During Truce, Marines Endure Boredom and Sporadic Fire--WaPo

[gottaB]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A15789-2004Apr15.html

This story contains a deeply troubling passage:

At 10 a.m. Wednesday, a man and woman tentatively crossed the alley, carrying a white flag. Browne trained his weapon on them but did not fire. Five minutes later, another Marine on the roof spotted a man in a white robe coming out of his house and bending over in his garden. Browne tensed, watched, waited. The rooftop around him was littered with spent shell casings. In the distance rose the tiled minaret of a mosque, gouged by a missile.

"If he displays hostile intent, drop him," the other Marine whispered. The man in the white robe kept gardening, apparently oblivious.

Impatient, the other Marine squeezed off one warning round from his M-16, and the man scurried back inside.

"Nobody should be on these streets now," Browne remarked, still squinting down his gunsight. "We gave them a chance to leave, and if they didn't, chances are they are up to no good." By this point, he confided, "I don't really think of them as people any more."

(My emphasis, of course)

[trumad]

1. Oh you will

in about a couple of years as you lay at night in the comfort of your own bed.....

[moof]

2. If only the tables could be turned.

Along the lines of Rod Serlings Twilight Zone episode about the American Military person that was ready to massacre the japanese troops hold up in a cave rather than wait them out. All of a sudden he is transformed and is a japanese soldier standing outside the same cave with his Japanese commanding officer telling him to hurry up & finish off the Americans hold up in the cave. Now he is trying to convince his Commander it is not necessary using the same arguement that was previously tried on him to no avail when it was the Japanese hold up in the cave.

Peace is easy, just stop fighting.