Greg Mitchell: Why did U.S. Soldier Kill Herself -- Instead of Taking Part in Torture?

[laststeamtrain]

Greg Mitchell: Why did U.S. Soldier Kill Herself -- Instead of Taking Part in Torture?

They served in the same battalion in Iraq at the same time. Kayla Williams spoke with Alyssa Peterson about the young woman's troubles a week before she died--and afterward, attended her memorial service. Williams even has her own Iraq interrogation horror story to tell. So what, in Williams's view, caused Alyssa Peterson to put a bullet in her head in September 2003 after just a few weeks in Iraq? And why were the press and the public not told about it?

The death of Alyssa Peterson, which I chronicled here last month, is unspeakably sad, and what was fully in her mind will never be known, especially since her parents apparently knew little about her death until years after it happened. The press, which has rarely challenged the official version of Iraq fatalities, has not probed the incident, to this day (although it is featured in two chapters in my new book on Iraq and the media). But this tragedy also begs the question: Which interrogation techniques drew her ire?...http://www.huffingtonpost.com/greg-mitchell/why-did-us-soldier-kill-h_b_95289.html

[seemslikeadream]

1. Kayla Williams

Your country's leaders have failed you

[Faygo Kid]

2. History will never forgive war criminal Bush and his allies.

There has never been an Administration so venal as this, and never been a president so pathologically incapable of understanding the consequences of his actions in ruining the lives of others.

[superkia]

6. Until the American public comes together to stop it, we are just...

people out at the park watching people being killed, beaten, raped, what ever you want to say and we sit by and talk of how bad it is. No, I don't know how to organize a mass protest to shut the country down to get our voices heard and I guess no one else has figured it out either. I don't know the answer but I wish I did because I am sick of seeing the atrocities that are taking place in our name as we pay for it to happen?

[nadinbrzezinski]

3. To the credit of both soldiers they refused to participate

but... and I know this is hard... they should have filed about geneva convention violations

Oh and the army has crossed the rubicon and is now having senior NCOs abiding by torture

Most kiddies don't understand this... but low ranking soldiers are immune (see who we tried for Abu Graib?) While senior NCOs E-4 and above, and Officers are not

And what could she have been asked to do that led to that? I can start the list... and it ain't pretty

By the way, the trial was a signal to the army to conform to the new rules

[sam sarrha]

4. have you seen this about soldier suicide .?? >LINK>>

http://www.news.com.au/heraldsun/story/0,21985,22762457-5005961,00.html
"THE US military is experiencing a "suicide epidemic" with veterans killing themselves at the rate of 120 a week, according to an investigation by US television network CBS.

At least 6256 US veterans committed suicide in 2005 - an average of 17 a day - the network reported, with veterans overall more than twice as likely to take their own lives as the rest of the general population.

While the suicide rate among the general population was 8.9 per 100,000, the level among veterans was between 18.7 and 20.8 per 100,000.

That figure rose to 22.9 to 31.9 suicides per 100,000 among veterans aged 20 to 24 - almost four times the non-veteran average for the age group.

"Those numbers clearly show an epidemic of mental health problems,'' CBS quoted veterans' rights advocate Paul Sullivan as saying"....


http://www.vermontguardian.com/dailies/022006/020806.shtml
"Rape fears lead women soldiers to suicide, death
NEW YORK — U.S. female soldiers in Iraq were assaulted or raped by male soldiers in the women’s latrines, and an alarming number committed suicide, Col. Janis Karpinski reportedly testified before an international human rights commission of inquiry last month.

“Because the women were in fear of getting up in the darkness , they were not drinking liquids after 3 or 4 in the afternoon,” Karpinski testified, according to a report on Truthout.org. “In the 100 degree heat, they were dying of dehydration in their sleep....”

[WillyT]

5. K & R !!!

:kick:

[Wilms]

7. K&R n/t