I’ve never been so goddamn proud to be an american, where at least I know I’m free.
Mr Bierce said that on the day of the attack, Specialist Barker, Sergeant Cortez, Private Spielman and Private Green had been playing cards and drinking Iraqi whisky mixed with an energy drink. They practised hitting golf balls, Specialist Barker’s statement said.
…At some point they decided to go to the house of the girl they had seen passing by their checkpoint. Specialist Barker also said that when they arrived at the house, the father and the girl were outside. Private Spielman grabbed the girl while Private Green seized her father and took them into the house.
Private Green took the father, mother and the younger sister into the bedroom, while the girl remained in the living room. Specialist Barker wrote that Sergeant Cortez pushed the girl to the floor, and tore off her underwear. Sergeant Cortez appeared to rape her, according to the statement. Specialist Barker then tried to rape the girl, Mr Bierce said. Suddenly, the group heard gunshots. Private Green came out of the bedroom holding an AK-47 rifle and declared: “They’re all dead. I just killed them,” the statement said.
Private Green put the gun down, then raped the girl while Sergeant Cortez held her down. Specialist Barker claims Private Green picked up the AK-47 and shot the girl once, paused, then shot her several more times. Specialist Barker said he got a lamp and poured kerosene on the girl. She was set on fire, but he does not say who did it. He does not say if Private Howard or Private Spielman took part in the rape. The statement says he grilled chicken wings back at their checkpoint.
I really don’t know what to say about this. I just know that I don’t want to be associated with it in any way. I know that these guys should never see the light of day again. I don’t know what they’ve been going through over there. But there is no mitigation for crimes like these.
I’m sorry it happened, is all.
I can’t remember when anything has made me feel sicker inside, or more certain of the existence of evil.
I want to follow this case closely to see that they do not get away with anything. They deserve to be given death for their activity here. If they dont get it I am sure they will get theirs in the end of it all. Others will see to it, of that I am very sure. I wonder what they would have been doing here in our land if they were not there in Iraq…..raping and killing here..this has entered into my mind a lot.
For some reason this particular story has been haunting me. This morning as I was reading the paper and drinking some coffee I read the testimony of the Iraqi 1st responder and his description of what he saw and became physically ill.
The press has been describing the 14 year old as a woman, she was only 14, her sister was 5.
May their spirits and those of their parents find peace. May the American ‘men’ who did this and/or knew about it and tried to cover it up be held fully responsible for their actions.
It makes me sick just to read this account. I can feel myself recoil.
I read this and I feel like finding the evil fuckers to literally beat the hell out of them. Because their crimes were more than brutal, but plain evil. Just evil.
“Held fully responsible for their actions…”
Just watch. If convicted, the bush will pardon them all before he leaves office, just like Nixon pardoned Calley for what he had done at My Lai.
“I don`t know what they`ve been going through over there”.
I really don`t care what they`ve been going through. If you`ve got a bottle of hooch, a bbq & some free pussy it seems they had it pretty damn good. Now put them away for life. If at anytime the fact of the “fog of war” crap comes up in a trial, I`m going anarchist. They`re not “sick”, they weren`t abused as a child, bullies didn`t beat up on them in grade school. They`re just plain criminals with a hugh streak of cowardice in them. No Mercy No Excuse
Please pardon the graphic language.
I’m beyond disgust, but the level of unit discipline that you can infer from this report is stupendous. This is one prime fighting force ready to take part in what is shaping up to be a historic debacle.
Shades of Nam all over again. We’ll be paying the social costs all over again for another generation.
We so badly need a new generation of leaders.
sorry, sad, angry, nauseous, crazy, teary, quivery, smashy, afraid, vindictive, hateful, stuck, achy, numb, screamy, silent, perverse, half-dead, bare, twitchy, itchy, dirty, barbarous, disgusted, heart-broken, afraid to look at my children, tense, terrorized, sullen, enraged, murderous, dumb, weak, useless, blind, heavy, vacant, alone.
for this and every other pointless cruel stupid inhumane act perpetrated as a result of our nation’s disregard for reason.
I admit it. I view our military and its corporate facilitators as a kind of spreading cancer on the constitution it has sworn to uphold. A military that is bankrupting america, trashing its democratic values, committing systematic, as well as spur-of-the-moment atrocities, and inciting terrorist retaliation against our “homeland”.
I am thinking about this escapade of our brave heroes and what I want to know is:
To what extent is our military infested with warped notions of racial and religious supremacy?
How many of our troops get a psychological boost from killing or humiliating dark-skinned foreigners?
Do our troops perceive themselves to be citizen-soldiers tasked with defending the constitution or a warrior elite tasked with subduing intrinsically evil foreign poor people?
How many of our troops have acquired a taste for brutality or sadism, and will they bring that inclination back home with them to America?
Acuittal, it’s really a leadership question that goes all the way to the top. From what I understand the psychological screenings and extensive background checks that used to be done no longer exist and that includes specialized areas like the Military Police.
As another poster points out unit discipline looks like it is shot to shit. This is not to excuse scum like those three (or five or whatever) but to paint all our troops with the same brush is wrong. Many joined because they really had no other options, many joined out of a desire or willingness to serve their country, neighbors, society in some fashion.
But the leadership has failed at multiple levels and we’re seeing a breakdown at the most barbaric instinctual level egged on by people who never served, never held a weapon, have never seen violence up close.
How can we demand that the Iraqis develop respect for the rule of law when we don’t respect their laws?
Drink, Golf, Kill, Rape, Kill, BBQ
What also comes to mind is the photo from the ’80s of “Rummy” shaking hands with Saddam Hussein. But then, it was called a “business deal.”
This is a really, really horrible and frightening thing to read about. BUT:
We should therefore not be surprised that it happened, or at the other atrocities committed by all parties to this debacle.
The men responsible should be put on trial.
Our main focus from the left should not, however, be to clean the rotten apples from the US military barrel. We shouldn’t be advocating a ‘clean’ or ‘just’ war. We should be advocating an end to the war altogether, because we know more innocent people are bound to get hurt and/or die, and more atrocities will occur. That is the nature of war.
Just happened to stumble over this LA Times story which mentions a 9000-page Pentagon archive from the 1970s that documents 320 Vietnam War atrocities by US forces.
Oh Dear Goddess…I have been avoiding this story like the plague and here you put it on the front page, where I can’t.
There is no punishment severe enough. Death would be too easy, but I can’t really condone the slow and painful torture, which part of me screams for. How about if these men spent the rest of their lives alone in a cell with a 3 ft. picture of this ruined girl after they killed her. Would that be cruel and unusual punishment?
I blame the entire military industrial complex. So long as we teach children it is ok to kill, then the rest just follows.
Such acts of heinous degradation and debasement, purely predatory and depraved, are unforgivable. They are more stark when told singly than when gathered collectively, as there’s a numbing effect from overload, but the mere fact that there are more than just the occassional single occurrence should be enough to give folks pause.
We’ve seen that our military has had to scrape the bottom of the barrel in order to keep boots on the ground; they’ve expanded their acceptability requirements to include folks who don’t register on the intelligence meter, folks who don’t adhere to any sort of sociological or societal norms, and folks who are more of a two-legged predatory animal than “human” in any sense of the word.
And then leadership is forced into “no win” situations by the civilian incompetents who severely undersupply and fail to properly support them, making a high-stress situation worse. Troops are rotated without proper downtime and with reduced (eliminated) military aid for PTSD and other issues related to prolonged battle-exposure. Those who constituted the higher-end troops are subjected to pressures that reduce them to the lowest common denominator — the animals in their midst, both at their shoulder as well as in their sights.
No, I’m not offering an excuse — I cannot condone or excuse the inexcusable. What I’m driving at is far, far worse: there can only be more such incidents, as this morass continues unabated. Our leadership is incapable of fostering strength within our military, and war is always hell.
…I do want to know more about the men involved in this incident. Are they an example of our new recruiting policies? — if so, there’s a major strike against the policies. Are they an example of leniency in acceptable mental stability? — if so, there’s a major reason that we had such protocols and should not have deviated. Are the men involved all part of a repeatedly-extended rotation? — if so, there’s more fuel for preventing such a practice.
Or were the men primarily upstanding examples (perhaps with the exception of Green, from the implications of the extended article) of what formerly went into our military? — if so, what kind of animals have we, as a people, been turning our military into?
I know several folks across a variety of military services, in various levels and grades. Not one of them would have ever participated in such a thing, under any normal circumstances. And not one of several of them would have permitted such a thing to occur even under rather adverse circumstances — having been through some rather interesting and adverse circumstances with those folks in particular, I still have a hard time envisioning what it takes to spawn such malignancy. And yet, I’ve seen examples of such malignancy, and find that this too is another example of it.
This whole thing — the crime, the investigation, the war that spawned the circumstances and perhaps shaped the soldiers — smacks of indecency on oh-so-many levels. It is, unfortunately, a clear glimpse of the cancer that is consuming the soul of this nation.
I fear for our nation’s survival. Given the growth and extent of the illness now spreading within it, will we — as a nation — be able to survive the journey back toward health? Will we even be given a chance to begin the treatment?
And where will that leave us?
As a human being it’s make me extremely sad to make the following statement.
War is no excuse for atrocities that offend any sane, reasonable human beings concept of “civilized behavior”.
But here is the paradox. By the very fact that war defines atrocity. Humanity excuses itself from the horror and reality that any form of war only has only one purpose. That purpose is to kill, maim, rape the intended victim whether it is a war between Nations or war that is waged by the individual human being.
The reality and horror of the effects of warfare as technology becomes more advanced has been removed from the public conscience of civilized society. The invention of the “Rules of Warfare” condones what is considered acceptable and unacceptable when war is being waged. This has removed the responsibility of the population who supports any war against any other population.
The current state of a high tech war where one never sees the faces of those who die has made warfare the ultimate form of entertainment for those who are not impacted directly by the effects of warfare.
The flaw of this form of high tech warfare is that it only creates casualties among the innocent and occasionally against the actual opposing force. Waging a high tech war by air or sea power leaves the ground that the war is fought on unoccupied and uncontested. Since the stated objective of war is to “win”. Ground forces are required.
In order to secure the ground warfare reverts to the most basic level. One individual or group of individuals against another individual or group of individuals. This is when the very brutal reality of kill or be killed sets in and the true horror of warfare achieves it’s full impact.
Leaders of Nations to make warfare justified in all cases to date ask their respective populations to ignore this brutal reality and horror of warfare being fought at this basic level on the ground. The individuals who inevitably fight these wars are young and mislead to believe they will be covered in glory, honor and by doing their duty they will survive the reality and horror of warfare.
Those members of humanity who are not directly involved in the actual combat waged on the ground are disconnected from the reality and horrors being faced by those who are in combat.
Today with a little media coverage in between the non-stop commercials war becomes like the rest of the programming found on TV, Entertainment. News outlets view war as “sexy” because things are being blown up and human suffering always is a good seller for products and services since more human being will stay tuned for the latest updated story.
The whole world then becomes one big Roman Coliseum as the atrocity unfolds on a daily basis before most of humanity. The perversity and obscenity of humanities inhumanity ascends to new levels on a daily basis.
War becomes entertainment for a person not there in the thick of the fighting. That person is somewhere, safe, comfortable and if that person get sick of it all there are 400 some channels with something else to distract them from the ugly reality of war.
The human being who is asked to fight war on the most basic level is brainwashed, trained and to kill the enemy. In order to achieve the necessary level of reducing the enemy to just another object to be removed by any means possible these individuals are mentally stripped down versions of a human being conditioned by training to ignore the pain and death they will cause to another human being. All this training goes against the very nature of 99.999% of the human race to wants only to be left alone in peace and have some sort of comfortable life.
The leaders of all nations or anyone who declares war on another party constitute less than 99.9999999999% of the human race. The rest of humanity if given the choice would never inflict harm upon another individual unless provoked to defend themselves or their loved ones.
So these leaders of humanity have sponsored mass paranoia from generation to generation. There is always an enemy. It could be the next human being you meet.
This type of paranoia makes every human being on this small planet the enemy. So every human being as they grow from birth to death is constantly paranoid that another human being is going to harm them so they are always ready to defend themselves. Some learn just enough to get by in a tough situation. Others go overboard and actively seek to become lean, mean killing machines.
Unfortunately for the human race there will always exist those human beings that for some mental, physical or social reason have no conscience or concept of what is acceptable civilized behavior within society. These individuals pose the greatest danger to civilized human society for they will kill without remorse or understanding of the consequences of their actions on the fabric of human society.
Given the concept of who is the enemy these days is nebulous at best. Any human being can be the enemy. When an individual without a conscience is placed in this situation everyone is for them the enemy. They can make no distinction between what is acceptable under the “rules of war” and the common bonds of humanity.
These human beings become the monsters that are used as the boogiemen that the human race must be ever on guard against since when they surface their actions will inevitably “shock all humanity to it’s core”.
Every war ever fought has produced “monsters without conscience”. This is one of the side effects of waging war. All the restrictions against killing another human being are removed at the individual level. This is the ideal environment to breed the monster without a conscience.
War is the curse of all humanity. War is the ultimate in obscenity. War, killing, rape and abuse of another human being cannot ever be justified for any sane reason.
When I read this diary what I saw in the mirror is the a very dark side of my own humanity. Ever present waiting to be released but held in check by only the fact that I know this is never the human being I want the world to ever see.
So this dark side of reality is rejected for one reason. This type of behavior would make me an animal that operates without one thought for the repercussions of my actions that would reduce me to being only an animal. A monster that has no remorse and no regrets if allowed to cause harm or take another human beings life.
Beneath the surface of every civilized human being lurks this monster that will kill and cause harm to another human being.
This morning when I look into my eyes in the mirror I will see this monster for what it is, the animal part of me, and accepted it’s existence. Then I will be civilized human being and say to the monster I will not kill or harm another human being today. Today I want to live in peace.
Many people have stated that these soldiers should be killed for their actions in raping a 14 year old girl, then killing her and her family.
Here’s a question I want everyone who has read this comment to ask.
Is this the wish of an animal or a civilized human being talking?
Or is it a time for everyone to take a good hard look in the mirror and be honest with the human being staring back at you from the mirror.
This is the horror which we as humanity allow to take place. Everyone is responsible for allowing this to happen because humanity continues to believes that someone else is always responsible for the horror humanity allows to be inflicted on itself.
Maybe tomorrow everyone will wake up and look in the mirror and say to the monster lurking there, Today I will not kill or harm another human being no matter how I am provoked.
Then maybe humanity might begin to understand the full meaning of this word humanity uses.
“Peace”.
Side note: I’m leaving on vacation today so I will not be able to answer any comments. Thanks for reading this longer than normal comment.
The ‘stress of war’ as a cause for this is on CNN right now. It was a lead in by Soledad who mentioned the trial of the rape of a ‘young Iraqi woman’…and she’s a mother. I guess the CNN/govt loyalty oath is stronger than the bonds of humanity and even motherhood.
They toe the gov’t line to give folks a break and be seen as not attacking the troops.
Meanwhile, the opportunity to speak of the failings of leadership that led to such atrocity slips away again like a thief in the night, again lost to us along with the opportunity to bring more outcries and perhaps influence a change of course toward a more equitable solution that may actually save lives and eliminate the crimes.
the chain of command ends with the privates, corporals and goes no higher in the bush regime. Simple- these guys did the deed! at the same time – so have the generals, the dod, the administration. Don’t forget that our standards have been slowly eroding and must continue to erode. Just visualize what our military will look like in about 5 years!-
Wow! what an example of us!
15th birthday of Abeer Qassim Hamza would have been August 19.
Please let us make it a national day of mourning and fasting.
thank you.