US Soldiers Bulldoze Farmers' Crops

[DemonFighterLives]

http://news.independent.co.uk/world/middle_east/story.jsp?story=452375
<snip>
US soldiers driving bulldozers, with jazz blaring from loudspeakers, have uprooted ancient groves of date palms as well as orange and lemon trees in central Iraq as part of a new policy of collective punishment of farmers who do not give information about guerrillas attacking US troops.

The stumps of palm trees, some 70 years old, protrude from the brown earth scoured by the bulldozers beside the road at Dhuluaya, a small town 50 miles north of Baghdad. Local women were yesterday busily bundling together the branches of the uprooted orange and lemon trees and carrying then back to their homes for firewood.

Nusayef Jassim, one of 32 farmers who saw their fruit trees destroyed, said: "They told us that the resistance fighters hide in our farms, but this is not true. They didn't capture anything. They didn't find any weapons."

Other farmers said that US troops had told them, over a loudspeaker in Arabic, that the fruit groves were being bulldozed to punish the farmers for not informing on the resistance which is very active in this Sunni Muslim district.

[MSchreader]

1. Goos morning, Vietna ... err ... Iraq!

:grr: :grr: :grr: :grr: :grr: :grr: :grr: :grr: :grr: :grr: :grr: :grr: :grr: :grr: :grr: :grr: :grr: :grr: :grr: :grr:

Martin

[The_Gopher]

2. so this is what they mean by winning hearts and minds.....riiiiiight. n/t

.

[imhotep]

3. sickening

Whoever the piece of shit that ordered destruction of crops does not deserve to wear a United States uniform. They obviously do not comprehend human rights or even the basic moral principles of the Constitution.

[bread_and_roses]

4. Is it Saruman

in control here? "No love for green and growing things...a mind of metal and wheels." Hearts and minds indeed, and another Orwellian meaning to "reconstruction." Maybe they'll put up a parking lot.

[VolcanoJen]

5. Dupe... locking

Please continue discussion here:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=102&topic_id=162226&mesg_id=162226

Thanks!
VolcanoJen
DU Moderator