As everyone knows by now, a 38-year-old
staff sergeant in the Army went on a rampage the other night,
breaking into the homes of villagers in Kandahar province and
methodically killing 16 civilians, 3 women, 4 men and 9 children.
Afterwards, he piled up some of the bodies and tried to burn them.
Here's a report.
The alleged murderer was on his fourth
tour in the Middle East, having previously been sent to Iraq three
times. Ironically, his mission was to train Afghan troops in order
to bring “stability” to the region. Here's some background on
the perpetrator.
The Afghans want him to be tried in
their courts and executed. We all know that will not happen. The
accused will be brought back to the U. S. and tried in a military
court. In all likelihood, he will be found guilty but mentally ill,
and will waste the rest of his life away in an institution. As a
consolation prize, the families—if there any of them left—will
get “compensation." I believe the free market value of an Afghan
life is $1500.
Predictably, the corporate media are
treating the event as more of a public relations disaster than a
human tragedy. A New York Times
headline read, “Civilian deaths imperil support for Afghan war.”
And USA Today:
“Killings threaten Afghan mission.” We're told that there will
be an anti-American backlash, but as previously noted in this blog,
it's hard to believe that support for the American occupation could
have been any lower before this latest incident. But not to worry.
Pentagon spokesman George Little said yesterday, “Despite what some
people are saying out there, we are absolutely not changing our
fundamental strategy in Afghanistan.” So there.
President
Obama expressed his regrets, but this time he did not apologize. I
guess he took too much of a tongue-lashing from the Elephant
candidates when he apologized for the burning of the Korans. The President went on to say: “This incident is tragic and shocking,
and does not represent the exceptional character of our military and
the respect that the United States has for the people of
Afghanistan.”
But
wait a minute. I don't know about people's “character,” but this
is not an isolated event. American soldiers have gone on killing sprees before,
sometimes cutting off fingers and other body parts as trophies.
Civilians have been targeted by helicopter gunships and drone
attacks. Night raids, where U. S. and NATO forces break into homes
and attack people as they sleep, have been going on for 11 years.
There have been as many as 40 raids per night, with the overall
average being 10 per night. You bomb a bunch of children gathering firewood here. You incinerate a wedding party there. Pretty soon
all of that adds up to a really pissed off population.
As for
our “respect” for the people of Afghanistan, don't these words
automatically elicit the image of American Marines urinating on their dead bodies?
These
incidents are just another example of what a prolonged war of occupation does to the occupying troops. As with Vietnam and Iraq,
this war has become an atrocity-producing environment.
We've been fighting in Afghanistan for 11 years. Since you can't
tell who the Taliban are, soldiers begin to see the entire population
as the enemy. Over time, this perception has become more and more
accurate, for obvious reasons. In order to justify what they are
doing to the Afghan people, it is helpful for soldiers to see them as
less than human. The extreme cultural differences between the
occupiers and the occupied further encourages this racism. Do we
have any right to be surprised by these atrocities?
President
Obama has said that “all those responsible” will be brought to
justice. If that's true, he might want to start by looking in the
mirror. Then he might continue by arresting the people who sat or are
sitting around the table in the war room at the White House. Biden
and Clinton. Panetta and Petraeus. These people knew the
consequences of their decisions. At the end of World War II, we
insisted on holding commanders responsible for the actions of their
troops.
I
guess I'm expected to end a post like this by calling for a quick end
to the occupation of Afghanistan. But we've said it so many times
before.
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