US soldiers 'killed Afghan civilians for sport and collected fingers as trophies'

[asdjrocky]

Soldiers face charges over secret 'kill team' which allegedly
murdered at random and collected fingers as trophies of war

Twelve American soldiers face charges over a secret "kill team" that allegedly blew up and shot Afghan civilians at random and collected their fingers as trophies.

Five of the soldiers are charged with murdering three Afghan men who were allegedly killed for sport in separate attacks this year. Seven others are accused of covering up the killings and assaulting a recruit who exposed the murders when he reported other abuses, including members of the unit smoking hashish stolen from civilians.

In one of the most serious accusations of war crimes to emerge from the Afghan conflict, the killings are alleged to have been carried out by members of a Stryker infantry brigade based in Kandahar province in southern Afghanistan.

According to investigators and legal documents, discussion of killing Afghan civilians began after the arrival of Staff Sergeant Calvin Gibbs at forward operating base Ramrod last November. Other soldiers told the army's criminal investigation command that Gibbs boasted of the things he got away with while serving in Iraq and said how easy it would be to "toss a grenade at someone and kill them".

the rest-
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/sep/09/us-soldiers-afghan-civilians-fingers

There is no such thing as a good war.

[Name removed]

1. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[asdjrocky]

2. I am willing to wait for a trial, but this tells me-

something must be going wrong in recruiting.

[uncommon]

4. In recruiting? How about in training?

The military teaches human beings to be killers. It is their entire purpose.

[asdjrocky]

10. I agree, training as well. nt

[Karenina]

12. This happened during Vietnam too. n/t

[county worker]

14. So all Vietnam vets are murderers too?

[Karenina]

17. Bitte...

:eyes:

[G_j]

20. Charles Colson comes to mind

:-(

[county worker]

15. Have you been trained by the military?

[HillbillyBob]

5. Yes, they lowered the recruiting qualifications.

Taking waivered violent youths both the poverty kids and the neothuglicans that did something wrong, got caught and were given a choice of jail or boot camp.
Lower education standards too.

[Name removed]

11. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[county worker]

13. No one here supports these murders. Now if you are calling all military in Afghanistan

a murderer, you are lower than whale shit in my opinion.

[Rebubula]

18. I do not support these murderers....

...BUT I DO support the brave and honorable men and women of our armed forces.

Your blanket hate based on the action of a few is duly noted.

[L0oniX]

22. I don't support the troops. I support vets that got screwed and those that go AWOL.

I don't want anyone to join the military and become pawns to be used for policy wars.

Military men are just dumb stupid animals to be used as pawns in foreign policy. - Henry Kissinger

"Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired signifies, in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed. This world in arms is not spending money alone. It is spending the sweat of its laborers, the genius of its scientists, the hopes of its children." - Dwight Eisenhower

That worst outcrop of herd life, the military system, which I abhor . . . This plague-spot of civilization ought to be abolished with all possible speed. Heroism on command, senseless violence, and all the loathsome nonsense that goes by the name of patriotism–how passionately I hate them! – Albert Einstein

[HillbillyBob]

3. Speechless

This reflects well on those sending them there to begin with.

[G_j]

6. It's fun to kill in Afghanistan, says top US commander

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=102x4459409

It's fun to kill in Afghanistan, says top US commander

Source: The Independent

By Kim Sengupta, Defense Correspondent


Saturday, 10 July 2010

The US military, still recovering from the shock of the sacking of General Stanley McChrystal, its top commander in Afghanistan – is facing fresh problems over revelations that another top commander declared that it was "fun to shoot people" in Afghanistan.

A video of General James Mattis making his comments was yesterday spreading through the Muslim world at a fraught time in Afghanistan for the US and it's Western allies. General Mattis has been named as successor to General David Petreaus as head of US Central Command. General Petraeus is moving to Afghanistan after McChrystal's sacking over derogatory remarks made about President Obama to Rolling Stone magazine. But General Mattis has yet to be confirmed by the US Senate. The general led the controversial US military assault on the Iraqi city of Fallujah in 2004.

..more..

[NNN0LHI]

7. Recommended

With sorrow...

[metapunditedgy]

8. War is disgusting, and people in power who call for (unnecessary) war are disgusting.

Given that, there's not much that could surprise me.

[T Wolf]

9. Not that these shits deserve any mercy or understanding - but, as usual, the leaders who

murdered hundreds of thousands have escaped justice or even investigation while these lower forms are sanctioned.

george, Dick and all the rest should stand trial right next to these assholes and suffer the same fate - the maximum available under the military code for treason.

[Jester Messiah]

16. War does horrible things to people.

I feel a great sadness for our soldiers who have been mentally warped & broken in that crucible.

[G_j]

19. US soldier 'warned dad of Afghan deaths'

http://news.theage.com.au/breaking-news-world/us-soldier-warned-dad-of-afghan-deaths-20100910-153tc.html

Source: AP

US soldier 'warned dad of Afghan deaths'

Gene Johnson
September 10, 2010 - 10:34AM

AP

The father of a US soldier serving in Afghanistan says he tried nearly a half dozen times to pass an urgent message from his son to the army: troops in his unit had murdered an Afghan civilian, planned more killings and threatened him to keep quiet about it.

By the time officials arrested suspects months later, two more Afghans were dead.

And much to Christopher Winfield's horror, his son Adam was among the five Fort Lewis-based soldiers charged in the killings.

The elder Winfield told The Associated Press that his son did not kill the unarmed man and would never have been in the situation if the army had investigated the warnings he says he passed along to Fort Lewis.

..more..

[L0oniX]

23. It's no wonder they hate us. They're only making more terrorists.

[L0oniX]

21. This is just the tip of the iceberg. I can easialy assume that many troops commited murder.

[Enrique]

24. Petraeus and Gates should worry about this stuff instead of Pastor Jones

yeah, the Koran burning will piss some people off, but I think this kind of thing pisses them off a lot more.

[G_j]

26. I'm sure this is news everywhere but here.

our media loves the book burners

[blindpig]

25. Same as it ever was....

On October 19, 2003, the Ohio-based newspaper the Toledo Blade launched a four-day series of investigative reports exposing a string of atrocities by an elite, volunteer, 45-man "Tiger Force" unit of the U.S. Army's 101st Airborne Division over the course of seven months in 1967. The Blade goes on to state that in 1971 the Army began a four and a half year investigation of the alleged torture of prisoners, rapes of civilian women, the mutilation of bodies and killing of anywhere from nine to well over one hundred unarmed civilians, among other acts. The articles further report that the Army's inquiry concluded that eighteen U.S. soldiers committed war crimes ranging from murder and assault to dereliction of duty. However, not one of the soldiers, even of those still on active duty at the time of the investigation, was ever court martialed in connection with the heinous crimes. Moreover, six suspected war criminals were allowed to resign from military service during the criminal investigations specifically to avoid prosecution.

The Toledo Blade articles represent some of the best reporting on a Vietnam War crime by any newspaper, during or since the end of the conflict. Unfortunately, the articles tell a story that was all too common. As a historian writing his dissertation on U.S. war crimes and atrocities during the Vietnam War, I have been immersed in just the sort of archival materials the Toledo Blade used in its pieces, but not simply for one incident but hundreds if not thousands of analogous events. I can safely, and sadly, say that the "Tiger Force" atrocities are merely the tip of the iceberg in regard to U.S.-perpetrated war crimes in Vietnam. However, much of the mainstream historical literature dealing with Vietnam War atrocities (and accompanying cover-ups and/or sham investigations), has been marginalized to a great extent -- aside from obligatory remarks concerning the My Lai massacre, which is, itself, often treated as an isolated event. Unfortunately, the otherwise excellent reporting of the Toledo Blade draws upon and feeds off this exceptionalist argument to a certain extent. As such, the true scope of U.S.-perpetrated atrocities is never fully addressed in the articles. The men of the "Tiger Force" are labeled as "Rogue GIs" and the authors simply mention the that Army "conducted 242 war-crimes investigations in Vietnam, a third were substantiated, leading to 21 convictions... according to a review of records at the National Archives" – facts of dubious value that obscure the scope and number of war crimes perpetrated in Vietnam and feed the exceptionalist argument.

http://hnn.us/articles/1802.html

[G_j]

27. kick