US Helicopter Fires On Iraqi Wedding

[Plekhanov]

How many non drinking parties do you go to? I've got a few muslim mates, who don't drink and I regularly see them out clubbing.

Been to a couple, none lasted past midnight or one, and most were over before dark.

Maybe Iraqis can party till dawn even without the demon drink, the guys I know certainly get past dark at any rate.

Does any body know how dry Iraq is anyway? There are plenty of countries in the middle east where alcohol is easily and even freely available.

At 3 AM, wouldn't it be rather hard to make the determination that it was a group of civilians rather than a group of combatants?

I expect the guys in the helicopter with the night vision and so forth were more able to spot civilians, than the alleged insurgents no doubt without night vision were able to accurately target the US helicopter. The “it was dark” thing works both ways; just how much danger was the helicopter in from small arms in these circumstances?

Also, okay, I can see a party going that late... but with children?

The target was apparently some kind of house these have been known to contain children till well past 3am.

Have you never been to a large family party where people bring their kids and they are running around most of the night, before they finally drop off and are put to bed upstairs whilst the adults keep going down stairs? Even if you haven’t, don’t forget this is a very different culture to yours, I expect you are a citizen of “the West” most likely one of the more “anglo-saxon” bits we tend to have very fragmented social relationships based around the nuclear family and generally get babysitters when we go to parties.

Much of the rest of the world including Iraq, particularly in the rural areas, is more structured around the “extended family” up to and including tribal relationships, when they have a party everybody goes. As several people have pointed out they fire automatic weapons into the air to celebrate, a custom we find odd. Is it so hard to imagine that they might stay up later than us as well? Just because you don’t regularly party till past 3, whilst not drinking, with children in the near vicinity doesn’t mean that nobody else does.

I really don’t like the implication made by several people in this thread that Iraqis awake past 3am are up to no good and are fair game. We are in their country without invitation supposedly for their own good, it is we who should adapt to their cultural practices not them to us. If they fire guns into the air to celebrate then our troops have to learn about this practice and react accordingly, if we ever hope to win hearts and mind simply saying “you were up late you shot guns in the air what did you expect” just doesn’t cut it.

[jegs2]

From this link:

[Brigadier General Mark Kimmitt] said earlier: "We sent a ground force in to that location. They were shot at. We returned fire."

Those were not celebratory shots into the air. The wedding story is starting to smell more and more like a skunk.

[mauldooku]

I'd probably give the soliders the benefit of the doubt if gunfire is being fired in their general direction.

[MKSheppard]

Does anyone really believe them?

I'd say the gun camera footage would be proof......big blobs of
outgoing tracer from the "wedding party" followed by 30mm return
fire

[banquetbear]

From this link:

[Brigadier General Mark Kimmitt] said earlier: "We sent a ground force in to that location. They were shot at. We returned fire."

Those were not celebratory shots into the air. The wedding story is starting to smell more and more like a skunk.

...the wedding story is starting to sound like a skunk? I think its the other way around...

raqi police and witnesses said the attack killed dozens of innocent people, many of them women and children. Some said the bride and groom also were killed.

People who said they were guests said the wedding party was in full swing — with dinner just finished and the band playing tribal Arab music — when U.S. fighter jets roared overhead and U.S. vehicles started shining their highbeams.

Worried, the hosts ended the party; men stayed in the wedding tent, and women and children went inside the house nearby, the witnesses said.

About five hours later, the first shell hit the tent. Panicked, women clutching their children ran out of the house, they said.

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,120436,00.html

...so according to witnesses-FIVE hours after any shooting in the air happened-the US attacked the village. Gen. James N. Mattis comments are amazingly childish-he sounds like a kid on a message board when he says:

"Ten miles from Syrian border and 80 miles from nearest city and a wedding party? Don't be naive," said Marine Maj. Gen. James N. Mattis in Fallujah. "Plus they had 30 males of military age with them. How many people go to the middle of the desert to have a wedding party."

...well General Mattis, sometimes people get married in the village they were born:

The celebration at Mukaradeeb was to be one of the biggest events of the year for a small village of just 25 houses. Haji Rakat, the father, had finally arranged a long-negotiated tribal union that would bring together two halves of one large extended family, the Rakats and the Sabahs.

Haji Rakat's second son, Ashad, would marry Rutba, a cousin from the Sabahs. In a second ceremony one of Ashad's female cousins, Sharifa, would marry a young Sabah boy, Munawar.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0, ... 58,00.html

...and yes, sometimes people of military age hang out together!!! How many guys out there are of military age? This is evidence of what, exactly?

...and when asked about the images of dead women and children-Mattis responded:

"I have not seen the pictures but bad things happen in wars. I don't have to apologise for the conduct of my men."

...so we have NO denials that woman and children were killed. And what other proof do they have that this was a foreign fighter safe house?

"During the operation, coalition forces came under hostile fire and close air support was provided," it said in a statement. Soldiers at the scene then recovered weapons, Iraqi dinar and Syrian pounds (worth approximately £800), foreign passports and a "Satcom radio", presumably a satellite telephone.

...anyone surprised that passports were found-near the border? What Iraqi family doesn't have weapons with them? and 800 pounds is hardly a lot of money to have at a wedding... the case just gets stronger doesn't it?

...oh, and this:

Brig. Gen. Mark Kimmitt (search) said the attack was launched after U.S. forces received "specific intelligence" about foreign fighters slipping into the country. "We sent a ground force in to the location

...how reliable is this "specific intelligence"? When the Red Cross state that 60-90% of prisoners at Abu Ghraib are probably innocent-and we know that a number of these "innocents" were abused and tortured to get information-the likelihood of them "lying" to get out of that abuse was high. And look at this case:

Intelligence had intercepted a phone conversation in which a man called Ayoub spoke of advancing to the next level to obtain landmines and other weapons. Soldiers broke through Ayoub's door early in the morning, but when the sleepy man did not immediately respond to their orders he was shot with non-lethal ordnance, little pellets exploding like gun shot from the weapon's grenade launcher. The floor of the house was covered with his blood. He was dragged into a room and interrogated forcefully as his family was pushed back against their garden's fence.

...sssnnnnniiiipppppp......

Several hours later a call was intercepted from another Ayoub. "Oh shit," said the unit's intelligence officer, "it was the wrong Ayoub." The innocent father of six who had the wrong name was not immediately let go so as not to risk revealing to the other Ayoub that the Americans were searching for him.

...sssnnnnnniiiiipppp........

Meanwhile Army intelligence was still confounded by the meaning of the intercepted conversations until somebody realized it was not a terrorist intent on obtaining weapons. It was a kid playing video games and talking about them with his friend on the phone.

http://www.reason.com/hod/nr032604.shtml

...there are countless cases where the US forces have been mislead by poor intelligence-whether it be accidental as posted above, or malicious, like below:

On a cold night in November, M., her mother, and four brothers had been sleeping when their door suddenly came crashing down during the early hours of the morning. The scene that followed was one of chaos and confusion… screaming, shouting, cursing, pushing and pulling followed. The family were all gathered into the living room and the four sons- one of them only 15- were dragged away with bags over their heads. The mother and daughter were questioned- who was the man in the picture hanging on the wall? He was M.'s father who had died 6 years ago of a stroke. You're lying, they were told- wasn't he a part of some secret underground resistance cell? M.'s mother was hysterical by then- he was her dead husband and why were they taking away her sons? What had they done? They were supporting the resistance, came the answer through the interpreter.

...sssssssnnnnniiiiipppppp......

M. and her uncle later learned that a certain neighbor had made the false accusation against her family. The neighbor's 20-year-old son was still bitter over a fight he had several years ago with one of M.'s brothers. All he had to do was contact a certain translator who worked for the troops and give M.'s address. It was that easy.

http://riverbendblog.blogspot.com/2004_ ... 4488988448

...and, with the burial of well-known Iraqi WEDDING singer Hussein Ali in Bahgdad today, can you REALLY say that the wedding case is starting to look like skunk? With the track record of the CPA and the pentagon at the moment-with stories like this one coming out
http://www.denverpost.com/Stories/0,141 ... 03,00.html

Mowhoush, considered a "high-priority target," turned himself in for questioning in November, according to documents. After two weeks in custody at an Al Qaim detention facility, northwest of Baghdad, two soldiers with the 66th Military Intelligence Company, slid a sleeping bag over his body, except for his feet, and began questioning him as they rolled him repeatedly from his back to his stomach, the documents show.

Then, one of the soldiers, an interrogator, sat on Mowhoush's chest and placed his hands over the prisoner's mouth, according to the report: "During this interrogation, the (general) became non-responsive, medics were called and he was later pronounced dead." According to the documents, "The preliminary report lists the cause of death as asphyxia due to smothering and chest compressions."

Immediately after Mowhoush's death was reported, U.S. military officials released a statement acknowledging he died during an interview.

"Mowhoush said he didn't feel well and subsequently lost consciousness," read the press statement, which is still posted on a Pentagon website. "The soldier questioning him found no pulse, then conducted CPR and called for medical authorities. According to the on-site surgeon, it appeared Mowhouse died of natural causes."

...I'm beginning to doubt ANYTHING coming out of the mouths of a CPA spokeman...

[Hamel]

Another article

A tiny bundle of blankets is unwrapped; inside is the body of a baby, its limbs smeared with dried blood. Then the mourners peel back the blanket further to reveal a second dead baby.

Another blanket is opened; inside are the bodies of a mother and child. The child, six or seven years old, is lying against his or her mother, as if seeking comfort. But the child has no head.

These are the images that American forces in Iraq had no answer to yesterday. They come from video footage of the burials of 41 men, women and children. The Iraqis say they died when American planes launched air strikes on a wedding party near the Syrian border on Wednesday.

US forces insist that the attack was on a safe house used by foreign fighters entering Iraq from Syria. They do not dispute that they killed about 40 people, but claim American forces were returning fire and the dead were all foreign fighters. For the video footage that shows dead women and children they have no explanation.

So potentially damaging is the video to the US occupation that American officials have demanded that the Dubai-based al-Arabiya television news network, which obtained the footage, give them the name of the cameraman who took it. Al-Arabiya has refused.

In the footage men weep and cling to the bodies of their loved ones before they are buried. There are dozens of bundles wrapped in flower-patterned blankets. Some of these images were shown on Western television news yesterday, but not the most disturbing: the bodies themselves.

"These were more than two dozen military-age males. Let's not be naive," Major General James Mattis, commander of the US 1st Marine Division, said. But he had no explanation of where the dead women and children in the video came from. "I have not seen the pictures but bad things happen in wars," he said cryptically. "I don't have to apologise for the conduct of my men."

US forces say they have been watching the border area where the attack took place for some time. They saw a large group of suspicious people moving in the area and sent in ground forces, who came under fire, so the US forces returned fire.

They are sticking doggedly to this version of events despite growing evidence that a wedding party was hit. More and more eyewitnesses are coming forward. Hussein Ali, a well-known wedding singer, was buried in Baghdad yesterday, alongside his brother Mohammed. Their family said they had been performing at the wedding.

The evidence that the US military has put forward to support its version of events has been seriously undermined. Brigadier General Mark Kimmitt said guns, Syrian passports and a satellite phone had been recovered. But Sheikh Nasrallah Miklif, the head of the Bani Fahd tribe to which most of the dead belonged, said that was to be expected, given that the air strike happened in Makradheeb, a village in the desert, about 10 miles from the Syrian border.

Every household in Iraq has a gun, usually a Kalashnikov assault rifle, to protect itself. In the desert it is even more common for people to keep guns, as protection not only from robbers, but also wild animals. Shepherds need to protect their flocks.

The village is 80 miles from the nearest town, al-Qa'im, and 10 miles from the nearest road. There are no telephone lines and no mobile coverage. Satellite phones are comparatively cheap in Iraq and it would be surprising if the villagers did not have one.

People in the area frequently marry neighbours from across the border. That means there have always been villagers on the Iraqi side with Syrian passports and vice versa. On top of that, many of the villagers on both sides make their living smuggling sheep across the border, and have been routinely crossing it for years - not entirely legal, but that does not make them foreign fighters planning to attack US forces.

General Mattis asked: "How many people go to the middle of the desert 10 miles from the Syrian border to hold a wedding 80 miles from the nearest civilisation?" Iraqis replied that the victims of the attack were holding the wedding in the village where they had lived all their lives.

Sheikh Mikfil was not in the village at the time of the attack, but he has spoken at length with the survivors. All of the villagers were members of his tribe; the only dead from outside were the musicians. He put the death toll at 41 - 25 of whom were members of the bridegroom's family. The wedding was held at the home of the bridegroom's father, Rikat Obeid Hussein. The newly married couple survived because they were in a specially erected honeymoon tent when the bombing began.

The sheikh said that by 2am, when the attack started, the celebrations were finished and the guests were asleep. There had been US helicopters in the sky earlier, but they had not fired and the wedding guests were not worried.

General Kimmitt said: "We sent a ground force in to the location. They were shot at. We returned fire."

But Sheikh Mikfil said the attack began with air strikes, without warning. They were followed by helicopters, and after several hours of air strikes, US troops arrived in armoured vehicles to search the devastated village.

Contrary to earlier reports, the sheikh said, there was no celebratory gunfire. Firing guns in the air is traditional at Iraqi weddings, and it was initially suspected that US forces had mistaken such shooting for hostile fire, as they did at a wedding party in Afghanistan when US air strikes killed more than 50 people in 2002. Sheikh Mikfil says he questioned the survivors extensively on this, and they were categorical: there was no shooting in the air.

He said the bride came from the same village, so there was no large-scale movement of people that could have aroused US suspicions. "If they killed foreign fighters, why don't they show us the bodies?" he asked. "If they suspected foreign fighters were there, why didn't they come to arrest them, instead of using this huge force?"

Sheikh Mikfil said he suspected the Americans might have been acting on false intelligence information, given by someone who wanted to increase the tension between Iraqis and Americans.

It is impossible to reconcile the American and Iraqi versions of events. But with more and more evidence emerging that casts doubt on the American version, and Iraqi anger rising, US forces need to come up with some answers. If this was one of the "bad things" that "happen in wars" - to use General Mattis's phrase - more explanation is required. 21 May 2004 13:20

[Illuminatus Primus]

EDIT: Excuse me, not firing artillery, but a helicopter firing heavy weapons into a crowd.

Now, I'm no military weapons expert, but could someone tell me how a hellicopter could possibly mistake a weding of 40 civilians for a military target? Is there any concievable way this could have been an error in instrumentation?

What are you, stupid? What kind of resolution do you think they have on their instruments? This is a helicopter, not a Keyhole-12.

And you're not going to approach closer when you think you were just shot at and you know your enemy has RPGs and MANPADs.

[SyntaxVorlon]

Islamic weddings, the only form of activity known to have an irresistable attraction for Air to Ground weapons.

[Illuminatus Primus]

What a bunch of horseshit. What do you really believe? Some chopper pilot got a boner and decided to ace a wedding party for the fuck of it with no celibration fire?

[Aaron]

"These were more than two dozen military-age males. Let's not be naive," Major General James Mattis, commander of the US 1st Marine Division, said. But he had no explanation of where the dead women and children in the video came from. "I have not seen the pictures but bad things happen in wars," he said cryptically. "I don't have to apologise for the conduct of my men."

I love how they assume that if your a military age male that you must be a terrorist. If the Americans continue to assume that every Iraqi is hostile, than these events are going to continue to happen.

[Hamel]

Footage of the remnants

Middle East - AP
Iraq Desert Bombing Video Shows Carnage

49 minutes ago


By SCHEHEREZADE FARAMARZI, Associated Press Writer

BAGHDAD, Iraq - Fragments of musical instruments, tufts of women's hair, and a large blood stain are among the scenes in Associated Press Television News film of a destroyed house that survivors say U.S. planes bombed during a wedding party.



It is the first known footage from the site of Wednesday's attack, which killed up to 45 people, mostly women and children from the Bou Fahad tribe in Mogr el-Deeb, a desert village on the Syrian border.

The U.S. military has said the target was a suspected safehouse for foreign fighters from Syria and denied Friday that children were killed in the airstrikes.

Brig. Gen. Mark Kimmitt told reporters in Baghdad that U.S. troops who reported back from the operation "told us they did not shoot women and children."

"There were a number of woman, a handful of women, I think the number was four to six, caught up in the engagement. They may have died from some of the fire that came from the aircraft," Kimmitt said.

But an Associated Press reporter in the Ramadi area, at least 275 miles east of Mogr el-Deeb, was able to identify at least 10 of the bodies as those of children.

At the Bou Fahad cemetery outside Ramadi, where the tribe is based, each of the 28 fresh graves contain one to three corpses, mostly of mothers and their young children.

Relatives said they include those of 2-year-old Kholood and 1-year-old Anoud, daughters of Amal Rikad, who was killed; of 2-year-old Raad and 1-year-old Ra'ed — whose headless body was found near his house — sons of Fatima Madhi, who was killed; of Saad, 10, Faisal, 7, Anoud, 6, Fasila, 5, Kholood, 4, and Inad, 3 — children of Mohammed and Morifa Rikad, who were killed.

There also are photo images of dead children, but it was not possible to determine if those victims were already accounted for by relatives.

In Washington, Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Gen. Richard Myers told Congress that "we feel at this point very confident that this was a legitimate target, probably foreign fighters" who may have ties to Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, a Jordanian wanted for allegedly organizing attacks on U.S. troops in Iraq (news - web sites) on behalf of al-Qaida.

"The intelligence right now and what we found at the site, which were weapons and the sort of things you might not expect at a wedding party, were not consistent with that. They were consistent with folks trying to come into the country, across the desert, in vehicles, staying for the night, trying to make it into Iraq."

Several shotguns, handguns, Kalashnikov rifles and machine guns were found at the site, according to Kimmitt.

But Bou Fahad tribesmen denied that any foreign fighters were among them. They consider the desolate border area part of their territory and follow their goats, sheep and cattle there to graze. In the springtime they leave spacious homes in Ramadi, the capital of Anbar province, and roam the desert.

Smuggling livestock into Syria is also part of a herdsman's life, although no one in the tribe acknowledged that.

Weddings are often marked in Iraq with celebratory gunfire, but survivors insisted no weapons were fired Wednesday — despite speculation by Iraqi officials that this drew a mistaken American attack.

The first bomb hit the huge goat-hair tent — where male guests were said to be sleeping — at about 2:45 a.m. Wednesday. The barrage didn't stop until sunrise, witnesses said. Women and children were in an adjacent one-story house and the men went to their nearby homes, they said.

After the first missile, Hamdan Khalaf ran in panic and hid in a grassy area.



"In the morning, we went back to the hill and saw people torn apart, attacked by the plane," Khalaf, who was not wounded, told APTN.

"We pulled them out of here," another man told APTN, standing on a pile of stones as he picked up a stained green cloth that looked like part of a young man's shirt. A severed arm lay in the rubble. "We took them to hospital — straight to the fridge," the unidentified man said.

An angry voice in the background of the tape denounced President Bush (news - web sites). "This is his terrorism," the voice said.

The body of what survivors said was the wedding's cameraman was pulled out of the debris Thursday.

The footage also showed women in colorful clothes sifting through the wreckage and carrying away blankets and other goods. Pieces of rockets and bullet casings were strewn across the sandy plain, as were pots and pans and a satellite dish. Partly charred pickup trucks and a water tanker stood in the desert.

The attack left few survivors. About a dozen wounded were taken to the town of Qaem, about 140 miles northwest of Ramadi and 130 miles north of Mogr el-Deeb.

Witnesses, interviewed Thursday by AP in Ramadi, said revelers at the wedding party began worrying when they heard aircraft overhead at about 9 p.m. Tuesday. Then came military vehicles, which stopped about two miles away from the village and switched off their headlights. The planes were still overhead at 11 p.m, so the hosts told the band to stop playing and everyone went to bed.

About four hours later, airstrikes began and continued until dawn when two helicopters landed and about 40 soldiers searched the house where the women had stayed and a second, vacant house. Soon after, the two houses were blown up. Some witnesses said the houses were attacked by helicopters; others said Americans detonated them with explosives.

Kimmitt confirmed that the operation was an air and ground assault. "Those people on the ground identified no children as part of that location that were killed," he said, adding that they reported only adult deaths.

He also referred to the APTN video, shot Thursday in Mogr el-Deeb, as well as separate APTN footage from Wednesday in Ramadi that showed a headless body of a child and other bodies of children.

"What we saw in those APTN videos were substantially inconsistent with the reports we received from the unit that conducted the operation," Kimmitt said. "We're now trying to figure out why there's an inconsistency.

"We're keeping an open mind as to exactly what happened on the ground. That's why we're continuing to try to gather all the facts; that's why we're not ruling out anything based on information coming forward," he added.

[Tribun]

"We are the U.S.! And we bring freedom to you!
By killing all of you, so you can't do anything to threaten OUR freedom!"

Or, to put it another way:

"Kill them all! God will find the innocent ones!"

[Keevan_Colton]

The U.S. military has said the target was a suspected safehouse for foreign fighters from Syria and denied Friday that children were killed in the airstrikes.

That should be in big neon fucking letters, nevermind the comical denying of any children being killed.

Suspected safehouse != Legitimate reason to bomb the shit out of the area.

Incase you all have forgotten, the coalition as the power occupying the country have a responsability to protect the civillian population. All this "safety of our troops" horseshit can be crammed back up the asses of the gun happy loons that spout it. Our troops have signed up to be in the military, part of that involves fucking risk, we've went in and taken over this country, the civillians that live there have not asked to be in the line of fire, they havent even asked us to do this shit and take over...their saftey comes before that of our troops.

[Illuminatus Primus]

More evidence that the DoD needs to pick up the pace on getting us back to wartime/Cold War levels of actual, human intelligence, and less reliance on nebulous bullshit from captured cellphone calls or something.

Fuck, a Predator flight could've verified. This was sloppy.

[MKSheppard]

Fuck, a Predator flight could've verified. This was sloppy.

No it wasn't. Ground troops took fire, and called in "Spooky" who
promptly took care of it.

[MKSheppard]

their saftey comes before that of our troops.

Thank you Mr Colton, Care to try to explain this to the British troops
right now facing insurgents?

Christ, the way you want it to be, it would be like Vietnam.

"Sir, we're taking fire."

"We can't shoot back, it's gotta go all the way up the chain of command"

*30 minutes later*

"This is President Johnson, you're authorized to destroy that outhouse from which enemy fire is coming from."

[Keevan_Colton]

Best to kill a shitload of civvies so long as it keeps our boys safe then!

We're the government there, the civillians are our responsability, their safety and wellbeing is supposed to be our prime concern. We've created a shithole for ourselves, but killing the people who live there will not help things and is not justifiable in any way shape or form, legally or morally.

Civillians > Soldiers.

[Aaron]

Its evident that the troops in Iraq need a revised set of ROE's. This shit about opening fire because there are military age males in a crowd with guns just doesn't fly. The troops need to confirm that they are actually under fire, there's a difference between shots being fired into the air and shots coming at you.

[Plekhanov]

their saftey comes before that of our troops.

Thank you Mr Colton, Care to try to explain this to the British troops
right now facing insurgents?

Christ, the way you want it to be, it would be like Vietnam.

"Sir, we're taking fire."

"We can't shoot back, it's gotta go all the way up the chain of command"

*30 minutes later*

"This is President Johnson, you're authorized to destroy that outhouse from which enemy fire is coming from."

And the US did such a fantastic job of getting the locals on side in vietnam didn’t you Why do you insist on totally ignoring all the lessons you should have learnt from your country’s last large scale fucked up imperialistic war allegedly fought for the benefit of all the innocent locals US forces killed.

Situations like this, which is looking increasingly like a major over reaction, only further turn the Iraqis against the occupying troops growing the rebellion and eventually exposing more troops to attack. This kind of thing is illegal, immoral and (probably from your perspective worst of all) stupid, it is exactly the kind of thing to drive “males of military age” into the resistance.

We a supposedly there to help the Iraqis we simply cannot go around blowing up houses because they are “suspicious” when you are spreading “freedom and democracy” you are supposed to follow a higher standard of behaviour.

[Lonestar]

Best to kill a shitload of civvies so long as it keeps our boys safe then!

We're the government there, the civillians are our responsability, their safety and wellbeing is supposed to be our prime concern. We've created a shithole for ourselves, but killing the people who live there will not help things and is not justifiable in any way shape or form, legally or morally.

Civillians > Soldiers.

During conflicts;

their civilians < our soldiers

[Keevan_Colton]

During conflicts;

their civilians < our soldiers

Bullshit, we went in there and are now the occupying power, we've taken over the protection of those people. They are OUR responsibility, and their lives are NOT worth less than our soldiers.

[Plekhanov]

Best to kill a shitload of civvies so long as it keeps our boys safe then!

We're the government there, the civillians are our responsability, their safety and wellbeing is supposed to be our prime concern. We've created a shithole for ourselves, but killing the people who live there will not help things and is not justifiable in any way shape or form, legally or morally.

Civillians > Soldiers.

During conflicts;

their civilians < our soldiers

During the hot part of a defensive war say WWII for example sure don’t take any chances. But you simply cannot apply that standard in Iraq today because:

1. This is a war of CHOICE, we are supposedly there for the Iraqis own good, spreading freedom and democracy.

2. We are OCCUPYING them and the GCs have a few things to say about how you treat occupied civilians.

[Lonestar]

Bullshit, we went in there and are now the occupying power, we've taken over the protection of those people. They are OUR responsibility, and their lives are NOT worth less than our soldiers.

Double bullshit on you. Priorities for the upper chain of command are;

1. Win the war
2. Keep the soldiers safe
3. Keep the soldiers morale up as high as possible
4. Make sure the war is handled in such a way we maintain support at home (and I'll agree they're fucking this one up)

and a distant fifth...

"Keep the civilians nice and happy."

Because, you know, that's what we did in every other war we won by a massive margin. By keeping the civilians happy.

[Keevan_Colton]

Bullshit, we went in there and are now the occupying power, we've taken over the protection of those people. They are OUR responsibility, and their lives are NOT worth less than our soldiers.

Double bullshit on you. Priorities for the upper chain of command are;

1. Win the war

We've defeated the Iraqi army and have our own regieme going into power, seems like this is done.

2. Keep the soldiers safe

But not at the expense of the people that they are meant to be protecting. We are the people in charge there, we ARE effectively the goverment of this land, the people that live there are under the protection of OUR soldiers.

3. Keep the soldiers morale up as high as possible

What a nebulous directive.

4. Make sure the war is handled in such a way we maintain support at home (and I'll agree they're fucking this one up)

Gotta keep things looking good on CNN, of course

and a distant fifth...

"Keep the civilians nice and happy."

You mean, "Dont risk killing them accidentely because it's easier and safer for us"

Because, you know, that's what we did in every other war we won by a massive margin. By keeping the civilians happy.

Fuck up moron. We've beaten the army, we've overthrown the government and we've got our own people in charge, we've won the war portion already. We whipped the ass of the former regieme. You dont grasp that this is not a war anymore, this is an insurgency, in which our troops are acting as the forces of the government (of our choosing) in this nation, which means they have the responsibility to protect the people of this land, from the insurgents and from being blown up from lack of care on the part of our troops.

[MKSheppard]

You dont grasp that this is not a war anymore, this is an insurgency.

Tell that to the people on the front line who are being shot at by
the enemy. And no matter how you slice and dice it,
guerilla wars are nasty, brutish affairs.