I didn’t do
>those things the way they said,”’ Melanie Dianiska
>said.
>
>Almost by definition, war creates chaos. Last week,
>Australian troops shot a civilian and a bodyguard to
>an Iraqi trade minister when they thought they were
>threatened. Two newly trained Iraqi policemen have
>been accused of shooting American troops. Meanwhile,
>two American soldiers were captured, brutalized and
>slain.
>
>Losing faith
>The uncertainty over the troop accusations only adds
>to the confusion.
>
>“I wonder whether people have lost faith in the
>military because of this kind of incident,” Cordesman
>said, referring to the allegations against American
>troops. A classic terrorist strategy, he noted, is to
>force the enemy into atrocities, turning the local
>population against the opponent and sapping its
>support at home.
>
>Already, this war’s mistakes are being taught as
>cautionary tales. The failings at Abu Ghraib are now
>part of a West Point leadership course, alongside
>Vietnam’s My Lai, where some 300 villagers were killed.
>
>The military courts and public opinion will determine
>whether Haditha, Hamdania and Salahuddin join them.
