This as Afghan President Hamid Karzai continues to criticize NATO and the US for civilian casualties. "Taliban Continue Human Shield Tactics in Afghanistan," from American Forces Press Service:
WASHINGTON, July 1, 2007 - Taliban terrorists continue to use innocent civilians as shields, NATO officials in Afghanistan said today. Afghan and American soldiers under International Security Assistance Force command participated in Operation Ghartse Ghar in Helmand province yesterday. The goal was to clear Taliban forces from both sides of the Helmand River in the village of Haderabad.After battling enemy forces most of the day, Afghan and coalition forces came under heavy fire from enemy small arms, medium machine guns, 82 mm mortars and rocket-propelled grenades.
The Afghan and coalition forces identified several enemy positions during this exchange, including mortar positions, observation posts, compounds and a trench system. They returned fire and called in close-air support. All enemy positions were destroyed in the engagement.
Though Afghan and coalition forces appear to have fired at clearly identified firing positions, said Army Maj. Chris Belcher, spokesman for Combined Joint Task Force 82, there are reports of civilian casualties.
“After our forces surveyed the area, there are reports of some possible civilian deaths,” Belcher said. The troops found the remains of innocent civilians who were killed in firing positions in a trench line.
“We are deeply saddened by any loss of innocent lives,” Belcher said. “Insurgents are continuing their tactic of using women and children as human shields in close combat with friendly forces.”
The brave soldiers of Islam fight on.
Crossposted from The American Israeli Patriot.
Just finished "The Long Road Home". Martha tells of children walking in front of gunmen to protect them in Sadr City, Iraq.
What and absolute waste of western lives!
The British had the right idea when they stopped at the Khyber pass.
No muslim is worth one allied life and the fact that the Afghani president whinges about the civilian casualties despite the blatant(and common) use of civilian shields should give an ideal reason to pull out as the morons appreciate nothing and never will.
What have we succeeded in doing? Creating another corrupt and greedy(for western aid)Sharia law state.
Well Done!!
I think we went wrong in Afghanistan when Ahmed Massoud's ideas where still alive and we still ignored the Northern Alliances. They had good intel. It got lost some where down the line. Even with Daniel Pearl, it all tied in. Izaz Mansour when he was a NA he told Daniel who to meet and warned him. ohh,..
Where are our allies? Again China could send toys and rid those land mines! There is alot other countries can do and no one does anything. We have to do it all! Plus listen to the dhimmi's here ***ch from day 1.
I wish Harmi when he says those things he also says what he is doing! Everyone kind of dumping things on us, like its your war, you do it and ***ch! Have we even listened to Harmi. He may have a point! He is not being heard too. Or has he lost faith in us?
We do need to do something that changes this whole coarse. I know alot of this is needless!
I'm afraid that eventually we'll simply kill anyone in the target area if US forces are taking fire. We'll also level any building, including mosques US forces take fire from. I don't see any way around this eventually. You heard it here first. The daze of "civilized fighting" will come to an end before this war comes to an end. We have far too much tradition in this matter to abandon the idea in 2007. General Sherman was doing his thing only 142 years ago. That's a blink of an eye.
I'm afraid that eventually we'll simply kill anyone in the target area if US forces are taking fire. We'll also level any building, including mosques US forces take fire from. I don't see any way around this eventually.
plague,
You're right. It's called WAR. The enemy is fighting it. Why aren't we?
Did you see this story from Sunday's NY Times?
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/07/01/world/asia/01afghan.html?_r=1&th&emc=th&oref=slogin
It's the story of two people being buried in Afghanistan. They claim not to honor suicide bombers but right in the middle of the story a mullah distinguishes between suicide and jihad:
The bigger of the bodies belonged to an old man, Khan Mir. His body had gone unclaimed, and the obligations of an Islamic funeral were forgone because he was a pauper. The identity of the other man was unknown. He was only half a body really, a headless torso with but a right arm and a right leg. His interment was meant to be ignominious because he was a suicide bomber, or yak enteher kunenda.
In Kabul, the burial of a suicide bomber occurs at a secret time in a secret place, the forgettable end to what most here consider an unforgivable act. Of course, it is easier to bury the remains of a bomber than the fearsome consequences of the bombing. At least 193 suicide attacks have been reported in Afghanistan during the past 18 months, enough to contaminate much of the nation with the persisting malady of terror.
...
The supply of suicide bombers appears to be unending, and countermeasures are hard to conceive. The Ministry of Defense sponsors a television advertisement intended to denounce such attacks. In the spot, a mullah arrives at graveside to oversee a burial. When he is told the deceased is a suicide bomber, he waves his hand derisively, proclaiming as he stalks off: “We do not say funeral prayers for someone who kills himself. We are Muslims, and Islam does not allow anyone to shed either his own blood or that of his brothers.”
This is hardly a unanimous interpretation, however. On this topic, the vocabulary itself is hotly contested, for there are those who believe suicide bombers are martyrs whose sacrificial deaths are lavishly rewarded by God in paradise. “Suicide is condemned in Islam, but it is not for me to judge whether a man blows himself up as a matter of suicide or in the righteousness of jihad,” said Noor ul-Haq, a mullah in Kabul.
why are we so queasy about killing the opposition, and anyone they use as shields? if this is their military tactic, ours should be to do what's necessary. it is not our fault civilians die; it is the enemy's fault & theirs alone.
i cannot & will not feel the weight of the world, and i refuse to ignore millenia of military history when i make this statement. our sqeamishness regarding "collateral" deaths only occurred in the past few decades.
we had no problem dropping an atomic bomb on hiroshima in 1945, nor in exterminating nazi "terrorists" after wwii.
why now do we fear it? because we have raised people wholly disconnected from the realities of war. and from life.
it's war, people. it's not pretty, and it's not supposed to be. so what.
"the purpose is not to die for your country, but to make the other poor dumb bastard die for his." - patton
Greetings:
Rules of War:
1) I get to go home; my enemy doesn't;
2) See Rule 1.
Beating women.
Killing their kids for misbehaving.
Training their kids to commit suicide.
Taking their neighbors, and their neighbor's wives and kids as hostages (not to mention their own).
Moral depravity doesn't get much deeper than this.
==============
BTW
I'm with Miss_Anthrope on this.
It's not like these bottom-feeders just showed up in the neighborhood last week.
The locals know who and where they are, and if they don't rise up, all at once together, and off these bastards, why should I worry about it when they and theirs are taken hostage?
This is the point in the movie where the outraged villagers are supposed to grab their pitchforks and burn down Frankenstein's castle.
If they can't be bothered, then why should I worry about it if the monster has taken one of them hostage?
My job is to kill the damn monster before he gets me and mine.
"I'm afraid that eventually we'll simply kill anyone in the target area if US forces are taking fire. We'll also level any building.... US forces take fire from.
Posted by: A_Plague_on_Both_Houses "
....It WWII, we leveled Japanese and German cities....the war ended soon thereafter, had we not done this, we could have continued fighting for many years...as we are now doing in the "war on terror" now....
...it is time to fight the war in a more serious manner....THe Islamic terrorists do not hesitate to kill civilians in their proclaimed JIHAD against US...
Islam is for losers.