‘Close and deadly contact.’
‘Close and deadly contact.’
“U.S. military officials say troops are trained to avoid civilian casualties and do not fire wildly,” the Los Angeles Times reports. “Iraqis, however, say the shootings happen frequently and that even if troops are firing at suspected attackers, they often do so on city streets where bystanders are likely to be hit.”
Since mid-February, Los Angeles Times stringers across Iraq have reported at least 18 incidents in which witnesses said troops had opened fire wildly or in areas crowded with civilians, usually after being attacked. The reports indicated that at least 22 noncombatants died in the incidents. Because they are based on various witness accounts and reports from hospital and police officials, many of whom refuse to give their names, it is not possible to independently verify most reports.
If the anecdotal evidence is an indication, such deaths often occur after troops are shaken by roadside bombs, as occurred when The Times employee’s son was killed April 17.
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What do people expect? If you are shot at, you have to respond or die. I personally don’t want to die. However this works in favor of insurgents, and terrorists. You shoot at US troops from a crowd, when they return fire, and kill bystanders, then you have new insurgents.
June 12th, 2007 at 3:39 pmThe troops over there are not cowboys, though out of 100,000+ you’re likely to find a few. They are trained to descriminate their targets and don’t fire wildly out of boredom or for the thrill. However combat is incredibly confusing and dynamic and when your buddies are all putting rounds into a building, it becomes very clear that you should probably be doing the same. I feel horrible for civilians caught in the crossfire, but unfortunately that’s the nature of counter-insurgency: fighting amongst the population without a clearly defined enemy. Moreover, any civlian that comes to the fight, either to help spot for insurgents, give them ammo, etc – is wrong.
June 12th, 2007 at 3:45 pmWars tend not to follow the rulebook. Cops aren’t supposed to beat on citizens either but they do. I wonder if some GI has a “Rodney King-type” incident on video. Oh wait, all’s fair in love and war.
June 12th, 2007 at 3:46 pmIt’s the rules of engagement – this was called out years ago – it’s been this way from the start:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2006/03/12/nsas12.xml
June 12th, 2007 at 3:46 pmJust shows how cowardly our enemy is. They fire in civilian streets in order to create chaos and inhibit the retaliation.
June 12th, 2007 at 3:46 pmThere are bound to be a few bad apples in any group, including the military, but I wonder if the main culprit is fatigue?
June 12th, 2007 at 3:47 pmWell, what are those US soldiers doing in Iraq?
June 12th, 2007 at 3:52 pmAnd then there is this disturbing reading. Last time I posted this, things became very hostile on this blog:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/12915283/
““I’d shoot one of them sir. And then, if that didn’t get the next guy to talk, I’d shoot another.â€
June 12th, 2007 at 3:55 pmWhoa! Perhaps you should add to this post the reports of indescriminate shootings by American contractors in Iraq. These mercenaries are making things more difficult both for our troops and for Iraqi civilians. My understanding (son in Iraq) is that everyone on all sides despises Blackwater. This whole “insurgency” business is nuts. No one knows who is the enemy, there are no “sides”, there are no “uniforms” that can be depended upon other than American military, and no “standard bearers”. This ain’t your B-grade WWII movie.
June 12th, 2007 at 3:56 pm“I’d shoot one of them sir. And then, if that didn’t get the next guy to talk, I’d shoot another.â€
Comment by TerrytheTurtle
Holy shit…
June 12th, 2007 at 3:57 pmWar is hell. This is the chymp’s war, therefore he belongs in hell.
June 12th, 2007 at 4:01 pmHeroes?
June 12th, 2007 at 4:06 pm.
June 12th, 2007 at 4:10 pmThese are regrettable, yet understandable, by-products of war. Though this is an occuption, it doesn’t really color this information any differently. RUCerious has got it right…
“War is hell. This is the chymp’s war, therefore he belongs in hell.”
June 12th, 2007 at 4:23 pmNot only does Chimpy refuse to get out of Iraq, but he’s gearing up again to bomb Iran.
Chimpy is not the President. He is an evil dictator who has taken over the US and turned it into his own personal Chimpire.
June 12th, 2007 at 4:27 pmThis does not surprise me that innocent Iraqi civilians are being slain by US troops. Caught in the crossfire is a sad thing, and another reason to pull the troops out and bring them home.
June 12th, 2007 at 4:28 pmUS Tells Maliki to Pass Oil Law by July
In a Sunday afternoon discussion that mixed gentle coaxing with asober appraisal of politics in Baghdad and Washington, the commander,Adm. William Fallon, told Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki that theIraqi government should aim to complete a law on the division of oil proceeds by July. Iraq’s Shiite dominated-government, Fallon added in the meeting, has consolidated power and should have the confidence to reach out to its opponents. “You have the power,” Fallon said. “You should take the initiative.”
http://www.handsoffiraqioil.org/
June 12th, 2007 at 4:33 pm;l
June 12th, 2007 at 4:37 pmTerryTheTurtle: Guess I missed this first time ’round. This is very sick and frightening stuff. What will we have returning once their tour of duty is over?? Some very mentally deranged individuals?? Couple that with the anarchy which will result from the showdown yesterday regarding the non-support for the rule of law in this country and I think it may be time to move to a foreign country – yikes!
June 12th, 2007 at 4:37 pmSadly, I suspect that total anarchy is coming our way – and sooner than later. I hope this bloc of republicans who voted against restoring law & order in this country are ready to take the heat for it, too. And there will be some tremendous heat from the fury of the american people when it’s clear that yesterday’s vote enabled this to occur. It’ll be time for all of yesterday’s “naysayers” to get out of Dodge.
June 12th, 2007 at 4:39 pmMaliki is a puppet of the US.
The Oil Law is a ripoff of Iraqi oil.
No more blood for oil.
June 12th, 2007 at 4:43 pmWhat will we have returning once their tour of duty is over?? Some very mentally deranged individuals??
Well, I for one will be fighting for their proper care. Our Country and Our Representatives have tasked them with a mission. They are still doing said mission because we have not told them otherwise.
Congress authorized Bush to do something.
June 12th, 2007 at 4:47 pmBush did it
Congress has not told him to stop
…usually after being attacked.
I hate to say it since I do not believe in this war and I believe that any death/murder/casualty is sad but…
SO WHAT!
How many times a day are our soldiers shot at or bombed? And there are only 18 incidents (on record anyway) since mid February. I think that ratio is pretty good!
Besides, these soldiers are only following orders. Who are we to judge them for being somewhat “trigger happy” under their conditions as we sit in our comfy air conditioned living rooms.
TP what is going on there? I see this blog posting more and more misguided “anger” or just plain dribble each day.
Quit picking on the soldier and continue to go after the top brass
June 12th, 2007 at 4:56 pmCongress hasn’t told bush to stop anything… they don’t have a spine to do so… and they won’t… otherwise they should stop funding it which is the only manuever they can do short of impeachment… they can word Bills and resolutions in anyway they want and their reasoning behind them… so they (the dems) have no excuse short of trying to hold tight till an election and vote grab… Its for the same reasons Hillary never read theintelligence report..
June 12th, 2007 at 4:57 pmits for the same reasons Con Edwards has never been to Iraq, its for the same reason Con Kerry hasn’t been to iraq… political posturing only carries so far
#22,
Hit that one out of the ballpark.
It would have been a grand slam, though, if you would have completed the loop. Here, let me help:
The people elected a representative congress (look it up, it’s in the constitution).
Congress authorized Bush to do something.
Bush did it
Congress has not told him to stop
The people told congress to do something about it sometime here in the near future, before the next election if possible.
The people then debate Paris Hilton ad nauseum until their next scheduled date with reality, sometime in September
June 12th, 2007 at 4:59 pmTundra at #22 says that “They [the troops] are doing said mission because we have not told them otherwise.” This is a very misleading statement. I strongly suggest that Tundra see the 2006 documentary Sir! No Sir! in order for him or her to realize that soldiers did not need the government telling them, i.e. the soldiers who participated in the Vietnam War, that that war was illegal and immoral. People like Adam Koresh and others in the IVAW do not need the government to tell them that their mission is phony and that killing innocent civilians was never part of their mission. The more soldiers who emulate the GI Resisters in Sir! No Sir! and people like Lt. Watada and the members of the IVAW, the quicker this illegal occupation can be brought to an end.
June 12th, 2007 at 5:05 pmrevfresh
June 12th, 2007 at 5:09 pmOh, go ahead TP, Blame the US Troops!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!1
Cha’know??????!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!11
I shouldn’t even be suprised!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!111
June 12th, 2007 at 5:52 pmErroll, I think I’ve asked you this before. If not, I’ll ask you now: Are YOU going to pay my bills when I get kicked out for doing what you say I SHOULD do?
June 12th, 2007 at 6:16 pmYou may have good intentions, but your vision is clouded, at best.
Wasn’t there a report out a year or two ago about the US military running out of small arms ammo because the soldiers in Iraq were firing 250,000 rounds of ammo for every insurgent killed. It was a really high number.
June 12th, 2007 at 6:47 pmLink
June 12th, 2007 at 6:49 pmCraig Mack
“Vision is clouded”. Actually that was true those many years ago, when I foolishly and naively obeyed the orders that I was given in a place called Vietnam. Iraq war veteran and GI resister Camilo Mejia has also said the same thing. As Lt. Watada stated in his speech to myself and fellow veterans at the Veterans for Peace convention in Seattle last summer, “Now it is not an easy task for the soldier. For he or she must be aware that they are being used for ill-gain. They must hold themselves responsible for individual action.” Certainly for a soldier to say NO and to resist would not be an easy undertaking. If you do not wish to do so, I would certainly understand. But do not presume to condemn those who have had the courage to say, again like those in the film Sir! No Sir! [have you actually taken the time to see the film before passing judgment on those who had resisted?] and people like Camilo Mejia and Lt, Watada and Agustin Aguayo and Kevin Benderman, Kyle Snyder, et al, that they will no longer take part in the occupation and subjugation of a people, both in Iraq and Vietnam, who had never threatened anyone in these United States.
Despite what you seem to believe, I believe that those who did, and are currently participating, in the GI Resistance movement should be held in the highest regard and should be considered the true heroes of this country. As David Cortland, author of the classic “Soldiers in Revolt-GI Resistance During the Vietnam War”, has stated “For many GI radicals, withdrawal from Vietnam is only the first step toward the larger goal of self-determination for all underdeveloped societies and demilitarization in America. The GI movement has also focused on the demand for greater serviceman’s rights. Whether seeking First Amendmant liberties, an end to racial discrimination, reform of the military justice system, or an end to repressive administrative practices, GI groups have relentlessly fought for a more humane and democratic military. In pursuring greater individual freedom and the rights of citizenship, GI activists have embraced the Nuremberg principle, asserting that servicemen have not only the right but the responsibility to oppose unconscionable military policies. ” These words ring just as true today regarding the debacle in Iraq as they did in relation to Vietnam when Cortland wrote his still relevant book thirty two years ago.
June 12th, 2007 at 7:17 pmYou’re supposed to be a veteran of a major campaign war who thinks that individual volunteer soldiers objecting to fighting a war based on their own perception of its legality is either something that could happen or something that should ?
I’ve got a question, who’s buying that ?
I wonder if there is someone, somewhere believing that if just more NHL players watched The Mighty Ducks then a meaningful portion of professional hockey players would choose not to play specific games based on their own individual decisions as to the merit of the game.
That scenario has a particular probability of occurring based entirely on an unfamiliarity with what motivates hockey players to play in the first place and whether that motivation decreases or increases once given an opportunity to play.
That probability of that occurring drops sharply if the person believing this is supposedly an ex-NHL player themselves.
Should that person exist, as presented, they in no way represent the position of any meaningful portion of the group they are referring to and have no appreciation of that relevant postion, which is opposed to their irrelevant one.
June 12th, 2007 at 8:19 pmApparently the answer is “no, there was no such report”, as per your link to some anonymous blog devoid of references as the only source for such a suggestion.
June 12th, 2007 at 8:24 pmKilo
Assuming that your convuluted comment and your mangled metaphor is directed at me, my response is that the military, despite your protestations, is in abject fear and terror of those in the military who are speaking out against this, yes, a most illegal and immoral war/occupation. The judge in Lt. Watada’s court martial, for example, tried to claim that the lieutenant did not understand the stipulation that he had signed, despte the fact that the judge went over it with him literally line by line a week before the trail began and also two days before the judge abruptly declared a mistrial, over the protestations of the defense. It is extremely unusual to have a mistrial declared if a motion is not presented to the court by the defense, which is not what Lt. Watada’s defense counsel did. In all probability the judge took this action on his own because the court had just reconvened after returning from lunch and the lieutenant was about to testify and the judge was most likely terrified because he probably feared that Watada was going to expose the lies that the government had used to justify invading Iraq on the witness stand.
More recently the military is trying to clamp down on ex-Marine Adam Koresh because he took part in a simulation in Washington D.C. of U.S. troops harassing and terrorizing Iraqi citizens. Koresh was honorably discharged and now the Marines are trying to revoke Koresh’s discharge, despite the fact that he did not have an insignia or a name tag on his uniform. The Marines are trying to make an example of Koresh because, like Watada, the last thing that the military wishes to see is its personnel daring to question and criticize its military policies. There are also the many soldiers who have joined the IVAW [Iraq Veterans Against the War]. All this begs the question of whether more soldiers should engage in resistance and the answer of course is yes since, as Lt. Watada stated at the VFP convention “The idea is this: that to stop an illegal and immopral war, the soldiers can choose to stop fighting it.” As Bertolt Brecht so eloquently said in his poem General Your Tank Is a Powerful Vehicle:
General, man is very useful.
He can fly and he can kill.
But he has one defect:
He can think.
Lastly, you find it inconceivable that a GI Resistance movement could possible be effective. I will make the same suggestion to you that I made to Craig Mack. Invest in the DVD Sir! No Sir! and/or buy David Cortright’s seminal and still very relevant work “Solders In Revolt-GI Resistance During the Vietnam War”. To do so will help to understand why the GI Resistance helped to bring about an end to the war in Vietnam. The best way to bring about an end to a war is to have it happen from within. It worked to help bring the Vietnam War to an end and it can do the same thing, which is what the military most fears, in Iraq.
June 12th, 2007 at 9:56 pmLet’s not forget here the shelling of the Palestine Hotel and the killing of the italian secret agent Nicola Calipari, when they were bringing home the kidnapped journalist. In neither of the two cases, the USA soldiers were fired at first.
And don’t forget either that the highest amount of attacks nowadays are suicide bombers, and IEDs. In the first case, well, the attacker has blown itself in little pieces and, in the second, most probably the terrorist has fleed the zone well in advance of the explosion.
We can safely deduce that there exists a trigger-happy culture in the USA military in Baghdad, be it from indoctrination, stress, or disdain for the victims. After all, they all look the same.
June 13th, 2007 at 7:50 amWell no, it was posted directly after yours in reply to the other poster saying the same things you were. But let’s ignore him and take from here.
BTW when you open with a comment about the quality of someone’s post, best not reply with something completely unrelated to what you are replying to. But hey, at least it’s not convoluted so you know, points for that.
What are you basing this statement on ?
What concern has the military shown towards the thousands of deserters so far ?
What about those who have made international news by applying for refugee status (seriously) in Canada ?
I live in Australia (or Sweden according to “troll alert”) and they’ve even been interviewed live on my local stations.
So what has the Pentagon response been to these most visible of deserters (more visible than any other military personnel in a 4 year war) who go on public TV and encourage others to desert that would indicate they live in terror of these people ?
What have you got ?
That it ? And what response has this decision seen over the following 5 months ?
An obvious and quantifiable measure would be the comparative rates of desertion before and after the war.
Execept you’re not going to quote those are you. Because they’re about half what they were in 2001. When there was no war.
This is how your great hope is measuring up.
That is simply ridiculous on all levels.
How would it be even possible for such a scenario to occur ?
Was this 28yo Lt somehow privy to top secret information that has yet to see public attention ? No ? Then why on earth would you not only think this but tell other people this was likely ?
That’s called lying. When you tell others to believe something you don’t.
As to how the mistrial even occurred, the account (from Truthout mind you) was that both the defence and prosecution wanted the trial to go ahead. The prosecution was the Pentagon. Not exactly shying away from that were they. Not a lot of terror evident there.
The judge declared a mistrial on the basis that he had already found the war to be legal, that Watada refusing on challenging these grounds would not amount to a viable defense and that he was declaring a mistrial on the grounds that his not-guilty plea was contradicted by his stipulation to the court which included admissions that invalidated this plea. He attempted to have the parties submit a replacement that would allow the trial to continue at that time. He also set a retrial date.
The Pentagon is arguing for that retrial and the defense is arguing against it.
So no, nothing there to indicate anyone was terrorfied of the case and the only display by anyone that they don’t want the case to go forward is by Watada.
No, they warned a marine that he may be subject to action after the fact and he told them to “go fuck yourself” and then did, and as a result they changed his discharge paperwork after the fact.
Pure terror on display and consequences totally dictated by fear rather than the obvious motivation.
“Many” is a very non-specific reference isn’t it.
And how has that question been answered by the millions of troops that aren’t named Watada ?
Deserting at anything approaching notable rates are they ?
I watched it a month before it was first screened in limited release, about a year ago.
How ? Does it explain how anything any soldiers did compared to what happened in the US or Vietnam which weren’t influenced by their actions which played an actual role in the withdrawal ?
You had escalating nationwide protests in response to the Cambodia bombing campaign being met with the Kent State killings. What compared to this ?
You had the failure of the ‘Vietnamisation’ strategy, overrun of the country by NVA, withdrawal of allied troops, and the US driven the fk out, ending the war. WTF compared to this ?
Nothing ? Then it no won’t help me understand how GI protests and dissent did anything meaningful that compared to these factors and others because they didn’t. And you’re kidding yourself if you think it does show this.
Really ? Aware of ANY military history are you ?
Because I’m fked if I can think of an example of this ever occurring in any of the conflicts that I am aware of.
So it’s “the best way to end a war” in the same way that sending bunches of flowers to every deployed serviceman is. Something theoretical that hasn’t been seen on this scale since who knows what century. Great.
Bullshit. You had how many years of draft expansions, hundreds of thousands of casualties and growing dissent among troops and it didn’t count for shit.
Why don’t you try citing a reference for troop dissent being at all relevant to the decision to scale down and then end the war in Vietnam.
Shit even the Pentagon Papers and thousands of oval office memos are online today. Piles and piles of analysis on a conflict topped only by WW2 in the number of times it has been analysed to death. Go at it.
Then I’ll post every other factor and then I’ll ask you to state how dishonest you feel on a scale of 1 to 1000 for suggesting this even rated. Everyone else will judge for themselves.
June 13th, 2007 at 8:09 ampost no show up yet test.
June 13th, 2007 at 8:14 amWell no, it was posted directly after yours in reply to the other poster saying the same things you were. But let’s ignore him and take from here.
BTW when you open with a comment about the quality of someone’s post, best not reply with something completely unrelated to what you are replying to. But hey, at least it’s not convoluted so you know, points for that.
What are you basing this statement on ?
What concern has the military shown towards the thousands of deserters so far ?
What about those who have made international news by applying for refugee status (seriously) in Canada ?
I live in Australia (or Sweden according to “troll alert”) and they’ve even been interviewed live on my local stations.
So what has the Pentagon response been to these most visible of deserters (more visible than any other military personnel in a 4 year war) who go on public TV and encourage others to desert that would indicate they live in terror of these people ?
What have you got ?
That it ? And what response has this decision seen over the following 5 months ?
An obvious and quantifiable measure would be the comparative rates of desertion before and after the war.
Execept you’re not going to quote those are you. Because they’re about half what they were in 2001. When there was no war.
This is how your great hope is measuring up.
That is simply ridiculous on all levels.
How would it be even possible for such a scenario to occur ?
Was this 28yo Lt somehow privy to top secret information that has yet to see public attention ? No ? Then why on earth would you not only think this but tell other people this was likely ?
That’s called lying. When you tell others to believe something you don’t.
As to how the mistrial even occurred, the account (from Truthout mind you) was that both the defence and prosecution wanted the trial to go ahead. The prosecution was the Pentagon. Not exactly shying away from that were they. Not a lot of terror evident there.
The judge declared a mistrial on the basis that he had already found the war to be legal, that Watada refusing on challenging these grounds would not amount to a viable defense and that he was declaring a mistrial on the grounds that his not-guilty plea was contradicted by his stipulation to the court which included admissions that invalidated this plea. He attempted to have the parties submit a replacement that would allow the trial to continue at that time. He also set a retrial date.
The Pentagon is arguing for that retrial and the defense is arguing against it.
So no, nothing there to indicate anyone was terrorfied of the case and the only display by anyone that they don’t want the case to go forward is by Watada.
June 13th, 2007 at 9:49 amNo, they warned a marine that he may be subject to action after the fact and he told them to “go fuck yourself” and then did, and as a result they changed his discharge paperwork after the fact.
Pure terror on display and consequences totally dictated by fear rather than the obvious motivation.
“Many” is a very non-specific reference isn’t it.
And how has that question been answered by the millions of troops that aren’t named Watada ?
Deserting at anything approaching notable rates are they ?
I watched it a month before it was first screened in limited release, about a year ago.
How ? Does it explain how anything any soldiers did compared to what happened in the US or Vietnam which weren’t influenced by their actions which played an actual role in the withdrawal ?
You had escalating nationwide protests in response to the Cambodia bombing campaign being met with the Kent State killings. What compared to this ?
You had the failure of the ‘Vietnamisation’ strategy, overrun of the country by NVA, withdrawal of allied troops, and the US driven the fk out, ending the war. WTF compared to this ?
Nothing ? Then it no won’t help me understand how GI protests and dissent did anything meaningful that compared to these factors and others because they didn’t. And you’re kidding yourself if you think it does show this.
Really ? Aware of ANY military history are you ?
Because I’m fked if I can think of an example of this ever occurring in any of the conflicts that I am aware of.
So it’s “the best way to end a war” in the same way that sending bunches of flowers to every deployed serviceman is. Something theoretical that hasn’t been seen on this scale since who knows what century. Great.
Bullshit. You had how many years of draft expansions, hundreds of thousands of casualties and growing dissent among troops and it didn’t count for shit.
Why don’t you try citing a reference for troop dissent being at all relevant to the decision to scale down and then end the war in Vietnam.
Shit even the Pentagon Papers and thousands of oval office memos are online today. Piles and piles of analysis on a conflict topped only by WW2 in the number of times it has been analysed to death. Go at it.
Then I’ll post every other factor and then I’ll ask you to state how dishonest you feel on a scale of 1 to 1000 for suggesting this even rated. Everyone else will judge for themselves.
June 13th, 2007 at 9:50 amfkn cant post 2nd half test post fkn
June 13th, 2007 at 9:55 amSo Erroll, you won’t pay my salary then? That was my question, but you danced around it…
June 13th, 2007 at 10:15 amCraig Mack
Did you actually bother to read what I had posted? I stated that I agreed with Lt. Watada that it is up to each individual soldier to search his or her conscience so he or she can arrive at his or her decision as to whether or not to say NO to the illegal occupation in Iraq. As I attempted to say, apparently to no avail, you certainly have the right to go along with illegally and immorally suppressing the Iraqi people. But there are certainly others in the military who do not wish to meekly comply with the government by blindly saluting and accepting the lies that they are told by their government. I do not know how much plainer that I can state this to you.
June 13th, 2007 at 10:46 amKilo
I was getting a little bleery eyed attempting to read your multiple and, at times, redundant posts but I will attempt to reply to some of your statements. You properly point out that the prosecution [who you label as part of the Pentagon] and the defense in Lt. Watada’s court martial objected to the mistrial. But the judge is very much part of the military and, as I attempted to point out, he had gone over the stipulation with Watada a week before he made his ruling in court. He had also reviewed the stipulation on Monday before the judge’s abrupt ruling on Wednesday. At both times there was absolutely no disagreement on the part of Lt. Watada regarding his understanding of the stipulation. As I previously mentioned, just before the lieutenant took the stand, the judge decides that Watada somehow misunderstood the meaning of the stipulation.
You cannot understand how “anyone was terrorfied [sic] of the case.” I find it extremely curious that the judge decided to issue his ruling, over the vociferous objections of the defense, just before the lieutenant was going to testify. Could it not be the case that the judge was extremely wary of what Watada might say about the reasons why the Bush administration decided to take this country to war? I submit that the judge panicked and had to do whatever he could in order to help the prosecution with its case, even if that meant shutting down the trial in order to give the prosecution another crack at Watada. I remains to be seen if the prosecution will be allowed to retry Watada again.
Your assertion that the GI Resistance movement had absolutely no effect upon ending the Vietnam War is also false. You correctly note the influence of the bombing of Cambodia and the Kent State killings along with the failure of Vietnamization, as if to somehow infer that the GI Resistance could not also have an impact upon ending the war. As David Cortright notes repeatedly in his book Soldiers In Revolt, the GI activists certainly have a substantial influence upon the outcome of the war. Cortright cites [Andrew Hunt's The Turning: A History of Vietnam Veterans Against the War pgs. 2, 118] which showed the contributions that veterans gave to the antiwar movement. Hunt persuasively argues that the veterans’ demonstrations in April 1971 played an important part in tilting public support against the war. He cites a poll taken two months after the demonstrations took place which revealed that 61 per cent of the public believed the decision to go to warwas a mistake. [Hunt The Turning pgs. 118-19]. Richard Stacewicz’s Winter Soldiers: An Oral History of the Vietnam Veterans Against the War [1997 p. 250] recounts that the act of the veterans throwing their medals was one of the most significant events of the Vietnam era.
To state as you do that the GI Resistance had no impact is simply ludicrous. Membership for the VVAW [Vietnam Veterans Against the War] doubled to nearly 20,000 during the summer of 1971, including 2,000 soldiers in Vietnam. An antiwar ad was placed in Playboy magazine in February 1971 which produced thousands of membership applications for the VVAW. As VVAW leader Joe Urgo correctly stated, “We were contributing to the collapse of morale.” [Stacewicz, Winter Soldiers p. 336].
Your belief that the GI Resistance was futile is simply bogus. As Cortright points out [Soldiers in Revolt p. 260], Nixon and his cohorts were “deeply concerned about the antiwar veterans and mounted a major campaign to subvert the movement”. H.R. Haldeman lamented to his boss that the coverage by the media regarding veterans’ protesting the war was “killing us”and that the White House was “getting chopped up” [Hunt The Turning p. 117]. Attorney General John Mitchell thought the VVAW was the single most dangerous group in the United States [Stacewicz Winter Soldiers p. 336]. The VVAW was continuously vilified by the Nixon adninistration. There was even a connection with the attacks perpetrated upon the VVAW with Watergate. John Dean and James W. McChord Jr., security coordinator for the Committee to Reelect the President [CREEP] have stated that they believed that the burgulary of the “offices of the Democratic Party was meant in part to find links between VVAW and the Democratic Party” [Cortright Soldiers In Revolt p. 260 citing Stacewicz Winter Soldiers p. 344].
As Cortright notes, those soldiers certainly played a part in demonstrating their dissatisfaction with the war. Cortright also pointed out that after 1969 American troops “ceased to function as an effective fighting force. Richard Nixon brought the troops home not only to accomodate domestic opinion, but to save the armed forces from internal ruin”. Cortright also cites a book by Army Captain Shelby Stanton entitled The Rise and Fall of an American Army to corroborate what he had written. As Cortright states, “the grunts GIs who fought the war were victims of a hopelessly misguided policy” [Cortright Soldiers In Revolt p. 264]. A survey conducted by the Research Analysis Corporation, a Virginia-based think tank that worked in conjunction with the Army, “found that during the height of the GI movement in 1970-71, one out of every four enlisted persons participated in dissident activities, with an equal percentage engaging in acts of disobedience” [Future Impact of Dissident Elements Within the Army R. William Rae, Stephen B. Forman, and Howard C. Olson January 1972].
I believe that I have presentd more than enough evidence for the average [and objective] person to realize that the GI Resistance had an impact upon the views of the military, the government and the citizens of the United States regarding the Vietnam War. Again, as I suggested on the earlier post, read Cortright’s powerful book which reveals the powerful influence the GI Resistance had on the war. There is certainly a good chance that the same thing will occur, if it has not already, regarding the morale of the troops, both in this country and in Iraq. I never cease to be amazed how those who comment on liberal blogs will do their utmost to discredit the GI Resistance and its impact upon war. One would think that those who are so quick to disparage the GI activists may have thought perhaps they were commenting on a neoconservative web site.
June 13th, 2007 at 1:14 pmWhy ? You know the following:
+ The mistrial wasn’t in regard to what he would testify about, it was about his submission to the court.
+ The judge made it clear to all parties that if the stipulation stood unaltered that this would result in a mistrial as his stipulation invalidated his plea in the judges opinion
+ The judge gave both parties the opportunity to confer and decide on an altered stipulation that would allow the trial to proceed
+ The judge, the prosecution and the defense all indicated that they all wanted the trial to go forward
+ In declaring a mistrial the judge also declared a retrial yet again indicating he wants the same case tried
+ The only party to have indicated they don’t want this to occur is the defense who are calling it double jepardy.
The only thing suspicious here is why you imply this motivation when you have not even a suggestion that it was a factor, every indication that it was not and a full account of exactly why there was a mistrial.
No. What planet have you been on where WMDs isn’t a punchline in 2007 rather than a revelation. Or that…. brace yourself…. Iraq didn’t attack the US in 2002/03 before the US invaded ?
You know this 28yo Lt isn’t going to say anything more scary than that based on the fact I spend 10min reading about him and I found his legal arguement spelled out in the press 3 times.
So stop saying this as though you actually believe it. You don’t.
I submit you are talking shit.
The prosecution didn’t get a shot at Watada and were very unhappy about this. They are very keen to take another shot at him. Watada isn’t keen to go back before the retrial.
As stated, wouldn’t be an issue if Watada wanted to make that stand and challenge the legality of this war you keep suggesting he wants to.
Also ? In addition to what ? That while everything I said so far is correct I failed to properly speculate wildly without any basis for doing so in the same way you have ?
No, I was actually noting things that GI sentiment didn’t even come close to which still didn’t have an impact on stopping the war.
Without knowing or caring I will confidently state that the week after Kent State, something incomparable in modern US history, Nixon vaporised just as many brown guys as he did the week before.
In fact I will be shocked if it made its way into any discussion of how many people could be vapourised that week.
There was no Vietnam war except the one where the sentiments of the US public were irrelevant throughout and the troops’ opinions and protests even more so.
Yet public opinion didn’t count to such a degree that any “tilt” due to troops or anything else translates into anything meaningful.
If you had said troop protests created civilian protests from scratch you would still be pushing it.
61% in 1971 ? Did support for the war increase ? Seriously, you’re citing that as a notable figure instead of the change ?
Yeah it probably was to the anti-war pro-troop-resistance author. Think that’s making the top 10 list of anyone else you ask on the street ?
Well I was just following your lead. Best way to stop a war, etc.
Seems rather low. What percentage of troops in country was this ?
Might want to keep that one under your hat. Lot of posts around here require the rejection of this premise as a propoganda smear.
Which would explain the 1971 end to the war. Again, you think this protest rated alongside nationwide ones and others where civilian protesters were killed ?
If you did, and could bring yourself to say that then you would have elevated these troop protests to the level of the rest of the protests that didn’t stop the war.
Did he really ? Because you’ve cited the same source for this as you have for everything else and apart from a review of this book such a statement is referenced nowhere else that I can find.
His name and “most dangerous group”, nothin. Not even repeated once by the same type of organisations doing the same thing today. Little odd don’t you think ?
I note there is no source offerred for such a reference other than him. He’s apparently still publishing these same books in the same period as the NSA archives are online offerring full copies of source documents. Cited anything like that in his book has he ?
And was that what you were tasked with ?
You had suggested that not only did this contribute to stopping the Vietnam war but that it was so successful in this regard that it was the best way to stop any war and as such was a transferrable movement, applicable to Iraq.
Bullshit. And not only is this bullshit but you know it is, as evidenced by your complete avoidance of discussion of such a likelyhood based on the available indicators.
Who’s buying this do you think ?
That if desertion rates were at levels that indicated anything but the complete opposite of what you imply they do that you would be saying “if this hasn’t started already” instead of just citing them. As though you hadn’t bothered to check this out before now.
Not a trend, not a single figure mentioned.
The reason is Desertion rates are half what they were in 2001.
Why ? You’ve hardly made anything approaching a convincing case here.
You’ve made absolutely no case at all in regard to the Iraq war, which seems a little odd considering nobody’s too concerned with getting out of Vietnam and you were here talking about this on how it supposedly applied to 2007 and not 1971.
I take issue with bullshit. It comes in brown, not red or blue.
June 13th, 2007 at 4:42 pmKilo
If you are still out there- you state “which would explain the 1971 end to the war.” To use your less than elegant term-bullshit. In Jan . 1973 the United States signed a treaty which provided for the complete withdrawal of U.S. troops from Vietnam within 60 days. In April 30, 1975 the Vietnam War ended when Saigon fell to the Communists.
It is certainly difficult to argue with any degree of intellectual vigor regarding this issue since any source that I cite you will quickly dismiss as being beneath your lofty consideration. What makes this whole discussion totally bizarre is that, as I previously stated, you are arguing against what the GI Resisters did in the past and also in the present on a liberal web site. I must confess that I am not clear as to your position regarding the illegal occupation of Iraq, as you seem to have danced around the issue. If you support Bush’s position on the war, then my attempts to rebut your position have probably been futile. But if you are [allegedly] liberal, then I would be totally mystified as to why you would denigrate and criticize those in the military who have spoken out against the war. You take issue with my statement that the best way to bring a war to an end is by having it happen from within. If you oppose the war, why would you not support those in the military who are speaking out against the war?
June 13th, 2007 at 6:45 pm