Soldiers horrifically abuse Iraqis

[The Gaffer]

You're absolutely right, Spock, but:
- they ARE responsible for various strategies to circumvent prisoners' rights under the Geneva convention
- they HAVE deliberately conflated Iraq with 9/11 when patently Iraq had nothing to do with it, thereby labelling anybody who opposes the Coalition as a potential terrorist
- they DO employ tactics of "softening-up" (i.e. torture)
- they ARE in command, so ultimately it's down to them, or else what do you do when the front-line perpetrators say that they were "just following orders"?

So they SHOULD be held responsible to some extent, the question is how much. Go to jail? Lose their job? Nothing? Surely it would depends on the extent to which these events are the direct result of their policies and actions.

What do you think?

[Spock]

[QUOTE]Originally posted by The Gaffer
[B]You're absolutely right, Spock, but:
- they ARE responsible for various strategies to circumvent prisoners' rights under the Geneva convention= I say those who do not abide by the Convention should not be treated under the Convention.

- they ARE in command, so ultimately it's down to them, or else what do you do when the front-line perpetrators say that they were "just following orders"?=Lower level commanders should be held resposible, I'm sure they "weren't following orders".

So they SHOULD be held responsible to some extent, the question is how much. Go to jail? Lose their job? Nothing? =If I'm right; nothing. Seven or twenty out of 148,000 turn rotten so you destroy the leadership? That's just not logical. We could have won WWII much sooner had we not acted like this every time something happened that wasn't "according to Hoyle". For that matter, Hitler too destroyed his military's ability to fight by removing capable leaders that had seeminly slighted him.

Remember everything on any BB is what that person thinks...I don't try to change anyone's perception merely provide my take on things as do you, yours. Thanks for the civil inquiry.

[Janny]

Why did you pick Hitler as an example? His extended to what, the night of the long knives? I mean, Stalin had purges, no-foolin purges!

I think the most fascinating thing about this war is how little everyone treats it like a war.
War crimes happen in conflict. 'Bomber' Harris, leader of the RAF in WW2, held by some as the man solely responsible for the successful defense of Britain, ie. won the Battle of Britain, is now airbrushed out of history because he also organised the bombing of Dresden. Can you imagine criticism of the destruction during the conflict? You'd be interned!
But now this is a war to the extent that laws must be abided by, or when you want to campaign against it, but by all other intents and purposes it's not one (just an expedition for oil?).

[Spock]

[QUOTE]Originally posted by Janny
[B]Why did you pick Hitler as an example? His extended to what, the night of the long knives? I mean, Stalin had purges, no-foolin purges!
**Because studying the past helps put everything into perspective. The US won WWII, barely. I used the German dictator as an example of how punishing military leaders for minor infractions can cost you the war.
**as for Dresden**Churchill had to keep it a secret that Enigma had discovered the German's plan to bomb a UK city and had to let them do it so that they'd never know we'd broken their codes and so could not veto the destruction of Dresden which was an important manufacturing site. No one predicted the firestorm that developed.

[The Gaffer]

Originally posted by Janny
But now this is a war to the extent that laws must be abided by, or when you want to campaign against it, but by all other intents and purposes it's not one (just an expedition for oil?).

I'm not sure what you're saying here, Janny. Are you saying it is a war or it isn't? If it is a war, don't you agree that the Geneva Convention ought still to apply?

I agree with Spock's comments about Dresden's firestorm, though as I understand it, Dresden did not have much industrial significance.

[Spock]

, after the fact, in his memoirs Winston Churchill described it as a "centre of communications of Germany's Eastern Front."
The city contained the Zeiss-Ikon optical factory and the Siemens glass factory (both of which were entirely devoted to manufacturing military gunsights). The immediate suburbs contained factories building components of radar and electronics, and fuses for anti-aircraft shells. Other factories produced gas masks, engines for Junkers aircraft and cockpit parts for Messerschmitt fighters

[The Gaffer]

I sit corrected

[sun-star]

Originally posted by Spock
**Because studying the past helps put everything into perspective. The US won WWII, barely. I used the German dictator as an example of how punishing military leaders for minor infractions can cost you the war.

I think what Janny was getting at was that while Hitler suffered from punishing Germany's military leaders, Stalin suffered a lot more from purging Russia's. The Purges seriously weakened the Red Army in the 1930s, although they obviously got it together again quite quickly

More on topic, did anyone see this story? here

[Janny]

Damn you Sunny. That is exactly what I was too inarticulate to get across...

Gaffer, it is a war, the Geneva convention should apply. However, it should not be treated on the home front like it should not be a war. It cannot be expected to be clinical and, well, without death.

[The Gaffer]

We're in agreement, then. (Whether we agree that it was a just war is another question..)

So, to what extent do you think that these breaches of the Geneva Convention were sanctioned by the strategies deployed by the senior politicians directing the war (as I outlined above)?

[Khamûl]

Apparently a response to the Abu Ghraib pictures.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/mid...st/3705409.stm

Disgusting.

[jerseydevil]

Originally posted by Khamûl
Apparently a response to the Abu Ghraib pictures.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/mid...st/3705409.stm

Disgusting.

That really is just an excuse. They would have beheaded him anyway. Did they need any excuse to execute Pearl? They have a big knack of justifying their actions and people seem to forget their reasons always change.

[Andúril]

Has anybody seen the footage? I once watched a clip of what seemed to be a Russian soldier, being beheaded by some dudes with a big knife. Wasn't the prettiest sight, although I could handle the visuals. The sounds were another issue altogether.

[Insidious Rex]

why would you even want to see it?

[Andúril]

An unhealthy fascination with the morbid, perhaps?

Someone on another forum asked if anyone had a link to the clip (which I had found during the day), so I put it up. I wasn't going to download it.

Next thing I know, Getright has downloaded 60% of the clip.

So I watched it.

I must admit, it was not as bad as the Russian soldier clip, as the resolution was much lower, and the sound wasn't as revealing. Maybe I'm a bit desensitized because I've seen a much more gruesome beheading....

If anyone is interested in seeing the clip, PM me and I will send you the link.

[Janny]

Shocked though I'm sure he'll be, I agree with IR. What would possess you not to be completed repulsed by it?
But I must admit a slight morbid respect for Mr. Berg. There is something... I don't know... grimly noble about such a killing. I remember the same emotion with Mr. Pearl, and also the Italian killed more recently whose final words were 'I'll show you how an Italian dies'.

May they rest in peace.

[Andúril]

Originally posted by Janny
What would possess you not to be completed repulsed by it?

Possibly the fact that I was expecting a clip as shocking as that of the Russian soldier. This clip did not provide the same level of picture and audio clarity, thus it did not make as big an impact as the aforementioned footage. I would go into more detail, but SGH and the other mods wouldn't be too happy with me.

[Ruinel]

I can not post on this right now. I am too distraught.

[Sister Golden Hair]

Originally posted by Andúril
Possibly the fact that I was expecting a clip as shocking as that of the Russian soldier. This clip did not provide the same level of picture and audio clarity, thus it did not make as big an impact as the aforementioned footage. I would go into more detail, but SGH and the other mods wouldn't be too happy with me.

The fact that it depicts this person having their head slowly cut off is enough. Comparing it to other grusome executions is neither here nor there. IT IS DISPICAPLE, and barbaric. I have seen the entire footage and it is sickening.

Let me just say that the excuse behind it is rubbish. The fact that American soldiers abused Iraqi detainees has absolutely nothing to do with jack. What about Daniel Pearl?

Unfortunately, the way I feel right now, and I don't really care what anyone says, is nuke that entire worthless, crappy area of the world, and move on.

This is apauling. Now, let anyone say that there isn't a war on terrorism, because that is all this execution amounts to.

[Ultimatejoe]

You expose an interesting area of discussion by saying that SGH. The sort of monsters depicted in the video had no standing in Iraq until it was invaded. However, the War on Terrorism was deployed as a vehicle for the U.S. to invade Iraq, creating the instability that fosters the sorts of attrocities we are discussing.

When you say nuke that whole part of the world, are you talking about the geographic area, or just the people, who are by-and-large as horrified by the beheading as you are?