Just In Case You Forgot...We're Still In Iraq--UPDATED
With all the hubbub about baby mamas in the media snowballing, you'd almost think we didn't have troops risking their lives in Iraq and Afghanistan. In fact, the US has ceded one more region to the Iraqi government on Monday:
The US military handed over Anbar province to Iraqi security forces yesterday, less than two years after it almost lost it to a Sunni Arab insurgency.
"We are in the last ten yards of this terrible fight. The goal is very near," Major-General John Kelly, commander of American forces in Anbar, told US, Iraqi and tribal officials at a ceremony in the provincial capital, Ramad, to mark the event.
"Your lives and the lives of your children depend on victory."
Maj-Gen Kelly and Anbar's governor, Mamun Sami Rasheed, embraced after signing a document making Anbar the 11th of Iraq's 18 provinces, and the first Sunni Arab one, to be returned to Iraqi control since the US-led invasion.
Police marched down a main street carrying Iraqi flags, followed by a parade of vehicles trimmed with flowers.
The US president, George Bush, praised the people of Anbar, scene of more than a quarter of US combat deaths in Iraq since 2003, for turning against al-Qaeda's Sunni Islam militants. "Today, Anbar is no longer lost to al-Qaeda - it is al-Qaeda that lost Anbar," he said.
UPDATE: Cernig has more on his blog:
Although this is being claimed as unalloyed good news by US pro-occupation voices, the general in command of US forces in Western Iraq is rather more circumspect. Read on...
We can't get out of Iraq AND not give Iraq back to Iraq. They're mutually exclusive. So I'm not understanding the beef.
There IS a goal? Really?
I don't think we so much "gave Anbar back to Iraq." More like we sold it to them with a subprime loan.
Great news! Now how much did that cost me?
The Ministry of Truth speaks.
Okay fine, now can the troops that were there come home today?
Whenever we say anything about Iraq we should put it context so that we are not deluding ourselves. The human toll both for Americans and for the Iraqis has been horrendous; Iraq is still not a functioning society or economy; and Anbar is only a small part of the current reality in that country. Besides, the "fight" is against fundamentalist terrorism and that extends into Afghanistan, Pakistan and other parts of the globe. These people are so cynical about everything and such facile propagandists that they will try to "doublespeak" reality into some kind of "victory" before the puppet-in-chief leaves office.
A Soldier Cries
Today I saw a soldier cry.
A patriot. A warrior.
An eyes wide open combat veteran…cry.
He cried because no one cared about the people in his care.
He cried because the cameras weren’t there,
to see the shame of this war we all share.
And it’s not Ok.
Today, I was a soldier cry.
What will you do, today?
Wolfsinger
Anyone from the Bush family work up enough patriotism to serve in this Bush family war yet?
"Today, Anbar is no longer lost to al-Qaeda - it is al-Qaeda that lost Anbar,”
Hmm... How did al-Q get in there in the first place?
Oh yeah...
Nice timing. This is very conveniently happening during the GOP convention. These are some slick bastards. Dollars to donuts they use this in the first 15 minutes, then drill it all night long
What's the beef? Well duh! This means surge worked, the strategy is working. Iraq is being rebuilt along democratic lines. Bad news for Bush-bashers.
Here's a quote I found in my local paper. It's a quote from former marine Jim Gilligan who has been deployed to Iraq, Afghanistan and Gitmo over the last 2 years. He is with 'Iraq Veterans against the War' ....
'We have to stop the suffering we've caused'. He said he witnessed US Marines mortaring an Afghan village and then telling the residents .. 'If the Taliban does that to you again, just let us know.'
Way to win hearts and minds there fella's !
Since Lieberman is speaking at the convention tonight, you can bet this will be at the heart of his speech, after he tells us all the things McCain couldn't do for five and a half years. Fred Thompson is also going to speak tonight. Sounds like a good night to hit the bed early with a good book.
“Your lives and the lives of your children depend on victory.”
Victory? Victory over what precisely? Victory over the foreign occupiers? Victory over your neighbor who doesn't think a small handful of foreign oil company execs should take the lions share of the nations resource wealth? When oh when will these idiots actually EXPLAIN what they mean by "victory" when they are refferring to Iraq where alledgedly "victory" was accieved 5 years ago. I think the word the 'good' general was looking for was subjugation.
If the Bushies pull us out of Iraq to take the issue away from Obama, it will be worth it.
And we'll still beat McCain because it will have proven that we were right. And there is so much else to run against him on.
America's Barack
Airhead @ 12:
Gee, I supposed truer words have never been spoken. And what a wise investment the invasion and occupation have been. Go back to sleep America.
Bla Bla Bla
Airhead @ 12:
It still doesn't change the fact that Boosh illegally invaded a sovereign nation. What was the reason he invaded again?
Every child born in this country now is saddled with a 34k dollar debt. I hope your kids and grand kids like working.
The greatest swindle in the history of the world.
Why would they ever want us to leave?
According to Dick Morris we were invited in. How dare they kick their invited guests out! How rude!!
Oh, and that Palin pick, not working out so well. On RCP the spread has gone from Obama +1.8 to Obama +6.0
Bam!
mudshark @ 19:
Oh one more thing before I go. Your name is apt.
Airhead @ 12:
A democracy like ours? You stupid fuck. Your moron Reshitlickons bankrupted our nation. I hope you die in a prison camp, you dim-whited piece of trash.
Gov. Palin and Iraq
Presumably, John McCain would only select a candidate for vice president who shared his supposedly clear-eyed vision about Iraq, who had also called for -- or at least thought it was a good idea -- to push more troops into Iraq in 2007.
Well, maybe Sarah Palin thought the surge was great, or maybe she didn't. It's hard to tell what, if anything, Palin thinks or thought about the surge of troops in Iraq, or the decision to invade Iraq in the first place, for that matter. A clip search doesn't show any substantive comments from Palin about Iraq during her short term as governor of Alaska, in 2007 or 2008, or at any point prior to that. That includes instances when she was specifically asked about the war.
In an interview with Alaska Business Monthly shortly after she took office in 2007, Palin was asked about the upcoming surge. She said she hadn't thought about it. "I've been so focused on state government, I haven't really focused much on the war in Iraq," she said. "I heard on the news about the new deployments, and while I support our president, Condoleezza Rice and the administration, I want to know that we have an exit plan in place; I want assurances that we are doing all we can to keep our troops safe."
Seven months into the surge, she still either had not formed any opinion on the surge or the war or just wasn't sharing. "I'm not here to judge the idea of withdrawing, or the timeline," she said in a teleconference interview with reporters during a July 2007 visit with Alaska National Guard troops stationed in Kuwait. "I'm not going to judge even the surge. I'm here to find out what Alaskans need of me as their governor."
That's a little weird, since Fort Richardson, near Anchorage, has dispatched countless soldiers to Iraq, including many who did not make it back. And Palin's own son, Track, is an infantry soldier who could go there any time.
Also
In a recent BusinessWeek interview, Gov. Sarah Palin (R-AK) admitted that she believes the Iraq war was fought because of oil.
link
I guess she dosen't believe John McCain's view of fighting terrorism in Iraq.
There's no stability of government to sustain this achievement.
But here's how it will stack up:
If it remains peaceful, it's a grand achievement and a tribute to the perseverance of American forces.
If it goes up in flames, it's al-Qaeda's fault and a sign that we need to persevere.
Either one will be presented in the media chock full of glorious tautology and fake patriotism, glossed over with patriotic soundbites and taglines.
For reasons of their own, the indigenous freedom-fighters in Iraq have taken an hiatus from the slaughter.
This could change in a literal minute, if it seems to them that it would be to their advantage to revive the slaughter.
They have no reason not to.
To imagine the USer invaders are in 'control' of ANYFUUKINGTHING in Iraq is to ignore EVERYTHING any invader ever learned from insurgency...
They should have held GOP convention from Craig's toilet stall, would have been a smaller 'shitstorm' than the one now in progress...bawaaaaaaaaa hah!
Shadowgm Hussein @ 25:
As long as it survives 'till November, Mission Accomplished.
tx @ 24:
McCain: the surge is working!, the surge is working!
Palin: What surge?
The more i find out about her, the more this women scares me (especially if McCain wins).
The only surge Palin knows of is the one from her broken douchbag.
John J @ 29:
She was focusing on getting the US out of Alaska..
Just In Case You Forgot…We’re Still In Iraq
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FS_VlIhKn6c
mudshark @ 19:
Whoever profits from an endeavor should be the ones paying for it.
Anyway, my question was why are sane people (liberals) complaining about this turn of events? I get how the Bush admin will spin it and they're full of shit as usual.
pissed off patricia @ 6:
Bingo.
Whatever happened to the Anti-War Movement anyway?
CafeenMan @ 33:
All you can say is working for now. But that's discounting Muqtada al-Sadr's truce, and the Reawakening Councils.
Where are the WMD's?
Who are we going to use to attack Russia over Georgia
Civil War recreaters or
Brownie troops?
L.A. Confidential @ 35:
Still around, even if the active protesters are fewer.
Believe it or not, people who believe Iraq had WMDs are still around as well, although in fewer numbers.
What was conveniently left off was the fact that al-Qaeda would Never had been there had we not invaded in the first place.
No matter how right they try to make this abhorrent insane war it will always remain a WRONG War and GWB and his ilk will be War Criminals forever.
Iraq and Afghanistan are depressing to the average American. MSM doesn't like to remind us of our failures. Give us Britney and Paris, and we will suck it up. I think that the average American has the attention span of an gnat.
FT column today:
L.A. Confidential @ 35:
They are in Minneapolis.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/video/2008/sep/02/minneapolis.protests?g...
When he announced the surge in January 2007, said "the Iraqi government plans to take responsibility for security in all of Iraq's provinces by November." It's almost a year after that, and we still haven't turned security over in seven provinces.
It's about
http://tinyurl.com/5zqq5e
L.A. Confidential @ 42:
A bright future rapidly aPpRoaching!
P.D. @ 39:
I thought it was Brittney and Paris who sucked it up.
From the first sentence in this post "... you'd almost think we didn't have troops risking their lives in Iraq and Afghanistan." I would modify that sentence to read that they are risking their lives in those quagmires for absolutely no justifiable reasons whatsoever. All the more reason for those soldiers to realize that since the government and the military lied to them and that they are slaughtering innocent civilians and children in Iraq and Afghanistan unjustifiably, that there is no reason why they should be used as cannon fodder by their most uncaring government. All of these soldiers and Marines should be in possession of the powerful documentary Sir! No Sir! which told the story of the GI movement during the Vietnam conflict. As former Marine Dan Felushko, who deserted from the military, said in Robert Fantina's Desertion and the American Soldier: 1776-2006 "I didn't want 'Died deluded in Iraq' [which can also apply to Afghanistan] over my gravestone.
L.A. Confidential @ 35:
id say they sold out!
45 Erroll
Do you work for the marketing department of that video?
I lived in Austin, Texas during the time Bush was governor. Later, of course, no doubt like most Americans with integrity, I became concerned about the situation enfolding in Iraq and the many lies being fed to the American public. Lies such as the Jessica Lynch lie, the Pat Tillman lie, and especially the al-Zarqawi lie, just to name a few.
But I was born and raised in Delaware so in mid-2005, I wrote a letter to Joe Biden and I asked him specifically, "Senator Biden, what has happened to my country"? Joe Biden answered me in November 2006 when he appeared on "Meet The Press" and responded with, "We can't get RID of the president" to a question about why the Democrats can't end the war.
Now, I'm concerned about this unqualified, Sara Palin person, who God forbid, COULD end up being required to answer that red phone. So I'm considering writing another letter this time to VP Candidate Biden and asking him a similar question regarding what has happened to my country?
Hopefully, he will respond in November -- after he and Obama have taken the White House and given us back our country.
the crappy truth is you cant separate afganistan from iraq! they are both bushes wars, and anyone not willing to see thats wearing rose colored glasses, 911 usa bin ladden reinforce with two brigades now lets get on with the real war on children !
As usual, all you leftists have missed the point:
We finally got those flowers the neocons promised us! Victory is ours!
'Cause nothing says victory like police marching down Main Street...
Love the spin on the headline. 'Good news from Iraq? Just bitch about how long we've been there!'
49 Centrocitta
Technically, sarah palin (tall) is MINIMALLY qualified for vice-president. The constitution only specifies for president (who she could possibly suceed but doubtfully successfully), to be 35, a citizen of the US or a Natural Citizen, and a resident of 14 years.
One, I'm not sure how important the Founding Father's wanted the presidency, and two this would be a good example to argue that they meant the constitution to be a Living Document.
ooo...OOO...ooo..
Night of the Living Document...
Bwaa...ha...ha...ha...ha
Funk the War!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nxlb0_G72uM
ysbaddaden @ 47:
As an [alleged] liberal, have you actually bothered to see that documentary? If you have, perhaps you can kindly explain what your objection is to those in the military realizing that they could not in good conscience continue to participate in the subjugation and killing and the slaughter of the Vietnamese, who never threatened anyone anyone in these United States? Those people, unlike those in the military today, should be considered the true heroes of this country for refusing to take part in the wanton genocide of the Vietnamese people, since approximately 3 to 5 million of them died unjustifiably when their country was invaded by the United States. Again, kindly put forth, if you are able, why those soldiers and Marines in Iraq and Afghanistan should not in good conscience, as their brethren did in Vietnam, refuse to participate in killing the citizens of those countries who are guilty of nothing more than defending their countries against the invading armies of the United States. Or are you simply not bothered by the fact that the Vietnamese were killed because their faces were yellow and now the Iraqis and the Afghanis are being killed because their faces are brown?
It is apparent that your flag waving super patriotic snide comment belongs on a neoconservative web site or on an Army and/or recruiting web site instead of on a liberal blog.
"Is there a hole for me to get sick in?"..Dylan
pissed off patricia @ 14:
Actually there's some fun happening today on C-SPAN 2!! The entire Ron Paul convention, "Rally for the Republic" is being broadcast live gavel to gavel starting at around noon, Central Time. Go to Rallyfortherepublic.com for the schedule. (It's also streaming live at their website).
Tucker Carlson (gag) will be opening around 12:30 pm Central Time (1:30 p.m.EST), Jesse Ventura 3:30 pm (Central), Barry Goldwater, Jr., and other "surprise speakers" will be in the line-up. Ron Paul will be delivering his speech around 8pm EST.
I'll be watching the action for many reasons, but the main one is that Ron Paul was shut out of the Republican Presidential Debates by his own party and by Faux News and he was ignored during other debates, yet he handily won every single poll afterwards (much to Sean Hannity's dismay!!). Even though he's not still running for POTUS, I do appreciate many of his positions, particularly those against U.S. imperialism and his comments on the economy and his analysis on why we are where we are today.
The Republican Party shut him out of their own convention in spite of the fact that he IS a Republican and was a candidate for POTUS, having set the record for raising the most $$ in one day of all candidates!
Hey! At least I'll bet this "convention" will be entertaining! And we won't have to listen to Lieberman's whiney-assed traitorous lies or the MSM pundits B.S.
.....One, I’m not sure how important the Founding Father’s wanted the presidency, and two this would be a good example to argue that they meant the constitution to be a Living Document......
When the Founding Father's wrote the Constitution, there were no dumb dumb citizens such as Daniel Boone, Davey Crockett and Sam Houston. Texas belonged to Mexico. Americans want intelligent people running our government and not bottom of the class students like Bush and McCain and especially not a radical, redneck, soccer mom from Ruby Ridge.
56 Erroll
You bring it up in so many comments
Even in this response instead of a yes or no, or get bent, you posted another advert.
Badwater @ 9:
my bet's on Not A Chance in Hell of that ever happening!!!
And the slimy shot at the end of the post: "“Today, Anbar is no longer lost to al-Qaeda - it is al-Qaeda that lost Anbar,” he said."
shows yet again that Bu$h is saber-rattling... sounds like more Bring It On to me. He has no frickin' idea what's going on in Iraq and not one clue about how safe Anbar is in the Iraqi's hands. Bu$h is still an arrogant fucktard in my opinion.
Asiren @ 10:
that's what I'm wondering too... I thought al-Qaeda was in Pakistan and Afghanistan... they never were in Iraq!
62 right on!
We gotta be careful with that Al Qaeda comment. Even though it was through lack of vigilence on booshco's part, what's there is a much smaller Al Qaeda in Iraq, not Al Qaeda per se (although there's some linkage.) My understanding is that they're for the most part simply Iraqians who want us out, and seem to have no other mission beyond that.
Otherwise we're falling for booshco's framing, and make any success against this small group look like a bigger success for them, than it actually is.
Timmm @ 41:
Exactly what I thought... they're in Minneapolis for certain!
ysbaddaden @ 63:
Exactly my point... Bu$h is wrapping any insurgent fighters into the al-Qaeda group without any understanding of who the American troops are actually fighting... it's a very unsteady house of cards there and he hasn't won a frickin' thing in my opinion. The Iraqis want the occupiers out of their country now and are taking an action that may do just that. We'll see how it turns out. I'm not, ever, advocating any appreciation for Bu$h and his syncophants... ever!
ysbaddaden @ 63:
Look for 'Al-Queda in Russia' to team up with 'Al Queda in Iran' and create an 'Al Queda in Minneapolis/St Paul' to threaten America and scare us into voting for McSame.
58 Abbywood. How do I get CSpan 2 online?
Actually it's my understanding that Al-Qaeda in Iraq was only a small part of the insurgency. The bulk is displaced Baathists and their fellow Sunnis, against the Shia Al Malki (who's making overatures to Ahmadinejad), and his rival Muqtada al Sadr head of the Mahdi army. Al Qaeda overall, is weakening some in the region for how they've targeted civilians, and al Sadr for blowing off the Golden Dome of one Sunni Mosque. He either thinks al Malki is not Shia enough, a collaberator, or I suspect wants to be like the Ayatollah of Iraq, so he's pulled back his army who were mass murdering Sunnis, which also hurt his claim.
ysbaddaden @ 60:
I will attempt to make this as simple as I can for you. The reason that I referenced the documentary Sir! No Sir!, as I attempted to explain at comment # 46, apparently to no avail, was to demonstrate that there is no legitimate reason why those in the military today should be, as the sentence of this post "Just in Case You Forgot... We're Still in Iraq" states, "risking their lives in Iraq and Afghanistan." If you claim to be a liberal, then one would have assumed that it would have been obvious that those in the military today should not have to be increasing their chances of ending up in a VA hospital across this country because they have been brain damaged, have been severely burned, blinded, have had their limbs amputated. or suffering as I am from the effects of PTSD. Military personnel today, just like those in Sir! No Sir! did, should realize that they have a brain and consequently have every right, as evidenced by the UCMJ, to speak out against illegal wars. They should be speaking out against those illegal and immoral occupations of Iraq and Afghanistan just as those in the GI resistance spoke out against the Vietnamese peasants being slaughtered by the United States military.
During the 1840s, Henry David Thoreau was jailed for refusing to pay taxes in support of the Mexican-American War. Ralph Waldo Emerson went to visit Thoreau in jail. Emerson asked "Henry, what are you doing in there?" Thoreau replied, "Ralph, what are you doing out there?" The question then becomes, not why I am referencing this important documentary but rather why you, as an alleged liberal, are not.
I just returned from the Democratic convention. As MSNBC Chris Matthews pointed out during the live broadcast in Denver the Democrats avoided talking about the Accountability issues. False intelligence before the war, an unnecessary war, torture, tossing the Geneva convention out the window, outing of Valerie Plame, illegal wiretapping program, politization of the Dept of Justice, congressional subpoenas being ignored etc etc. Take your pick of crimes committed by the Bush administration.
Most Americans spend years teaching their children to accept responsibility for their actions, yet we have not witnessed either party really hold the Bush administration accountable. Both parties keep talking about "turning the page, moving on, looking forward"
We witnessed in the 90's what the Republicans deemed important in regard to a President and Accountability. Will the Republicans as the Democrats did at their convention pretend that we can move forward as a nation as we wade through the unnecessary pools of blood spilled by both American soldiers and the Iraqi people in a war of choice based on a pack of lies?
Will the Republicans address holding the Bush administration accountable at their convention? Or will they continue to ignore these critical issues? I am deeply discouraged by both parties.
We know what it takes to get the Republicans accountability juices to flow. LIES UNDER OATH HAVING TO DO WITH A BLOW JOB. The Republicans are clearly not concerned about the unnecessary deaths, 50 thousand American soldiers injured, hundreds of thousands of Iraqi people who are now dead, who knows how many have been injured, 5 million Iraqi refugees. Hell either are the Democrats. They did not touch these issues at the convention.
We are hearing "move on , turn the page, our nation needs to move forward" yada yada from both the Democrats and Republicans. Will we allow them to pretend to move forward or demand ACCOUNTABILITY as Rep Dennis Kucinich continues to push for?
right on! @ 64:
hell hundreds of thousands marched against the invasion and afterwards. Accumulatively millions...30 million world wide. The media ignored the WWII, Korean, Vietnam, Desert Storm Vets during those marches. They ignored the teachers, union members, students, soccer moms, families pushing strollers and seniors in wheel chairs. They would show the 20 people with black hoods over their heads to the American public repeatedly and ignore the hundreds of thousands of middle americans who marched against this bloody and unnecessary war based on "a pack of lies".
People have become discouraged by the lack of fair coverage and our Reps ignoring the Accountability issue. (both Republicans and Democrats) think they can take the majority of the American people who do not want to know the truth or face it into the future with out examining what really take place. They may be successful.
But the whole world knows we are a society in decline, wading through the blood of the Iraqi people. The rest of the world knows it and that is why they fear us.
69 Erroll
You're trying to criminalize the soldiers and hold their superiors responsible for those orders non-answerable.
I doubt you can understand this; it's too brief.
......During the 1840s, Henry David Thoreau was jailed for refusing to pay taxes in support of the Mexican-American War. Ralph Waldo Emerson went to visit Thoreau in jail. Emerson asked “Henry, what are you doing in there?” Thoreau replied, “Ralph, what are you doing out there?” The question then becomes, not why I am referencing this important documentary but rather why you, as an alleged liberal, are not......
And together, they wrote "The Spoon River Anthology". Gay lovers also.
i watched the late late late news last night/early morning on cbs, abc and nbc -- all of them reported on the turning over of anbar to iraqi security control and all of them reported that everything is just grand in anbar, no more violence at all, one minute there were 90,000 sunni militia members being paid by the us to stop fight against the occupation and now, magically, there are 36,000 iraqi police/military.
then they went on to talk about changes in the dollar.
given their complete lack of credibility on iraq, i am now unable to believe even a single word with regard to anything else. so i am left wondering what the real story is behind the economic report -- i can only assume the situation there is in reality much more dire than we're hearing and being led to believe, just as the anbar security turnover is much more problematic than you would know from listening to any of the so-called news reports.
I was deployed in Ramadi and Fallujah, so I can't say I'm not hoping for my fellow Marines to get out of that hellhole. The sooner the better.
But what the hell does a turnover really mean? It's just a piece of paper and a way to get more Marines over to Afghanistan, where they are desperately needed. I don't believe that you can secure one part of the country without securing all of it. Fallujah is just a couple hours outside of Baghdad and a great place for insurgents from Baghdad to go for some R&R while the Army does their raids in the city. If the Army ends up having to go back into the province just because most of the Marines are gone, chances are all hell will break loose again and they'll have to send the Marines back in again.
gee i never would have guessed that gas prices would begin to drop and images and statements of "success" in iraq are flowing from wingnut mouths. and now we have the wonderful image of a peace treaty type of signing. and how nice to have it during the week of the repubic convention.
damn if they are nothing they certainly are predictable.
i wonder when the actual wall we built dividing the civil war in iraq will be taken down.
ysbaddaden @ 73:
This will probably be like shouting into the wind but nonetheless I shall attempt to respond to your comment. I shall go in reverse order. I have absolutely no idea what your enigmatic last sentence is supposed to mean. Why should I fail to understand your previous "brief" sentence where you claimed that I believed that those who gave the orders to the soldiers to occupy and terrorize the Afghan and Iraqi people should somehow not be answerable for giving those orders? Nowhere in my comments did I ever write that. But that does not mean that American soldiers should be let off the hook for carrying out those orders. As I attempted to explain earlier, apparently to no avail, when one joins the military it does not mean that they leave their brains behind in the civilian world. As David Zeiger, director of Sir! No Sir! [there is another reference to that documentary which you, as an alleged liberal, hate so much] once wisely pointed out in an interview, the soldiers "are just as capable as anyone of knowing right from wrong." One wonders when these soldiers who are so quick to blindly obey orders will perhaps ever acknowledge the words of former Master Sergeant and Green Beret Donald Duncan [shocking, isn't it, a Green Beret who dared to think for himself and to question authority] in Sir! No Sir! who observed that "the problem I had was realizing that what I was doing was not good. I was doing it right, but I wasn't doing right." Or the words of Dave Cline who was seriously wounded in Vietnam and stated in Sir! No Sir! [here is another mention of that movie that dares to show military personnel challenging the military]:
"You find out that it's all lies, that they are just lying to the American people. And your silence just means that you are a part of keeping that lie going. I couldn't stop; I couldn't be silent. I felt I had a responsibility to my friends, and to the country, in general. And to advocate for the Vietnamese who were fighting for their country."
This is what the soldiers today should be doing, empathizing with and advocating for the Iraqis and the Afghans by refusing to take part in the illegal occupations of their countries. But to so many Americans like you, war is simply an abstract concept since it is obvious that you do not seem to be able to comprehend that these soldiers and marines and airman and sailors are taking part in the wanton maiming and killing of the Iraqi and Afghan people.
You think I am being too tough on these soldiers. You may want to try telling that to the average Iraqi and Afghan who has had their house broken into and whose family has been shot at and killed at a checkpoint or the family members of those 60 Afghan children who were recently ripped apart by 500 and 2000 lb. American bombs. Each and every one of those military personnel could have said that they were not going to pull the trigger or that they were not going to fly that plane and dropped those bombs that slaughtered those Afghan children.
Trying to hide behind the defense that soldiers were only following orders did not work out too well for those German soldiers and officials who were hanged at Nuremberg in 1946 for their offenses. If you actually possess that quality called imagination that Einstein valued more highly than knowledge then you might be able to empathize when an Iraqi and an Afghan sees an American soldier walking down their street and carrying an assault rifle. Now try imagining a foreign soldier walking down your street and carrying an assault rifle. I suspect that, like the average Iraqi and Afghan, you will find little pity for that foreign soldier as he terrorizes your neighborhood.
Oh, are we?
Soldiers are like the workers, NCO's and officers are like management, Washington politicos Upper Management CEO's. As liberals we should support the workers, and trace questionable commands up to those responsible.
You sound like those repugs who claim we're winning the War On Drugs because we fill the jails with low-level addicts and pushers, while the money men are running free, unpursued.
Nuremburg is largely inapplicable to the rest of your argument. There the officers were pursued, and those of unusually cruel nature, due to some personality malformation or ambition in the party.
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