Posted on 03/13/2012 3:21:19 AM PDT by EBH
The Afghan parliament demanded on Monday that a US soldier accused of killing 16 civilians, including nine children, be put on trial in Afghanistan as a growing tide of local anger added to the pressure on the US-led war against the Taliban.
The murders have triggered a new spike in anti-western sentiment just weeks after furious protests erupted after the discovery of burnt copies of the Koran at a US base.
US officials have rushed to condemn the killings and pledged that the accused soldier will face justice. The sergeant detained on Sunday is accused of going house to house in a remote community near Kandahar and shooting men, women and children.
The combination of resentment in Afghanistan and revulsion in the west has dealt a fresh blow to the Nato-led force struggling to convince Afghans and voters among troop-contributing nations that it is winning the war.
“Yesterday’s incident in Kandahar is inexplicable; it cannot be forgiven on any account,” said Shinki Karokheel, a member of parliament from Kabul.
Resentment has been building in Afghanistan for years over night raids by US and Afghan forces on homes sheltering Afghan insurgents and civilian casualties caused by wayward coalition air strikes...
(Excerpt) Read more at ft.com ...
While I don't condone what the soldier is alleged to have done...
I do believe if this man was unstable and the command failed to remove him from the situation, they themselves should stand trial as well.
I so strongly view the situation in Afghanistan as that of one of 'domestic abuse.' For every good we try to do, it is returned to us as abuse 10 fold. In a land of no mercy and no gratitude, it is not hard to draw the conclusion this soldier did. He killed innocents and for that he must answer, but I in no way wish to see justice determined in a court or by a people that will kill him, burn his body, and hang him from a lampost either.
Obama-ramadan-o-ding-dong will capitulate and let the Afghan savages torture and mutilate this man to death.
Torture and mutilation is ok when his moslem friends do it.
Part of me wants to get this guy to realize how much he has jeopardized the entire mission...
There is no out on this one. None. If 0bama pulls the guy out of the country all hell will break loose.
If we conduct a military trial and they determine he is mentally ill, thereby avoiding death...all hell will break loose.
And putting him into a Afghan civilian court...well, we all know how that is going to end.
I also see this as a bonus for 0bama. The loss of Afghanistan can now be blamed on this man too.
For one thing, the "wrong" leader is in the White House for this sort of thing, as far as the U.S. media are concerned. The soldiers who put underwear ont the heads of prisoners at Abu Ghraib were portrayed as war criminals by the U.S. media, while they're already reporting unsubstantiated hints about a mysterious "head injury" that this guy suffered in Iraq.
Secondly, the details of this story may well include some extremely embarrassing facts about the perpetrator's prior medical or personal history that would lead any objective observer to question why he was ever sent to Afghanistan in the first place.
And thirdly (and perhaps most important of all), there's always going to be a fear that this sort of episode is actually going to be far more effective in "winning" over in Afghanistan (whatever that is even supposed to mean) than any of the other nonsense the U.S. has been doing for more than a decade.
Of course, the operative phrase is “consent of the U.S. government.”
There is no out on this one.
Stop being a citizen of the world.
Some Freeper on another thread last night suggested that this incident involved more than just a lone soldier who had snapped.
Watch how muted the Afghan response (other than the predictable public statements from all these people) is going to be. They were willing to riot in the streets and kill U.S. soldiers over a Koran-burning because everyone from one corner of the planet to the other knew that the U.S. government and the military would simply cower in fear, beg forgiveness, and take a couple of extra measures to further emasculate the troops over there.
This is different. The knowledge that one or more of these "invaders" was capable of walking off his base one night and slaughtering families in their sleep is likely to put fear in people -- in both Afghanistan and the U.S. -- that they never felt in the ten years since the U.S. military arrived there.
What "mission" might that be, dude? There is no mission to speak of, which was probably one of the biggest reasons why this sort of thing happened.
("BENIGHTED": 1)...overtaken by darkness or night - 2)...existing in a state of intellectual, moral and social darkness )
Leni
I’m too calloused from all the Muslim on the western world violence and rhetoric to actually care what this soldier did. We don’t know the whole picture either. There was a brief blurb the day it happened that others were involved. I want to hear the whole story.
Maybe his gay Muslim lover was stoned to death. Perhaps his female Muslim girlfriend was victim to an honor killing. Maybe one of his comrades in arms was shot and killed by an Afghan soldier in the aftermath of the Qur’on burnings. Maybe he got upset over young girls having their feet chopped off at the ankles for going to school.
I smell some big CYAs going on—and the “brain damage” story not only allows him to be isolated but prevented, under medical “supervision” from talking.
Innocent to proven guilt anyone? Given that the afghanis have destroyed whatever evidence there may have been, given the afghanis have secreted the purported bodies, given the afghanis have destroyed the purported crime scene, given the afghanis have no sense of law and justice under the law and given they usually are full of crap, shpouldn’t this fellow be brought back to America as this situation is investigated. Also, the tallyban calling the American soldier a criminal for doing somthing they have done for centuries (killing random moozlums)seems a bit hypocritical. Screw them.
Wanna bet this guy was friends with one or more of the ‘NATO’ troopers massacred in the aftermath of the Koran burning debacle? How can one not go insane when military officers you serve side by side with everyday suddenly open fire on you because someone burned a book?
If America was attacked by a Moslem country such as Iran this could be one of those “behind a million blades of grass” scenarios.
Especially when the average citizen alone has more ammo than most soldiers, and Americans are really pissed off and on a short fuze.
A scenario like a flaming Disney World, thousands of dead children, images broadcasted all across America from a sudden Moslem attack solely for striking fear.
They believe such a disaster like this and with the current POTUS that America will surrender.
Surrender? To Islam?
I don’t think so.
Thst is what will happen if we allow the Muslims into our country. No more Muslim immigrants into our country! Not even diplomats!
My thoughts exactly. What is the most likely profile of a murderer of unarmed civilians? A muslim.
What is the mission...?
The mission is about turning the country over to the Afghanis and getting out. We’re no longer in true Nation building mode.
So let all hell break loose. We don’t owe the afghans anything and we certainly aren’t obligated to sacrifice one of our own to their irrational manner of thinking.
I agree with the courts martial but the guy was supposedly
injured in the head. If the evidence shows he was impaired
due to the injury, then its not clear to me he could be held responsible. The extent of his mental condition needs
clarification. Bottom line, political
considerations should not trump his right to a fair trial.
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