The Bloody Iceberg's Tip

by Sami Ramadani

http://www.commondreams.org/views06/0607-30.htm

<snip>

Why we should welcome an inquiry led by Donald Rumsfeld's Pentagon is a mystery, given its determination to avoid investigating the involvement of senior officers in the torture and killing of Iraqi detainees at Abu Ghraib prison. The culture of indiscriminate violence that Iraqis have long insisted permeates the US-led occupation forces is in any case gradually being exposed by the testimony of US soldiers.

One such soldier, Specialist Jody Casey, a scout sniper in Baquba who witnessed civilians being killed by soldiers, said recently bombs "go off and you just zap any farmer that is close to you". Soldiers were told to carry shovels in vehicles so they could plant them on civilian victims, he said, to make it look like they were digging to set up roadside bombs. Specialist Michael Blake, who served in Balad, said it was common practice to "shoot up the landscape or anything that moved" after an explosion.

Meanwhile, we are inundated with stories about Sunnis killing Shias, Shias killing Sunnis, killing Kurds, killing Turkomans, while regular anti-sectarian demonstrations are ignored: 10 days ago, for example, there was a large rally in the predominantly Shia town of Balad in solidarity with the nearby Sunni town of Dhullu'iya, under siege by US forces. The reality is that the occupation is detested by most Iraqis. US-led forces are surrounded by popular hostility, and are operating completely outside Iraqi "sovereign" jurisdiction. No Pentagon courses in the ethics of how and how not to kill Iraqis will change this.

What the occupation forces experience on the ground is a consequence of what their political masters decide in Washington and London. The indiscriminate harming of Iraqis has, in practice, been the modus operandi of US-led policy towards Iraq since 1990. There is a continuity between this bloody occupation and the indiscriminate 13 years of US-led sanctions that preceded it - which also killed thousands of Iraqis...

Lesley Stahl on U.S. sanctions against Iraq: We have heard that a half million children have died. I mean, that's more children than died in Hiroshima. And, you know, is the price worth it?

Secretary of State Madeleine Albright: I think this is a very hard choice, but the price--we think the price is worth it.

--60 Minutes (5/12/96)

...that question the way she did. I've always thought she was/is a decent person who does actually care about the innocent victims of our Middle East misadventures. I could be wrong.