"I would like to hear a defense for this particular action that shames me as a proud American. Does the unnecessary bombing of civilians qualify as a war crime?? "
There is absolutely no credible evidence from any credible
source that Coalition forces intentionally targeted or
otherwise unnecessarily killed any civilians. None
whatsoever. Accidental or otherwise unintentional civilian
deaths caused by Coalition forces? Sure there were. This is
war! And this when Saddam tried his level best to assure
massive civilian casualties!
Name one war of liberation that had Zero civilian
casualties.
Name one war of liberation that had proportionally less
civilian casualties.
Did any civilian deaths it bother me? Absolutely! War is
Hell! People die in every, even innocent civilians. This
war resulted in a shockingly small number of lives lost,
including innocent civilians.
Did the incessant rape, torture & slaughter of millions of
innocent Iraqi citizens under the Butcher of Baghdad bother
you?
It bothered me! And the more I learn about this horrific &
relentless oppression of women & children makes my blood
boil!
Coalition forces did their absolute best to limit civilian
casualties. Saddam did his absolute best to insure there
would be massive civilian casualties. Still, the number was
historically low by any measure during wartime.
Coalition forces had good intelligence that Saddam, one or
both of his brutal sons & a large number of senior Iraqi
leaders were gathered at that site you are so upset about.
A successful bombing there would likely bring a swifter end
to the war, thus saving countless lives, both military &
civilian.
The Butcher of Baghdad is responsible, on average, for the
slaughter of more than 1,000 Muslims per week, every week
he was in power, perhaps as many as 2 million Arabs/Muslims
slaughtered...... The few innocent Iraqi's killed in that
Mansour district (AKA Saddam City) bombing pales in
comparison. And that bombing was in a wealthy neighborhood
where Saddam's cronies lived lives of luxury at the expense
of the millions of oppressed Iraqi's.
Still I grieve for the loss for any innocent civilian. You
seem only concerned for innocent civilians accidently
killed by Coalition forces.
In any event, if that bombing shortened the war by just one
day, chances are that even more lives were saved than were
lost in that bombing. Considering how quickly Iraq crumbled
after that bombing & senior military officers suddenly went
silent, perhaps it shortened the war by many, many days &
untold hundreds of lives spared.
The best numbers available for civilian casualties for this
whole war is from the Iraqi government & likely massively
exaggerated. Others keeping track have serious credibility
problems as well. Still, the numbers they offer are
incredibly low for a war of liberation..........
"A Web Site (www.iraqbodycount.com) run by academics and
peace activists puts Iraq's civilian casualties at between
1,402 and 1,817, based on incidents reported by at least
two media sources, though its methodology has been
questioned.
The last Iraqi estimate issued on April 3, just two weeks
into the war and well before Saddam's rule crumbled <one
week later>, was 1,254 civilians killed and 5,112
wounded. "
reuters.com
"But far worse is a group that claims to be keeping an
accurate running count of Iraqi civilian deaths but is, in
fact, doing no such thing. The group is called the Iraq
Body Count Project <See their claims above>, and its main
figure is Marc Herold, a professor of economics and women's
studies at the University of New Hampshire. You may
remember Herold from his similar project during the
Afghanistan campaign. There, he produced a figure of almost
3,800 civilian casualties, and his methodology was
immediately criticized by many for taking reports from
unreliable media sources at face value and for double-
counting some incidents. An independent analysis by the Los
Angeles Times found 1,200 or fewer civilian casualties.....
....So how many civilians have actually died in Iraq? The
simple answer is that it's far too early to come up with
anything resembling an accurate count. But it is striking
that, as of this writing, the Iraq Body Count Project's
maximum stands at less than 1,800. And if there's one thing
we can say for sure about the Iraq Body Count Project, it's
that the maximum is undoubtedly a true max: Given the
group's methodological biases, the chances of the actual
number of civilian deaths being higher than its maximum
figure seem very, very small. By comparison, the best
estimate of civilian deaths in the first Gulf War--where
the military task was significantly less demanding and the
number of people liberated significantly smaller--was
between 2,000 and 3,000."
weeklystandard.com
"Iraqi authorities said last week that over 1,250 civilians have been killed in the war and more than 5,000 injured"
rferl.org |
