After three months in Baghdad, Ben Griffin told his commander that he was no longer prepared to fight alongside American forces.
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He said he had witnessed "dozens of illegal acts" by US troops, claiming they viewed all Iraqis as "untermenschen" - the Nazi term for races regarded as sub-human.
3 comments:
I find this to be a very compelling testimonial... not that any of the many opposite testimonials have ellicited even the slightest cause for optimisim from Tom, Nadir, or any other leftists. The only worthwhile and valid testimonials are the bad ones it would seem. I, on the other hand, am saddened by this testimonial, assume it is voracious, and am very concerned.
Maybe the US forces should act more like Saddam Huessein, and be even *more* trigger happy. Afterall, if the US forces could get Iraq to be as "stable" as Huessein had it, this would eliminate one of the bitter complaints of Tom, Nadir, and the other leftists. For them, apparently stability for its own sake is good. According to their reasoning, Nat Turner, John Brown, and the US federal troops would never have struck violent blows against slavery. Stability is good! Civil wars are bad!
Back to the point: I think that this guy should be taken serioiusly. I am genuinely confused about how to reconcile these conflicting testimonies from soldiers, reporters, and Iraqis, some describing positive, constructive conduct by US troops, others the opposite.
Certainly you can't assume that embedded reporters, whose very presence and safety in Iraq is dependent on the slant of the stories they write. Just ask Italian reporter Giuliana Sgrena and the other reporters who have been targeted by US troops.
Some soldiers, even some from whom I've heard second had reports, report positive actions by US troops and positive response by Iraqis. I don't discount these reports.
But this soldier and others (including those who worked at Abu Ghraib) report the opposite. Many Iraqis and other outside observers report negative things.
The truth is the war was illegal, and shouldn't have been fought in the first place.
There were legal or more moral ways to oust Saddam Hussein all of which involved the Iraqi people doing it. I want the Bush regime out of office, but I don't want China to invade us to do it. That is the job of the American people.
Of course, the fact that the US put Saddam in power and helped him oppress his people is lost on you. Meanwhile, you would support the illegal overthrow of democratically elected leaders like Chavez and Aristide because that would help "American corporate interests". You're full of shit.
Nadir: I am 100% certain that US troops have not targetted reporters, and just as certain that you can provide no evidence to support that view.
I do not base my assessments on officially embedded reporters. I accept many various reports, some positive and some negative. I have even posed many negative reports here.
If you want to get "legal", the baathist Iraqi govt avoided a US invasion under Bush I by agreeing to a cease fire, the terms of which it violated consistently ever since. I believe a legal case exists to justify Bush's invasion. What laws do you claim that he violated?
Congradulating on killing another straw man: I have several times in this forum addressed the role of previous US presidents in helping Hussein gain power in Iraq and arming him. On each of those many instances I have expressed my opinion that such previous mistakes should neither bound all subsequent presidents to perpetrate such mistakes, nor preclude them from making ammends for the. To the contrary, as I have several times further pointed out, this obligates subsequent US presidents to correct that mistake. This is also Chris Hitchens's view.
I have never expressed support for overthrowing Chavez. I have not read extensively on this topic, but from what I have read the US govt has not tried to overthrow him, though he appears to be dismantling democracy there as the voters cheer him on. I predict increased poverty and immigration to the US and reduced petro production as he socializes that industry.
I have read enough about the Hatian situation to be certain the the US did not overthrow Aristide, but rather saved his life. I agree that he was democratically elected, but believe that he became a sad tyrant.
Your China analogy is preposterous since the US govt is not paying people to violently attack China's deomcratic allies, the US govt has not harbored such attackers, and China is not a democracy.
As for those "legal" ways of ousting Hussein, I believe you opposed those UN sanctions, which were not even being imposed and were about to be lifted.
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