America’s Crimes of War [View all]
from Consortium News:
Americas Crimes of War
March 15, 2012
A decade into the Afghan War, the atrocities by U.S. forces whether accidental or intentional keep piling up along with assurances from American leaders that this is not who we are. But the unwillingness to impose serious penalties and the failure to adopt less violent strategies say something else to many Afghans, writes John LaForge.
By John LaForge
A U.S. Army Staff Sergeant walked through two villages in Kandahar Province, Afghanistan, around 3 a.m. March 11, methodically shooting 16 people that hed dragged from their beds with single shots to the head. Then he dragged corpses outside and set some on fire. Eleven were reportedly from one family. Nine were children.
The Taliban has promised revenge against sick-minded American savages. Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta appeared to confirm this characterization when he callously told the press later the same day, War is hell. These kinds of events and incidents are going to take place. Theyve taken place in any war. Theyre terrible events. This is not the first of those events, and they probably wont be the last.
Events and incidents arent the pronouns that come to mind when contemplating premeditated multiple murders of sleeping women and children. Afghanistans President Hamid Karzai called the massacre an assassination and an intentional killing of innocent civilians and cannot be forgiven.
Seth Jones of the Rand Corporation, a former Special Forces Command officer in the Pentagon, tried to cement the blood-thirsty image of the U.S. at war when he said March 12 on the PBS News Hour, This is not as out of the norm as its appearing in the media.
Afghans are used to being killed. .................(more)
The complete piece is at:
http://consortiumnews.com/2012/03/15/americas-crimes-of-war/