U.S. Air Strikes Kill About 40 Insurgents

[Barrett808]

BAGHDAD, Iraq (AP) - U.S. fighter planes equipped with precision-guided missiles launched airstrikes on an Iraqi town near the Syrian border Saturday, killing about 40 insurgents who were stopping and searching cars, the military said.

Seven missiles were fired at insurgents near Karabilah, close to the volatile town of Qaim, the Marines said in a statement.

http://www.lasvegassun.com/sunbin/stories/w-me/2005/jun/11/061107384.html

[Selatius]

1. I won't believe they were all masked, armed men until I see the bodies

Too many "insurgents" turned out to be dead women and children in the end. If we were to broaden the definition to include people who don't like the US occupation, then yeah, we did kill 40 insurgents even if they were women and children.

[lebkuchen]

2. Everytime the US kills Iraqis

the Iraqi drive to retaliate increases exponentially.

Bush is willing to sacrifice every Iraqi and American man, woman and child to get that oil for his Daddy's bigboys, but once he's forced into the draft, the GOP will have supplied its own final nail to its coffin.

RIH GOP

[PassingFair]

3. Easy Peasy!

Were they wearing "I'm An Insurgent" iron-ons on their backs.

One thing we learned from that leaked document re: the Italian Journalist, is that the US does, in fact, make a distinction between "insurgents" and terrorists. "Insurgents" being B'athist Sunnis.

[SlavesandBulldozers]

12. yes they all had uniforms of the insurgency. which are

er civilian clothes.

[okieinpain]

17. right, in a couple of months some one will print a report saying

that it was civilians asking for money, or warning people a bridge was out, or something like that.

[SlavesandBulldozers]

22. yes on page 32 of moonie times

they will print two sentences about how it was all a big mix-up.

[Endangered Specie]

4. Translation: 4 bodies found, assumed to be insurgents, multiply by 10.

[maddezmom]

5. hmm, just the other day things were under contol

Carrier Jets Not Bombing Iraq Lately

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=102&topic_id=1534230

:sarcasm:

[Whoa_Nelly]

6. About 40 insurgents...but how many innocents?

eom

[Just Me]

18. BAH! We don't count the "collaterals" in our death for profit plans.

So,....STFU!!!

[Whoa_Nelly]

32. Innocents killed...

When will this insanity stop?

There is no answer. Even the blithe reply I hear from some Repubs I know saying, "Things will change with the next Prez election." That's not good enough :cry: :mad: :cry:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=102x1543276
At scene of Iraq air strikes, casualties unclear (children's clothes...)

[da_chimperor]

7. What about the people inside the cars?

Oh yeah, collateral damage. I forgot.

LOOK! Michael Jackson! Wheeeeee!

:eyes::puke:

[SlavesandBulldozers]

13. wheeee!

hahaha. it's funny because its so fucking tragically true

[okieinpain]

19. damn, I even forgot about them. poor people.

[hadrons]

8. Fighter planes were carrying 'insurgents' bombs ....

they only target and kill "insurgents" :eyes:

[SlavesandBulldozers]

14. yes, insurgent-seeking-missiles

they measure the brain-wave algorithms of freedom-hatred and track accordingly.

[MrPrax]

9. When the first line contains: "precision-guided missiles"

you know they are lying and it was just an 'attack' on a suspected position--in this case a checkpoint near/over the Syrian border.

Placing emphasis on 'precision-guided missiles' is auto-suggestion as the person reading it is presumely to 'fill in' the narrative; they use stupid 'car bombs' and we use 'smart' bombs...

Mind you even some moderate types have suggested that 'black ops' have been doing some of the bombings to forment religious division and sectarian revenge to keep a unified movement from approaching the current puppet regime to present a 'withdrawal' timetable to the US--a timetable that suggests BEFORE the next elections.

Makes sense, because an official demand, would undermine the US position completely and force them into 'purely' imperialist rhetoric which then go into undermining already shaky support for the war domestically

In fact one can clearly see a huge divide growing between the US public and the power elites on this one...

[VegasWolf]

27. Isn't a suicide bomber a "precision guided bomb" by definition? nt

[Voltaire99]

29. The propaganda can hardly get more transparent or desperate.

Great post, MrPrax.

The latest poll data show the divide is deepening.

We are close to a turning point, so what a pity there isn't a functioning opposition party!

Now, for instance, is the time to capitalize on hostility toward the war: the Democrats should press for a withdrawal timetable while turning up the heat on the Downing Street Memo. But none of empire's friends in the party want to see the US out of Iraq, and the vocal DSM contingent is relatively small.

So a stalemate, in which leading pro-war Democrats play a critical role in sustaining the occupation, seems likely. The war party would like nothing better than for the 2008 campaign to feature Jeb Bush and Hillary Clinton each braying he or she will fight the war best.

[Just Me]

10. Um, they killed people for stopping and searching cars?

:wtf:

:shrug: What were they searching for? Food? Money? Were they stealing? Were they killing people?

I am really curious: when YOU are occupying someone else's land, who is the enemy?

[Chicago Democrat]

11. Yawn, another bunch of dead brown people....

(Sarcasm off)

[Barrett808]

15. BBC: Iraq raids 'kill 40 insurgents'

About 40 insurgents have been killed by air strikes in western Iraq, the US military has said.

The military said it had carried out seven precision-guided air raids in Anbar province, close to the Syrian border, on Saturday.

The raids are said to have targeted groups of heavily-armed men who had set up checkpoints in the town of Karabila.

...

The US said it launched the first of its air strikes at 1140 local time (0740 GMT).

The operation ended about four hours later after all the targets, including an insurgent camp, had been destroyed, the military said in a statement.

The insurgents had reportedly set up a barricade on the outskirts of Karabila and were threatening Iraqi civilians.

No marines were hurt in the operation according to the military.

(more)

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/4084508.stm

[Just Me]

16. Precision-guided death against people who never threatened our country.

That is what we have become: precision killers of those who did NOTHING to threaten our territory, our security or our freedom.

:cry:

[Jack Rabbit]

20. How do they know they were insurgents?

Remember the Nineteenth Century and the winning of the West? In those days, they said: The only good Injun is a dead Injun.

Ah, but times have changed and it is no longer right to kill someone in order to take what is his just because of the color of his skin or because he is part of a non-Western culture.

So, we can't just kill an Iraqi because he is an Iraqi. He has to be an insurgent Iraqi, one who doesn't want to live in a democracy where a foreign power takes his nation's wealth without asking. That's a bad Iraqi. We can kill bad Iraqis. We can't kill good Iraqis.

So, the modern variation is: The only dead Iraqis were bad Iraqis.

See how it works?

[wtmusic]

23. If we just kill enough of the ones who will fight

for what they believe in, we'll be left with a docent, pliable population that will be much more accepting of our oppression.

Kind of like what happened with American Indians.

[Media_Lies_Daily]

25. They also tried that tactic in Vietnam...didn't work, did it?

[tabasco]

28. Zackly right.

Expect to see more of this insane tactic as the military loses boots on the ground. You can't win an infantry war with air power. It only hurts the cause because innocent people are being killed. For every innocent person killed, increase the number of insurgents by the number of remaining family members.

If somebody dropped a fucking bomb on my town and my mom or other family, I would dedicate my life to killing as many of those motherfuckers as I could. Apologies to Mr. Ghandi, that's just the way it is. Revenge is an even stronger motivator than nationalism.

[Kagemusha]

21. I think some politician read about no air strikes for weeks/months

and wanted that changed or the USAF wasn't gonna see its usual funding.

On edit: Carrier air strikes. Was an article about this just YESTERDAY.

[Media_Lies_Daily]

24. Wedding party or insurgent group; wedding party or insurgent group???

...Sad to say, but I don't trust ANY of these reports.

[daleo]

26. Is this payback for the five marines killed by the IED?

It doesn't seem like the same area, but that may not matter. Conflicts like this eventually start to generate retaliation for the sake of retaliation, and the target doesn't really matter.

[indepat]

30. Hopefully there was no collateral damage, no children maimed or killed

[Barrett808]

31. US story already being debunked by alert media

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=102x1542768

[ckramer]

33. Air strikes meant the ground war is lost

When you use air strike, you admit you lost the populace support and lost the face-to-face fight already. Loss of the populace support means you are not going to win the war.

[Frederik]

35. They have been using air strikes all along

according to Sy Hersh. It just doesn't get reported. The bombing never ceased.

[Name removed]

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