US Choppers Kill … Who? Enemy or Innocents?
BAGHDAD, Iraq - This much is agreed upon: at least six Iraqis died overnight Saturday when American attack helicopters pounded a cluster of homes in a dusty, nondescript neighborhood on the northern outskirts of Baghdad.
But the story of why those homes were targeted and who was killed depends on the storyteller. 
The U.S. military said the dead were insurgents and the homes in the Husseiniya district probably served as weapons depots; troops observed seven or more secondary explosions after the air assault. By the military’s tally, six fighters were killed and five wounded.
Iraqi residents told a different version: the dead came from two Shiite Muslim families who lived in an area controlled by the powerful Mahdi Army militia. The bodies pulled from the rubble, locals say, were ordinary parents killed with their children in the middle of the night. Locals counted 11 corpses - two men, two women, and seven children. Another 10 were injured. Some Iraqi authorities put the death toll as high as 18.
In Iraq, where new bombings occur before authorities can even investigate the previous day’s violence, the truth about Husseiniya might never come to light. Roadblocks erected around the neighborhood prevented reporters from reaching the scene.
“Lies, lies, lies,” sputtered Salam al Rubaiye, 35, a computer technician who lives in Husseiniya and works in Sadr City. “The Americans always try to change the truth, especially when it concerns the Sadrists,” the collective name for followers of the Mahdi Army commander, cleric Muqtada al Sadr.
Rubaiye visited the scene of the air strike twice Saturday. He first showed up early in the morning when, he said, volunteers were still digging the corpses of women and children from the rubble. Later, he brought a camera and snapped 14 photos.
They showed several piles of cinderblock where homes once stood. The interior of a severely damaged home showed only the detritus of family life: a potted plant, a wall hanging, a refrigerator, an electrical generator. “For Sale” was written in Arabic on the only surviving wall of one home.
Rubaiye also e-mailed two short cell-phone video clips that showed at least seven bodies swathed in blankets, some with grayish feet sticking out at the ends. Two of the bundles were tiny, as if they shrouded young children.
Residents said they’d finished retrieving the dead by 8 a.m., and that two young girls were still missing.
“I took out with my own hands the bodies of two young children, two men, two adult women and four little girls,” said Bassem al Musawi, 30, who lives in the neighborhood. “I don’t know why the Americans bombed these homes. I know one was the house of Abu Mustafa. He’s a very poor man with only one boy and the rest of his family are girls. And he didn’t even have a rifle.”
In an e-mail response to questions on the incident, an American military spokesman wrote that U.S. troops had come under small-arms fire from gunmen in the area just before midnight. The troops “returned fire and attack helicopters, armed with missiles, engaged the structure the gunmen were firing from.”
When three of the gunmen fled into another building, the military statement continued, “attack aircraft dropped a bomb on that structure and observed at least seven secondary explosions, likely caused by explosives and munitions stored inside the building.” Iraqi police who inspected the site reported to the Americans that the home was destroyed, six insurgents were killed and five wounded.
Presented with the dueling accounts, both sides modified their versions.
Iraqi residents acknowledged hearing gunfire before the air strikes. And the U.S. military no longer insisted that only militants perished, though a spokesman emphasized that the air raid was a self-defense measure.
“The adversary is ruthless and puts no value on human life and will endanger innocent civilians - women, children - by hiding and cowering in buildings they take over,” read a statement from Lt. Col. Michael Donnelly, spokesman for U.S. forces north of Baghdad.
Burials were planned, though it was unclear who had custody of the bodies. By late Saturday, there were plans for a large Mahdi Army demonstration to accompany the expected funeral procession.
“They say they target the terrorists, so where are they?” asked a 45-year-old Husseiniya resident who identified himself only as Abu Ghufran. “Most of the dead are women and children. There is no justice in this life.”
Hussein is a special correspondent for McClatchy Newspapers. Special correspondent, Laith Hammoudi, contributed.
McClatchy Newspapers 2007
“Bombing the houses is a patchy way of getting the women and children, and our infantry always incur losses in shooting down the Arab men. By gas attacks the whole population of offending districts could be wiped out neatly … ”
- T.E. Lawrence (as told by R. Fisk)
In my younger days it was the murdered Vietnamese women and children that were counted as V.C. kills.
If our enemy in Iraq want to take out it’s enemy; then shoot at U.S. helicopters from your enemy’s house. That way we blow up the few people left in Iraq that support us.
I can only feel grief shame and horror at what we are doing. It’s like Vietnam all over again. All my life I avoided the word evil, but that is what we are becoming. I am so appalled that Americans just sit by and let it happen. And our members of Congress are accomplices in crime. We deserve a judgment day on this.
How dare we invade another country and smash it to bits and murder the women children and elderly and torture the men and boys because we want what belongs to them? We are no better than Hitler and his Nazis, and the American people are no better than the Germans that they so sanctimoniously blamed for letting it happen. I am not comparing what we are doing to the Holocaust, I am comparing it to what Hitler did to other countries.
And while we slaughter innocent Iraqis we are giving Osama exactly what he wants. And Nancy Pelosi has as much blood on her hands as Bush because she is shielding him for the crassest of reasons, political gain in the next election. Are these the kind of leaders we want?
Many years ago I was talking with a woman about the Vietnam war and I said We are burning women and children with napalm and she said “they are used to dying. There has always been war there. But we’re not used to paying more for butter”. That is an exact quote. I was speechless. What can you say to someone who thinks that way? Are there still people who think that way? What kind of people are we? And Bush wonders why they hate us.
Well, I was very young but I wouldn’t be speechless today.
No telling what the truth is. There are thousands of fighters shooting at our troops, without worrying about putting innocents at risk. At the same time, air strikes in an urban setting are problematic at least.
US citizens must realize that they are the enemy of the planet, its flora, fauna, and its peoples. Those citizens unwilling to become enemies of the planet must join the alredy forming insurgency to defeat the Evil Empire they reside in. This insurgency revolves around various political groups like Code Pink, and as yet has no known military component.
My conclusion is for us to maintain any of our civil and human rights, we will have to embrace the Second Amendment, as the elites behind the politicos will not cede power without a physical battle, and all that entails. I see any political solution ending then reversing the last 60 years of Business-as-usual as close to nil, especially with elites in control of the propaganda mill known as the corporate media.
The Enemy is Domestic, not Foreign, and will use every tool to maintain its grip on power, including using the anti-war bloc to re-gain the executive branch–Yes, that means that Clinton, Obama, etc., are Enemies.
As long as folks like Sigma think “our troops” are somehow in the right by being in Iraq, then nothing will change, and our enemies will win.
Karloft - I know several of the troops over there. Not a single one was asked if he or she wanted to go.
Kathyodat you said it so right. Bombing women and children will only earn you perpetual hatred. One day Americans will no longer be able to travel.
Safely.
Will the American Army like the Roman start crucifying the people they wish to pacify?.
Please, please do not call yourselves Christians.
You are Romans and like Romans you take vicarious pleasure in seeing people tortured to death.
What right do they have to do this?
As long as our forces are there, they’ve got to show something, to earn their keep. The generals have to keep the war going, for the sake of their careers. The pResident has to keep the war going to seem to legitimate his tenure of office. The U.S. power structure needs this war to go on. The politicians in Congress need to keep the industry going to keep their constituents in the chips. They need to maintain the status quo, so the money keeps flowing. They don’t believe there’s a real threat from an electorate that’s sour on the war. It doesn’t look to them like there’s anything the people can do, or will do, to disrupt things too much. Maybe they’re right.
On April 28th, 32 years ago I flew out of Saigon with a sense of sickness and shame at we, my country, had done. Now I feel overwhelmed by the same sense of shame, but with an added sense of futility. Will we never learn? Are we destined to continue with this insanity into Iran or Pakistan perhaps?
Sigma, every child knows the difference between right and wrong. It’s only when we grow up that we lose our moral compass. What a weak excuse “but they’re doing it too”.
What do they care who they kill as long as the stock market keeps going up. When I say “they” I mean “me” my taxes, my tacit consent, ME.
duchaspa: fuck you with your sweeping judgements about Americans in general. “you are romans”, my ass. There are 300 million people in this country and I’m sick and tired of seeing judgements made about all of us based on the insane actions of our sociopathic government. Saying Americans approve of torture is as inane as saying ‘irish are drunks’ or ‘the french are pompous’ or ‘japanese are pedophiles’.
sigma: you can’t say the people you know serving in Iraq didn’t choose to go. Are they robots with no free will or something? Or are they humans, like Ehren Watada?
“probably served as weapons depots”
So now we bomb civilian homes based on probably? It seems collateral damage is just a fly in the ointment. And who has a better idea of what happens on the ground, those who are there when it happens or Iraqi police trying to please their masters? These are the immoral war crimes of cowards and traitors. How can I possibly support our troops when they do these things?
MetalDog,
Thanks for your comments.
I get pissed at being painted with that particular broad brush: Statements like “We voted for him…” or “He’s our President…” are not only not true, they are divisive. The statements about “We must…” set my teeth on edge. Must what? Take up self-immolation on the White House lawn?
He is NOT my President! I did NOT vote for the man! I have campaigned against these assholes since my first election [JFK] and even before that when I delivered signs for Henry Wallace with my Dad in ‘48.
There are people in this country who were on the House Un-American Activities list, and then were denied jobs under the Walter-McClaren Act for belonging to subversive organizations. From there, they went on to the list of people the FBI spied on regularly because the didn’t agree with Richard Nixon, or they believed in Organized Labor, or tried to Ban the Bomb.
I am considered low-income here in Hawaii, but I still come up with money for the Farm Worker’s Union, and Jobs for Justice. I have proudly marched against the WTO in Seattle in 1999, and will do so again if I stay healthy.
So, keep your sweeping generalizations to yourselves, folks. Many of us in this country have fought our whole lives to leave a better world to those who come after. Our failures are not because we didn’t try - We were out-spent, out-maneuvered, and out-numbered; but we’ve yet to sell out!
Metalhead - The military doesn’t recognize free will. These are people with families that can’t afford to have the breadwinner sitting his ass in the brig for a year.
Listening to Meet the Press this evening gave no hint of the reality of our occupying forces’ method of self-defense that must turn powerful weapons on communities with the inevitable “collateral damage.” What they speak of is an alternate reality claiming that withdrawal of our forces, even in a methodical manner, will result in a civil war blood bath akin to Rwanda or worse. The fact is that by continued occupation, we set up the inevitable continued warfare by insurgents. Only our withdrawal can eliminate insurgency, Iraqis who do not want their nation occupied by foreign powers. You can bet that the foreign al Qaeda element will have no more reason to be there. We will have left a gosh awful mess. But at least WE will have stopped making war on the Iraqis.
“All my life I avoided the word evil, but that is what we are becoming”
Where were you the last 200 years, kathyodat?
If Sweden was murdering people in Iraq, I’d be surprised. But our country? Why? Our story started badly. We’ve had blood on our hands since the beginning.
-genocide of the Native Americans
-Slavery
-we stole land from Mexico
-Segregation, it ended only 40 years ago
-Look at all the coups we help implement all over the world.
-Look at all the dictators we put in power after having removed democratically elected leaders!
Consider also the following:
-We are The only country that doesn’t mandate paid leave by law for its workers
-The only country where the rich are making sure we will NEVER have a National Health Care
Look at the paranoia with our military
You’re surprised that such a country with such a history can kill and torture?
I’m not. It’s totally logical
Like so many reports of the suffering going on in Iraq they are presented like weather reports. But as people here have commented the deaths of Iraqis at our hands are a direct result of our occupation of their country. What if there were 50 divisions of Arab or Chinese troops in the our country uninvited? There would be lots of “collateral” damage. Our invasion was a criminal enterprise from the beginning and each day we remain compounds the crime.
Generalisations?
I was living in USA in 2002. About 90% of people in USA agreed on the mission in Afghanistan to “bomb them to the stone ages>”
True in 2003 only 70% agreed to war in Iraq. GW Bush was reelected by a majority in 2004.Although he stole the 2000 one.So a majority of Americans express a desire for their country to show FORCE ,excessive force . Your TV screens are full of violence which you let young children watch, even your cartoons are violent. Your national anthem is full of explosives and violence.The USA has run so many false flag operations in the last century and before. Andrew Jackson graces a five dollar bill ,yet he is guilty in front of history of genocide of the Cherokee nation.
You need to look in the mirror.That was not a generalisation ,just facts. And the question about the Army ,not rhetorical as 23 000 Iraqis are in U*S jails uncharged, dying a slow death. As for the Christians ,they are supposed to turn the other cheek. When oh when did that happen in USA until Matin Luther king came along. Your religious leaders advocate assasinations of leaders in other countries.You all need a week of mourning in sackcloth and ashes.
Phor, some people are just waking up to the fact.
I remember only too well how those of us who were against Bush invading Iraq were called “anti-Americans”. If those that are doing what they are doing in Iraq, American, then indeed I am “Anti-American”.
It makes you damned proud to be an American!
Duchaspa: I never contested any facts you presented. I took issue with your statement “You are Romans and like Romans you take vicarious pleasure in seeing people tortured to death.” It’s an asinine, foolishly wrong, and deeply offensive thing to say. I don’t think there’s one single thing that you could accurately say applies to all Americans. Many of us are sickened and deeply embarrassed by the actions of our government. Most of the rest are just ignorant, and ignorance is not the same as evil.
By the same token, I’m offended by the remark about “our” religious leaders. We don’t collectively acknowledge any single religious leader. You refer to Pat Robertson calling for the assassination of Hugo Chavez, no doubt, but most of us regard Robertson as a clown, not a ‘leader’. He’s respected only by crazies. The only reason he’s ever in the media is because he’s loony-tunes, and that makes for good tv in this age of profit-driven newsrooms.
Two more corrections: the 2004 election was fraudulent too — it just wasn’t as sloppily done as the 2000 one, and Andrew Jackson is on the 20, not the 5. Don’t underestimate the importance of our second most genocidal President.
Attack Bush and his criminally insane government all you want. It’s well-deserved. Just don’t extend that anger onto all Americans, because many of us hate these criminals more than you ever could, and many of us consider ourselves to be humans first and Americans second.