WikiLeaks Releases Cache of 400,000 Iraq War Documents 676
Caelesto writes "Today around 21:00 GMT, WikiLeaks declared an end to their media embargo of over 400,000 Iraq War documents after Al Jazeera released their story 30 minutes ahead of schedule. These documents, which have been kept under wraps by WikiLeaks for months, may reveal tortures and murders ignored by coalition forces during the fighting and occupation in Iraq. The Pentagon maintained that releasing these documents represented a danger to US troops, but already dozens of news outlets are scrambling to report on what could be a devastating blow to the US Armed Forces' already tattered image." Reader Entropy98 points to the BBC's coverage, as well. If you care to download the collection of files, it's available as a torrent.
The irony... (Score:5, Insightful)
...of people like this complaining about "collateral damage" is so thick you could drive a truck across it.
Re:Wow (Score:5, Insightful)
The beauty of not reading the actual article (Score:5, Insightful)
Is that you can just categorize based on Slashdot's summary, and just vaguely use it to go on a soapbox about what you want to make a bunch of noise about.
Even the summary uses phrase "Iraq war documents". Good reason - the Wikileaks release dealt with documents that often referred to what the Iraqi police/forces were doing, and what the US forces knew about. Not that the US forces were doing those actions themselves (though you could argue that allowing such actions were as bad as doing the actions themselves...) Nevertheless, we can't on one hand say we should withdraw and then say that we should keep the Iraqis from doing things we think are bad - good or bad, Iraqis hurting Iraqis is a possible outcome of self-government.
Re:Wow (Score:3, Insightful)
Some are guilty, but all are responsible. (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Tattered Image (Score:5, Insightful)
After seeing the gunship video they presented... and then later the way it was torn apart by others examining the film I no longer get too worked up over anything Wikileaks has to say. It's sad really but they will do just about anything they can to skew what they present :-(
Re:the US and Israel butchers assassins torturers (Score:5, Insightful)
Americans are complicit in all their government does since they do not stop it.
I do what I can: I vote for candidates who are not from the demonstrably corrupt main parties, or who have a proven track record of doing good (despite their party allegiance). As such, I reject your accusation that I am complicit in my government's actions.
Re:Wow (Score:5, Insightful)
It's too bad Wikileaks has such an obvious agenda. I like the idea of them, but that the same time, knowing they have such a clear agenda, makes me wonder what they decide not to release because it doesn't flow with what they want the world to think.
Why is it too bad? What the fuck are you talking about? Would you rather have them have a hidden agenda? Like the government bullshit they expose?
Re:the US and Israel butchers assassins torturers (Score:5, Insightful)
Actually it's the Iraqis that are the butchers. Clearly you didn't read the article.
Now that opens up the question of what exactly the US Army is supposed to do if the local Army is up to no good. Are we supposed to "reconquer" them again and start over from scratch and prolong the occupation of Iraq even longer than it would be otherwise?
Re:I've never given money to a web site before (Score:5, Insightful)
Having worked in the U.S. before and having an SSN and all that, I actually got worried about this (I'm not American). Regardless, I went ahead and used Paypal.
I figured that if I actually get in trouble with TSA and all that, then they would be doing me a favor, and I would be better off not entering the U.S.
nothing's going to happen (Score:5, Insightful)
Wikileaks released 400,000 more dox that will shake the very foundations upon which the Middle East War rests upon and the news organizations will just sit around masturbating over "Was this ethical? Are people really endangered? What does this mean in regards to bloggers vs. journalists" but never looking at a single document or citing it for the sake of delivering news instead of the storyline which has been perpetuated for the last ten years.
Re:its called war (Score:5, Insightful)
War is nasty. Lets think this shit through next time. If diplomacy is not an option, and all other options have failed, and there will be an provable danger to us or our allies by not acting, then bomb the motherfuckers. Otherwise can we please just stay out of the rest of the world's business? Do it quickly, cleanly, with a solid plan, with an exit strategy, accomplish the goal, and move on. War cost money, and between the MID profiteering it, the globalist loving it, the extremist encouraging it, the only people that lose are the taxpayers and the unnecessary casualties.
Why is that so hard?
If our civilization overcomes the thread of annihilating itself, I hope dearly that it becomes peaceful and moves away from dogmatic BS and more towards science and reason. I don't care if it is after I am dead. I just would sleep better knowing that the human race will make it over the next 1000 years. It really doesn't look so good. I don't think the idiots can handle the fruits of the scientist labor in a responsible manner.
Re:Just us, or ... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Wow (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Just us, or ... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:The Pentagon would say mass (Score:5, Insightful)
And this time, all names (except for well-known and obviously non-secret names like names of commanders) have been removed.
It's still going to be a game of blaming the messenger, and very little focus on the atrocities that the mercenaries have wrought.
Re:Just us, or ... (Score:5, Insightful)
Unlikely. It's a rhetorical question as the obvious answers are... obvious.
A. It is intended to make you think that maybe WikiLeaks has something against the Western world.. or at least against the U.S.
B. It is intended to make you remember that other countries do atrocious things, too.. thus on some level, to some people, mitigating the fact that `we're` doing so now.
C. It is intended as a troll to invite such east vs west, Russia vs U.S., U.S. vs the world, etc. debates that serve only to muddy the waters.
D. any combination of the above.
Move along, nothing to see here but flamebait.
Re:Facebook Censoring Torrent Link (Score:5, Insightful)
Me thinks Zuckerberg and company are staying on Uncle Sam's friendly side...
Or maybe it's a general block on that kind of file type?
Re:If Obama wasn't such a coward... (Score:3, Insightful)
If Obama wasn't such a coward, the last president would be behind bars (along with most of his cronies), we'd have single-payer-for-all health care, and Wall Street would actually be held responsible for treating the economy the way Michael Vic treats dogs....
FTFY
Re:Wow (Score:5, Insightful)
The problem with facts is that they're easily picked and attached to dubious endevours - Wiki has been unabashed about holding a specific philosophical view - which is admirable really especially given that they're so honest about it - and that viewpoint has an effect on what they chose to present as the truth.
If you have the facts on your side, pound the facts.
If you have the law on your side, pound the law.
If you have neither on your side, pound the table.
Claiming bias makes it rather transparent that you're pounding the table.
Re:I've never given money to a web site before (Score:1, Insightful)
All those people could have been alive today. Of course the dead are just the tip of the iceberg of suffering. This is the direct result of corporations lobbying the government. And there is more to come unless the system is fixed. bit.ly/WdJQP
Re:the US and Israel butchers assassins torturers (Score:3, Insightful)
You broke it, you bought it
- Colin Powell
Re:Wow (Score:5, Insightful)
It's too bad Wikileaks has such an obvious agenda.
Really? You mean to publish leaks? Or do you think it is something else?
Because if you think it's to paint somebody as good and somebody else as bad, I don't see it.
If you think it's to specifically paint the US government as bad, well there is at least one leaked document that does the reverse: [nytimes.com]
One of the most infamous episodes of killings by American soldiers, the shootings of at least 15 Iraqi civilians, including women and children in the western city of Haditha, is misrepresented in the archives. The report stated that the civilians were killed by militants in a bomb attack, the same false version of the episode that was given to the news media.
Re:the US and Israel butchers assassins torturers (Score:2, Insightful)
This is the American war in Iraq. It only exists because the Americans started it.
Clearly you drank the cool-aide
Re:If Obama wasn't such a coward... (Score:5, Insightful)
If Obama wasn't such a coward, Guantanamo Bay would be closed, habeas corpus would be restored, our former president his vice president, and a few other select members of his cabinet would be behind bars, and the people responsible for the economic meltdown would either be up on fraud charges, no longer running their companies, or the heads of bankrupt companies.
Re:Wow (Score:4, Insightful)
all this shows, is that the USA, like other nations, does terrible things sometimes. the difference: somebody took a stand and disagreed with what they were being told to cover up.
Re:Wow (Score:3, Insightful)
If the released reports are biased, the government will give us the whole story, right?
Right?
Wikileaks may have a bias, but they also know their message is destroyed if they are shown to censor data for their effort. The 'Collatoral Murder' fisasco showed that. Even there, they provided the full video but put the focus on where *the issue* was for a short attention span viewing crowd.
Wikileaks should win the Nobel Peace Prize (Score:3, Insightful)
At least the money would be very welcomed, since it seems no corporation wants fund such organization.
And, of course, it would be fun to see they winning the same prize Obama won a few years ago.
Re:I've never given money to a web site before (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:the US and Israel butchers assassins torturers (Score:2, Insightful)
Let's take you up on that idea. Suppose I vote for Green Party. Oops, since I didn't vote for the Democrat, the Republican got more votes and won. Now the Congress is taking up a motion to drop out of the UN and back out of treaties. Great.
I understand your frustration, but the problem is quite large. I'd favor better education in schools on US foreign policy and international issues and history, the creation of instant runoff voting and election law changes to favor third parties. While I blame general ignorance, I don't know if I can blame every American, especially since I see so many trying to fix the problems.
Questionable Authenticity? (Score:2, Insightful)
Why is everything posted by wikileaks seen as fact? Even if they modified a few entries or slipped a few new ones in, would anybody notice? If the US gov't then said "These things aren't true." - would anybody believe them? By just assuming everything wikileaks releases is incontrovertible truth, you're giving them license to fabricate whatever "reality" they choose.
Re:Do two wrongs make a right? (Score:3, Insightful)
I realize you are trying to justify WikiLeaks, but they aren't the ones shooting guns and launching bombs. Our starting supposition should be that humanity has an intrinsic right to enforce transparency upon power wielders, particularly governments and militaries, so that the may be held to account for the efficacy and morality of their actions. Here, WikiLeaks serves the public good, and--excepting gross violation of journalistic ethics--we must credit with them doing something basically right even though many powerful people would like us to see them as basically wrong. IMO, somebody's handling their journalistic obligations much better than, for instance, The New York Times did with warrantless wiretapping [they delayed publishing for a year], or Fox News did with the Downing Street Memo [they fanned the runaway bride story and diverted public interest].
Re:Wow (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Tattered Image (Score:5, Insightful)
Comment removed (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Do two wrongs make a right? (Score:5, Insightful)
But blaming in on telling the truth is just bullshit.
Odd write up (Score:5, Insightful)
These documents, which have been kept under wraps by WikiLeaks for months, may reveal tortures and murders ignored by coalition forces during the fighting and occupation in Iraq.
While there's been some speculation that Wikileaks has an anti-US bias, I don't see that. You're not going to get leaks from non-democracies. Nor are you going to get incriminating leaks from democracies that aren't engaging in significant combat (especially with an insurgency that blends in with the general population). So it'd be natural for them to get such documents from the US.
Having said that, the Slashdotter who submitted the story had a blatant anti-US bias. Hyping the release as "may reveal" bad things (even worse, "ignoring" bad things which somehow got documented anyway) is irresponsible, not that we had any expectation of responsibility from this guy. It's almost like the Slashdot editors picked the juiciest bit of flamebait they could find to dangle before the slavering hordes.
Re:the US and Israel butchers assassins torturers (Score:5, Insightful)
And that's how we got a second term for GWB instead of Al Gore - all you folks who voted for Ralph Nader and so on handed the White House to the Republicans.
And vice-versa. All you folks who voted for Gore instead of Nader handed the White House to the Republicans.
Re:Wow (Score:5, Insightful)
There's a reason why The Daily Show often tops the polls as the most trustworthy news source on television.
It's because they're upfront with the fact that Jon is liberal, and also they're upfront about their agenda: to tell dick jokes and poke fun at the absurdity of the system - often by using dick joke.
Re:Wow (Score:3, Insightful)
Powell sold us out (Score:3, Insightful)
In fact it doesn't matter who says what !
"you broke it, you own it"
- pure propaganda; I wonder if Powell even came up with it.
This is not a business... well, in a way our wars are big business and that dictates our policies; but corruption aside, comparison of geopolitics to crap like that is just false reasoning. We have no obligation to fix Iraq because we made a bad situation even worse by trying to fix it. Clearly, by "fixing it" we made it worse! Common sense says do not continue to fix the mess you made if you just make it bigger.
Since when did ethics really become part of our geopolitics??? its just propaganda. Even then, we are not required to repair nations we break - the morals went out the window when we attacked in the 1st place.
Re:Tattered Image (Score:5, Insightful)
These documents, which have been kept under wraps by WikiLeaks for months, may reveal tortures and murders ignored by coalition forces during the fighting and occupation in Iraq
*May* reveal? What, didn't you read it? They *may* reveal that Elmer Fudd is God, too, you never know. Or that aliens landed and the government is covering it up. Stop the sensationalism (although I understand why they are sensationalistic, and it's a fairly normal human failing so I don't begrudge them that).
Re:Tattered Image (Score:5, Insightful)
Top level officials not wanting these documents publicly released is unfortunate but the fact that these documents even exist is a testament to professionalism on the part of the Armed Forces.
At the risk of invoking Godwin, it's worth pointing out that the Nazis maintained meticulous records on the operation of their extermination camps that make these documents look like scribbling on the back of a napkin. Professionalism is value-neutral. You can be perfectly professional about both good and evil, and it has no effect on the moral value of what you're being professional about.
In short, if what you're doing is torturing people and murdering civilians, professionalism is really neither here nor there. Whether our forces a) stop doing these things, and b) hold accountable the people who did them (and their superiors) is the issue at hand.
I'm not holding my breath about either one. My guess is that instead, we'll be treated to a bunch of bloviation about WikiLeaks' danger to our national security, what an exception to the professionalism of the armed forces these thousands of anomalous incidents are, and, if all else fails, a tour of historic military atrocities aimed at arguing that everyone else does it, too, only with more words and no awareness of the consequences of letting our morality be determined by the lowest common denominator.
Oh, and that word you're using, "unfortunate"? It's not actually a synonym for "criminal coverup".
Re:I've never given money to a web site before (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:the US and Israel butchers assassins torturers (Score:3, Insightful)
Besides, how do you know he wouldn't have voted for Bush?
Re:Just us, or ... (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm curious why we've not seen any releases of Russian actions in Chechnya, by these folks.
Is the implication here that records of (frankly, very well-known) Russian atrocities in Chechnya would somehow make it okay for us to do similar things? Everything will be alright if we're not as bad as the Russians?
Well, we aren't as bad as the Russians. And I'll bet that comes as a huge relief to the victims of our war crimes.
Re:Wow (Score:1, Insightful)
Actually, the US forces might generally be considered neutral party, the bias coming from their superiors and the decision makers who wish to show the campaign in a positive light towards the American public. Vietnam gave a lesson on the consequences of 'beautified' reporting from the field.
Re:Wow (Score:4, Insightful)
Wikileaks may have a bias, but they also know their message is destroyed if they are shown to censor data for their effort. The 'Collatoral Murder' fisasco showed that. Even there, they provided the full video but put the focus on where *the issue* was for a short attention span viewing crowd.
The "Collatoral Murder" video is a really great example. That wasn't simply pairing down the information to cater to short attention spans. It was a nicely done propaganda piece. For me, that propaganda effort over-shadowed the opportunity to hold the US Military accountable to mistakes made. But then, it also played very well with the anti-war movement. I'd hazard to guess Wikileaks gained more supporters than they lost for their efforts.
Re:Wow (Score:5, Insightful)
Except all the "other side" of the 'truth' has already been published. It's actually the ONLY fact presented so far.
If nobody ever had said anything anywhere about the US military, and wikileaks published this, then it might have been a half truth, or at least something to be taken with a grain of salt. But what actually happens is that everyone, always and everywhere is fucking talking about the "heroes" that are "fighting for freedom" over there at the "axis of evil". Everything we've heard so far is their side. So, accusing wikileaks of being one sided is fucking stupid. The other side is the whole fucking media. All the fucking media against a single fucking website. Don't be such a fucking hypocrite.
Re:Wow (Score:2, Insightful)
I have a better idea: Stay the fuck away from that country. What none of you question, ever, is the real reason and validity of being there in the first place.
Give me one fucking valid reason why you need your troops anywhere outside your own territory murdering people.
Re:Wow (Score:1, Insightful)
The truth.
Not surprising (Score:3, Insightful)
Two things at work there:
1) They are just learning from other journalists. You may notice the media LOVES bad stories, loves speculation, and generally loves trolling. Fox News may be the most egregious but they all do it. Why? Gets viewers. For some reason, people eat that shit up. Slashdot is just emulating that, trying to get page views. I don't agree with it, but I can understand why they do it.
2) A lesser factor is just that you may have noted there are a lot of US haters on Slashdot. They believe the US government sucks and so on. They are just catering to a part of their fan base.
Unfortunately Slashdot does not have what you'd call good journalistic standards.
Re:The Pentagon would say mass (Score:2, Insightful)
They didn't counter the statement that there is a risk.
Everything in life has risk. The best you can do is mitigate the risk. Reportedly, Wikileaks attempted to redact as many names as possible for the first leak and asked the Pentagon to help (and none was provided).
Re:I've never given money to a web site before (Score:2, Insightful)
Crazy Horse, the chopper in the original video, was fully justified in their actions.
That is, like, your opinion.
It doesn't change the fact US trigger-happy troops cowardly and gleefully murdered a bunch of unarmed civilians and everyone and their kid who came around to help. From a distance. Nor does it change the fact that the command of the said troops covered up tens of thousands of civilian murders as well.
There were no "enemy combatants" in Iraq in 2007. The war there ended in 2003, remember?
Also, you're no veteran, you're just an anonymous asshole on a random board posting bullshit.
Re:Odd write up (Score:1, Insightful)
> While there's been some speculation that Wikileaks has an anti-US bias, I don't see that. You're not going to get leaks from non-democracies. Nor are you going to get incriminating leaks from democracies that aren't engaging in significant combat (especially with an insurgency that blends in with the general population). So it'd be natural for them to get such documents from the US.
That seems to require a bunch of iffy assumptions to make it work, though. Either that only the US does bad things (an obviously silly claim), or that only Americans care enough when their government does bad things to leak the info (also a silly claim).
If it had to do with war, then even the two big wars the US is in had other parties involved (NATO countries in Afghanistan, some of those and some others in Iraq). Where are *their* documents? There are Israelis who disagree with their government - where are their leaks? There are numerous free countries some selection of internal or external problems - France's frequent riots of "youths" should have much internal police documentation; Italy's corruption issues; the UK's investigation into Russia poisoning dissidents in the UK, which mysteriously nothing came of; the UK's issues of sailors abducted by Iran, where we got only official government claims from both nations, which could be confirmed or denied by leaks from the UK. Drug issues in South America? Oppressed groups in Venezuela? How about internal Indian reports of the terrorist attacks in India, which resulted in neither trials nor war? Investigations into tainted products from China (which strangely always get squashed instead of leading to legal action, even though there are MANY countries that get burned by the issue)? How about things slightly older than this decade, including wars, which are still secret?
There's a lot of stuff that patriotic individuals would want aired. Either they are mysteriously unable to get that to wikileaks, or wikileaks just isn't publishing it.
IMO, a big indicator of bias? Sweden; specifically, the lack of leaks on there, even with the accusations of corruption around the pirate bay raids and supposedly the US leaning on them to make trouble for Assange. But no leaks on those things earlier (when they were trying to get immunity there) and no leaks after there was heat on Assange; just his accusation the US was leaning on Sweden, which inherently means there must be some high level corruption going on.
Re:I've never given money to a web site before (Score:4, Insightful)
Who's going to read it? (Score:5, Insightful)
400,000 documents? We couldn't get people to read the 1000 page health care bill. Who's going to read these?
Re:Tattered Image (Score:5, Insightful)
Why in hell is this classified as 'Troll'? Didn't the Germans keep exceptional records during World War II, for instance? How about the Japanese? How about the United States during the Vietnam War... was its campaign with agent orange meticulously planned, implemented, and documented? I'm betting all the above is true.
"Professionalism" has NOTHING to do with social ethics; they are not synonymous, and that was precisely the point of the parent post by moortak. Professionalism merely implies a certain degree of diligence and attention to detail.
Re:Tattered Image (Score:2, Insightful)
You already knew this?
You already knew the best estimates people were providing were wildly less than it actually was?
You already knew the situation over there was wildly worse than reported?
Holy shit, you're awesome! You should get a job as an analyst/reporter, because you're better than everyone else! Congratulations, here's a star!
Re:Tattered Image (Score:5, Insightful)
Some people might say that these things inevitably happen in war. That's exactly the reason things like this should be made public. People need to know that things like this happen. Right now I get the impression that most Americans believe war is like a hollywood movie where the good guys never kill innocent people.
Re:Do two wrongs make a right? (Score:1, Insightful)
Telling the truth is never wrong.
Wrong !
1. WW2 - Germany
2. You hiding jews, allied soldiers etc.
3. SS officer asking about 2.
4. Teling truth right / wrong ?
Re:The irony... (Score:3, Insightful)
Why should one have to rely on "other sources" to get an accurate death toll? Oh that's right because the US Military has been dodging pinning down a death toll that mirrored reality the entire war. They had the data right in front of them, they just didn't care or didn't want to the public to know of all the civilian deaths caused by this careless, ham-fisted war.
Irony indeed (Score:5, Insightful)
I liked this one:
I think the whole world already knows how we operate. This only proves the point.
Putting soldiers lives at risk (Score:5, Insightful)
The documents reportedly also tell about incidents of torture by coalition forces, and of civilians being killed at checkpoints (for speeding to get their wife to the hospital). There is an incident described where a single terrorist on the roof of a building caused the military to obliterate the entire building and everyone in it (civilians).
Time to queue up the politicians whining about how evil it is releasing secrets about the torture and murder or civilians and at no time admitting the real evil was in the acts themselves.
Two Words : Pat Tillman (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Disgusting (Score:5, Insightful)
Looting. Rape. Killing. This is normal. This is what war looks like up close.
Short glance through the articles reminded me of few things my grand-father were telling about WWII (who fought on Russia's side).
Over time I have developed the opinion that glorification of a war is the sign of corrupt and evil state.
Re:Tattered Image (Score:5, Insightful)
The video shows that the army has very low standard of proof in deciding whether someone might be a combatant, and that innocent people die because of it.
Spoken like someone who doesn't know anything about war. What kind of standard of proof would you expect? Land the helicopter and ask each person to show their terrorist ID card before they can be engaged? The US soldiers see a group of men on the street. They confirm that they are not US or friendly Iraqi personnel. They confirm that some of them are armed (lookup blown up stills from that video. AK47 and an RPG are clearly visible). They suspect hostile intent as some of the men are peering around the corner in the direction of US ground forces. They ask higher ups for the permission to engage and get it. The film and document every detail of the operation (though not necessarily release to the media). No other army does anything remotely close to that. Russians would have carpet bombed the entire city block like they did in Chechnya and nobody would have ever known anything about it. Same with Chinese. The most tragic part of it was the van but even that was not strictly speaking a violation of the rules of war. Anybody helping the enemy (while not clearly marked as a medic) is a fair target.
Your international rights (Score:5, Insightful)
Now let's suppose a group of Canadian terrorists bombs a building a China. You couldn't complain if the Chinese consequently invaded the USA because you are harboring Canadians. The Chinese could march up to Washington, catch Bush, Obama and friends from pits in the ground, and execute them after a fake trial. While hunting the terrorists, they could kill innocent civilians with a ratio 5:1. These events, they could hide them actively from the media and from being ever discovered, because it is the patriotic thing to do and to protect the Chinese freedom fighters. If your family was killed at a checkpoint, you could witness people on Chinese internet forums discussing that it is irresponsible to have information about this incident released, that this would be anti-Chinese and evidence of a strong bias and sensationalism of the person of organisation releasing that secret info. There will be much torture, and those who expose it will be branded traitors, while the torturers walk. Many Americans and Canadians will be shipped to a remote prison. The new Chinese ruler who will keep everything the same will get the Nobel Peace Price.
Re:Playing devils advocate (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Playing devils advocate (Score:5, Insightful)
Problem is, it was supposed to be a liberation, not a war.
When the WMDs didn't pan out, Bush went on and on about the glorious democracy they were going to bring by deposing of the evil tyrant. Well, just look at it. Isn't the guy who was driving his wife to the hospital glad you set things right?
I'll grant you that ignoring a checkpoint in wartime isn't the smartest decision one can make, but chances are under Saddam he would still be alive. And I thought that the whole point of this was making things better.
Re:Do two wrongs make a right? (Score:3, Insightful)
Telling the truth is never wrong.
Telling the truth is, in some instances, completely wrong. Just think about it for two seconds and you'll know it's true. Same for keeping promises, especially bad ones. Do I really need to enumerate examples or can you go one step past what you learned in elementary school with this thought experiment?
Re:Playing devils advocate (Score:5, Insightful)
So, we're now the radical left if we think that a whole building full of people don't deserve to die because there is a sniper there? Great. Hope you weren't anywhere in DC when there was a sniper there...
Invading a country that had nothing to do with 9/11 and no WMD is not a valid military tactic. To compare the invasion of Iraq with liberation of Europe is laughable. Would you suck it up with "War is hell" if they did this in your country? And "muslims killing muslims" - well, what if I invaded and put the KKK in charge of the US - would that be OK as "Christians killing Christians"? When you remove power and authority and hand it to psychopaths you are NOT absolved of whatever they do.
So FUCK YOU armchair warrior. Your "War" was illegitimate, the hell you brought with you is horrendous, and if it makes me a radical left winger to say so, we DO need to see what the results of our "War on Terror" are and become outraged that thousands of civilians have been killed FOR NOTHING. I don't want to be desensitized. I don't want to get used to it. I want it to stop happening, unless it's the absolutely fucking last resort, which it was not in this case.
Re:I've never given money to a web site before (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Playing devils advocate (Score:4, Insightful)
Bringing your wife to hospital? Did you grow up in a movie? In reality, there is no emergency. Labour lasts hours even with mothers who had babies before.
Okay, this may run completely contrary to your worldview so it may be best to sit down and steady yourself : giving birth is not the sum total of a woman's existence. If someone is rushing their wife to hospital then there is a very good chance that it has nothing to do with making babies. And yes, in reality, it may be an emergency. People use hospitals in emergencies. Even women who aren't giving birth. Does that make any sense to you at all?
Re:Wow (Score:2, Insightful)
give me one country where US troops are present where the local government who is in favour of US troops being there wasn't put there by the USA
Re:Playing devils advocate (Score:1, Insightful)
> War is hell. Get used to it.
> War is hell, accept that. Civilians are going to be killed...
> We ask the pentagon to go to war, then we have to accept the results.
I don't think that's a particularly accurate summary of the maniacal push to war. Plenty of normal civilians already know that war is hell, and that civilians inevitably get killed, and that's precisely why so many people protested and demonstrated on the streets making it quite clear that no matter how much the pentagon and the politicians were desperate to start up their war machine, the public DIDN'T WANT IT.
Don't claim that we asked the pentagon to go to war, that's incredibly insulting.
Re:Your international rights (Score:3, Insightful)
The United States sponsored the terrorists too. A major reason Osama bin Laden is so skilled at terrorism is that he learned from and was at one point funded by the CIA. The primary reason the US thought Saddam Hussein had chemical munitions left is that the US had sold them to him in the 1980's in the hopes that he would use them against Iran. While simultaneously selling weapons to the Iranian regime in the hopes that they would use them against Hussein in Iraq, and using the profits to fund guerrilla fighters in Nicaragua.
Although you're right about one thing: the US usually doesn't use outside terror groups the way poorer countries do. When they want to terrorize a population, say, Grenada, they don't use terrorists, they use Marines.
Playing devils prosecution (Score:5, Insightful)
You say that pointing out the bad things that happen in war is wrong because in war they are inevitable, well they are not. The real issue is that the war was illegal, injustified (unless lies are currently a justification for anything), and in direct violation of international law. Even enemy soldiers getting killed is a tragedy and worth speaking up about, let alone pregnant women on their way to hospital, and for the record labour is quite often an emergency, especially where poverty and bad hygiene are involved. Ask a doctor if you doubt this.
I have a joke for you: A man breaks into a house and starts raping a woman living there. Her husband interferes. In the ensuing struggle the husband and wife are both killed. In court the rapists lawyer says: "Rape is a messy business, that's the reality. People get killed sometimes." So the judge lets him off the murder charges.
Also, the idea that you should silence the critics of war in order to have a rational debate about atrocities committed is absurd, I hope you realise this.
Now that the silliness is out of the way, can we talk about REALity?
Re:I've never given money to a web site before (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Tattered Image (Score:4, Insightful)
You know, you're an ass.
It doesn't matter what the fucking standard is, if it results in destroying innocent children in vans driving by, the AMERICAN PEOPLE THINK IT IS TOO LOW.
If you can't fight a war without following that standard, perhaps the American people should be apprised of this fact so they can, before the war, debate 'Hey, should we kill some innocent children or not?'. And if they aren't willing to accept that, perhaps they should, I dunno, decide against said war.
This democratic concept, that American people should decide if the horrors of war are 'worth it', only fucking works if the American people know what war looks like.
You don't get to whine and bitch that they were actually, finally, shown that and think it's outrageous. Please direct your whining and bitching to the media and government that sanitized the war for almost a decade.
Re:the US and Israel butchers assassins torturers (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Tattered Image (Score:5, Insightful)
heya,
If you're referring to that stupid incident involving the embedded AP reporter, then I'm sorry, that myths already being debunked.
AP has a reputation of embedding its reporters within insurgent groups. The AP reporter in question here was a Iraqi local who decided to hang with an insurgent group...gee...whodee damn doo, I wonder what happens when you decided to embed yourself inside an insurgent group, trying to kill Americans, in order to be "on the ground", and get the other side of the story. Seriously guys, blaming the US for killing an embedded reporter in enemy forces is just plain stupid.
And the van issue, with kids? Right, so the US just had a firefight with some insurgents armed with AK-47's and RPGs...so what do you do? Gee, drive an unmarked van, with kids *inside* the van, to go take a closer look? *sigh*. Even if you were allegedly picking up wounded insurgents (gosh, I wonder what side that makes me look at), has anybody considered that it's frigging retarded, if not bad parenting, to drive a van with your kids into the aftermath of a US versus insurgents aftermath?
I mean, if you yourself want to basically commit suicide, and paint a big target on your head saying, please, please, shoot me, then at least leave your damn kids out of it.
Urgh, seriously guys. Take off your ANTI-US DOWN WITH THE IMPERIALIST blinkers, and actually apply the logic. I dislike the US for other reasons, but at least I can apply some common basic sense here.
I bet if it was any other two forces, we'd be like...yeah...that is a pretty retarded thing to do. Vote them for a Darwin award...
Cheers,
Victor
Re:Playing devils advocate (Score:5, Insightful)
BTW there are also a lot of people on "the left" who were pro-war.
Go back and look at the Congressional Authorization for War in 2001.
The Democrat representatives voted near-unanimously to go to war.
Even now the Democrats continue forward with war, even though they've held Congress since 2006 and could have ended the war anytime they felt like it. IMHO they should have ended it then, or immediately after Obama became inaugurated.
Re:Irony indeed (Score:2, Insightful)
Diagnosis is the first part of the cure (Score:5, Insightful)
It's not being divisive to diagnose the problem correctly. AC is spot on.
The problem with the radical left wing is that it is measured in distance from the right. Which keeps moving to the right. In the 1960's you had to be a hippie in a minivan or a communist or a black panther to be called radical left wing. These days all it takes is for you to say "gee blowing up children might not be a good thing."
If you want a serious dialog on this, I'll tell you what. We of the left will happily become more centrist. Just as soon as you put down the Fox news driven fear and paranoia, and really think about what is best. A good start would be to just simply head to youtube and watch a few recordings of the Dalai Lama speaking.
I've done my part. I'm a registered Democrat and I'm pro second amendment. And guess what? My head didn't explode. So that's my first step. What will yours be?
Re:Putting soldiers lives at risk (Score:3, Insightful)
Anyone else notice how Aljazeera are one of the few news sources that don't make Julian Assange look shifty as fuck in every story about him?
aljazeera:
http://english.aljazeera.net/mritems/Images/2010/10/23/201010231247163784_20.jpg [aljazeera.net]
Now try this in google image search and look at the first few hits.
julian assange inurl:CNN
they seems to be one of the few news sources other than the guardian which can take a picture with decent colour balance and without taking it from way above his eye level or as he's leaning forward?
Re:I've never given money to a web site before (Score:1, Insightful)
"I have no desire to protect an Iraqi soldier who is on our side, but commits the same tortures and executions that Saddam Hussein's troops did. Allies like that, we don't need. Throw him to the dogs"
You know, I've always thought the same as Americans as supposed "allies" when British troops go to war to support you only to get killed in countless friendly fire incidents over the years, followed by your government blocking any investigations we do into such incidents to try and find out what went wrong.
Do you know why America has such a bad friendly fire incident rate compared to other nations? Well, your attitude is a good pointer:
"Crazy Horse, the chopper in the original video, was fully justified in their actions. They shot up what they believed to be enemy combatants, all according to the laws of war."
Sorry but no, you don't fucking fire unless you're god damn sure they're enemy combatants. Thinking they are is fucking bollocks, do you think that excuse would hold water if you walked next door and shot your neighbour in the head now and told the courts "Well, I saw smoke coming out of his kitchen so I figured he was a terrorist brewing home made explosives". It doesn't fucking cut it, if you're not sure, you do not fire. This is precisely why we have rules of engagement like "Do not fire until fired upon", unfortunately due to the US militaries severe lack of professionalism and competence, this is something they just don't get, and incidents like that with the 2 journalists, or the countless other friendly fire or civilian casualty incidents happen over and over and over.
You only have to look back a week or so to see how the Americans seemingly killed the hostage they were meant to be rescuing in Afghanistan by throwing a fucking grenade into the room the hostage was in.
The incident with Crazyhorse in the video was unacceptable, and it was not in any way justified, there was absolutely no evidence that all the people they shot initially were a threat and there was absolutely no evidence whatsoever that any of the people who came to help the injured deserved to be fired upon.
Keep telling yourself and your countrymen it was okay though, and the incidents will keep happening, yet your country will keep losing respect. I was one of the people who stood by America post 9/11 agreeing we should go to war with them, but nowadays, I would vote and protest at the first opportunity any military action alongside the American military until they can a) Start to show some professionalism, and b) Allow us to finish all outstanding enquiries into friendly fire incidents against our troops.
America is starting to look very alone in the world as even those of us who stood by you no longer wish to do so due to your military's severe level of incompetence on the battlefield. Between the accidental killing of hostages and the dramas in the last set of war diaries relating to Task Force 373 even US special forces are beginning to resemble Dad's Army. When even your most elite troops are involved in blunder after blunder you should start to realise your whole military has a severe fucking competence problem.
Re:All war, all the time (Score:1, Insightful)
I don't know if he's constitutionally guilty of being a traitor, but he is guilty of being a dishonest propagandist and a liar.
Apparently, when a militant Islamic psychopath kills another Muslim, that's automatically America's fault, wherever it occurs.
Re:Tattered Image (Score:3, Insightful)
Jesus Christ.
Both you and I and clarkkent09 are saying 'War is a horrible thing that if people knew what really happened, they'd be horrified, so the people talking about war gloss over the details.' We all appear to be in agreement on that..
However, I think that's a damn good reason to not invade other countries to 'liberate' them anymore, whereas you two seem to think that's an argument against telling showing people what actually happens because they won't like it, which is the most goddamn fascist bullshit I've ever heard my life.
No shit that people don't like war. No shit governments have always sanitized it so they can have their 'adventures' against 'the bad guy'.
We all know that. It's that some of us DON'T LIKE THAT, dumbass. Others, like you, seem to think the problem is actually admitting what really happens in a war, presumably because...you're pro-war in general?
I don't think the general public really do want to know the gory details of each and every atrocity.
'Beware of the man who would deny you access to information, for in his heart he dreams himself your master.'
And I love how you say that and then, two paragraphs later, imply they do already know the details, and I'm some sort of idiot for pointing out they do not and were horrified when shown them.
No, the general public did not know the US military would blow up vehicles that just happened to be driving near firefights. And probably would have been more upset if they understood that, instead of a couple of loose cannons who did something careless, the people who did it were entirely within correct behavior, and vans full of innocent children could hypothetically be blown up all the time.
Sadly, most of the general public appear to think it was some sort of one-time mistake instead of, strictly speaking, not a mistake at all. Hopefully the WikiLeaks release will help dissuade them of that.
Re:Tattered Image (Score:4, Insightful)
And the van issue, with kids? Right, so the US just had a firefight with some insurgents armed with AK-47's and RPGs...so what do you do? Gee, drive an unmarked van, with kids *inside* the van, to go take a closer look? *sigh*. Even if you were allegedly picking up wounded insurgents (gosh, I wonder what side that makes me look at), has anybody considered that it's frigging retarded, if not bad parenting, to drive a van with your kids into the aftermath of a US versus insurgents aftermath?
The driver in all probability didn't know any of that. The helicopter was at least a kilometre away and the wounded man he stopped by was unarmed. (Had he been armed the helicopter would have fired, as is demonstrated by the comments by the crew; they goad the wounded man crawling along the street to pick up a weapon so they can open fire).
Also, you are conducting a war in someone's neighbourhood. (Compare the British squaddie joke of renaming FIUBA, "FISH" - "Fighting in somebody else's house.") Of course there are going to be civilians with children around. Civilians that might want to aid what they perceive as their countrymen laying wounded in the street. Civilians who weren't there when the fight actually happened, and may not even be aware of one taking place (esp. with the prevalence of IEDs targeting the civilian population). Don't you think people came running/driving/ when the Oklahoma city bomb went off? It wasn't as if a Bradley was parked in the middle of the street just as he came around the corner.
A helicopter crew should and did knew all of this. As is witnessed by their lying to their chain of command in describing the situation, one can only assume to knowingly and illegally secure permission to fire.
Re:All war, all the time (Score:2, Insightful)