Civilian Deaths in Kandahar: A Globe & Mail Reporter Gets it Wrong

This is what the Globe and Mail's reporter Graeme Smith wrote in his piece "How Taliban exploit civilian casualties" on Monday:

The number of civilian deaths inflicted by NATO and U.S. operations in Afghanistan has risen dramatically, with roughly 300 killed so far this year.

One of the major exceptions to this trend has been in Kandahar province, where Canadian commanders say they haven't heard any complaints of civilian casualties in 2007.

So, who's lying? The "Canadian commanders" or Smith?

Via wiki:

* February 17, 2007 An unarmed man acting in a suspicious manner was shot and killed by Canadian troops near the village of Senjaray 12 km west of Kandahar[21]

* February 17, 2007 NATO troops shot and killed a civilian who was running through convoy near Kandahar[22]

* February 18, 2007 Canadian troops mistakenly gunned down an Afghan National Police officer and a homeless beggar after their convoy was ambushed in Kandahar City late Sunday[23]

* February 27, 2007 Canadian troops fire at a Toyota car that failed to stop at a security cordon around a broken down Canadian vehicle in the Kandahar area. One occupant is killed, the other is wounded. No weapons or bombs were found.[24]

Maybe that article should get a new headline: How Graeme Smith Denies Civilian Casualties
 

Bloody Saturday Indeed

Via antiwar.com: 168 Iraqis Killed, 180 Injured, 26 Kidnapped

Via Reuters:

KERBALA, Iraq (Reuters) - A suicide car bomber killed at least 40 people and wounded scores at a crowded bus station near a Shi'ite shrine in the Iraqi holy city of Kerbala on Saturday, police and hospital sources said.

In Baghdad, police said a suicide car bomber detonated his device near a checkpoint at the southern Jadriyah bridge, killing 10 people and setting fire to cars in the second major attack on a bridge in the capital in the past three days.

Television footage of the aftermath of the Kerbala explosion showed a distraught man cradling the charred body of a small child, and witnesses said the blast sent body parts flying into the air. Ambulances rushed to the scene.

"I suddenly heard a horrifying explosion. I had never expected that Kerbala would see an explosion of that size because it is a safe city," said Ali Mussawi, 30, a store owner who was 50 meters (yards) from the blast.

Not anymore.

Meanwhile, Bush and Cheney continue their whinefest because no one's letting them get their way, although they may certainly get their demands met when it comes to Iran - thanks to the Democrats.

Back to Iraq though...

And, while Bush keeps insisting that he is guided by the commanders on the ground, it seems more than a bit odd that General Petraeus, according to the Army Times, was "surprised" by the announcement of troop extensions by Gates this past week.

The Pentagon was forced to announce the shift, which includes extending the deployment of every active Army unit already in Iraq to 15 months, “a couple of days” earlier than planned because the information had been leaked to the news media, the senior military official said.

The Pentagon had planned to send news of the pending announcement down through official channels so that military personnel and their families would have advance notice, the official said. “Somebody in the Pentagon leaked it, [and] that forced [the Office of Defense Secretary Robert Gates] to go early,” the official said.

Right. Like we're supposed to believe what some unnamed military official says. The MSM has been more than willing to sit on stories much more important than this one when they've been asked to by the government in the past.

Saber-rattling Turkey is still threatening to cross the Iraq border to attack the Kurds and since al Maliki has obviously failed to gain control of his country, it remains to be seen how he can possibly handle another incursion. The EU Commission is the intermediary in that dispute. Where's Condi?

And I have some good news...and some bad news...:

BAGHDAD - Iraqi civilian deaths have fallen in Baghdad in the two months since the Feb. 14 start of the U.S.-led offensive, according to an Associated Press tally.

Outside the capital, however, civilian deaths are up as Sunni and Shiite extremists shift their operations to avoid the crackdown.

And the sweeps have taken a heavy toll on U.S. forces: Deaths among American soldiers climbed 21 percent in Baghdad compared with the previous two months. [ed. the US death toll is inching close to 3,300].
[...]
Figures compiled by the AP from Iraqi police reports show that 1,586 civilians were killed in Baghdad between the start of the offensive and Thursday.

That represents a sharp drop from the 2,871 civilians who died violently in the capital during the two months that preceded the security crackdown.

Outside the capital, 1,504 civilians were killed between Feb. 14 and Thursday, April 12 compared with 1,009 deaths during the two previous months, the AP figures show.

The insurgents have adjusted and the so-called coalition of the surging has yet to catch up.

As Joseph Galloway writes:

It will be costly and painful to prolong the war in Iraq for another 21 months so that those who started it can hand off the harder decision of how to end it to the next occupant of the White House.

President Bush isn't extending and expanding the war in a search for victory. His dream of victory in Iraq cannot be achieved. Not by sending 30,000 more American troops. Not by making parts of Baghdad temporarily safer by billeting American troops in violent neighborhoods and pushing the slaughter into the northern and southern suburbs - or into the Green Zone where U.S. and Iraqi officials live and work.

Not by letting American soldiers bear the brunt of combat, targeted not only by our enemies, the Sunni Muslim insurgents but also by our supposed allies, the Shiite majority and the murderous militia of radical cleric Moqtada al-Sadr. In March, more American troops died in Iraq than Iraqi soldiers.

This is a search for a fig leaf to cover the emperor’s nakedness - a way for Bush to go home to Texas with a ringing but hollow declaration that "Iraq wasn't lost on my watch."

And there's no guarantee that whoever occupies the White House next will end the Iraq war anytime soon either.
 

Bolton to be Investigated?

Last week, John Bolton told the BBC that he was "damned proud" of the fact that the US refused to work for an early ceasefire in the Israel/Lebanon war. "He said the US decided to join efforts to end the conflict only when it was clear Israel's campaign wasn't working." In other words, the Bush administration's failure to seek a ceasefire cost hundreds of people their lives. You'll recall the last minute blitz by the IDF against Lebanon when the Israeli government knew UN resolution 1701 was going to be passed by the UN security council. It was a final act of desperation in a war they had already lost.

Now, the the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee (ADC) is calling for a congressional investigation into Bolton's revelations.

In January, the US Department of State issued a preliminary report to Congress indicating that the State Department might have found evidence that Israel violated bilateral weapons agreements when it dropped US-made cluster bombs on civilian populations in Lebanon last summer. According to reports from international human rights organizations, it was determined that Israeli Defense Forces dropped more than 130,000 cluster bombs containing 1.2 million cluster bomblets in 498 locations in villages throughout southern Lebanon. These cluster bombs are in addition to those already present in southern Lebanon from previous Israeli operations.
[...]
It should be noted, Israel dropped the majority of unexploded ordinances in Lebanon during the last 72 hours of the conflict before an impending cease fire deadline. Bolton's remarks to BBC indicate that the delay in implementing this ceasefire was a result of deliberate actions by the United States. The 2006 war in Lebanon resulted in well over 1,000 Lebanese civilian deaths, 43 Israeli civilian deaths, approximately 4,500 Lebanese civilian injuries, and approximately 4,000 Israeli civilian injuries. The war displaced over one million Lebanese civilians from their homes and resulted in an environmental tragedy creating the largest ever oil spill in the Mediterranean Sea with over four million gallons of oil leaking into the Mediterranean as a result of Israeli bombing of Lebanese power plants. According to reports, the damage to Lebanon's infrastructure and economy is estimated to surpass four billion dollars.

We also recently learned through leaked testimony that Olmert had been planning the war against Lebanon for months before the generally accepted reason (one of a few justifications) - the seizure of IDF soldiers (which became the cause celebre) - was used as an excuse to spur on a plan that had already been set in motion. It was just a matter of waiting for the right timing.

Further:

And second, we have an interview in the Israeli media with Meyrav Wurmser, the wife of one of the highest officials in the Bush Administration, David Wurmser, Vice-President Dick Cheney’s adviser on the Middle East. Meyrav Wurmser, an Israeli citizen, is herself closely associated with MEMRI, a group translating (and mistranslating) speeches by Arab leaders and officials that is known for its ties to the Israeli secret services.

She told the website of Israel's leading newspaper, Yediot Aharonot, that the US stalled over imposing a ceasefire during Israel's assault on Lebanon because the Bush Administration was expecting the war to be expanded to Syria.

"The anger [in the White House] is over the fact that Israel did not fight against the Syrians. The neocons are responsible for the fact that Israel got a lot of time and space. They believed that Israel should be allowed to win. A great part of it was the thought that Israel should fight against the real enemy, the one backing Hizbullah. It was obvious that it is impossible to fight directly against Iran, but the thought was that its [Iran's] strategic and important ally [Syria] should be hit."

In other words, the picture that emerges is of a long-standing plan by the Israeli army, approved by senior US officials, for a rapid war against Lebanon -- followed by possible intimidatory strikes against Syria -- using the pretext of a cross-border incident involving Hizbullah. The real purpose, we can surmise, was to weaken what are seen by Israel and the US to be Tehran's allies before an attack on Iran itself.

That was why neither the Americans nor Israel wanted, or appear still to want, to negotiate with Assad over the Golan and seek a peace agreement that could -- for once -- change the map of the Middle East for the better.

Many, of course, posited that the Israel/Lebanon war was just a proxy war against Iran and Syria and while the Israeli government was failing, the pressure for sanctions against Iran was racheted up via UN resolution 1696 (which was followed up again this weekend with yet another resolution. This time, however, the Bush administration didn't get everything it was asking for.)

Justin Raimondo was certainly prescient back in December, 2005 when he wrote this:

Syria is now girding for the imposition of economic sanctions and trying to head off the campaign to destabilize the country on two fronts: by restarting talks with Israel, and by cooperating with the request to permit Syrian officials to be questioned in the Hariri investigation. I have the funny feeling, however, that this is not going to do them a lot of good, as far as their enemies in the West are concerned. As we have seen in the case of Iraq, when the U.S. wants to manufacture a case for war, it can be done pretty easily: Congress is not likely to ask inconvenient questions until it's too late, and the American people can hardly be expected to keep up with arcane doings in faraway Lebanon, the scene of the intrigue and obscure religious-ethnic rivalries that could spark another Mideast war. Acting pretty much without either congressional or public scrutiny, this administration thinks it can get away with anything when it comes to Syria – and in that, they are probably right.

If things had gone differently in the Israel/Lebanon war, it definitely is possible that Syria would have been brought into the armed conflict as well.

I imagine John Bolton was severely disappointed by the IDF's failure - that is, if he actually feels anything at all - about anything. Only a sociopath would be "damned proud" that he engineered a strategy that cost more people their lives based on a failed neocon ideology that places military might above all else.

Will the Democratic congress, most of which supported Israel's war, agree to investigate Bolton? I guess we'll have to wait and see...
 

The Nation Exposes 'The Other War': Civilian Killings by the US Military in Iraq

Via The Nation, this one is a must read. Be prepared. It's lengthy. Here's the intro:

The Other War: Iraq Vets Bear Witness

Chris Hedges & Laila Al-Arian

Over the past several months The Nation has interviewed fifty combat veterans of the Iraq War from around the United States in an effort to investigate the effects of the four-year-old occupation on average Iraqi civilians. These combat veterans, some of whom bear deep emotional and physical scars, and many of whom have come to oppose the occupation, gave vivid, on-the-record accounts. They described a brutal side of the war rarely seen on television screens or chronicled in newspaper accounts.

Their stories, recorded and typed into thousands of pages of transcripts, reveal disturbing patterns of behavior by American troops in Iraq. Dozens of those interviewed witnessed Iraqi civilians, including children, dying from American firepower. Some participated in such killings; others treated or investigated civilian casualties after the fact. Many also heard such stories, in detail, from members of their unit. The soldiers, sailors and marines emphasized that not all troops took part in indiscriminate killings. Many said that these acts were perpetrated by a minority. But they nevertheless described such acts as common and said they often go unreported--and almost always go unpunished.

Court cases, such as the ones surrounding the massacre in Haditha and the rape and murder of a 14-year-old in Mah­mudiya, and news stories in the Washington Post, Time, the London Independent and elsewhere based on Iraqi accounts have begun to hint at the wide extent of the attacks on civilians. Human rights groups have issued reports, such as Human Rights Watch's Hearts and Minds: Post-war Civilian Deaths in Baghdad Caused by U.S. Forces, packed with detailed incidents that suggest that the killing of Iraqi civilians by occupation forces is more common than has been acknowledged by military authorities.

This Nation investigation marks the first time so many on-the-record, named eyewitnesses from within the US military have been assembled in one place to openly corroborate these assertions.

I've done a lot of writing about civilian deaths in the wars that have raged on the last few years - always wondering what we didn't know about. Now, finally, at least some of this will be brought to light by the efforts of these courageous journalists and veterans. I think we all have a responsibility to closely examine what our countries' militaries are doing in our names and to hold those responsible accountable.

Excerpt:

"I'll tell you the point where I really turned," said Spc. Michael Harmon, 24, a medic from Brooklyn. He served a thirteen-month tour beginning in April 2003 with the 167th Armor Regiment, Fourth Infantry Division, in Al-Rashidiya, a small town near Baghdad. "I go out to the scene and [there was] this little, you know, pudgy little 2-year-old child with the cute little pudgy legs, and I look and she has a bullet through her leg.... An IED [improvised explosive device] went off, the gun-happy soldiers just started shooting anywhere and the baby got hit. And this baby looked at me, wasn't crying, wasn't anything, it just looked at me like--I know she couldn't speak. It might sound crazy, but she was like asking me why. You know, Why do I have a bullet in my leg?... I was just like, This is--this is it. This is ridiculous."

They're Just More Dead Civilians

The stories about the unending deaths of Afghan civilians, mainly as the result of "air strikes" (which is just a PC way of saying bombings), eat away at me.

Note the latest news:

More than 100 people, nearly half of them Afghan civilians, were killed in Nato air strikes against the Taliban this weekend, an investigation by local officials in Helmand province has concluded.

This, on the heels of repeated outcries for NATO to be more damn responsible while NATO spokespuppets issue the standard, meaningless apologies. It's just insulting. And although Karzai is trying to wrest control of the situation, he is virtually powerless to do anything to stop the killings while NATO's chief just wants to pay off the families and move on. (And what's the big topic of the day at that conference about Afghanistan? How much judges get paid. Get real.)

He [Karzai] has repeatedly called on US, Nato and Taliban forces to do more to prevent civilian casualties, warning that "Afghan life is not cheap and it should not be treated as such". And he has ordered foreign forces to co-ordinate military operations with the Afghan government. "From now on, they have to work the way we ask them to work in here."

Good luck with that. It's not going to happen.

And the military always uses the same excuse:

Major John Thomas, an Isaf spokesman told the Associated Press: "We don't mean to trivialise any of those who died but we want to make it clear that we believe the numbers are a dozen or less."

He blamed the Taliban for the civilian deaths, saying: "It's the enemy fighters who willingly fire when civilians are right next to them."

Now tell me, if London had decided to launch "air strikes" on Belfast to root out IRA terrorists, does anyone think this "human shield" line would have passed muster? Are you kidding me?

We are taught that "civilian casualties" are acceptable during war time but, while some may be absolutely unavoidable, when you have a situation like the one in Afghanistan where more ordinary people are being killed by the allied forces than by insurgents, isn't it time to rethink the military strategy - a strategy, by the way, which everyone has agreed will not even end the war there? Britain's government officials expect to be there for decades.

The US military is now also expanding attacks into Pakistan. How many more civilians will they kill there while their military pretends that fewer are dead than the real counts show?

Now, read this carefully:

Operations inside Pakistan might be carried out independently by the United States, probably with air power, by Pakistani forces acting alone or as joint offensives. In all cases, though, the US will pull the strings, for instance by providing the Pakistanis with information on targets to hit.

Musharraf has apparently already told his military commanders, the National Security Council and decision-makers in government of the development.

Officially, both NATO and Pakistan deny any agreement on hot-pursuit activities. Major John Thomas, spokesman for NATO's International Security Assistance Force, told Asia Times Online, "The ISAF would not strike any targets across the border. That is not part of our mission. We work with the Pakistani government closely on cross-border issues. The ISAF does not have a counter-terrorism mission that I know of."

NATO is supposed to be in charge of military operations in Afghanistan, yet US forces are still free to do whatever they want to? Is it any wonder the place is still such a mess? And if the ISAF's mission does not include counter-terrorism, what is it still doing in Afghanistan?

This statement is from NATO's web site:

NATO is contributing to the fight against terrorism through military operations in Afghanistan, the Balkans and the Mediterranean and by taking steps to protect its populations and territory against terrorist attacks.

And this:

ISAF’s key military tasks include assisting the Afghan government in extending its authority across the country, conducting stability and security operations in co-ordination with the Afghan national security forces; mentoring and supporting the Afghan national army; and supporting Afghan government programmes to disarm illegally armed groups.

No counter-terrorism mission for ISAF? You're kidding, right?

In addition to that, as far as NATO involvement in attacks inside Pakistan go:

Islamabad on June 25 urged NATO-led forces to exercise “restraint” while conducting operations against Taliban fighters in Afghanistan along its border, days after scores of civilians were killed in air strikes by coalition planes and helicopter gunships inside Pakistan.

NATO forces reportedly fired several missiles on June 22 at two villages, leaving at least 33 people dead and more than 70 wounded in North and South Waziristan.

“This incident underscores the need for better coordination, care and restraint by NATO forces, especially when they are operating close to the border,” foreign office spokeswoman Tasneem Aslam told reporters in Islamabad. “We have protested against this incident and we condemn the killing of civilians,” she added.

And I have to mention that the NATO leadership looked incredibly stupid after that:

NATO-led forces admitted June 25 that during an anti-insurgent operation near the shared border, their forces had mistakenly tracked rebels into Pakistani territory and killed up to 10 civilians.

“We regret two things: one that we mistakenly operated inside the Pakistani border, and secondly we regret the loss of civilians in our operation,” an International Security Assistance Force spokesman, Major John Thomas, said in Kabul.

Trained military personnel who don't know how to read maps or use a freaking compass or GPS system? Who are they trying to kid?

And meanwhile, on the Pakistan front, guess who's running the show for those operations?

Senior US officials, including John Negroponte, the deputy secretary of state, and Richard Boucher, the assistant secretary of state, recently visited Pakistan to spell out to opposition leaders that the US is still behind Musharraf, although it will support the participation of secular, democratic political parties in government.

This development occurred even as Washington voiced its dissatisfaction over Musharraf's performance with regard to the Taliban: it pointed to Pakistan's clear involvement in supporting the insurgency in Helmand province since last year.

Indeed, the US was even prepared to withdraw its support of Musharraf, who seized power in 1999, but after a visit by Vice President Dick Cheney to Pakistan, the general remains in favor. Cheney's office is believed to run the United States' Pakistan policy.

What Dick wants, Dick gets. I'll bet he's even counting on flowers and candy.

The reasons are probably twofold: the US needs Pakistan's support should it attack Iran (covert operations into Iran are reportedly already taking place from Pakistan), and the US is concerned over the revival of the Taliban and al-Qaeda in Pakistan

I think we all know that reason number #1 is the prime motivator for Bushco's continued support of Musharraf - to the tune of $1 billion per year. And Pakistan does have nukes, after all. The US administration knows that Musharraf is between a rock and a hard place politically, so he needs to be propped up in order to survive. Yes, another one of those flourishing "democracies" where Bushco actually runs the place. They're like franchises.

And because Dick just hasn't been able to come up with enough credible evidence to launch his war on Iran now, the newest meme is that there are Iranian weapons in Afghanistan. Karzai denies that charge.

Karzai has said there is no proof the Iranian-marked weapons are provided by Tehran.

"Iran and Afghanistan have never been as friendly as they are today," he said earlier this month.

But a defence ministry general said the government had "evidence", including documents, to prove the weapons were coming into the country for the Taliban, with Tehran's knowledge.

The official, who asked not to be identified because of the sensitivity of the matter, would not give further details.

Of course he wouldn't. It's spin.

Ratchet up that rhetoric, boys:

"Iran is giving the option to the US that if it does not give Iran a green light on the nuclear issue and its role in the region, Iran can turn Afghanistan into a second Iraq or Vietnam for them," the general said.

Another military general who asked not to be named agreed, saying, "Iran is baring its teeth to the US at this stage" -- but is also capable of destabilising Afghanistan.

I guess since the "hey, there are Iranian-made weapons in Iraq" thing didn't quite cut it, Buscho now has to figure out other ways to convince the world that bombing Iran is an absolute, imminent necessity.

So meanwhile, as these warmongering fools try to stir up even more trouble, they are doing absolutely nothing to make sure that they stop killing innocent people who are obviously just getting in the way of the glorious day when they will win the war on terror - which, by definition, is impossible.

It's a geopolitical game played on the backs of innocents. War for war's sake. War for profiteering. War for oil. Why should they care about dead men, women and children?

It's infuriating and it needs to end. What the hell is my country doing over there?

Related: Wiki's count of civilian deaths in Afghanistan since 2001
 

Afghanistan: 21 Civilians Killed by Airstrike

Via Reuters:

KANDAHAR, Afghanistan (Reuters) - An air strike by Western forces killed 21 civilians, including women and children, in Afghanistan, a provincial governor said on Wednesday, the latest in a string of civilian casualties that has riled Afghans.

The incident, which brings to nearly 90 the number of civilian deaths blamed by Afghan officials on Western troops in the past two weeks, comes as President Hamid Karzai faces rising pressure to halt the bloodshed and find a way to start peace talks with Taliban insurgents.

90 dead.

Saying your sorry and dishing out a few thousand dollars to family members is not enough: "The U.S. commander for eastern Afghanistan, Army Colonel John Nicholson, apologized on Tuesday for the killing of 19 civilians by U.S. troops just over a month ago."

Johnson added:

"I stand before you today, deeply, deeply ashamed and terribly sorry that Americans have killed and wounded innocent Afghan people," US army spokesman Col John Nicholson told reporters in Washington by video conference from Afghanistan.

"The deaths and wounding of innocent Afghans at the hands of Americans is a stain on our honour and on the memory of the many Americans who have died defending Afghanistan and the Afghan people.

The US military's so-called "honour" was stained a long time ago and feeling ashamed does nothing to bring back those who died needlessly. As nice as it is that he is actually expressing some humanity and responsibility, the thousands of Afghanis who protested these civilian killings would appreciate some assurances that these types of miscalculations will not happen again.

This latest incident shows that they have yet to learn from their mistakes and, in fact, the military again immediately denied reports of dead civilians and claimed they were all members of the Taliban - women and children included.

The bloodshed has returned to levels not seen since the fall of the Taleban in 2001, and a quarter of more than 4,000 people killed last year were believed to have been civilians.

Correspondents say fewer civilians are killed by international forces than in suicide and other attacks by the Taleban.

Well, that's comforting, isn't it? Right.

The way to win those "hearts and minds" is to start by making damn sure you're not killing innocent people. The survivors tend to have very long memories.
 

Two Very Disturbing War Stories

One from Afghanistan. The other from Iraq.

Afghanistan:

Thousands of angry demonstrators took to the streets in Afghanistan yesterday after US forces were involved in a panicked shooting which left 16 civilians dead and 23 injured.

Local people as well as a number of Afghan officials accused the American marines of opening fire indiscriminately following a suicide bomb attack on their convoy in Nangarhar province.

With protests continuing to grow, and the police coming under attack from stone- throwing crowds, the US military maintained that the casualties were the victims of a "complex ambush" in which gunmen had carried out a synchronised attack following the blast in which a marine was injured.

But Mohammad Khan Katawazi, the district chief of Shinwar district, where the deaths took place, insisted that they "treated every car and person along the highway as a potential attacker" as they attempted to speed away from the scene of the explosion.

Abdul Ghafour and Noor Agha Zwak, speaking on behalf of the Nangarhar police and government, and Zemeri Bashary, the Interior Ministry spokesman in Kabul, also claimed the deaths and injuries were due to American fire.

Iraq:

BAGHDAD, Monday, March 5 — Iraqi special forces and British troops stormed the offices of an Iraqi government intelligence agency in the southern city of Basra on Sunday, and British officials said they discovered about 30 prisoners, some showing signs of torture.
[...]
Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki, a conservative Shiite, condemned the raid in Basra. He publicly said nothing about the evidence of torture.

“The prime minister has ordered an immediate investigation into the incident of breaking into the security compound in Basra and stressed the need to punish those who have carried out this illegal and irresponsible act,” said the full text of a statement issued late Sunday by his office.

It remained unclear why he sought to pursue the raiding force aggressively rather than the accusations of prisoner abuse. Efforts to reach officials in his office were unsuccessful.

The civilian deaths in Afghanistan will obviously be the subject of an investigation resulting in the usual conflicting reports.

The raid in Basra and al-Maliki's response to it however ought to be raising some serious red flags for those who have gushed about how cooperative and compliant he's been. This situation, coupled with his terse dismissal of an alleged rape perpetrated by Iraqi security officials in February, shows a man who is far too devoted to sectarian interests to be an effective leader of a country in grave turmoil at a time when bridges need to be built between the warring religious factions.

The discovery of prisoners in the Basra offices, which the British described as the headquarters of Iraq’s government intelligence agency, echoed other recent cases in which American or British forces stumbled onto a government-run detention center that held people showing signs of torture.

As recently as December, a combined force of British and Iraqi troops assaulted a police station in Basra and rescued 127 prisoners from fetid conditions. Some of the prisoners had been tortured.

The most significant recent case involved a secret Baghdad prison run by the Shiite-controlled Interior Ministry, known as Site 4 and discovered by American and Iraqi troops last year, where more than 1,400 prisoners were discovered and where some had been subjected to systematic abuse.

al-Maliki has promised a cabinet shuffle within the next couple of weeks in an attempt, he says, to root out corruption. That certainly remains to be seen, especially if he continues to come to the defence of forces that are torturing and raping people. I have a feeling he won't be around much longer - nor should he be - unless the US decides to continue to prop him up so they can get their oil deals sealed.

Related: Media Censorship by the US Military in Afghanistan following the suicide bombing.
 

Iraq Death Toll Reaches New High

The death toll in Iraq continues to rise at an alarming rate as hundreds of thousands flee to safety in neighbouring countries, a UN report revealed on Wednesday:

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Iraqi deaths hit a new high in October and 100,000 people are fleeing abroad every month to escape worsening violence that is segregating the country on sectarian lines, a U.N. report said on Wednesday.

Painting a grim picture of a population caught in the cross-fire between insurgents, militias, criminal gangs and security forces, the bimonthly report put civilian deaths in October at 3,709 -- 120 a day and up from 3,345 in September.

Under growing pressure from an impatient Bush administration to do more to curb the violence, the Iraqi government accused the United Nations of exaggerating the death toll to "mislead the world". U.N. officials said they stood by their figures.

The Health Minister asserts that the death toll is only 1/4 of the UN number. al-Maliki actually banned the ministry from releasing any figures last month so, while it disputes the UN toll, it hasn't offered any real, documented figures of its own.

A month ago, it [the UN] said Shi'ite Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki's office had banned the Health Ministry and morgue from giving it data, saying this would be controlled by the premier's office.

An official in the Maliki's media office declined to give any figures on Wednesday and referred inquiries to Shimeri.

The minister is a supporter of cleric Moqtada al-Sadr, whose Mehdi Army militia is blamed by Sunnis for death squad violence. It is a charge Sadr, a key ally of Maliki, insistently denies.

Shimeri's apparent estimate of less than 1,000 violent deaths in October is at odds with a figure given to Reuters by a source at the morgue, who said last week it alone received about 1,600 bodies in October, about 1,350 of whom died violently.

Playing politics with the number of people who have died in Iraq in order to claim that the situation is not as bad as it seems, despite daily reports like this which revealed that 101 Iraqis died today, is certainly not conducive to coming up with any kind of coherent strategy to end the violence.

Iraqis and the rest of the world have the right to know how many have perished as a result of this illegal war and despite the Iraqi and US governments efforts to hide the truth, some day we will know. You can't hide that truth forever. The people who have died have family and friends whose grief cannot be ignored and who deserve to have the fate of their loved ones acknowledged. It's cruel that the death of every single coalition soldier is noted and recorded while Iraqis who suffer the same end are treated like non-humans whose lives don't count - literally.

Photo credit: AP

Rumsfeld Hates the Media - Round 67

Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld hates the media, unless of course, he is able to manipulate it to his own ends. Then it's an endless love affair with the propaganda machine.

Rumsfeld told reporters at the Pentagon that he thought the news coverage since the February 22 bombing of a revered Shiite shrine in Iraq had been filled with inaccurate information that would inflame the situation there.

He based his comments on remarks made Friday by U.S. Army Gen. George Casey, the top-ranking U.S. military official in Iraq.

"From what I've seen thus far, much of the reporting in the U.S. and abroad has exaggerated the situation, according to General Casey," Rumsfeld said. "The number of attacks on mosques, as he pointed out, had been exaggerated. The number of Iraqi deaths had been exaggerated."
[...]
On Friday, Casey said the military had confirmed about 30 mosque attacks and about 350 civilian deaths. CNN and other media outlets, citing local officials, have reported more than 100 mosque attacks and at least 500 deaths during the same time.

Let's get real here. This is the same military operation that tried to sell a false story about the rescue of Jessica what's her name and said that Pat Tillman was a hero killed by terrorists - which they later had to admit was a big, fat lie. We're supposed to believe what the military supposedly confirms? Right. I don't think so.

Rumsfeld continued:

He said Iraqis have "looked into the abyss and have said, 'This is not where we want to go. We want to have calm. We want to have a peaceful future.'

He forgot to mention that they also looked into the abyss and told the Americans to get the hell out of their country because they're making the situation worse - not the media reports.

The day Rumsfeld starts telling the truth is the day I'll start believing him. In the meantime, pretty much anything that comes out of his mouth is bullshit. At least the media tells the truth more than he does. That's not saying much, but we certainly can't hold Rumsfeld up as some shining beacon of openness and transparency. He's as thick as a brick and has a head just as hard to match.

What ever happened to that Republican mantra of "taking personal responsibility"? Oh. I forgot. That only applies to everyone else but them.

Afghan Civilian Death Tolls Disputed

Is NATO traveling down the path followed by the US and Israeli militaries when it comes to acknowledging dead civilians? Via CTV:

KANDAHAR, Afghanistan -- As they trickled back to Panjwaii district on Friday, some Afghan civilians said they will bury innocent family members who died in NATO's recent bombardment of the former Taliban stronghold.

Interviews with returning families indicate the civilian death toll in the district west of Kandahar city could be higher than the 13 acknowledged by provincial officials.

NATO says there is no way to know for sure how many innocent people caught in the fierce battles might have been killed, but the alliance has done everything possible to avoid civilian casualties.

Retired farmer Toor Jaan claimed 26 family members, including men, women and children, died in Sperwan on the western edge of the battle zone during bombing and helicopter gunship attacks.
[...]
"Everybody thought the operation would remove the Taliban and security would improve," Jaan said through an interpreter.

"Instead, innocent civilians were attacked and several of my family members are still buried in rubble. This is not what we expected."

And, in a flashback to the recent Israel/Lebanon war:

Faced with questions about civilian deaths, NATO has taken pains to point out the ample warnings area residents received to get out of the combat zone. For days, the area was scattered with leaflets and NATO forces openly warned days in advance that an attack was imminent.

We, the Afghans and the rest of the world deserve to know how many innocent civilians have been killed in this war.

Quote du Jour: On Killing Afghan Civilians

Speaking in the capital, Kabul, Nato spokesman Brigadier Richard Nugee said the alliance was working to change its tactics in 2007 - and civilian casualties were the number one issue to be addressed.

"I believe the single thing that we have done wrong and we are striving extremely hard to improve on is killing innocent civilians," he said.

So, is he saying that NATO is going to improve on how they kill innocent civilians or that it will try not to?

(kidding)

There is no doubt that winning the whole 'hearts and minds' thing involves admitting your mistakes and then trying to do better. NATO could improve that situation by being honest when its troops do kill civilians instead of issuing standard denials that are the stock in trade of military aggressors who believe they somehow maintain the moral high ground by dismissing accounts of civilian deaths from area residents. There have been too many such instances where Afghans (and Iraqis) have been made to look like liars when they decry these deaths and are struck by the almighty hand of the military in an insulting and degrading way for simply trying to get the truth out.

Karzai has repeatedly warned the forces in his country to use extreme caution as he has publicly excoriated the coalition for being careless to the point of callousness at times when civilians have been killed. But, there is nothing he can do to change what's happening.

The war being waged in Afghanistan still follows Rumsfeld's rule of using a stealth force to tackle a hugely complicated situation. Everyone has paid for that and will continue to do so now that the NATO allies are not only overstretched but also weary of that war. History has shown how difficult it is to deal with a country like Afghanistan and that is being borne out to this day. NATO won't be able to kill its way out of this one. It's time for a sharper focus on political solutions involving all of the players in the region - most particularly Pakistan.

Israeli Ambassador Slams Canada's Opposition Parties

In an article in Embassy News the Israeli ambassador to Canada, Alan Baker, accuses the opposition of 'playing politics' with the Middle East, says they're 'naive' and hold 'curious positions' while he pats Stephen Harper on the head for being a good sockpuppet.

The Conservative government has refused to call for a ceasefire until a number of conditions have been met that will ensure a permanent cessation of hostilities. But opposition committee members last Tuesday passed a resolution 7-4 calling for an immediate ceasefire following a day-long hearing in which Mr. MacKay was the only witness to testify.

Mr. Baker says he was overcome with "surprise and shock at the way the opposition parties have developed their very curious positions here."

"The Liberal party, who are saying Canada [should] take a neutral or fair-minded or a balanced approach, I think this is purely opposition talk to establish a different position from the government," he says. "I genuinely don't believe that this is their genuine interpretation of how Canada should be acting.

"If the Liberal party had won the elections and was still in power today, then the Liberal party would have taken exactly the same position that Prime Minister [Stephen] Harper is taking because any fair interpretation of Canadian values and Canadian concepts of the right to protect civilians and the right to protect territory would recognize Israel's right to defend itself against a terror organization," says Mr. Baker.

'Offended' By Opposition MPs

Mr. Baker says he was "personally offended" by NDP foreign affairs critic Alexa McDonough and Bloc Québécois foreign affairs critic Francine Lalonde who "were so blindly hostile to Israel for whatever their own reasons are."

During the hearing, Ms. McDonough questioned whether Israel was violating international law with its bombing attacks on Lebanon, which have destroyed a large portion of the country's infrastructure and killed hundreds of civilians. She and NDP leader Jack Layton have also called for Parliament to reconvene to debate the issue.

Well, at least Baker hasn't called anyone an anti-semite - yet.

Dismissing suggestions Israel has valued Canada's neutral stance in the past and that Canada is now trying to curry favour with the United States by taking the same position as its southern neighbour, Mr. Baker says Israel sees Canada's position "developing over the past few years."

"Not only has it been registered, but it's extremely highly valued by the Israeli leadership," he says.

'highly valued' - well, of course it is! Who wouldn't value the opinion of someone who agrees with you no matter how much death and destruction you cause? And he's just plain wrong about this supposed evolution of Canada's position unless he's talking about how the Israel lobby has cozied up to the Conservatives - not that they needed much cozying up to to begin with since they actually do march lockstep with Bush, his neocon cronies and AIPAC.

Baker's also dead wrong about his interpretation of Canadian values. Someone needs to show him the latest poll that indicates only 32% or so of Canadians agree with Harper's staunch support of Israel. Perhaps he's been getting his education about these so-called Canadian values solely from the Conservative party, because that's the only way his distorted views make sense.

Canadians do not stand for obliterating a country's entire infrastructure in some misplaced mission to root out a few Hezbollah members.

Canadians do not stand for kidnapping and jailing more than 20 members of Palestine's democratically elected parliament.

Canadians do not stand for killing innocent civilians and then having Israel defend these deaths by saying that they dropped a few warning leaflets after they bombed out the escape routes.

Canadians do not stand for gross violations of international laws, including the Geneva Conventions, as we are forced to sit by and watch collective punishment, blockades to humanitarian assistance and the bombing of a civilian building in Qana which was located nowhere near where Hezbollah rockets were reportedly being fired - a fact even the Israeli government conceded after it had massacred innocents.

Canadians do not stand for bombing UNIFIL positions or Red Cross ambulances.

Canadians do not stand for military campaigns that have absolutely no hope of bringing peace to a region.

Canadians do not stand for invading another country, weakening its democratically elected government and then blaming civilian deaths directly caused by Israel on a militant faction of that government.

We certainly do have values, Mr Baker, and they're not the ones being spoon fed to you by Stephen Harper who still refuses to condemn your country's actions. You'll also find that most Canadians do not value Stephen Harper and that he and his minority grip on our federal government are bound to be history in a very short time - thankfully so.

So, enjoy this support of these Conservatives while you have it but remember this: Harper does not speak for the majority of Canadians. Believing otherwise is just plain denial. And, if you want to accuse politicians of playing political games, look to our neighbours to the south who fund your every move and send you missiles to continue your campaign of destruction. They, along with your government, are hell bent on fashioning some sort of New Middle East out of all of this rubble and flesh according to their twisted political philosophy which we've already witnessed to be extraordinarily short-sighted and destructive. So, as America's pop psychologist Dr Phil would ask, 'How's that workin' for you so far?'

And, just a friendly reminder: insanity is doing the same thing over and over - expecting different results. Perhaps you need a refresher course on your country's misadventures in Lebanon just two decades ago. What makes you think things will be any different this time?

Wanker of the Day

Because some people just don't get it:

While neither the media nor the Left will pause to take note, there are a few other numbers we can justifiably project for ourselves on this New Year's Eve, Dec. 31, 2006.

An estimated 16,692 persons were murdered nationwide in 2005, an increase of 3.4 percent from the 2004 figure.

Murder comprised 1.2 percent of the overall estimated number of violent crimes in 2005. (Based on Table 1.)

There were an estimated 5.6 murders per 100,000 inhabitants.

Based upon the 2005 figures, approximately 46 Americans are killed within our borders every day. The Iraq War officially began on March 20, 2003 - approximately 1,375 days ago. Consequently, one can project that well over 63,000 Americans have died at the hands of other Americans since the beginning of the war.

It might do a person some good to think that our media and our Left cared just that much more about the 3,000 military deaths over the same period because they were proud members of our military ... serving our country with courage, dignity and honor. Unfortunately, given that both the media and the Left seem so quick to ignore the more than 63,000 civilian deaths which have occurred during the same time period, I don't know that I will take much comfort from what will likely be their over-coverage of this particular milestone in the Iraq War.

Watch the Riehl World View site for announcements of sympathy for every single one of those murder victims during 2007.

Not.

That bit of astute political analysis was brought to you by the same man who also penned this:

All they can do, day in and day out, is bash the administration and complain about the war. In some twisted way, even Saddam almost looks more noble compared to the faceless editors of the NY Times. At least he is going to take responsibility and ultimately die for his crimes.
[...]
it's unclear if executing Saddam will help Iraq move forward, though a good case can be made that it will. Alas, it will have to do, I suppose. Unfortunately, we can't just up and execute an editor for the Times, instead ... even if eliminating such a profane source of enemy propaganda might actually help Iraq.

Heh! Watch that last bit set the Liberals off! ; )

Set us off? No. Sorry. Making oneself look absolutely pathetic by writing mindless garbage like that doesn't set me off. It just makes me shake my head over the fact that you have fans who actually think what you write is in any way valuable.

Are there any other journalists you'd like to kill, Mr Riehl?

Ignatieff on War Crimes

I've said it before and I'll say it again: Michael Ignatieff is not ready for prime time politics. He's a scholar, not a long-term politician and his latest round of sticking his foot in his mouth proves that once again.

Just how does one get from not losing any sleep about what happened in Qana, Lebanon and months later describing it as a war crime?

Ironically, the controversy erupted as Ignatieff was attempting to explain a previous gaffe about Qana.

Last summer, Ignatieff told the Toronto Star that he was “not losing sleep” over the civilian deaths in Qana — an insensitive remark which he later admitted was a mistake.

In an apparent bid to over-compensate for that initial gaffe, Ignatieff said Sunday that he should have shown more compassion for the Qana victims.

“I was a professor of human rights and I am also a professor of the laws of war and what happened in Qana was a war crime and I should have said that. That’s clear,” he told the popular Radio-Canada program, Tout le monde en parle.

Let me be clear about something: I believe the Qana massacre was a war crime and that it should be thoroughly investigated since the IDF admitted they had absolutely no intel that the building was being used as a missile launching location for Hezbollah. 28 people died - innocent civilians. It doesn't get much more obvious than that.

As for the resignation of his campaign co-chair, Thornhill MP Susan Kadis, I would remind her that this issue is not about the nationality of the purported war criminals. It is about what happened - no matter which country was involved. Those who would just unquestioningly support what Israel did just because they support Israel as a whole need to be able to seperate the actions of the IDF from whatever protectionism they want to afford Israel. That's how crimes ought to be seen, but too often aren't.

Now, as for Mr Ignatieff - whose nomination I am thoroughly opposed to - and his backers who are now claiming that it's 'refreshing' to hear his stance on possible war crimes, I would offer this caution: a seasoned politician on the world stage measures his or her words very carefully. It's annoying. I know. But there are reasons for that kind of behaviour. You want your statesmen to have considered opinions on issues. We have enough free range nonsense coming from leaders like Bush who are a bloody embarassment and a diplomatic nightmare. Ignatieff's stretch from 'not losing sleep' over these deaths to calling them war crimes is one huge leap. How can we really know now exactly what he thinks - especially since his intended audience for those comments was Quebecois where the Israeli bombardment of Lebanon didn't exactly go over all that well? Did he make those those statements based on a core belief or because of the political climate in the province?

So, he's now relying on his status as a professor of human rights for this about face yet he has been anything but definitive about opposing torture - using the ticking time bomb theory as a justification for its use. Surely, as a professor of human rights, one would think he would flatly reject torture. Not so.

Could Ignatieff be an effective politician in the future? Probably. Is he ready to lead the Liberal party right now? No. And I will keep saying that to whoever will listen because being the head of a major political party is not an apprentice's job. It's a role that's deserving of a much more experienced politician who is firm on where he or she stands on the issues. Ignatieff has too much to learn to be entrusted with such a prominent position.

Note: I am not a member of the Liberal party and have not officially endorsed any candidate in the leadership race.

Afghan Civilian Deaths to be Investigated

Following the deaths of at least 16 Afghan civilians in air raids by coalition forces on Monday, Afghanistan president Hamid Karzai has called for an investigation. Concerns by Afghans go much deeper than this tragedy, however:

"We do not like Taliban but we don't like foreign troops because we're shot by both sides," said Abdul Baqi at Mirwais Hospital in Kandahar, where 15 wounded Afghans were brought Monday after a raid on a meeting of Taliban leaders erupted into a firefight in the middle of the village of Azizi.

"We thought Canadians were our friends," he said.

Canadians were not involved in Monday's action, but few Afghans make a distinction between troops of the various western countries in the U.S.-led coalition.

Afghans feel caught in the middle, said Atta Mohammad, who was wounded in the fighting.

"I'm not concerned with Taliban. I'm not concerned with foreign troops," he said. "Who is responsible for me, that I'm being shot?"

So, while Canadians pump their chests and talk about how much the Afghans like having our troops over there, they need to remember there's a war going on and if bullets from foreign troops are killing innocent Afghans there ought not be any distinction made by the country of origin of the shooter.

Taliban sponsored violence has increased dramatically:

Between January and the end of April, suicide bombings killed 14 coalition and Afghan security forces members and wounded 33 others. The cost to civilians was nearly three times higher - at least 34 Afghans were killed and 93 wounded.

There is no doubt that many Afghans are extremely thankful that their country has been freed from the former Taliban government, but one can definitely appreciate the mixed feelings in the country after living with decades of war with no end in sight.

The Taliban has launched an intense attack this spring that has escalated the conflict to fierce proportions and the Afghans are literally caught in the crossfire. It's unclear how the new NATO mission will help to ease the enormous pressures faced by the people.

NATO Chief Meets With Bush

It was a nice photo op anyway and it's the thought that counts, I suppose.

CRAWFORD, Texas (Reuters) - President George W. Bush and
NATO Secretary-General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer on Monday pledged to try to reduce civilian casualties in Afghanistan but blamed the Taliban for using human shields.

Afghan President Hamid Karzai has protested the rising civilian death toll from U.S. and NATO operations trying to defeat a spring offensive by the Taliban.

Afghan officials say dozens of civilians have been killed in recent weeks. The growing death toll has triggered protests by Afghans demanding Karzai's resignation and the expulsion of American troops from Afghanistan.

"The Taliban likes to surround themselves with innocent civilians," Bush said. "They don't mind using human shields because they devalue human life."

Karzai has said Afghanistan could no longer accept civilian casualties, and a U.S. military commander apologized for the killing of 19 civilians by U.S. soldiers during an attack in March.

But, the US military has a history of justifying civilian casualties and then thinking that a weak apology and a few bucks handed out to survivors' relatives makes up for their incompetence.

Over the past month, Afghan officials reported 50 civilians killed in US air strikes in fighting in the western province in Herat, and another 21 in south central Helmand province. They followed a string of similar incidents last year as fighting intensified between NATO and Taliban forces, many of them involving air strikes called in by troops in the heat of battle. “Every time that happens someone walks away .. with a bad feeling either to NATO or the United States or its coalition members. That’s what we don’t want to happen,” General Bantz Craddock, NATO’s supreme allied commander, told reporters Friday.

The deaths have sparked public outrage at a time when NATO is facing a major challenge from the Taliban, creating a dilemma for commanders over whether the gains offered by air strikes are worth the loss in public support. Some analysts say too few troops on the ground, coupled with allied sensitivities about using ground forces and taking casualties, have made air power an irresistible option. “The problem is when you don’t have enough forces on the ground, and when those forces - especially with the variety of NATO countries - are restricted and there are deep concerns about casualties, air power is all you have left,” said Seth Jones, an analyst at the Rand Corporation, a think tank with ties to the US Air Force.

This is what happens when you fight a war on the cheap after you've decided that Iraq is where you're really supposed to be:

US special forces called in unusually heavy aerial support in fighting April 27 through April 30 in the remote Zerkoh Valley of Afghanistan’s western Herat province.

Air force B-1B bombers and F-15E fighters dropped 2,000 pound and 500 pound satellite-guided bombs on Taliban positions and on at least one compound that had been used as a firing position, according to air force summaries. A US military press release said an AC-130 gunship also was used to kill a large number of fighters. It put the total Taliban dead in two days of fighting at 136. Later, though, Afghan and UN officials said the bodies of 50 civilians were recovered, and differing accounts have emerged over whether US forces engaged Taliban fighters or armed villagers fighting off foreign intruders.

The US military has provided no explanation of what happened, or acknowledged any civilians were killed in the fighting. Officials said the commander on the scene used “appropriate level of force” to protect his unit. The rules under which a commander is required to operate are classified, so it is not known what restrictions are placed on them. Military officials say they go to great lengths, using surveillance aircraft and “eyes on the ground” to positively identify their targets, and hold back if they cannot.

Obviously, that's not working.
 

Justifying Civilian Deaths in Afghanistan and Pakistan

It never ceases to amaze me that military spokespeople can spew talking points full of denial and actually believe that others are too dense to see right through them.

How else can you interpret a statement like this - knowing that 90 Afghan civilians were killed last week in botched air strikes and ground combat?

We think the procedures that we have in place are good -- they work," he [U.S. Army Brig. Gen. Joseph Votel, NATO's deputy commander in eastern Afghanistan] told reporters at the Pentagon by videolink from Bagram Air Base near Kabul.

No - they don't, obviously.

And he added that "NATO forces had intentionally fired into Pakistan in one recent incident said to have resulted in the killing of civilians."

Now, think of all of the times the US has scolded other countries militaries or insurgent groups for crossing a national border. Think of Israel's response to Hezbollah soldiers crossing over from Lebanon last year and the revenge war that sparked. Yet, the US military has absolutely no qualms about killing Pakistani civilians while insisting that their methods to avoid civilian casualties "work".

Pakistani officials say 10 civilians were killed in the strikes in North Waziristan, opposite Afghanistan's Paktika province. Pakistan publicly urges foreign forces not to carry out operations on its territory or using its airspace.

And note:

Pakistan has said that NATO has apologized for the strike and told Pakistani officials the firing was inadvertent.

Inadvertent? Bullshit.

Addressing an incident last week in the border area with Pakistan, Votel said the local NATO commander had taken action after identifying a sizable group of insurgents that had come across the frontier into Afghanistan.

"The commander on the ground determined that he needed to continue to address that threat until it was eliminated, and that included firing into areas that were in Pakistan," he said.

Every time they open their mouths, they lie.
 

The New Winter Soldier Hearings Start Today

Iraq Veterans Against the War, following in the footsteps of Vietnam veterans in 1971, are holding new winter soldier hearings about the Iraq & Afghanistan wars beginning today through March 16, 2008 in Washington. IVAW's membership includes veterans from the US & Canada.

Details on how to watch and listen to those hearings are listed here. If the site is down, as it was earlier today, you can also access the hearings at this site.

Via Salon:

Will American war crimes be revealed?

Like Vietnam vets did decades ago, a group of soldiers are poised to speak out about atrocities they say the U.S. committed in Iraq and Afghanistan.

"It has often been remarked but seldom remembered that war itself is a crime. Yet a war crime is more and other than war ... It is an act beyond the pale of acceptable actions even in war. Deliberate killing or torturing of prisoners of war is a war crime. Deliberate destruction without military purpose of civilian communities is a war crime."
-- Former infantry platoon leader William Crandell opening the "Winter Soldier Investigation" in Detroit, Jan. 31, 1971

More than 100 veterans gathered in a Detroit hotel in early 1971 to talk about things they had seen and done in the Vietnam War. Called the Winter Soldier Investigation, the group spoke about a horrifying array of allegations: convoys driving over civilians; burning of villages; bodies thrown out of helicopters; torture, mutilation and infamous "free-fire zones," where anyone not wearing a U.S. uniform could be killed.

Thirty-seven years later, more than 100 veterans will gather over the next several days for "Winter Soldier: Iraq and Afghanistan." The event is designed to be another purging of the horrors of war, and another effort to put American military policy on trial in the public eye. The gathering this time, at the National Labor College outside Washington, D.C., is sponsored by the group Iraq Veterans Against the War. "Soldiers will certainly be testifying about their experience and observation of actions which are absolutely in violation of international law," says IVAW spokesperson Perry O"Brien, who served as an Army medic in Afghanistan in 2003.

In interviews with Salon, several veterans from the group described incidents in Iraq that they believed constituted wrongdoing by the U.S. military, including disproportionate use of air power resulting in civilian deaths. The soldiers were unable to provide Salon with any conclusive evidence of war crimes. But as the fifth anniversary of the U.S. invasion of Iraq approaches, the allegations they and other Winter Soldier members will publicize in Washington this week add to a long-term set of questions about the damage and destruction wrought by U.S. military operations over years of war.

These veterans deserve to be heard and it's quite telling that the author of that article who, after using the quote that "war itself is a crime", asserts that "the soldiers were unable to provide Salon with any conclusive evidence of war crimes" especially in the face of proven allegations of torture, collective punishment and murder.

Will anyone in the MSM listen? That remains to be seen. It should be the duty of citizens in both of our countries to hear what they have to say about the conduct of both of these wars, especially to counter the unending militaristic war propaganda that we are fed daily to attempt to boost support for these missions.
 

It's simple: Ban Cluster Bombs

The New York Times reports that the US government might be prepared to give Israel a slap on the wrist over its use of American-supplied cluster bombs during the Israel/Lebanon war last year.

98% of recorded cluster munitions casualties that are registered with Handicap International are civilians. Cluster munitions are hotly opposed by many individuals and hundreds of groups, such as the Red Cross,[1] the Cluster Munition Coalition and the United Nations, because of the high proportion of civilians that have fallen victim to the weapon. Since February 2005, Handicap International called for cluster munitions to be prohibited and collected hundreds of thousands signatures to support its call.

And remember this from Afghanistan?

In addition, some cluster bomblets, such as the CBU-87, are brightly colored in order to increase their visibility and warn off civilians. However, the color, coupled with their small and nonthreatening appearance has caused children to interpret them as toys. This problem was exacerbated in the United States military action against Afghanistan, when US forces dropped humanitarian rations from airplanes with the same yellow colored packaging as the BLU97. The rations packaging was later changed first to blue and then to clear packaging in the hopes of avoiding such hazardous confusion.

As Human Rights Watch reported last summer:

Human Rights Watch conducted detailed analyses of the U.S. military's use of cluster bombs in the 1999 Yugoslavia war, the 2001-2002 Afghanistan war, and the 2003 Iraq war. Human Rights Watch research established that the use of cluster munitions in populated areas in Iraq caused more civilian casualties than any other factor in the U.S.-led coalition's conduct of major military operations in March and April 2003, killing and wounding more than 1,000 Iraqi civilians. Roughly a quarter of the 500 civilian deaths caused by NATO bombing in the 1999 Yugoslavia war were also due to cluster munitions.

This is what happens when cluster bombs are dropped on innocent civilians:

According to eyewitnesses and survivors of the [Blida] attack interviewed by Human Rights Watch, Israel fired several artillery-fired cluster munitions at Blida around 3 p.m. on July 19. The witnesses described how the artillery shells dropped hundreds of cluster submunitions on the village. They clearly described the submunitions as smaller projectiles that emerged from their larger shells.

The cluster attack killed 60-year-old Maryam Ibrahim inside her home. At least two submunitions from the attack entered the basement that the Ali family was using as a shelter, wounding 12 persons, including seven children. Ahmed Ali, a 45-year-old taxi driver and head of the family, lost both legs from injuries caused by the cluster munitions. Five of his children were wounded: Mira, 16; Fatima, 12; ?Ali, 10; Aya, 3; and `Ola, 1. His wife Akram Ibrahim, 35, and his mother-in-law `Ola Musa, 80, were also wounded. Four relatives, all German-Lebanese dual nationals sheltering with the family, were wounded as well: Mohammed Ibrahim, 45; his wife Fatima, 40; and their children Ali, 16, and Rula, 13.

30 August 2006 The UN's humanitarian chief has accused Israel of "completely immoral" use of cluster bombs in Lebanon.

UN clearance experts had so far found 100,000 unexploded cluster bomblets at 359 separate sites, Jan Egeland said.

Israel has repeated its previous insistence that munitions it uses in conflict comply with international law.
[...]
UN efforts to rid Lebanon of cluster bombs have been under way since the conflict ended. Earlier estimates from UN experts had suggested a total of about 100 cluster bomb sites.

Mr Egeland described the fresh statistics as "shocking new information".

"What's shocking and completely immoral is: 90% of the cluster bomb strikes occurred in the last 72 hours of the conflict, when we knew there would be a resolution," he said.

So, stories about how the Bush administration might suddenly get tough with the Israel government over its use of cluster bombs that his government gave to them are not even worth the paper they're printed on.

Israel/Lebanon War Updates

Updated throughout the day.

Following the Qana massacre on Sunday, the Israeli government announed very early Monday morning that it would cease airstrikes on southern Lebanon in order to allow for an investigation of the incident and to give residents the ability to evacuate the region safely.

But the IDF is still attacking.

Via AP:

Prime Minister Ehud Olmert agreed to a 48-hour halt in the airstrikes beginning at 2 a.m. Monday while the military concludes its inquiry into the attack on the south Lebanese village of Qana.

But Israel left open the option it might hit targets to stop imminent attacks or if the military completed its inquiry within 48 hours.

Monday's airstrikes near the village of Taibe were meant to protect ground forces operating in the area and were not targeting anyone or anything specific, the army said.

In a second airstrike around the port city of Tyre, Israel accidentally killed a Lebanese soldier when it hit a car that it believed was carrying a senior Hezbollah official, the Israeli army said. Lebanese security officials said the soldier was killed by a rocket strike from a drone aircraft.

The Israeli army justified the action, saying the leader believed to have been in the car was a threat to Israel. Instead, the car was carrying a Lebanese army officer and soldiers.

And while some people are trying to make their way out of the area, journalist Robert Fisk reporting from Lebanon told the CBC on Monday that the IDF is, in fact, blocking some convoys from getting through to safety.

- Human Rights Watch: Indiscriminate Bombing in Lebanon a War Crime.

Human Rights Watch researchers have been in Lebanon since the onset of the current hostilities and have documented dozens of cases in which Israeli forces have carried out indiscriminate attacks against civilians while in their homes or traveling on roads to flee the fighting. A report of these findings and their legal consequences will be issued later this week.

Note: HRW also has this to say about Hezbollah's actions:

Human Rights Watch has also documented Hezbollah’s deliberate and indiscriminate firing of Katyusha rockets into civilian areas in Israel, resulting in 18 civilian deaths to date. These serious violations of international humanitarian law are also war crimes.

“War crimes by one party to a conflict never justify war crimes by another,” Roth said.

- Amnesty International has a summary of applicable international humanitarian laws on its site.

- Qana Last Time: 'Just a bunch of [dead] Arabs'.

- Lebanese Civilians Bear the Brunt of Israel's Destruction.

- Israel will 'expand and deepen its actions against Hezbollah'.

"We cannot agree to an immediate ceasefire in Lebanon because then we will find ourselves in a few months in a similar situation," Peretz told a heated parliamentary debate during which four Israeli Arab lawmakers were escorted out for heckling. One Knesset member called Peretz a murderer.

- Update: The Israeli government has just approved the widening of its ground attack in Lebanon.

- CNN reports that 15,000 IDF reservists have been called up according to Israeli radio.

- News from Syria:

DAMASCUS (Reuters) - Syrian President Bashar al-Assad told the Syrian military on Monday to raise its readiness, pledging not to abandon support for Lebanese resistance against Israel.

more to come...