Remember how the Brits assured us in the early days of the illegal war on Iraq that they were the kindler, gentler occupiers who knew how to keep the restless natives onside and under control without bashing heads in (in contrast, we were lead to believe, to those poorly trained and undisciplined Yanks who would inspire a whole bunch of anti-coalition ill-feeling and native opposition by hauling off and kicking native ass unnecessarily and without much provocation).
Seems that more and more evidence is now surfacing that British Tommys have a significant share of head bashing, ass kicking, warped headed assholes among their ranks as well.
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It was not until after 5.30pm that a group of people made the journey of just over one mile from their tenement homes in the Guzezih district to the sandbagged front gates of the camp. They found, they say, scenes of violence, fear and confusion.
Muthanar Jaseem Mahmud, 22, was crouching on the ground, blood pouring from his head, holding one broken distended arm with another. This was the result, he claims, of being beaten with a metal rod. Others were limping around, victims of a day of severe beatings and abuse which had been undertaken by troops engaged in Operation Ali Baba to hunt looters of precious humanitarian supplies.
As Muthanar's mother cried, holding him in her arms, his father frantically tried to find a car to take him to hospital.
But when his brother, Akil Jassem, tried to find out from British soldiers and Iraqi police what had happened, he was, he says, arrested and dragged inside. There, he claims, he was subjected to beating and kicking for several hours.http://news.independent.co.uk/world/middle_east/story.jsp?story=615205