US denies 147 civilians killed in Afghan violence

[laststeamtrain]

Source: AP

US denies 147 civilians killed in Afghan violence
By FISNIK ABRASHI, Associated Press Writer 36 mins ago

KABUL – The U.S. military said Friday reports that as many as 147 civilians died in fighting involving American forces and the Taliban were "extremely over-exaggerated" and investigators were still analyzing the data collected at the site.

In the south, meanwhile, four NATO soldiers and 21 civilians died in a string of insurgent attacks, and an unmanned U.S. drone crashed in central Ghazni province.

Officials said preliminary findings of the joint U.S.-Afghan investigation into the deaths in the villages of Ganjabad and Gerani in the western Farah province could be released as early as Friday, but they have yet to schedule an announcement.

Reports of the large number of civilian deaths come at an awkward time for the Obama administration, as the U.S. steps up its military campaign here while emphasizing the importance of nonmilitary efforts to stabilize the country.

Read more: http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090508/ap_on_re_as/as_afghanistan

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"extremely over-exaggerated"

AfPak folly-speak.

Not just exaggerated. Not just over-exaggerated. Extremely over-exaggerated!

This isn't good.

[Downwinder]

1. Didn't I see something like this about a wedding party or two? n/t

[shadowknows69]

2. We're America we don't bomb wedding parties

We don't torture
We don't hold people without due process
We don't give money to corrupt bankers and let our civilians hang
We don't drive valuable soldiers from our military in disgrace because of how they were born.


Oh wait, yeah we do.

[Baby Snooks]

3. What happens when you let the fox investigate who killed the chickens...

The fox invariably will state the investigation revealed that in fact no chickens were killed. The farmer had simply miscounted the number of chickens he had.

[Tempest]

4. Meet the new boss, same as the old boss

This is the same bullshit we heard from the Bush administration.

[laststeamtrain]

8. This is the same BS we heard from LBJ & Nixon.

When they start talking gibberish about body counts, that's when it really doesn't look good.

They're talking about dead people; murdered people. It's not an abstraction.

I have a super bad feeling about the 'AfPak War'.

[panzerfaust]

11. Has any Empire EVER won in the Graveyard of Empires?

This pix was back when the Soviets were just leaving (after TEN years), and the 'insurgents' - including Benny L - were our 'friends'

[tocqueville]

13. yes

the Afghans have been defeated over and over since history's dawn. Starting with Alexander the Great. Go to the wikipedia page of Afghan history. Their original Buddhist beliefs were crushed by the Arabs etc etc...

It's exactly the same myth than "the Serbs have never been defeated by the Nazis". In reality the Serbs held some resistance pockets in teh mountains and raided towns now and then, having to retire with heavy casualties. They won when Nazi Germany was in deep doo-doo towards the end and pulled back their troops.

[ieoeja]

5. So the Taliban just killed 21 civilians. n/t

[Honeycombe8]

6. So how many civilians WERE killed? Since you (and the article)

assumes that U.S. is lying. Curious, since the article does not give one fact, not even one, indicating that the #147 is, in fact, wrong, just as the U.S. says.

These are the sorts of articles and posts I'd expect to see in Freeperville, or hear on Hannity.

[EFerrari]

9. The Red Cross says they estimate about a hundred.

And the military routinely lies about civilian casualities in order to minimize them. Watch, by Monday or Tuesday, they will be changing their numbers and apologizing.

[ProgressIn2008]

16. I know, first will come the shift in numbers and this current lie will fall down the memory hole

Then we get defensive non-apology

then we get lukewarm apology

(though it wasn't our fault really)

Ugh.

[ConcernedCanuk]

7. Sorta hard to identify the bodies when you are blasting the shit out of them from the air.

.
.
.

USA get some balls.

Put your troops on the ground SO YOU CAN SEE WHO THE FUCK YOU ARE KILLING!

Remember, it was you Nintendo pilots that killed the first four Canadian Soldiers (YOUR ALLIES BY THE WAY)to die in the Afghanistan conflict -

And it took your Pretzeldent(probably with coaxing from someone with an operating brain) TWO DAYS to make an apology

OH

The pilot that slaughtered our guys walks free.

We noticed.

All these denials from the US War-Machine are only good for USAmerican consumption

noone else in the World believes the USA.

[tocqueville]

12. arm some plated BEECHCRAFTS and go back to visual

the fundamental fault is in the US strategy

it doesn't matter if ones denies (even in good faith and with proofs) the US won't be believed

you cannot win against an insurgency melting among civilians with WWIV weaponry. This weaponry can only be useful in a classical conflict of WWII type (regular armies figthing eachother). It's like trying killing flies in a China shop with a baseball bat.

new rules of engagement

1) use slow aircraft in populated areas, modern ones in unhabited terrain.
2) skip drones unless you are 100% sure no collateral damage is possible
3) never engage with aerial strikes in populated areas unless you know the civilians have been evacuated (you'll catch the bastards later anyway)
4) use primarily specialized ground troops to eliminate or arrest insurgents
5) use "your balls and a knife" (la bite et le couteau) as the French Foreign Legion says. Or the Ghurkas.

the worse is that the US has a terrible reputation in not "minding" collateral damage since WWII. The criticism isn't new. It was a major cause of the failure in Vietnam and Iraq and of now of the current failure in AfPak. Even in won wars like the Gulf and Serbia, the resentment causes so much enmity that political complications follow, bedding for new violence.

the US generals are losing war after war due to mere ideological conservatism. The eventual tactical gain is blown away by the strategic political defeat. Exactly like for torture.

[panzerfaust]

10. Says only 146 killed.

The rest is all lies.

[Vidar]

14. We kill innocents & then make it worse by ineffective denial.

[ProgressIn2008]

15. Ugh, so this the death game of lies we're playing? Still? Isn't it old and tired by now? nt