US Marines Accused of War Crimes

The Guardian (UK)
Chris McGreal
January 12, 2012.

Video posted anonymously on YouTube claims to show American troops in Afghanistan urinating on dead bodies

US forces in Afghanistan are facing fresh accusations of war crimes after film emerged of American marines urinating on dead bodies and laughing.

The US military command in Kabul, which was severely embarrassed last year by revelations that Americans soldiers were running a "kill squad" murdering Afghan civilians, said it would investigate the undated video, and that if it proved to be authentic, desecration of corpses would be regarded as a serious crime. Despoiling of the dead is illegal under the Geneva conventions as well as under US military law.

In the graphic short video, four soldiers in combat gear and carrying weapons are seen acting in unison as they urinate on three bloodied corpses. One of the soldiers sighs with relief, another says "yeah" and a third laughs. One remarks: "Have a great day, buddy". Another says: "Golden, like a shower".

A fifth soldier films the incident.

The video was posted anonymously on Wednesday along with a caption that said: "scout sniper team 4 with 3rd battalion 2nd marines out of camp lejeune peeing on dead talibans".

Military officials confirmed that the soldiers appear to be carrying rifles of a kind issued to sniper teams in Afghanistan.

A US department of defence spokesman, Captain John Kirby, told CNN: "Regardless of the circumstances or who is in the video, this is egregious, disgusting behaviour. It's hideous. It turned my stomach."

The marine corps said in a statement: "While we have not yet verified the origin or authenticity of this video, the actions portrayed are not consistent with our core values and are not indicative of the character of the Marines in our Corps. This matter will be fully investigated."

The promise of an investigation is unlikely to quiet concern at yet another revelation of abuses by American forces. Last year, 11 soldiers were convicted over the murders of three Afghan civilians by a "kill squad" and the subsequent cover up. It was revealed that some of them collected body parts, including fingers and skull parts, as trophies, and posed for photographs over the corpses of their victims.

The US military has also yet to live down the abuse of prisoners at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq, and the use of waterboarding and other torture of alleged terrorists held at Guantánamo.

The US marines corps is also under scrutiny after the trial began this week of one of its soldiers, Staff Sergeant Frank Wuterich, charged with the deaths of 24 Iraqis during an attack in 2005.

Wuterich was commanding a group of soldiers who burst into the victims' homes in Haditha and shot women, children and men in their nightclothes. He is accused of manslaughter. Seven other soldiers also charged were either acquitted or had the case against them dropped.

A US congressman compared the killings in Haditha to the infamous My Lai massacre in Vietnam.

The Haditha killings contributed to the Iraqi government's refusal to agree to immunity for US troops after the formal withdrawal of American forces at the end of last year.

*****

Comment: The anonymous video that was posted in the article has been removed from YouTube.  

Surprised?

But here it is preserved by the The Guardian:

Are these fools part of the "heroes" Obomber was referring to when he waxed on about the sacrifices made by US soldiers in Iraq?

And please save me the nonsense about the need to verify the video.  The mere fact that the original 39 second video is now removed from YouTube tells you that some folks in Washington are embarrassed.

Yesterday was a good day for those who are already at war with Iran; fighting the good fight by assassinating academics in the field of nuclear science.

Today not so good, again.  Now the minutes can't tick fast enough past another small revelation of how dirty and unjust US soldiers can be when they making 'sacrifices over there'.

Late last night I happened on the start of a movie called The Dry Land.  I read the introductory caption to see how a movie about a returning war veteran would be sold to non-American audiences.

It read:  "A U.S. soldier returning home from war struggles to reconcile his experiences abroad with the life and family he left in Texas". 

I forced myself to sit through most of the movie and it was true to form; the Vietnam vet syndrome of a returned military man who can't quite put pieces together.  The pained stares into nowhere and flashbacks that the loved ones can't understand.  The looking up of war buddies and the sharing of memories.

In this version the white boy is fighting memory loss - 'cause that happens when you shoot and kill people and then conveniently forget that you were a voluntary part of a killing machine 'over there'.

The scene at Walter Reed Army Hospital was about enough to make me want to hurl.  Somewhere in-between a few guitar verses of  Bob Marley's Redemption Song (go figure hey??)  the other white boy in the hospital bed starts bleeding profusely and then is stabilized fast enough to tell the guitar-playing main actor about his heroic deed that led to the incident that in turn led to the bomb that blew of the legs of the guy telling the story. 

Seems the do-gooders were just trying to help a wounded woman and her child and it was a booby-trap ... but wait, the woman was purposely shot by "hajees" to draw the goodwill intention of the soldier boys! 

See!  So they were doing what god endows Americans to do especially when the savages sacrifice a defenseless woman with child (how biblical and patriarchal and racist and patronizing) only to get bombed for their innate humanity and kindness.

What f*cking bullsh*t?  

The US is an immoral warmongering state that kills innocent children on the daily.  Not a f*cking day goes by when innocents are not massacred so that they can hold onto their empire delusions.

By the time white soldier boy returns from the hospital his dog is happy to see him but his mama is gravely ill and I was choking for air so I turned off the idiot box.

Hollywood has already started to revise history to fit the delusions of most Americans (a dominant theme of American life is the 'heroic victim').  Soon we will have a Chuck Norris looking for missing in action f*cks who are presumed to be held by 'hajee savages somewhere over there'.

And huge chunks of the population will be immersed in post-war trauma irrespective of whether they actually fought anywhere else other than their local pub.

Nascar and Harley Davidson will hold memorial events to highlight the plight of the 'brave souls' who carried America through heroic battles killing children, raping women inside and outside military camps, and pissing on living and dead hajees.

F*ck these contrived 'heroes'.  They do not deserve anything but contempt.  The US war machine and its attachments represent nothing less than inhumane barbarity.  

We should resist being pulled into the sentimentalized version of the US soldier as hero.  Moral, ethical, and thinking people do not join dirty wars no matter what.   

And heroes don't kill for killing sake like the celebrated sniper, Chris Kyle, who has written a book about assassinating more than 160 hajees! 

This man is no hero.  He is a murdering drone.  Nothing more.

He deserves our contempt no matter where you live or how close or remote your life is to the killing fields 'over there'.

Don't celebrate, venerate, or feel sorry for the American soldier.  Karma is a b*tch and the wheels of justice may turn slowly but turn they most certainly do.

An American poet, Gary Coseri, put the hero syndrome into context with the following poem:

Do not call them “heroes”
if they have done your killing for you.
Say that they have done your bidding;
say they were your “soldiers.”

Say that you have trained them well:
They are the oiled machinations of war,
performing as expected.

Refrain from saying “professionals,”
and the usual nonsense about “surgical strikes.”
They were never doctors and nurses
in starched, white linens.

The best heroes are dead ones—
mortified and mortared.
They neither complain nor contradict.
They don’t re-live “friendly fire” incidents,
the sonofabitch sargeant-sadist,
nor the rapist in their midst.

They don’t see again
the faces of traumatized children.
Their bones stretch to attention under the sod.

The man and woman who will kill and injure
because some fool tells them to
are just little spin-off fools.
No act born of ignorance is heroic.
Heroes are sensible, not imbeciles.
Heroes dispel myths; they neither create
nor perpetuate them.

The fully manifested hero,
aware of his power and dignity,
is more than human, is humane.

Heroes don’t talk about heroes.
They need no confetti showered in their faces.
They question; they learn; they challenge; they act
according to their own honed principles:
What is truth? for example;
what is honor?

Onward!