The shooting of the wounded by the second helicopter was an evil, barbaric act.

I'd like to see the British solution to this:

When Voltaire quipped (in Candide) about John Byng's case that it was a British custom to occasionally execute one admiral 'to encourage the others'

for some of the US' General Staff...

that have fired on what appear to be wounded unarmed enemy insurgents.
I have always believed it to defy rules of war. It is also clearly better to have a talking POW as versus dead bodies. In those vids, I have also seen aircraft direct ground troops to those wounded persons. I have seen some wounded blow themselves up to avoid capture. As SP mentioned I am not clear on the rules of engagement but I found the video mentioned very disturbing, specifically the part with the van.

but, other than disgust and contempt, the other thing I took away from the video is the likelihood that something of this nature could happen here in this country. If/when the fabric of our culture begins to unravel, and groups of U.S. citizens band together for whatever reason...perhaps even peaceful protest, who's to say that the response will not be to label the gathering terrorist, and call out the 'copters? Personally, I don't think the idea is too far-fetched.

Remember Kent State?

______________________________________________________
I got two wooden nickels and a rabbit's foot...
Matt King

To say the least!! In completely agree with today's Glen Greenwald's column!

http://www.salon.com/news/opinion/glenn_greenwald/

The US military as an whole in my opinion is nothing short of pure fucking evil - I have no sympathy for any of these motherf**kers under any conditions! The same for the War Criminal and Con-Man Extroidinaire, Barack Obama and the rest of his lame minions!

n/t

"Landru! Guide us! Landru!"
(Kirk reaches for phaser)
"Unnecessary, captain; they have no guidance – possibly for the first time in their lives."

- Lawgivers and Spock

I know of British Officers who shot ORs (Other Ranks) for mistreating wounded enemy. And today I saw on video clips soldiers in a helicopter shooting wounded civilians.

I am truly shocked by this. Shocked and upset. What have we become? We who preach such lofty ideals, and Human Rights, and lie and deceive and hide our black hearts behind a facade of hypocrisy and deceit. How we will be mocked, mocked and spat upon by history?

McChrystal can talk all he wants about disinformation and winning; he and we will never win, ever. All he will accomplish is increased hated amongst the Afghan Women, who will never forgive. Never forgive what McCrystal has done to their sons and husbands.

Why? In 1901 The British believed they “won” the Boer war. In 1948, the Boer’s, the Afrikaans, really finished the Boer War, and took the country from the weakened British. In the '70s, when I went to South Africa, the Boer’s were still bitter about the First & Second Boer War and muttered about Oupa (Grandpa)’s efforts in the Boer War. The Afrikaans were still bitter about the “Boer War”, which they called "The South Africa War", in a cadence that your mind kept listening for the Words after “War”, and there were none, and your mind filled in “Of Independence,” and your mouth stilled, for there was nothing to say.

The Boer War was a minor, pissant 3 year war. The Afghans have been the happy recipients of two empires in the last 30 years killing their sons and husbands, wives and daughters. Win? Win you say? How? How will the mothers of the dead sons and daughters and husbands ever forgive you and allow you to win? They will teach their Children and Grandchildren and their Grandchildren’s Children hate, and these actions will never, never be forgotten for the next 100 years.

We have earned their hatred for the next 100 years. Us and our imperial allies, the Israelis. We will never enjoy peace from these people, never. We will be forever looking over our shoulders in fear of the next attack, to which we will overreact until were are completely impoverished, ground down by our own greedy elites, and still they will never forgive and forget until the memory of the US is dust. Dust. No union, no continental empire, and their world will never allows the US to be reconstituted because of the dreadful deeds we did while preaching that we had the high moral ground.

We have betrayed our birthright.

Nothing good will come of this, ever. Nor will we receive any help as our oil based civilization crumbles, our people starve and cry for help, for they, they who could help, the rising civilizations of Asia, will find no profit in that venture.

For they have learned our true values, that the effort for communal help would take actions to internalize costs while externalizing profits, for these are the actions that build, and these are directly the opposite of our values, and our values shall be our reward.

I curse the rule of man, and those who brought this upon us. I curse them, their children, with attainder for 10 generations, and I look forward to the day when they and their families are persecuted and trampled by the mobs, for this they truly deserve.

Having got that out, I shall go, and dream of shoes and ships and sealing wax, of cabbages and Kings and of many other things.

on what kind of war we're wanting to fight. If the goal is to truly conquer, occupy and subjugate then what we saw in the video is how you do it...which doesn't make it right, just effective.

If the goal is to win hearts and minds and build a nation, then this is not at all how you do it.

I'm not sure that the US military knows any other way to do it.

ambivalence. It wasn't an acceptable act. And I know soldiers who agree. And you don't have to be a soldier to have a bloody opinion, either. If civilians start saying "hey, it's ok" that's permission.

Sickening.

It sucks that more people are dead but really, you want to nitpick over the details? When we invade a country that didn't attack us, we have committed a crime against humanity.

Every Iraqi death from that moment on is Murder. Even those not killed by American forces. After all, we broke it, we bought it.

I agree that the real important info about the tape is the attempt to suppress it.

This is just a reminder that our tax dollars go towards murder, dismemberment and torture. Yay us!

Welcome to the new normal! You allowed it; you change it! Dead simple!

All the rest is bullshit!