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TechnoratiOperation Enduring Folly: US Kills 60 More in Pakistan Air Strike
"Operation Enduring Freedom is ostensibly being fought to uphold the American Way of Life. It'll probably end up undermining it completely," the Indian writer Arundhati Roy wrote in 2001, in "The Algebra of Infinite Justice." Roy took a lot of grief for that piece from American public opinion, hijacked at the time by a blind desire for violent revenge (and the silencing of dissenters) that would prove to be far worse than 9/11's mass murders. Far worse, because we're living its consequences still, though far less in the West than in the Middle East: Iraq, Iran (yes, even Iran), Afghanistan and Pakistan as Roy's words have been unfortunately and terribly vindicated many times over, with no end in sight.
![[Slick and deadly: Most of the victims in at least 22 unmanned "drone" missile attacks in Pakistan have been civilians. (US Air Force)]](http://www.commondreams.org/files/article_images/0623-drone_0.jpg "0623-drone.jpg")
Yesterday there was this headline in The Times: "U.S. Tightens Airstrike Policy in Afghanistan," over a Dexter Filkins
story quoting the new U.S. commander in Afghanistan, Gen. Stanley A.
McChrystal, saying that "Air power contains the seeds of our own
destruction if we do not use it responsibly," and pledging, "Even in
the cases of active firefights with Taliban forces," in Filkins'
paraphrase, that "airstrikes will be limited if the combat is taking
place in populated areas - the very circumstances in which most Afghan
civilian deaths have occurred. The restrictions will be especially
tight in attacking houses and compounds where insurgents are believed
to have taken cover."
Details of the attack, which occurred in Makeen, remained unclear, but the reported death toll was exceptionally high. If the reports are indeed accurate and if the attack was carried out by a drone, the strike could be the deadliest since the United States began using the aircraft to fire remotely guided missiles at members of the Taliban and Al Qaeda in the tribal areas of Pakistan. The United States carried out 22 previous drone strikes this year, as the Obama administration has intensified a policy inherited from the Bush administration.It begs the question. What's Stanley A. McChrystal doing differently? What's the Obama administration doing differently? McChrystal's words sounded strangely similar to those of Mike Mullen, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs, who told a congressional committee in September 2008, "We can't kill our way to victory." Only to let the killing continue.
Sometime this summer, the United States will register its 5,000th American soldier killed as a result of wars in either Iraq or Afghanistan. The media, if there's still any interest in casualties of any sort Stateside, will write the mournful editorial or two, missing, as always, the larger problem: the day-in-and-day-out devastation visited on local populations by the very forces ostensibly dispatched to protect them, at a price far, far heavier than the one sustained by Americans.
That one strike today killed more people in Pakistan than the death toll of American soldiers in Iraq since March. That many, maybe most, of the victims may turn out to be "militants" won't diminish the ripples of the attack in Pakistan, precisely the kind of ripples McChrystal was claiming to want to control from here on.
It's no longer the American Way of Life American deployments are fighting to preserve. The wind went out of that shameless bit of flag-waving years ago. But it hasn't been clear for years, either, what the deployments are fighting for. Or against. Except for the one recurrent target that never fails to take a hit, even when all else fails: civilians.
61 Comments so far
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You guys don't understand----We MUST stay in Iraq/AfPak until our Empire crashes.
It's sad about all the dead people, but that's just the way things are done...
Tristam wonders what we fight for in his last paragraph, obviously it's not raw materials.
We are attacking these countries because it is Israel's Will. 100%, that and nothing more. What Israel wants from the US military it gets, PNAC, "We need a new Pearl Harbor," WHAM, 9-11. The Arab world attacked.
Now it is IrAfPak, with the bombsights trained on Iran. FOR ISRAHELL! Or maybe Switzerland is driving these wars? Ah-Ha! May-be...
NO mystery, the US military is a sub-branch of the IDF!
It's time to go after the people who make these UAVs and missiles for war crimes.
Lockheed-Martin, Boeing, and Mcdonnell-Douglas are the makers of these death machines.
And the US military's biggest suppliers/contractors, just ahead of Halliburton-KBR.
BTW, Lockheed-Martin is the company that is doing your tax returns and collating all domestic economic data for the US government now, a no-bid contract they were handed as part of Bush's downsizing of federal government. The once dreaded IRS is now just there for the letterhead...
So good luck trying to prosecute these jokers for war crimes. If Obama is willing to go to the mat to prevent Bush and Cheney and their entire twisted torture loving cabal from Crimes Against Humanity charges, he will certainly protect these guys. But not you when these corporations nail you with a SLAPP (Selective Litigation Against Public Participation) suit that will ruin you financially, and tie you up in court for years...
Walk in peace.
"The Algebra of Infinite Justice."
What a prescient, eloquent essay written by Arundhati Roy back in 2001; 8 years later it is valid more than ever.
And speaking of Infinitie Justice.. for those who think that Americans are somehow insulated from suffering in their innocent oblivion I would like to remind you that all the elements are now in line to remove from the minds of most Americans all their delusions, as they watch their materialist society collapse in on itself around them, while the thugs and sociopaths, those masters of destruction and deception: that top 1%, those economic and therefore political elite 300,000 US citizens; as they protect themselves in gated communities with paid mercenaries, isolated from the others, especially that bottom 60% (most of America), that 180 million, who share the same amount of diminishing wealth but are forced to be slaves to endless debt and taxes to support a failing system.
The American dream has already become the endless nightmare, endless horror of violence and misery but unfortunately the worst is yet to come. Those chickens will come home to roost and it is the lack of compassion and the competition of self interest which will make their lives intolerable.
That is Karmic law. It's not passed by congress but without a doubt it applies to America as well as northern Pakistan.
Question that stands out is.
Why is there a weapons maker involved?
Why should weapons be used at all to appease the suicidal tendencies in our society?
toophat for you!
Tristam sez, "It's no longer the American Way of Life American deployments are fighting to preserve. The wind went out of that shameless bit of flag-waving years ago. But it hasn't been clear for years, either, what the deployments are fighting for."
It's the Way of Life of Amerikkkans that is being fought for.
What Mr. Tristam obviously lacks is a theory of imperialism.
I invite you, Mr. Tristam, to watch the new documentary film by Massimo Mazzucco "The New American Century" at:
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-3776750618788792499&ei=bEs-SuuI...
This will give you some indications regarding the causes of the endless war, the war that is need of constant growth (of which the savaging of Iraq is manifestly but a phase).
Tristam doesn't need any lessons from you.
Qbuma is just another War Criminal now.
We need enemies abroad to keep the unwashed quiet here at home. Drones create terrorists the American way.
Operation Enduring Double Standard
How many more lives?
How much more violence?
How much more destruction?
How much more distraction?
When will it be enough?
When will we reach our satiation point?
what is this, an American version of the British movie '4 weddings and a funeral'? Now retitled - 'For weddings and funerals'. No academy awards for this extraviganza!
If there were any decency in this country, this incident would mark the end of our involvement in Afpaklia.
I will not go to the extent of blaming Mr Obama personally for this attack which killed so many civilians.
I will, however ask why so many Americans feel a sense of sympathy for Iran's protesters, but nothing in the way of compassion for the thousands of civilians done to death in the US military operations, ostensibly under the guise of fighting terrorism.
I mean the thousands killed in Iraq when the US invaded their country after FALSELY accusing them of amassing WMDs.
I mean the thousands of Iranians tortured and imprisoned under the regime of the Shah which was created artificially to serve the needs of US and Western oil companies greedy for Iranian oil.
Or the thousands of Palestinians who have perished under the US backed Israeli occupation of their country ?
Or how about the half a million Iraqi children who are said to have died under the econonic sanctions regime backed by the Clinton administration ?
I am happy to see the death of Neda Sultani has all of a sudden made so many Americans find instant compassion for Middle Eastern types. I wonder where all this compassion was until now, though, and I could be forgiven for suspecting it will not last.
Sorry suhail_shafi, but if numbers count you missed the one million or so Iranians killed by Saddam, using the conventional, biological and chemical weapons along with satelit intelligence supplied to him by the US and Europe among others despite embargoes. It's quite ironic when you think of it, isn't it?
Compassion is the essential fruit of enlightened awareness, something I can only dream will come home one day to most Americans once they realise how narrow self interest is nothing to be applauded but the cause of, and the root of, their suffering.
Sad to say, it will not last. It's the sentiment du jour, I'm afraid.
I might add, the media sensationalized it!
"I will not go to the extent of blaming Mr Obama personally for this attack which killed so many civilians."
Excuse me? Does the U.S. President no longer hold his much-celebrated status as the nation's military Commander-in-Chief? What about his uniquely American status as both head-of-state and head-of-government without any day-to-day parliamentary accountability whatever? How does that differ significantly from absolute monarchy and its dictatorial edicts governing ALL executive activites, whether military or otherwise? Even without the powers of death-by-drone and indefinite detention without trial, both George III and Kaiser Bill would be envious.
Leaving aside those complicated (for USAns) issues, whatever happenened to the notion that a ship's captain is ultimately responsible for its direction and for the conduct of its crew?
No personal blame? Seems like a very vague distinction without any real difference.
Obama is just a LEO with the worst traits on display. Not a leader but wants people to follow...like Mr. Magoo
Barac OBbaMa = BOMB ....anagrams never lie
"or that he is plainly an evil intelligent man (a type of person that unfortunately does exist)."
Anyone remember Robert McNamara... another patrician intelligent scholar businessman...idiot.
Took him more than 20 years to apologize for his mortal actions.
Seems like all these guys come out of the same elite fraternity...none of them ever got their hands dirty...but sure do have a lot of blood on them
Perpetual wars...perpetual images = perpetual care.
DRACULA
After this new round of murders of Pakistani people by his own armed forces -- probably primarily, if not exclusively, civilians -- our Savior Obama is going to stand behind his presidential pulpit and deliver a lecture to the Iranian leadership on just conduct, human rights, democracy, free speech, and whatnot.
I am beginning to think Obama is either not as intelligent as I thought he was, or that he is plainly an evil intelligent man (a type of person that unfortunately does exist).
Imagine how we would feel if the official terrorists kept bombing our weddings and funerals. Our Government would use that as a pretext to carry out revenge bombings. Gee, maybe some of them feel that way too.
The official terrorists are typically portrayed as crazy folks. What our policies do is continually supply them with motives for killing us.
McChrystal states there is a new, more humane policy; then, turns around and continues the same murderous acts. The longer these policies continue under his appointees and holdovers, the more our President earns the name, "O-bomb-a.
In Viet Nam the big thing was "body count", when everbody we killed was counted as the enemy. Now, in Pipeline-istan, we kill 80 more terrorists. Upon hearing this, we are supposed to feel safer.
I guess Afghanistan is more accurately a center of Pipeline-istan. How did our pipeline routes get in their countries? Kinda like, how did our oil get under Iraq's sand?
President Obama about Neda:
"anybody who sees it knows that there's something fundamentally unjust"
and here is what he just did:
Operation Enduring Folly: US Kills 60 More in Pakistan Air Strike
by Pierre Tristam
http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2009/06/24-5
The problem is not so much the obvious hypocrisy where Obama laments those innocents killed by his official enemies and thinks nothing of those innocents he himself kills. It is the fact that when he laments Neda, no one in the press conference points out that he just killed a bunch of civilians like Neda . . .
I'm continually astonished at the Orwellian nature of the corporate media . . .
Yes, those journalists who were gawking at Obama while he made those remarks and uttered not a single of criticism are a bunch of servile monsters.
I suppose they were merely taking notes and doing their job, weren't they?
Yep They are doing their job . . . (Helen Thomas excluded) . . . if their job is enabling empire and defending the corporate regime. Sheldon Wolin wrote a good book called Democracy Inc. He is a political science professor from Princeton. He refers the US system as "totalitarian." Indeed. And even more effective when most of our "citizens" think it is a real democracy.
"Sometime this summer, the United States will register its 5,000th American soldier killed as a result of wars in either Iraq or Afghanistan."
There is no war in Iraq or Afghanistan, only occupations. We installed the governments in those countries, and thus we are fighting a resistance.
However, we are fighting a "war" (undeclared by Congress) in Pakistan.
A question for (Ret) Gen Tommy Franks: Do US soldier war casualties in Pakistan count?
I think we know “what the deployments are fighting for.” Operation Enduring Empire or Operation Perpetual Resource Grab would be more apt title. But they do not have a feell-good factor and we, the Americans, are very very big on feel-good factor.
A FUNERAL PROCESSION!!! WOW!
According to the geneva conventions, it is a war crime to fire at a retreating army, even if it was charging a few minutes earlier.
A FUNERAL PROCESSION!!!
I wonder who will pay for the innocent blood that we shed every day.
And who would have been at that funeral? Supporters of "Qari Zainuddin, whom the government had hoped to use as an ally in its campaign to corner the Taliban leader." The article describes it as "a serious blow to Pakistan’s effort..."
Other Pakistan sources describe Zainuddin as a kind of whistleblower. He claimed that Baitullah Mehsud was an agent of foreign forces. Whether that is true or not, the slain leader Zainuddin was seen as a moderate that could be ally to the Pakistan government in stopping the bloodshed.
Now who called in the airstrike against these moderates? Why are we killing those who could bring down the violence? Does it make sense?
We target funerals and marriages to more effectively take out the popular support by taking out portions of the populace. I'm pretty sure it is also a war crime. And I don't think the word "folly" even begins to subscribe it.
"Why are we killing those who could bring down the violence?"
Because it is the intent of the U.S. to maintain and escalate the violence, not alleviate it. Its all part of the "great game" played by the masters with human pawns. Why else would McChrystal and his secret death squads be deployed to Afghanistan for example? And where there are death squads you will also generally find John Negroponte. I wonder if he is part of the Obama administration behind the scenes as he was with Bush II.
I thought it was only weddings that we were bombing. Oh, sorry - that is in Afghanistan. It probably is correct that we bomb funerals in Pakistan. Each country is so different it is hard to keep up with what our killers are doing.
There will be blowback for years to come.
You are incorrect. The Geneva conventions cover prisoners of war, non-combatants, and sailors captured in wartime. That is it. There is a Hague convention on munitions that people often get confused with the Geneva Conventions, but none of the treaties cover this eventuality. Attacking a retreating army is totally within the law and is a particularly effective tool in warfare.
Attacking a funeral procession if it is a civilian procession is precluded, but if it were a military funeral, it would be legal as well.
Skip the conventions. It is and was and always will be criminal to murder helpless civilians from the air. Or from anywhere. And twice as cowardly using drones.
It is immoral by any normal human standards to pursue and murder retreating soldiers. I've never even heard of anyone trying to defend it before.
Bombing wedding parties is something the united states does, and fairly often. Each time they do, it's just still more monstrous than the last.
Now they deliberately kill people at a funeral. Only our morally bankrupt military could even imagine doing that.
"Bombing wedding parties is something the united states does, and fairly often."
It happens so often that it simply MUST be intentional, in spite of "apologies" and PAYMENTS to the aggreived.
OH! And on a really more important note, right now on MSNBC: Farah Fawcett Died.
I'm bettin' "god" giggled when he created anal cancer: "Whoa, this'll really give 'em the heebie-jeebies."
abuelo: "Only our morally bankrupt military could even imagine doing that."
In fact, it has been done before. Here's an example:
http://cosmos.ucc.ie/cs1064/jabowen/IPSC/php/event.php?eid=1372
I do not believe that we are any more "morally bankrupt" than any other empire in history, including many empires built by Muslims. There just is more visibility today, with the internet and all.
Let's focus on stopping the violence. Many people don't grasp how sweet life would be without manufactured conflicts that create unmanageable levels of stress and result in so much unnecessary violence.
Thanks, JohnShade.
This is my reading, though: Geneva Conventions of 1949, Common Article III: "(1) Persons taking no active part in the hostilities, including members of armed forces who have laid down their arms and those placed 'hors de (out of) combat' by sickness, wounds, detention, or any other cause...shall in all circumstances be treated humanely..."
I was reading "or any other cause" to include a state of mourning/funeral. I think that the essence of Common Article III is that you shouldn't be killing people who are simply trying to partake in their activities of daily living... people who obviously are not fighting.
I'll go back and read the conventions again when I get a chance. --Peace!
I understand that Obama may introduce a "public option" for that purpose just as soon as his domestic health care program has been approved.
This mass killing of civilians undermines our moral standing in the world. We are in no position in the world to lecture others if we commit evil acts of our own.
We have NO moral standing in the world. No love. No respect. Just fear... People are afraid of being bombed from the air. But they couln't care less what comes out of our mouth, as we haven't told the truth since 1492, and the whole world knows that, except for the majority of Americans.
Yeah! Lay these crimes side by side with the Iranian regime's "violent" break-up of the protests.
No none has proven the Iranian election to be a fraud. They are protecting themselves against the coup we have been concocting in Iran with the hopes of installing a new Shah. Yet, the entire congress (minus one) and US media have voted to paint Iran evil colors.
We are protecting pipeline routes that are not ours by terrifying locals with random acts of stupefying violence against families in their sleep and mourners at funerals. Not a peep comes out of the congress, or our mainstream media.
Lay them side by side.
Even in "Star Wars", it probably would have never occurred to Spielberg to have Darth Vader order airstrikes on memorial services of rebel fighters (well, maybe if the rebel fighters were Palestinian, but I digress).
First it was weddings, now funerals. The sheer analloyed evil depravity and cowardice (cowardice being a large component of evil) of such an act beggars the mind.
Kill from the air--no good; kill from the ground--better? No. Recognize that the good ole USA is a killer country, especially so in its empire stage. Empire Spain killed like mad in the new world, and tortured non-believers in the old world.The Brits were horrendous in the the middle east and elsewhere (Churchill's RAF was the first to gas the Kurds from the air) and on and on....
Our empire is running out of money, though,-- what with our being overextended militarily and Wall Street unable to make an honest buck, we could yet become a more humane, caring country.
Jason Ditz at http://news.antiwar.com/2009/06/23/at-least-65-killed-as-us-drones-attack-south-waziristan-funeral-pro... reports it thus:
"On Thursday, US drones launched an attack on a compound in South Waziristan, and when locals rushed to the scene to rescue survivors, they launched more missiles at them, leaving a total of 13 dead. The timing and target of the attack were controversial, as was the tactic of luring locals in with a first strike to maximize the kill count. Today, locals were involved in a funeral procession when the US struck again.
Drones attacked what they suspected was a “militant hideout” early today, killing at least 17. When mourners gathered to offer prayers for those slain in the first attack, the drones struck again, attacking the procession itself and bringing the overall toll to at least 80, according to witnesses."
What we see here is indiscriminate murder. I've also see a report that a major killing ocurring recently was the result of a dispute between villages among people looking to be employed, with one of them telling the US the competitors were 'militants'.
Well -- pretty soon, if not already, most anyone killed WILL be militants because the entire country will be filled with people who are ready to take up arms to avenge murders and chase the barbarians out. Many of those 'militants' will be lifelong enemies of the US -- and we are making such enemies all over the world.
"launched an attack on a compound"
A compound. Its always a fucking COMPOUND isn't it?
OOOOOHHH, a COMPOUND... be scared, be very very scared...
"Well -- pretty soon, if not already, most anyone killed WILL be militants because the entire country will be filled with people who are ready to take up arms to avenge murders ... "
Well, "we" HAVE to kill whole families if one of them might be a "militant", because if we kill just the "militant" then the whole family MIGHT become "militants" as well. So, you see there is a certain logic to all of these seemingly indiscriminate murders. Some of us complain about the US apparently not realizing they are creating more "insurgents" every time they kill one, but obviously that understanding does exist within the Pentagon, whose policy seems to have become "It's best to kill them all and let Allah sort them out."
Therefore I submit to you that these killings of innocents are intentional and planned ahead of time.
Someone is going to say it sooner or later -- BABY KILLERS !!!!
"Operation Enduring Freedom"
I can't help it. I just laugh and laugh and laugh at the bullshit monnikers the military and their political slaves put on these things. Do these bastards even know what irony is? Obviously not. The fact that they believe this outrageous bufoonery is, all by itself, proof that we will be defeated.
Your obvious failure to comprehend and wholeheartedly adopt Newspeak as your patriotic duty is clearly indicative of commie tendencies and militant sympathies. It has therefore been determined that you may also fail to appreciate that true "freedom and democracy" dictates the limitation and circumscription of your electoral choices by USA Incorporated whose interests will exclusively determine the post-election behavior of your "representatives" for your own good governance.
In consequence whereof, please be advised that the drones that you may notice circling your place of abode are only there to ensure your full future compliance and that of your family and neighbors with the best interests of Pax Americana and its imperial responsibilities for global enforcement. Any minors residing with you should be instructed that the shaking of sticks at the sky and any other defiant gestures will be interpreted as their own militant endorsement of your deviant behavior and may have unpleasant consequences for the entire neighborhood.
Yours in peace,
I. Killam, Acting Duty Officer
Domestic Compliance and Enforcement Division
Northcom
YES! Most adroitly put, RV, this analysis of the repercussions of our choices, actions and lack of awareness is dead the heck on! And funny, dammit and gosh!
Can the depravity of the US ruling class go any deeper? As Jim Glover points out, the Washington Press Corp demands sanctimony and tribute for "Neda the innocent" at the same moment Obama's missiles leave their drones to deal absolutely indiscriminate death to sixty human beings in Pakistan. Wonder who their names were? Never mind, apparently they all had the same name--Militant.
Operation Enduring Freedom???
Truth takes the intensity out of Obama's "outrage" at the killing of Neda in Iran.
He is doing more of them every day now.
For the War Machine, Death is Enduring Freedom.
"Dawn, the Pakistani newsper, puts the death toll at 50 and describes most of the victims as "militants."
DAMN those six year old militants.
Yeah, they're not anywhere near as dangerous as the 2-year-olds - look out for those WMD spit bubbles!
Sad but true. Thanks!
A hundred people gather to mourn the death of a patriot who died trying to drive the invader from his home and country. As the Patriot was a "terrorist" by US definition, the mourners must all be militants or terrorists also, so kill 'em all.
See, it is easy in Govspeak.
Must not have followed the new rules (sarcasm).
Obama to CIA: Bombs Away! No Let Up in US Drone Attacks
al Queda to Obama: Thanks for your help in recruiting new members! No let up in resistance
-Whatever happened to when in a hole stop digging?
Clinton in Yugoslavia, Bush in Iraq and now Obama in Pakistan.
When will they ever learn?
The American way of life is experiencing its inevitable outcome. We have become what all spiritual traditions have warned about and provided caveats for for millennia.
"Rugged Individualism" is a perspective of the egoic mind that denies the reality of interdependency and resulting capacity for compassion and real intellectual growth. Becuase it is incomplete and lacks rooting in the full scheme of things it is insecure and sees threat at every turn.
The peoples we need more than ever are precisely our "enemies" and the billions of poor and marginalized being exterminated by the machinery of extraction and genocide. Their survival and well being is ours.
Our creativity is being 'educated' out of us, our resilience contorted into fear of insecurity, our respect for each other subverted by the mirror world of dominance.
Cease and desist from agressions and dominance - prior and informed consultation and consent - balance
The delusion of rugged individualism in the mind of each USan matrix vegetable actually depends highly on the umbilical cord connection to the fascist machine. The real individuals in this world ensure that the elites fear the people, not the other way around.