Kobuchi-You speak authoritatively about subjects of whom you have not credibility, understanding or experience. There for you require correction.

Communication requires the articulation of information using proper convention. When you fail to use the proper convention for words/terms and it affects the intellectual honesty of your argument, I will correct you.

When you post about subject in which you have no experience or credibility and your comments are wrong or intellectually dishonest, I will correct you.

Again, you need to stick with political arguments and not comment on military matters, as you have no credibility by your own admission.

K
that was not directed to you,
no discussion intended by me, you are spouting polemics as if they were facts
dream on

Damnit!!

do we really need to use such needlessly big ****ing words? It's like I'm reading a LiquidNinja review. Come on.

I'm fairly mystified - and it's not the vocabulary.
Kobuchi - was your point that troops should not value their lives over civilians? Not trying to put words in your mouth. Just a simple yes or no will do.

No. I observed that, in Fallujah, the overall approach is "rather harming civilians than see troops suffer the same harm." I did not make the value judgement "troops should not value their lives over civilians", but I did raise the question. Superart engaged it in a spirit I appreciate:

"If it comes down to an Iraqi civilian or a US troop, I would chooses the troop. He volountered for the job, knowing the risk, and accepted the risk. A choice between an American civilian and an Iraqi civilian, I would choose the Iraqi civilian. Just like if you asked that same question to someone in Iraq, they would say they would prefer an American civilian gets killed over an Iraqi. That's human nature."

And here's Lothar5150's reaction: "Kobuchi-You speak authoritatively about subjects of whom you have not credibility, understanding or experience... stick with political arguments and not comment on military matters, as you have no credibility by your own admission. "

You're mystified, I think, because you read people refuting "points" that don't appear in my posts, and loathing my position, whatever they think that is.

Well, if you'd like to haggle over "troops should not value their lives over civilians" I'll join. It could be interesting. Nationalities, ratios, urgency, and other factors deepen the issue. If you follow the news, you'll know it's a hot one.

I'm not looking to haggle - particularly over something you didn't say, and particularly don't feel qualified to make any comment on military tactics - although I have been in the situation of being a civilian being shot at (was on Cyprus when the Turkish army invaded). I'm pretty sure those were shots intended to make me keep my head down. If they'd dropped leaflets, I'd have been gone - but so would their element of surprise. And no, I don't want to get into whether it was an invasion or a freeing of downtrodden ethnic Turkic Cyprians.

I do feel somewhat qualified to make comments on the politics of getting involved in an unnecessary war. Particularly one for which we voters were offered one lame justification after another until it finally became "support our troops". I do support our troops - I don't want them unnecessarily put in harm's way - and if we do have to do that, I want that to be only if there was no other way.
It's quite possible that, now that we're there, the way to the least number of casualties, both US and Iraqi, is an aggressive offense.

Finally, to get back onto the "Bush or Kerry" topic, there was one quote (in this thread?) that at least one person voted for Bush because he "was doing God's work". That post got me to thinking - I think a lot of people did vote for Bush at least partially for that reason.
So... when in history did lots of people feel that sending troops to the middle east was "doing God's work"?

Kobuchi- It is comments like those above that elicit comments from me regarding your lack of qualification. First, we announced we were coming in and get out of the city if you want to ensure your safety and the safety of your family. In doing so we let some top tear terrorist, escape. Further, at some point, you have to assume that most of the remaining people are likely hostile. As I said before "good men" with families will get their families out, people who don’t want any part of the fight will get out.

Next, you obviously have little understanding regarding the dangers in urban combat. If you see Marines filling a house with metal, it is because someone shot at them from that building. Do you think it is practical to shoot up every house you clear? This isn't Halo where the ammo fairy shows up and your weapon is magically reloaded. Every, unit down to the individual warrior has to be concerned with the expenditure of ammo. If you use more ammo than your log-chain can re-supply then you end up losing your ability to fight pretty quickly.

From a less practical standpoint, you have never in our military and you have no idea to the extent we try to avoid civilian casualties. In fact, the protection of civilians is an American tradition. Further, we have lawyers look over our battle plans and ROE prior to any operation to insure we comply with the Geneva Conventions and the Law and traditions of Land Warfare.

To me perhaps?

I apologize for any undefined acronymns; they have become a daily occurence for me the past 4 years, and my attempt to re-civilianize my speech is slowing going.

ROE: Rules of Engagement.

LOAC: Law of Armed Conflict.

Definitions availiable via the search engine of your choice.

And if its the Latin;

Ad Nauseum: So as to disgust or nauseate, or in the context of the post

"its a legal target. Our soldiers are trained on Rules of Engagement and Law of Armed Conflict until they are sick to death of it"

I gotta chime in here again.

You have to be very careful describing this as a soldier/sailor/marine vs. iraqi civilian. Thats a pretty rough and broad catagorization.

Its very rare that soldiers just go out and "waste" civilians. Yes, the odds are high that everyone is in a high state of personal alert, weapons are hot and its green and loose. But that doesn't mean go and shoot anything that moves - until you are engaged.

Then it gets tricky. When you raid a building thats known hostile (good intel and/or shots fired) then you assume that anything not positively identified as friendly or non-com must be the enemy. If you don't you greatly increase the odds that you, and your battle buddies, will die.

When clearing a room, if it moves you shoot it. Once the room is secure you do the EPW search. Thats the standard. If someone is there that should not be (an innocent happens to be around) the odds are high that they will be shot. It sucks. Thats why war is hell and should only be a last resort. Maybe we (we everyone not just the usa) need to pause and rethink what is worth fighting, killing, and dying over.

-----------

As for the overarching issue of the legitimacy of the war. Thats something different and should be talked about at a different level. Argue that where the bullets are not flying. Partial and total war are strategic concepts. When its at the boots in the mud level, all conflicts are total war. Its your duty to accomplish your mission AND come home alive.

So even if we shouldn't be there and if Bush/Washington is completely ****ed, that still doesn't change how individual soldiers fight their engagements.

The Marine did what he should. The RoEs were spelled out. His actions were within the scope. Case closed.

If the backseat chairborn rangers have an issue with that, go enlist and fight it YOUR way.

Better than you do in the uniform of my country. Too bad I don't work for self-righteous cocks; sorry, it's just a personal policy. And I love the way you gloat your own intelligence until someone makes a point to the contrary, then immediately resort to childish quips without even attempting to defend yourself from the logic used against you. You're getting smarter by the minute.

I think he was quoting superart (?)

You're attacking superart's words, not mine. That's consistent with your foolish pattern of plucking at straws in my posts, insisting anything you find objectionable must be Kobuchi's own dear belief. In fact, I've largely stuck to quoting others(including Marines in Fallujah who you take issue with, thinking them me (!?)) and keeping my own opinions out of the debate. Address your misguided rant to superart.

I do respect his right to an opinion on the matter, and like to hear it, whether I agree or not.

m

him then

:D

More commentary from Webster, you must have just completed midterms. Hunting for more split infinitives?

I’m a mustang with 16 years and I’m certainly not going to take any crap from some pink ear troll like you. If you want to criticize, my political view that is fine<--(fragment). (misuse of a conjunction)-->But don't insult my service to my country.

...no kidding, it is considered bad form to start a sentence with a coordinating conjunction perhaps I should remove the period and combine the fragment and the last complete sentence. Oh, the previous sentence started with a passive voice, that is also considered bad form.

What a chucklehead

Ok, I should have used this quote, as it was what I was obviously addressing.

Fair enough. Here's some background, in diplomatic language: Statement by UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Nov 16th 04

I said that Marines are, in incidental cases as well as in the overall structure of the operation, favouring collateral damage over Marine casualties. Kicking off the assault by bombing the central hospital kinda clinches that, don't you think? If you have a better term to describe the practice of fighters hurting civilians to protect themselves than my "force protection" or "cowardice", let me know. Is it that one applies to your side, while the other only applies to your enemy?

Now, specifically, what do you disagree with, and why.

Under the Geneva Conventions, use of a hospital for military operations allows said hospital to be considered a viable military target. Now, from what I've read, they had snipers on the roof/upperfloors and machine guns positioned in the windows. That makes it a viable military target. If this pisses you off, tough. They should have kept the wounded and the fighters apart.

If you have specific evidence where Marines or other allied troops hurt civilians (people who were clearly non-combatants in a situations that provided no reasonable ambiguity) then please present it. I'll been looking over your points and its alot of outrage but its rather light on facts.

Everyone knows diplomatic language is very vague. As is evident in the statement made by the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights. He did assert that these were on going issues. He only stated that there were reports of violations. Who is making the reports? Honestly, that link hardly supports any of you your premises.

Yes, it appears there may have been isolated violations; however, none of us will know the full facts until the investigations are completed. I know from personal experience that people can act as though they want to surrender then start fighting again. Some of the people we are fighting now don’t have our same sensibilities regarding parlay. I think it is extremely important to understand this in the context these incidence.

In terms of the overall operational ROE, again we have lawyers whose job it is to ensure that the ROE meets and in most cases exceeds the law and western customs of land warfare. You will also be interested to know that the layers will sit on targeting selection boards. Thus, any large pre-selected target like a hospital being used as a combat headquarters will be review by a lawyer to ensure we are not violating any laws. Further the lawyers usually want solid evidence that the hospital now being used for offensive operations.

Force protection-"I do not think it means, what you think it means" force protection is a term used to describe measures we take in order to protect our personnel and/or equipment from terrorist when we are NOT engaged in offensive operations. Please use it correctly from now on.

If you want to call Americans cowards for targeting a hospital, which was being used for military operations…, well I don’t know what to say. I think the cowards are the guys who used the hospital in that way, with the intent to insight bleeding hearts such as you. Further, we gave lots of warning before we started the offensive. We gave civilians an opportunity to get out weeks of notice…hell by doing so we gave some terrorist the opportunity to get out. At what point would you say that the civilians are reasonable for there own safety? Had we sealed off the city and let no one in or out you would have a valid point, but that is not the case. Personally, I would say about 75% of the city’s population had good sense and the other 25% are Darwin Award Candidates.

I don't really see anything wrong with the way the ROE is being conducted- keep in mind the measures the Americans took to get people who don't want to die out
also keep in mind that the 'enemy' doesn't wear a uniform and sets up camp in vital and non-vital civilian areas, mosques included :rolleyes:

Do you think the proportion that stayed behind is as high as 25%? Not quibbling, just curious - would have thought is was in the 7% to 10% range...

Last thing I read it was something like 300,000 people before the attack and only 60,000 during. (~20% left)

"must be brought to justice, be they members of the Multinational Force or insurgents. "

This isn't even specific allegations against any one side. Sure, there are always reports. Anyone someone dies people get mad. Even in the US you hear stories about someone shooting at the police, they shoot back and kill him and his family tries to sue the police for killing him.

Its interesting to note that they address the use of human shields in that report. Do you honestly thing the US is doing that?? Maybe you need to look as the other side as causing some violations. Did you know that pretending to be injured/surrender and continuing to fight is a violation of the geneva conventions and is techincally a war crime?

I read some of the same figures Tempus read. However, that was very early on in the operation. We certainly have a better Intel now and perhaps the 7%-10% is the current estimate.

I personally thought 25% was a little high but they were the numbers reported in the papers.

Yep, if you kill someone after you surrender it is murder under the Geneva Conventions.

Yes. I'll explain why in the end.
The fact that one side is guilty of war crimes doesn't make the other innocent. Not much I can do about violations by the resistance fighters, except work to put them out of a job.

I've read that some combatants in Fallujah have "abused" the white flag. I don't mind it as a dirty trick - they're outgunned, so they need to delude the enemy in more ways than he can imagine. They need to fight with greater cowardice than the enemy (Lother5150 dismisses the term, but until he provides a better one, I'll use this). I mind it because it robs non-combatants of the white flag's protection.

I wouldn't be surprised if some resistance fighters used human shields, to varying degrees. No doubt they think they're defending something, or someone. They might think Marines will desecrate a mosque (by entering it), for example, if they don't use force to defend the building. Some are likely defending their own family members, or think they are. There must be a few among them who in desperation would take a neighbour hostage, if those people are the same as mine.

I didn't intend it to. It's just there to remind us of the current official status, to ground the argument.
I tried to point out earlier that the resistance fighters believe they will be brutalised and perhaps murdered if captured. You see how that can cause problems for both sides.

A good lawyer pays no regard to ethics. His function is to mark (or argue to) the limits of legal interpretation. Lawyers determined, for example, that intercepting Canadians on flight stopovers, rendering them to states infamous for torture, and pressuring those third party states to extract confessions of Al-Qaeda membership, is not illegal. Lawyers also determined that American interrogators could strip detainees naked, drug them, put them in stress positions, splash them with ice water, employ repeated rectal exams, and so forth - because they determined that unless lasting physical harm is done, or the practice has already been cited, then it's not torture and therefore not illegal. So I'm confident army lawyers are busy enough mapping out what's not illegal.

I wasn't even thinking about rules of engagement. By the "overall operation" being a war crime I meant that 250,000 people have been made refugees in a country with 75% unemployment and violence everywhere. They had to pack up and flee. Their city was ruined. Most of them are now starving or begging. Half of those refugees are children who should be in school right now. As designed, the operation destroyed 250,000 lives. If that isn't plain, then Lothar5150 you must have the most brutal understanding of human life. I think human life means a little more than just whether a person is breathing or not.

On the other hand, a pro-war newspaper published an article about 1,000 refugees lined up to receive food aid from the US military. The story included a photo of some sad character frowning behind the razorwire barrier. It said there was some confusion, and the soldiers helped the people keep order, without elaborating on what this meant.

Maybe Fallujans could use some help with ovens to get rid of the corpses. Bring in an excavator, and help.
OK so you've negated two terms now. This is fun. Shall I keep guessing what the correct term is?
No.
Both sides engage in propaganda. I realise you trust statements by the US military or pro-war media as the only truth, so we'll just have to build our picture from those alone.

So, as you suggested and your fellow hawks assert, the hospital and clinics in Fallujah proper had to be destroyed to prevent the assault from looking inhumane through the lens of liberal media. I'll let that stand. The truth of the intent is self evident. Whether or not foreign fighters had violated the neutrality of those institutions, or to what degree, we can't know and probably never will.

We share a clearer view of that main hospital on the outskirts of Fallujah, taken early on by US and US led forces. Drawing only from US official statements and pro-war media quoting American forces, we get this: The hospital was surrounded. An ambulance was fired upon (and stopped) as it tried to leave. Loudspeakers were used, telling people in the hospital they'd be shot if they tried to leave. A commando group composed of foreign fighters stormed the building; they handcuffed the people inside, searched the facility. Not one shot was fired. There was little resistance. Apparently the resistance fighters had respected the neutrality of this institution. American forces and embedded journalists entered, and remained in the hospital - they still occupy it. Hospital staff and ambulance crews have not been allowed to leave the hospital, not for any reason. They can't just go home, for example. In short: they're hostages. Wounded civilians or resistance fighters have not arrived at the hospital. A US commander was quoted saying his men are "defending" the hospital. Presumably this means US forces would take up firing positions in the hospital if it came under attack.

Agreed but we do not condone war crimes. In fact we prosecute our service men and women who commite them. The other side commits war crimes as there normal mode of operation. I fought in Iraq; please don’t presume you know more about what is going on


FYI the white flag does not mean you surrender. It only means you wish to talk, I am no longer hostile. If you through down your weapon and approach with your hands in plain sight…that is surrender. I agree with you, fainting surrender does rob non-combatants of the ability to remain out of the fight. This is precisely why it is illegal to surrender then start fighting again.

This is bullshit. They could get the women and children out and stay in fight.


Your resistance fighters are Al Qaeda members from surrounding countries.

I agree with you lawyers are only interested in the rule of law. However, I am sure that the rule of law is one of the pillars of civilization. Nevertheless, you were saying I was a war criminal and criminal is a legal term. There for one should use lawyers in order to assure his or her actions don’t constitute a crime.



Most were being and starving before the offensive. In part, that was due to the insurgents attacking US convoys filled with food and clean water. What you fail to understand is that their situation was not going to get any better as long as the foreign fighters where in their city. Sure, a good chunk of the city was destroyed. Oh well…so was Hamburg and Berlin. They will get a new city and have full employment over the next few months. The money to rebuild the city was on standby before we even started the operation.

Life is brutal, however, if you are as in tuned to Japanese culture as you claim. You know that warriors have a greater appreciation for life than other members of society. Just yesterday, one of my oldest friends, Mohamed, and I were having beers and discussing how lucky we both were to be born in America. We both hoped that the rest of the world could live as free and as well as we do someday.


It’s not my job to articulate for you. However, I will correct you if you use the wrong terms.


Ok, if we run this great propaganda machine, why do you think the tape of the Marine shooting the insurgent in the mosque is all over the news? We want people to see the truth, even when it not in our best interest or when facts are twisted and used against us. We put up with the latter because of our respect for the former. Don’t you find it interesting that Al Jazzera would not show the tape of Margaret Hassan being shot but did air the tape of the Marine shooting the insurgent at the mosque.

We will know this is the 21st Century and I am sure there is evince created by drones and missile cameras. Just give it time. Just as we saw the footage of the gunmen on top of the mosque in An Najaf.


What is your point? We don’t want the hospital staff leaving the hospital because there is a battle going on in the streets. It is our responsibility to ensure their safety, as they are clearly non-combatants. They are no more hostages than people who are told they cannot go back to their homes during a natural disaster.

I’m still baffled by the “liberal” view of this war. We go in and remove an undisputedly evil dictator and the “liberal” complain. Some how in your twisted minds the Iraqi’s were living in a benevolent, peaceful and plentiful paradise. Then America stepped in and ruined paradise. What a twisted view of the world you have.

Obviously, people with your view don’t value democracy or freedom. If you did you would be celebrating the fact that we got rid of Saddam (whatever the pretext) and are moving with all deliberate speed to get them to elections. I personally have high hopes for Iraq as a free nation and for the Iraqi people as free people. Finally if I were asked to go free another nation, I would go in a New York Minute. Because I was able to be, part of something greater than myself, which will change the world in a positive way. People like you just complain and do nothing.

not very constructive, but i need to say it

Lothar you are such an #@$$#@#
:D i feel better :D