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Ear to the Ground

U.N. Sides With Afghans in Airstrike Controversy

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Posted on Aug 26, 2008
AP photo / Fraidoon Pooyaa

A boy carries his belongings next to the rubble of his home, destroyed in a U.S. airstrike in Herat province, Afghanistan.

Iraq isn’t the only U.S.-occupied nation looking for some sovereignty. Afghan officials are calling for more regulation of foreign troops amid an uproar over U.S. airstrikes. One recent U.S.-led attack, according a U.N. investigation, probably killed 90 civilians—mostly children.


AP via Google:

In a stark warning to U.S. forces, the Afghan government said it will try to regulate the presence of U.S. troops and their use of airstrikes, while the U.N. on Tuesday announced that “convincing evidence” exists that an American-led operation killed 90 civilians.

The U.N. sent in a team of investigators, who relied solely on villagers’ statements in alleging the American-led operation in the western province of Herat on Friday killed 60 children and 30 adults. The U.S. military stood by its account, that 25 militants and five civilians were killed in the operation.

“I don’t have any information that would suggest that our military commanders in Afghanistan don’t believe, still, that this was a legitimate strike on a Taliban target,” Defense Department spokesman Bryan Whitman said in Washington.

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Purple Girl's avatar

By Purple Girl, August 27, 2008 at 12:19 pm Link to this comment

Please it became veryapparent that invading afghanistan was nothing more then Cheneycorp shoving their foot in the M.E. Door.Pitching Saudi (UAE) snake oil-“We’ll take care of your Oil for you”, “don’t mind our task masters in the Oil Royal get ups over there”
although Afghanistan doesn’t have any known quanitites of oil, they make a great launch pad for military operations in the area. and Hey they have Poppies, wonder what Congress has been on for the last 7 yrs?
I never want an American boot set down in that country either!these Corps knew Afghanistan would be a quandry, a sure fire money maker for them!
The only reason they wanted afghanistan was to butter their bread and be a cetralized Operational command post for their Hostile expansion takeover.

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By lawlessone, August 27, 2008 at 10:11 am Link to this comment
(Unregistered commenter)

Former bomber jock McCain no doubt is saying, “So what.”  Since he routinely killed others for a living until he screwed up and got shot down, it is hard to imagine him believing the deaths of innocent women and children as being anything other than inconvenient.

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By nomorebombs, August 27, 2008 at 9:22 am Link to this comment
(Unregistered commenter)

the war criminals
wonder what will happen?

same as saddam got?

worlds peoples fed up with the american attitude..

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By KPinSEA, August 27, 2008 at 8:41 am Link to this comment

It’s no longer possible to see a reasonable end-game for the U.S. in Afghanistan.  We’ve completely botched any semblance of a successful counter-insurgency program and instead have become a great recruiter for the insurgents among the Pashtun people.

We have no definition of ‘win’ other than ‘killing a lot of bad guys’.  But with our inept application of force, we’re creating them faster than we kill them.

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By Fadel Abdallah, August 27, 2008 at 8:13 am Link to this comment

In the past, when such barbaric scales of civilian killings took place in both Afghanistan and Iraq- and there were many of these massacres- I posted trying to explain why this keep happening. Here I offer my explanation again on the occasion of this latest barbaric massacre.

First: There is the myth of the West’s superior weapons that can pinpoint with precision military targets and destroy them.

Second: There is also the myth of the Western professional and humanistic soldiers. The soldiers of any army in the world are actually trained to be heartless killers who see an enemy in what they come upon. So the false image of hero soldiers who put their lives at risk for the sake of their country and to bring freedom and salvation to the people they occupy is a big bullshit. With the exception of a small percentage, soldiers are professional killers and agents of destruction who are making a living for lack of other skills or opportunities. Most of then, in my opinions are as cowards as the leaders who send them to wars.

Third: Because of their cowardliness they panic when they see a large group of natives from a distance and they react to this with the trigger-happy mentality they were trained for. Only an omniscient God would know how many of them wet their pants out of fear when then suddenly come across a large number of the natives!

Fourth: An example of this is McCain, an aspirant to the presidency, who is falsely portrayed as a hero. However, he was, in fact, a badly trained professional killer pilot who participated in an evil and immoral war, of which his God disapproved by having him shot down and tortured for few years. His training coupled with the torture he received have destroyed the little soul that he might have had. And that’s why for almost thirty years he has been part of the Washington’s misguided political establishment that brought this country to the brink of ruin and destruction.

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By Mario Tafur, August 26, 2008 at 9:07 pm Link to this comment
(Unregistered commenter)

Despite the fact that I am very pleased that the United Nations is taking the time to investigate the killing of civilians by Coalition forces in Afghanistan.  I find it horrifying that as many as 90 civilians may have been killed by U.S. Forces.  I am almost more concerned at the lack of hard evidence the U.N. is able to offer up in its investigation to the press covering the incident.  We are told 90 people died, but we aren’t told about visits to hospitals, interviews with doctors, mass grave sights, discussions with any other foreign official or visitors that may happen to be there, or any other seemingly important evidence that could support the report.  No doubt the U.N. and its war crimes investigators can either do more, or tell us more of what they are doing.  Am I asking too much?

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By QuyTran, August 26, 2008 at 7:26 pm Link to this comment

Stop killing innocent children and women, please !
Are Bush/Cheney still blind and deaf ?

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By joey, August 26, 2008 at 5:57 pm Link to this comment
(Unregistered commenter)

When Putin looked back into Bush’s eyes we can know for sure he didn’t see a soul. To murder people that have nothing with high tech toys is below cowardly.

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By msgmi, August 26, 2008 at 5:19 pm Link to this comment
(Unregistered commenter)

Bernard Fall, freedom fighter, scholar, war correspondent, raised a red flag against military tactics employed in Vietnam during the ‘60s. His message remains unheard while the Afghan counter-insurgency is losing the hearts and minds with every ill-conceived strike.

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