177 replies to this topic

[rashore]

Travelling Man, on 02 June 2011 - 04:31 PM, said:

I'm not sure if it's been brought up (and "I'm right and you're wrong" posts without supporing cites are too tedious to read), but what of My Lai?

Are we including mistakes in here, as in accidental homicide? There are errant munitions used all the time, and in every military engagement there are, "Oopsies."

Apparently oopsies don't count. It's murder done upon civilians by direct order of the US government. The Cambodia bombings and the Detroit 67 riot are currently the only two acceptable examples of US committing mass murder at this point in the thread. Vietnam and Korea have been ruled out as mass murder, and fall under a different heaps o dead term. US support or sanction of others doing the mass murders don't count either. Stuff done during wartime doesn't count either.

Edit: spelling error

Edited by rashore, 02 June 2011 - 05:05 PM.

[ali smack]

rashore, on 02 June 2011 - 05:03 PM, said:

Apparently oopsies don't count. It's murder done upon civilians by direct order of the US government. The Cambodia bombings and the Detroit 67 riot are currently the only two acceptable examples of US committing mass murder at this point in the thread. Vietnam and Korea have been ruled out as mass murder, and fall under a different heaps o dead term. US support or sanction of others doing the mass murders don't count either. Stuff done during wartime doesn't count either.

Edit: spelling error

Howcome?
Personally I believe this thread is getting tedious

[Spark Plug]

ali smack, on 02 June 2011 - 06:19 PM, said:

Howcome?
Personally I believe this thread is getting tedious

If the US murders people you lot wouldnt be here.

The slightest hint that you were onto them and you'd vanish.

Get a grip guys and gals.

Edited by Spark Plug, 02 June 2011 - 06:24 PM.

[rashore]

ali smack, on 02 June 2011 - 06:19 PM, said:

Howcome?
Personally I believe this thread is getting tedious

I dunno how come. Seems to be the parameters of this thread though. Ask Dekker, he's the one who started this thread based off the comments two people were making in another thread(s).

[ExpandMyMind]

How are Vietnam and Korea "ruled out"? Just because there is a war, this does not mean that when civilians are killed that it can not then poossibly be mass murder.

On NK and Vietnam.

The centrality of the wholesale killing of noncombatants through the myriad uses of air power runs like a red line from the bombings of 1944-45 through the Korean and Indochinese wars to the Gulf, Afghanistan and Iraq wars. In the course of six decades since the firebombing and atomic bombing of Japan, while important continuities are observable, such as the firebombing and napalming of cities, new, more powerful and versatile aircraft and weapons would be deployed in the course of successive American wars fought predominantly in Asia.

General Curtis LeMay, the primary architect of the firebombing and atomic bombing strategy applied to Japan in 1945 played a comparable role in Korea and Vietnam. Never one to pull punches, or to minimize the claimed impact of bombing, LeMay recalled of Korea:

We slipped a note kind of under the door into the Pentagon and said, “Look, let us go up there…and burn down five of the biggest towns in North Korea – and they’re not very big – and that ought to stop it.” Well, the answer to that was four or five screams – “You’ll kill a lot of non-combatants,” and “It’s too horrible.” Yet over a period three years or so…we burned down every town in North Korea and South Korea, too… Now, over a period of three years this is palatable, but to kill a few people to stop this from happening – a lot of people can’t stomach it.” [47]

In the course of three years, US/UN forces in Korea flew 1,040,708 sorties and dropped 386,037 tons of bombs and 32,357 tons of napalm. Counting all types of air borne ordnance, including rockets and machine-gun ammunition, the total tonnage comes to 698,000 tons. Marilyn Young estimates the death toll in Korea, most of it noncombatants, at two to four million, and in the South alone, more than five million people had been displaced, according to UN estimates. [48]

One striking feature of these wars has been the extension of bombing from a predominantly urban phenomenon to the uses of airpower directed against rural areas of Korea and Vietnam, leading the United States to breach another of international principles that had sought to curtail indiscriminate attacks on noncombatants. Beginning in Korea, US bombing was extended from cities to the countryside with devastating effects. In what Bruce Cumings has called the “final act of this barbaric air war,” in spring 1953 North Korea’s main irrigation dams were destroyed shortly after the rice had been transplanted. [49]

Here we consider one particularly important element of American bombing of Vietnam. Franklin Roosevelt, in 1943 issued a statement that long stood as the clearest expression of US policy on the use of chemical and biological weapons. In response to reports of Axis plans to use poison gases, Roosevelt warned that “use of such weapons has been outlawed by the general opinion of civilized mankind. This country has not used them, and I hope that we never will be compelled to use them. I state categorically that we shall under no circumstances resort to the use of such weapons unless they are first used by our enemies.” [50] This principle, incorporated in US Army Field Manual 27-10, Law of Land Warfare, issued in 1954, affirmed the principle of no first use of gas warfare and bacteriological warfare. By 1956, that provision had disappeared, replaced by the assertion that the US was party to no treaty in force “that prohibits or restricts the use in warfare of toxic or nontoxic gases, or smoke or incendiary materials or of bacteriological warfare.” US CBW research and procurement efforts, that began in the early 1950s and culminated in the Kennedy administration in the early 1960s, resulted in the use of chemical and biological weapons both against Vietnamese forces and nature, specifically extending from the destruction of forest cover to the destruction of crops. As Seymour Hersh documents, the US CBW program in Vietnam “gradually escalated from the use of leaf-killing defoliants to rice-killing herbicides and nausea-producing gases.” [51] How widespread were US gas attacks in Vietnam? A 1967 Japanese study of US anticrop and defoliation attacks prepared by the head of the Agronomy Section of the Japan Science Council concluded that more than 3.8 million acres of arable land in South Vietnam was ruined and more than 1,000 peasants and 13,000 livestock were killed. [52] In the face of US military claims that the gases were benign, Dr. Pham Duc Nam told Japanese investigators that a three-day attack near Da Nang from February 25 to 27, 1966 had poisoned both livestock and people, some of whom died. “Pregnant women gave birth to still-born or premature children. Most of the affected cattle died from serious diarrhea, and river fish floated on the surface of the water belly up, soon after the chemicals were spread.” [53]

http://www.japanfocu...ark-Selden/2414

Let's just have a look again at what the general wrote:

We slipped a note kind of under the door into the Pentagon and said, “Look, let us go up there…and burn down five of the biggest towns in North Korea – and they’re not very big – and that ought to stop it.” Well, the answer to that was four or five screams – “You’ll kill a lot of non-combatants,” and “It’s too horrible.” Yet over a period three years or so…we burned down every town in North Korea and South Korea, too… Now, over a period of three years this is palatable, but to kill a few people to stop this from happening – a lot of people can’t stomach it.” [47]

A U.S. general openly admitting the act of killing masses of civilians. A general who served in Vietnam also it should be added.

And this is before we go on to mention the dams that were attacked towards the end of the war - which is a war crime. After the largest dam was attacked it flooded for a distance of 27 miles, wiping out many villages. How is this not mass murder? It certainly wasn't an accepted act of war, that's for sure.

Edited by expandmymind, 02 June 2011 - 07:46 PM.

[ExpandMyMind]

Quote

post a link then!

it's no good to say something of the sort with no back up.

I already posted the link to Wiki for you to read the case of Nicaragua vs the U.S. in this thread.

Quote

you're not being honest in that your original position has not been as easy to prove as you thought and has in fact nearly been totally disproven.

you're not being honest by claiming the us committed mass murders for decades and then point to other countries actually commmitting the murders with US support...ie NOT the us comitting mass killings...and you refuse to accept that point.

Well, Vietnam, Cambodia, Laos, and Korea seem to support my claim...

And not just with U.S. support but with U.S. support, ENCOURAGEMENT, training, funding, arming, and often diplomatic support. In other words, doing the killing FOR the U.S.

Quote

people get killed in wartime...and the fog of war makes it difficult to corroborate such things...but if by vietnam your referring to my lai then let me refer you to the court martials and the prison sentences that followed for the US servicement involved...let me also point you to the actions of the many US troops at My Lai who prevented even more war crimes by their fellow troops.

It isn't as simple as "the fog of war", as the general's sentiments I posted above clearly show. When you bomb entire towns, villages and cities knowing you will kill civilians (and indeed often with the intention of doing so, as my quotes from Kissinger also show), then it is murder. Like I stated before, if you point a gun into a crowd of people, turn your head and close your eyes and let rip, it is murder. Claiming innocence doesn't work.

Quote

but you admit there are differences!

so if the twin towers attacks are mass murder how do you refer to the (rhetorical) us attack that kills 4000 by accident?

Of course there are differences, but I'll refer you to the analogy I supplied above. When YOU KNOW civilians will die, even though it MAY BE a legitimate target, then it is essentially the same as the 9/11 attack you describe. And, as I stated in my previous reply to you, going by your own logic, the attack on The World Trade would be legitimate - the casualties were nothing more than by products.

Quote

the WTC was not the centre of US finance...that would be Wall St.

The point still remains. It was a massively important financial institution. If a place such as that existed in Iraq before it was bombed the hell out of, it would have been considered a "legitimate military target".

Quote

and if they are not being attacked directly but die as a consequence of actions aimed at legitimate targets??

I don't know how to make it any clearer. I have already referenced the relevant law on the matter. If there is any doubt as to whether or not civilians will die, it is a war crime. If you know that innocents will die as a result, it is still murder.

[SolarPlexus]

dekker87, on 02 June 2011 - 04:36 PM, said:

MOTIVE is the key.

If you're tryin to hit military targets and civilians get killed that's colllateral damage.

if you're tryin to kill civilians and achieve that then that's mass murder.

Interesting views. As far as i know, mass murder comes down to "an act of murdering four or more people over a relatively short time period".
Collateral damage is just a euphemism for mass murder.

[ExpandMyMind]

Francis Boyle

Quote

Francis Anthony Boyle (born 1950) is a professor of international law at the University of Illinois College of Law.[1] Boyle received a J.D. degree magna cum laude and A.M. and Ph.D. degrees in political science from Harvard University. He also practiced tax and international tax with Bingham, Dana & Gould.

http://en.wikipedia....i/Francis_Boyle

On U.S. attacks on Iraq carried out during the Gulf War said:

Quote

The bombing continued for 42 days. It met no resistance from Iraqi aircraft and no effective anti-aircraft or anti-missile ground fire. Iraq was basically defenceless. Most of the targets were
civilian facilities. The United States intentionally bombed and destroyed centres for civilian life, commercial and business districts, schools, hospitals, mosques, churches, shelters, residential
areas, historical sites, private vehicles and civilian government offices. In aerial attacks, including strafing, over cities, towns, the countryside and highways, United States aircraft bombed and strafed indiscriminately. The purpose of these attacks was to destroy life and property, and generally to terrorise the civilian population of Iraq. The net effect was the summary execution and corporal punishment indiscriminately of men, women and children, young and old, rich and poor, of all nationalities and religions. The intention and effort of this bombing campaign against civilian life and facilities was to systematically destroy Iraq’s infrastructure leaving it in a pre-industrial
condition. The United States intentionally bombed and destroyed defenceless iraqi military personnel; used excessive force; killed soldiers seeking to surrender and in disorganised individual flight, often unarmed and far from any combat zones; randomly and wantonly killed iraqi soldiers; and destroyed material after the ceasefire. The United States used prohibited weapons capable of mass
destruction and inflicting indiscriminate death and unnecessary suffering against both military and civilian targets. Fuel air explosives were used against troops in place, civilian areas, oil fields and fleeing civilians and soldiers on two stretches of highway between Kuwait and Iraq.

Francis Boyle, “Flashback: US War Crimes During
the Gulf War,” 2 September 2002,
http://counterpunch.org/boyle0902.html

Then there is the over 1 million estimated dead through the U.S. led sanctions of the country that saw many of its civilians starve. While this was not a military attack, it was the policy of the U.S. that led directly to the deaths. And effect that the U.S. had to be aware of, and something that has also went on in North Korea for the past two decades.

Denis Halliday and Hans von Sponeck (both former UN humanitarian
coordinators for Iraq who resigned) in November 2001 wrote: “The uncomfortable truth is that the West is holding the Iraqi people hostage.

Hans Von Sponeck and Denis Halliday, “The Hostage Nation,” 29 November 2001, http://zmag.org/halsponiraq.htm

And of course the "Shock and Awe" campaign of the Iraq war. A campaign that saw the relentless bombing of an already decimated country. Not only had the country not recovered from the war in '91, but the U.S. had continued bombing campigns throughout, up to one month before the Iraq invasion was sanctioned in Congress. The 'military targets' of the most recent bombing campaign, simply did not exist. Iraq was already long defeated.

Edited by expandmymind, 03 June 2011 - 01:30 AM.

[ali smack]

http://revcom.us/a/v...9/912/guate.htm

http://www.us-foreig...ndex.php?id=325

http://www.ekoreajou...l/HTML4233.html

http://www.iacenter..../skorea070608//

http://u2r2h-documen...s-with-bio.html

http://www.minorityp...in-afghanistan/

http://www.fortuneci...65/killings.htm

Here are some bits and bobs i've found by searching on google.

[ExpandMyMind]

ali smack, on 03 June 2011 - 03:44 PM, said:

http://revcom.us/a/v...9/912/guate.htm

http://www.us-foreig...ndex.php?id=325

http://www.ekoreajou...l/HTML4233.html

http://www.iacenter..../skorea070608//

http://u2r2h-documen...s-with-bio.html

http://www.minorityp...in-afghanistan/

http://www.fortuneci...65/killings.htm

Here are some bits and bobs i've found by searching on google.

[H.H. Holmes]

ali smack, on 03 June 2011 - 03:44 PM, said:

http://revcom.us/a/v...9/912/guate.htm

http://www.us-foreig...ndex.php?id=325

http://www.ekoreajou...l/HTML4233.html

http://www.iacenter..../skorea070608//

http://u2r2h-documen...s-with-bio.html

http://www.minorityp...in-afghanistan/

http://www.fortuneci...65/killings.htm

Here are some bits and bobs i've found by searching on google.

None of those fall within the definition set out by dekker, so none of it is really relevant to the discussion. Plus, many of those were obviously biased sites who have no interest in being objective.

War crimes happen, it happens in every single war that has ever been waged practically. You cannot control the individual actions of troops on the field. Why should a whole country be blamed for the actions of a few of it's soldiers?

[Spark Plug]

H.H. Holmes, on 03 June 2011 - 08:24 PM, said:

None of those fall within the definition set out by dekker, so none of it is really relevant to the discussion. Plus, many of those were obviously biased sites who have no interest in being objective.

War crimes happen, it happens in every single war that has ever been waged practically. You cannot control the individual actions of troops on the field. Why should a whole country be blamed for the actions of a few of it's soldiers?

Civilians die in wars especially if the enemy forces mix into the population. War crimes are the targeting of civilians for no other purpose but to kill civilians.

As I said earlier there is a grey area. For instance what do you do if a hospital contains biological agents and the means to produce germ warfare? Do you bomb the hospital and kill 200 people or risk thousands of lives by not acting?
What do you do if the enemy builds its top secret communications bunker below a school?
What do you do if the enemy uses human shields?

Many enemies are clever when placing their assets.

[ali smack]

To say all the links that have been posted are biased is silly and in all honesty it doesn't matter how or why civilians ended up getting killed.They got killed and it's wrong.
And to simply say things like it doesn't count because of such a such is silly.
I just simply googled to see if I could find anything.

[H.H. Holmes]

ali smack, on 04 June 2011 - 10:23 PM, said:

To say all the links that have been posted are biased is silly and in all honesty it doesn't matter how or why civilians ended up getting killed.They got killed and it's wrong.
And to simply say things like it doesn't count because of such a such is silly.
I just simply googled to see if I could find anything.

I looked through each one of those links; I didn't see one that was referencing the specific issue, which is "mass murder carried out by the U.S.A", that we are talking about. When someone says that a mass murder(s) is carried out by the United States, then it is usually in reference to an official/unofficial (I cede that it is a possibility, but I have not seen much real proof) policy to commit these killings of civilians. The incidents that you linked to were either a.) isolated incidents of soldiers murdering civilians on purpose. b.) cover ups of these incidents (which is wrong, I admit) c.) what I considered was a rambling diatribe written by an iraq war veteran, who sees himself and all other soldiers as murderers. or d.) They were from conspiracy websites that provided little legitimate sources as to where they got their information from. Like when I asked expandmymind to see the sources regarding the claim that 9/10 of the people killed from predator drone strikes (and other precision targeting systems) were civilians. He gave me a source, I read the source he linked to, then I couldn't find one reference in that entire article as to where the statistics about precision strikes came from. I would like to know specifically where this number came from, not something as vague as "critics".  

Of course, it is horrible that war even goes on, even more heinous when non-combatants get killed or injured. I am not arguing about that, but this is about one specific issue. As I outlined above, none of the links you provided me were either relevant or properly cited their sources.

[ali smack]

H.H. Holmes, on 04 June 2011 - 10:46 PM, said:

I looked through each one of those links; I didn't see one that was referencing the specific issue, which is "mass murder carried out by the U.S.A", that we are talking about. When someone says that a mass murder(s) is carried out by the United States, then it is usually in reference to an official/unofficial (I cede that it is a possibility, but I have not seen much real proof) policy to commit these killings of civilians. The incidents that you linked to were either a.) isolated incidents of soldiers murdering civilians on purpose. b.) cover ups of these incidents (which is wrong, I admit) c.) what I considered was a rambling diatribe written by an iraq war veteran, who sees himself and all other soldiers as murderers. or d.) They were from conspiracy websites that provided little legitimate sources as to where they got their information from. Like when I asked expandmymind to see the sources regarding the claim that 9/10 of the people killed from predator drone strikes (and other precision targeting systems) were civilians. He gave me a source, I read the source he linked to, then I couldn't find one reference in that entire article as to where the statistics about precision strikes came from. I would like to know specifically where this number came from, not something as vague as "critics".  

Of course, it is horrible that war even goes on, even more heinous when non-combatants get killed or injured. I am not arguing about that, but this is about one specific issue. As I outlined above, none of the links you provided me were either relevant or properly cited their sources.

OK Then.Fair Enough