Killing the Innocent — on Purpose — in Iraq
Jeanne at Body and Soul talks about a story that really depressed me when I read it in the LA Times last week. It concerns a group of US soldiers in Baghdad who shot up a garbage truck one night, mistakenly believing that its occupants were planting mines. And then, having determined that they were innocent victims, two US sergeants finished off a wounded teenager by shooting him as he lay writhing on the street. To put him out of his misery, you see, the same way you would end the suffering of a wounded animal. Except he wasn’t an animal, of course. He was a human being. Just not in the eyes of a couple of young men from the US heartland whose values have been twisted by the cruel logic of occupation.
Jeanne thought it must actually be an older story that she’d read about previously, but then realized that no, it was just a repetition of the same exact circumstances: Déjà vu all over again.
We can expect such incidents to continue, and multiply. It’s the nature of war. And it shows ever more clearly how we as a nation are following the same path to defeat that we walked in Vietnam.
November 6th, 2004 at 7:17 pm
My god is that disgusting.
November 7th, 2004 at 4:39 am
That’s what happens when you raise a generation used to hitting the “reset” button everytime things don’t go well in their video game. Just forget that mistake and start over.
November 7th, 2004 at 6:59 am
Man kills himself at trade center site to protest Iraq War, Bush reelection.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6428499/
November 7th, 2004 at 7:12 am
We shouldn’t be surprised about this story; it is the expect result in all wars.
The problem is that this is war initiated by the United States that had the initial goal of finding WMD’s and removing links to “terrorism”/al-queda that has now morphed into a war about freedom and democracy and changing the Middle East – W.T.F. – B.S. – S.N.A.F.U.
Now that a significant percentage of the US population has bought into this faulty conventional wisdom, we are witnessing a population embracing the psycological pathology of cognitive dissonance.
November 9th, 2004 at 11:01 pm
This is incredible… really.
A prime example of rumour mongering…
The story is an urban myth, perpetuated since the Civil War and with every war/conflict it morphs again. This story resides within the morass of the emotional and ignorant. It rises every now and then whenever a strawman is needed to take the place of facts.
And as for the war, I have experience seeing what the Muslim agenda can do. And no Blue Stater couldn’t stomach what happens when reason is used to deter fanatics or to get respect for your own beliefs.
Actually there are examples of what would happen to a Blue Stater when confronted with the Muslim agenda… John Walker and Adam Gadahn both from Calif.
November 10th, 2004 at 7:19 am
Uh, it’s not an urban myth. The two soldiers in this latest incident are undergoing trial, and their defense amounts to asserting they performed a “mercy killing,” rather than a murder. They admit killing the guy.
The story pops up with each new war because with each new war it happens again.