Haditha

[Jim]

I'm repulsed by Reid's blatant use of Haditha along with another laundry list of complaints.

http://www.rawstory.com/news/2006/Democratic_leader_enumerates_issues_gay_marriage_0605.html

 

Raging in Iraq is an intractable war. Our soldiers are fighting valiantly, but we have Abu Ghraib and Haditha—where 24 or more civilians were allegedly killed by our own—and no policy for winning the peace.

 

What an irrational mishmash of concepts. Atrocities occur in war, sometimes by military "necessity" (How could airborne troops make prisoners of every German that surrendered the night before D-Day and still accomplish their objectives?) and other times simply because a kid with enough firepower to level a small city blows a fuse. The ultimate test of character is not adversity but is to be given power over other human beings and Americans, like all nationalities, will fail this test from time to time.

 

You won't get such things to simply "stop" and to act like this is a question of Presidential leadership is false and cynical in the extreme. I can accept cynical politics in some areas but not in questions of national security.

 

As Americans we are ashamed when our own commit atrocities and we should insist on prosecution to the fullest extent of the law. If those up the chain of command tried to cover this up, they should also pay the fullest price allowed by due process.

 

However, it should stay out of the political sphere. I had been fairly encouraged that not many had tried to use Haditha for political ends.

 

Edit: Note Reid's sleight of hand: First he praises the troops when it was troops that caused the atrocity and then mixes the issue with that of the war being a stalemate. Well, sorry, but if Haditha is as reported it was the fault of the troops involved and, to a lesser extent, those who tried to cover up the atrocity. It's a question of personal responsibility.

 

Look at that again in slow motion: The troops are valiant and "...24 or more civilians were allegedly killed by our own—and no policy for winning the peace..." Is he excusing the atrocity of the few troops involved just so he can make political hay at a higher level? Seems so to me.

 

(Pangloss edit: Fixed the URL.)

[Mokele]

While I generally agree, I do think Haditha could be used to highlight viable concerns, such as how some have criticized any investigation into the alleged incident as 'unpatriotic' (creating an unhealthy air of 'anything goes'), internal military issues which allowed the incident to be covered up for so long, excessive deployment time / troop shortages which may have lead quicker fuse-blowing, and the need to move towards a fully mechanized military devoid of humans and therefore human error.

 

Basically, I feel there are ways it can be used to highlight real issues, and ways that it can be used as a cheap political tool. The good news is that the latter stands a good chance of backfiring.

 

Mokele

[Pangloss]

It's a stupid statement (on Reid's part) because a lot more than 24 Iraqis (like several orders of magnitude more) have been killed by American soldiers. The difference being that most of those were accidental, caused by proximiting bombing or stray fire, but in this particular case it looks more like a deliberate act. But he can't SAY that about Haditha yet because it hasn't been tested in court, so the best he can do is allude to it in a false and idiotic manner. He's just being a petty demogogue here. But that's typical for Washington, and the statement in general doesn't bother me more than most of the garbage that seeps out of the beltway these days.

 

Regarding the subject of the Haditha incident itself, I find myself in rare agreement with the left. The incident (if it's true) should not have happened, the fact that it did strongly indicates a larger problem with troop training and morale, and the obvious cover-up is beyond inexcusible.

[john5746]

I agree with his main point that Bush is using the marriage issue to drum up his base, so they will forget about other issues. Of course, many politicians are doing this during the election year cycle.

 

I don't take that much offense from his statement. I don't see why politicians can't complain about military mistakes. It may be a little early to throw Haditha around, but mistakes do happen and will continue to happen. The point is do we stay the course or change it.

[Jim]

It's a stupid statement (on Reid's part) because a lot more than 24 Iraqis (like several orders of magnitude more) have been killed by American soldiers. The difference being that most of those were accidental' date=' caused by proximiting bombing or stray fire, but in this particular case it looks more like a deliberate act. But he can't SAY that about Haditha yet because it hasn't been tested in court, so the best he can do is allude to it in a false and idiotic manner. He's just being a petty demogogue here. But that's typical for Washington, and the statement in general doesn't bother me more than most of the garbage that seeps out of the beltway these days.

 

Regarding the subject of the Haditha incident itself, I find myself in rare agreement with the left. The incident (if it's true) should not have happened, the fact that it did strongly indicates a larger problem with troop training and morale, and the obvious cover-up is beyond inexcusible.[/quote']

 

I don't see the massacre, if that's what happened, indicates a larger problem with troop training. I'm not sure how a problem with troop training could lead to a massacre of civilian men, women and children. If there was a systematic problem, we'd have other cases. Maybe we do but there is no proof of that as of yet.

 

I agree it could be indicative of a problem with this group's morale. It depends on what happened. It could be that there was a charismatic sociopath that led a group astray. We just don't know. It seems chauvinistic for Americans (not talking about you here, Pangloss) to assume that we can't have bad actors in our military. I guess that's the problem with idealizing the troops that it is hard to simply assign fault with the young man or men, no matter how dire the circumstances who shoot a helpless child (if that's what happened).

 

In any event, I would like to think that if I were a politician I would not use a massacre by US troops as a political talking point. There are a variety of reasons this seems beyond the pale, out of bounds, or whatever metaphor you want to use to say, "let's for God's sake act in our common interest and not use this politically." Let's understand it as best we can, punish the bad actors up and down the chain of command, keep it in some historical context, improve training if we can, address morale issues but let's not include it in a laundry list of talking points. Talk about it as a matter of national soul searching, consider the policy implications but this is not an issue on which our leaders should make glib political points.

[Pangloss]

I don't see the massacre' date=' if that's what happened, indicates a larger problem with troop training. I'm not sure how a problem with troop training could lead to a massacre of civilian men, women and children. If there was a systematic problem, we'd have other cases. Maybe we do but there is no proof of that as of yet.

[/quote']

 

There's no way to draw any conclusions at this point, I agree. The connection, though, is pretty clear. Soldiers are a very close-knit community, relying on each other for behavioral indicators -- it's essential to their very survival. This sort of thing is well documented. So yes, if this happened even once, that is an indication that it might have happened at other times, and we need to keep an open mind about that unfortunate possibility. It's the sensible thing to do, regardless of politics.

[Sisyphus]

Or it could just be a fundamental problem with militaries in general. The average American soldier is of necessity going to be more bloodthirsty than the average American (they did sign up for violence as a job), and the primary motivation of some will always be to "kill some towelheads" or whatever. It's not something that gets talked about, because first, it's "unpatriotic" (i.e., ammo for right-wing pandering), second, it is insulting to those who join up out of a real sense of duty, and most importantly, there's nothing we can do about it. We need an effective military, and volunteer militaries are much more effective than conscipted ones. Also, another reason our military is so effective is that our soldiers are trained to dehumanize everyone but their own troops, so they won't hesitate in battle. I don't know if that contributes to this sort of thing, but I don't see how it couldn't. To be fair, though, they are also trained in as realistic settings as possible so they won't shoot the wrong guy, so who knows.

[padren]

Thats funny, after I read the article in question, I ended up taking a much different stance than I expected. What I see in his list, is that he's blasting the administration for avoiding real issues that actually affect people to push one contraversial issue that - whether it is passed or not - will have absolutely no impact on most Americans, other than a small minority will get kicked in the face yet again.

 

 

Why shouldn't the guy be pissed off about Haditha? Why shouldn't he join others in demanding accountablility? When an administration arranges organized torture by shuffling people off to prisons where we can pay non-americans to do unamerican things to prisoners, when we completely devalue the lives of people that should be innocent until proven guilty - and then that mentality appears to seep into the battleground in iraqi prisons, in gitmo and in the skulls of dead women and children strewn in their homes - who is responsible? Why shouldn't we demand a change? At the very least some real dialog instead of crap we get.

 

 

To be honest, its actually nice to see a democrat with a spine for once. I hope more follow suit.

[john5746]

..."let's for God's sake act in our common interest and not use this politically."

 

OK, same for the gay marriage issue.