OT: One incident. Forty dead. Two stories. What really happened?

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Topic:	Religions > Atheism
User:	"maff"
Date:	21 May 2004 02:57:16 AM
Object:	OT: One incident. Forty dead. Two stories. What really happened?

One incident. Forty dead. Two stories. What really happened?
http://news.independent.co.uk/world/middle_east/story.jsp?story=523356
By Justin Huggler in Baghdad
21 May 2004
A tiny bundle of blankets is unwrapped; inside is the body of a baby,
its limbs smeared with dried blood. Then the mourners peel back the
blanket further to reveal a second dead baby.
Another blanket is opened; inside are the bodies of a mother and
child. The child, six or seven years old, is lying against his or her
mother, as if seeking comfort. But the child has no head.
Justin Huggler
http://groups.google.com/groups?hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-8&selm=18510aff.0405130137.7f2cb209%40posting.google.com
.

User: "stoney"
Title: Re: OT: One incident. Forty dead. Two stories. What really happened?	24 May 2004 03:55:52 PM

On 21 May 2004 00:57:16 -0700,

(maff), Message ID:
<18510aff.0405202357.6acbb160@posting.google.com> wrote in alt.atheism;

One incident. Forty dead. Two stories. What really happened?
http://news.independent.co.uk/world/middle_east/story.jsp?story=523356

One incident. Forty dead. Two stories. What really happened?
By Justin Huggler in Baghdad
21 May 2004
A tiny bundle of blankets is unwrapped; inside is the body of a baby,
its limbs smeared with dried blood. Then the mourners peel back the
blanket further to reveal a second dead baby.
Another blanket is opened; inside are the bodies of a mother and child.
The child, six or seven years old, is lying against his or her mother,
as if seeking comfort. But the child has no head.
These are the images that American forces in Iraq had no answer to
yesterday. They come from video footage of the burials of 41 men, women
and children. The Iraqis say they died when American planes launched air
strikes on a wedding party near the Syrian border on Wednesday.
US forces insist that the attack was on a safe house used by foreign
fighters entering Iraq from Syria. They do not dispute that they killed
about 40 people, but claim American forces were returning fire and the
dead were all foreign fighters. For the video footage that shows dead
women and children they have no explanation.
So potentially damaging is the video to the US occupation that American
officials have demanded that the Dubai-based al-Arabiya television news
network, which obtained the footage, give them the name of the cameraman
who took it. Al-Arabiya has refused.
In the footage men weep and cling to the bodies of their loved ones
before they are buried. There are dozens of bundles wrapped in
flower-patterned blankets. Some of these images were shown on Western
television news yesterday, but not the most disturbing: the bodies
themselves.
"These were more than two dozen military-age males. Let's not be naive,"
Major General James Mattis, commander of the US 1st Marine Division,
said. But he had no explanation of where the dead women and children in
the video came from. "I have not seen the pictures but bad things happen
in wars," he said cryptically. "I don't have to apologise for the
conduct of my men."
US forces say they have been watching the border area where the attack
took place for some time. They saw a large group of suspicious people
moving in the area and sent in ground forces, who came under fire, so
the US forces returned fire.
They are sticking doggedly to this version of events despite growing
evidence that a wedding party was hit. More and more eyewitnesses are
coming forward. Hussein Ali, a well-known wedding singer, was buried in
Baghdad yesterday, alongside his brother Mohammed. Their family said
they had been performing at the wedding.
The evidence that the US military has put forward to support its version
of events has been seriously undermined. Brigadier General Mark Kimmitt
said guns, Syrian passports and a satellite phone had been recovered.
But Sheikh Nasrallah Miklif, the head of the Bani Fahd tribe to which
most of the dead belonged, said that was to be expected, given that the
air strike happened in Makradheeb, a village in the desert, about 10
miles from the Syrian border.
Every household in Iraq has a gun, usually a Kalashnikov assault rifle,
to protect itself. In the desert it is even more common for people to
keep guns, as protection not only from robbers, but also wild animals.
Shepherds need to protect their flocks.
The village is 80 miles from the nearest town, al-Qa'im, and 10 miles
from the nearest road. There are no telephone lines and no mobile
coverage. Satellite phones are comparatively cheap in Iraq and it would
be surprising if the villagers did not have one.
People in the area frequently marry neighbours from across the border.
That means there have always been villagers on the Iraqi side with
Syrian passports and vice versa. On top of that, many of the villagers
on both sides make their living smuggling sheep across the border, and
have been routinely crossing it for years - not entirely legal, but that
does not make them foreign fighters planning to attack US forces.
General Mattis asked: "How many people go to the middle of the desert 10
miles from the Syrian border to hold a wedding 80 miles from the nearest
civilisation?" Iraqis replied that the victims of the attack were
holding the wedding in the village where they had lived all their lives.
Sheikh Mikfil was not in the village at the time of the attack, but he
has spoken at length with the survivors. All of the villagers were
members of his tribe; the only dead from outside were the musicians. He
put the death toll at 41 - 25 of whom were members of the bridegroom's
family. The wedding was held at the home of the bridegroom's father,
Rikat Obeid Hussein. The newly married couple survived because they were
in a specially erected honeymoon tent when the bombing began.
The sheikh said that by 2am, when the attack started, the celebrations
were finished and the guests were asleep. There had been US helicopters
in the sky earlier, but they had not fired and the wedding guests were
not worried.
General Kimmitt said: "We sent a ground force in to the location. They
were shot at. We returned fire."
But Sheikh Mikfil said the attack began with air strikes, without
warning. They were followed by helicopters, and after several hours of
air strikes, US troops arrived in armoured vehicles to search the
devastated village.
Contrary to earlier reports, the sheikh said, there was no celebratory
gunfire. Firing guns in the air is traditional at Iraqi weddings, and it
was initially suspected that US forces had mistaken such shooting for
hostile fire, as they did at a wedding party in Afghanistan when US air
strikes killed more than 50 people in 2002. Sheikh Mikfil says he
questioned the survivors extensively on this, and they were categorical:
there was no shooting in the air.
He said the bride came from the same village, so there was no
large-scale movement of people that could have aroused US suspicions.
"If they killed foreign fighters, why don't they show us the bodies?" he
asked. "If they suspected foreign fighters were there, why didn't they
come to arrest them, instead of using this huge force?"
Sheikh Mikfil said he suspected the Americans might have been acting on
false intelligence information, given by someone who wanted to increase
the tension between Iraqis and Americans.
It is impossible to reconcile the American and Iraqi versions of events.
But with more and more evidence emerging that casts doubt on the
American version, and Iraqi anger rising, US forces need to come up with
some answers. If this was one of the "bad things" that "happen in wars"
- to use General Mattis's phrase - more explanation is required.

24 May 2004 13:50
(c) 2004 Independant Digital

Stoney
"Designated Rascal and Rapscallion
and
SCAMPERMEISTER!"
When in doubt, SCAMPER about!
When things are fair, SCAMPER everywhere!
When things are rough, can't SCAMPER enough!
/end humour alert
alt.atheism military veteran #11
{so much for the 'no atheists in foxholes' rubbish}
.

User: "SMChristenson"
Title: Re: OT: One incident. Forty dead. Two stories. What really happened?	25 May 2004 08:06:15 AM

On Fri, 21 May 2004 00:57:16 -0700, maff wrote:
Kimmitt doesn't look that old, but one thing that strikes me is how much
these guys all act like dinosaurs. "Hey, denial always _used_ to work!"
-- before digital cameras, home video, the internet and email.
"Clueless angry old white men" I guess.
.

User: "Lord Calvert"
Title: Re: OT: One incident. Forty dead. Two stories. What really happened?	25 May 2004 11:19:09 AM

Kimmitt doesn't look that old, but one thing that strikes me is how much
these guys all act like dinosaurs. "Hey, denial always _used_ to work!"
-- before digital cameras, home video, the internet and email.

"Clueless angry old white men" I guess.

The one thing that really got me about this story was MG Kimmitt's quote, "I
have not seen the pictures but bad things happen
in wars. I don't have to apologise for the
conduct of my men."
Excuse me? Just how the ***** did someone so blatantly irresponsible ever get a
commission, much less make it to flag rank in the Marines? Commanders ARE
responsible for the conduct of the men under their command. That's part and
parcel of being a commissioned officer. If he's not man enough to take that
responsibility he should resign. This man is a disgrace to the Corps.
Rich Goranson, Amherst, NY, USA (aa#MCMXCIX, a-vet#1)
EAC Department of Applied Rattan Use
"Without faith we might relapse into scientific or rational thinking, which
leads by a slippery slope toward constitutional democracy." - Robert Anton
Wilson
.

User: "Kate "
Title: Re: OT: One incident. Forty dead. Two stories. What really happened?	26 May 2004 08:12:09 AM

On 25 May 2004 16:19:09 GMT, forlornh@aol.complicated (Lord Calvert)
wrote:

The one thing that really got me about this story was MG Kimmitt's quote, "I
have not seen the pictures but bad things happen
in wars. I don't have to apologise for the
conduct of my men."

I thought we won this war a year ago. Who are we fighting now? How
can we justify civilians being killed when it's us who killed them and
the whole point of the war was to save them?
Instead they've become a liability standing between us and something
else.
.

User: "stoney"
Title: Re: OT: One incident. Forty dead. Two stories. What really happened?	28 May 2004 10:19:08 AM

On 26 May 2004 08:12:09 -0500,

(Kate ), Message ID:
<40c4962e.151839890@news-west.newscene.com> wrote in alt.atheism;

On 25 May 2004 16:19:09 GMT, forlornh@aol.complicated (Lord Calvert)
wrote:

The one thing that really got me about this story was MG Kimmitt's quote, "I
have not seen the pictures but bad things happen
in wars. I don't have to apologise for the
conduct of my men."

I thought we won this war a year ago. Who are we fighting now? How
can we justify civilians being killed when it's us who killed them and
the whole point of the war was to save them?

/neocon
We are. They're being saved from going to hell as infidels and saved
from a hellacious existance.
/neocon

Instead they've become a liability standing between us and something
else.

Liebenstraum, Gott, un Oil!

Stoney
"Designated Rascal and Rapscallion
and
SCAMPERMEISTER!"
When in doubt, SCAMPER about!
When things are fair, SCAMPER everywhere!
When things are rough, can't SCAMPER enough!
/end humour alert
alt.atheism military veteran #11
{so much for the 'no atheists in foxholes' rubbish}
.

User: "stoney"
Title: Re: OT: One incident. Forty dead. Two stories. What really happened?	26 May 2004 09:41:44 PM

On 25 May 2004 16:19:09 GMT, forlornh@aol.complicated (Lord Calvert),
Message ID: <20040525121909.04129.00002108@mb-m16.aol.com> wrote in
alt.atheism;

Sucking Shrub's *****. It's not what you know, but who you blow.

Commanders ARE
responsible for the conduct of the men under their command. That's part and
parcel of being a commissioned officer. If he's not man enough to take that
responsibility he should resign. This man is a disgrace to the Corps.

Yes, he is a disgrace to the Corp. The corp is now rotten, but what
else can be expected when the rot starts at the top of the pyramid?

Stoney
"Designated Rascal and Rapscallion
and
SCAMPERMEISTER!"
When in doubt, SCAMPER about!
When things are fair, SCAMPER everywhere!
When things are rough, can't SCAMPER enough!
/end humour alert
alt.atheism military veteran #11
{so much for the 'no atheists in foxholes' rubbish}
.

User: "SMChristenson"
Title: Re: OT: One incident. Forty dead. Two stories. What really happened?	26 May 2004 07:44:53 AM

On Tue, 25 May 2004 16:19:09 +0000, Lord Calvert wrote:

Yes, he would have been. Demonstrates how clearly the lack of honor
trickles down the chain from the Commander in Chief, doesn't it? Nobody
in this administration takes responsibility for ANYTHING.
Really, far beyond the executive branch. There was an interesting web
article yesterday on how it was Goldwater and the Republican Party who
talked Nixon into resigning and it was the Democratic Party who talked
Johnson into not running again. So far, the Republican Party has been
asleep at the wheel in not reining in these guys for bringing dishonor
upon the party and, frankly, for stomping on a lot of traditionally
conservative values. Perhaps a frightening symptom of imbalance and
disease in the republic if they think they have a death grip on power and
will never have to be held accountable for the Bush administration.
.

User: "Fred Stone"
Title: Re: OT: One incident. Forty dead. Two stories. What really happened?	26 May 2004 08:30:30 AM