This is Barack Obama's war.
He's slaughtering civilians in Afghanistan.
KABUL, Afghanistan -- President Hamid Karzai condemned a U.S. operation he said killed 16 Afghan civilians, while hundreds of villagers denounced the American military during an angry demonstration Sunday.
Karzai said the killing of innocent Afghans during U.S. military operations "is strengthening the terrorists."
He also announced that his Ministry of Defense sent Washington a draft technical agreement that seeks to give Afghanistan more oversight over U.S. military operations. The same letter has also been sent to NATO headquarters.
...Karzai's latest criticism follows a Saturday raid in Laghman province that the U.S. says killed 15 armed militants, including a woman with an RPG, but that Afghan officials say killed civilians.
Two women and three children were among the 16 dead civilians, Karzai said in a statement.
In Laghman's capital, hundreds of angry demonstrators denounced the U.S. military Sunday and demanded an end to overnight raids. U.S. military leaders, victims' relatives and Afghan officials — including two top Karzai advisers — met at the governor's compound to discuss the issue, Gov. Latifullah Mashal said.
Now the buck stops with Obama. HE is responsible for the deaths of three children and other civilians!
This guy should be impeached and put on trial for war crimes.
Right?
More, from the Washington Post:
Assadullah Wafa, a Karzai adviser investigating the deaths, said on Sunday that "16 civilians, many of them children and women, were killed" in the operation.
"We strongly condemn it and want an end to it (civilian casualties)," he told reporters in Mehtar Lam, Laghman's provincial capital, where the protest was held.
A statement from the presidential palace quoted Karzai as saying that bombing villages and causing civilian deaths "will not bear any progress in the war against terrorism."
Karzai said failure to coordinate attacks with his government would weaken its sovereignty and bolster the militants, it added.
A spokesman for the U.S. military said it planned to jointly investigate the incident with the Afghan government this week.
Chanting slogans against Karzai and the United States, thousands of people took part in the protest despite heavy rain.
"If the foreign troops do not put an end to their operations, we will launch jihad," said Malik Hazrat, a protest leader.
...Regardless of how Obama is viewed now by the Muslim world -- savior, menace or something in between -- the opinions will almost certainly change in the coming months. For Muslim countries, as for the United States, perceptions based on rhetoric and image will soon collide with reality as the policies of the new administration take form, said Pillar, the former CIA official.
"Inevitably Obama will make certain decisions that will be unpopular and which the propagandists will quickly castigate," Pillar said. "I expect that the honeymoon will be just as fragile and short as with the American electorate."
Since Obama is so popular in the Muslim world, do you think civilian casualties will be less of an issue for them or for anti-war activists here at home?
Regardless of how Obama is viewed now by the Muslim world -- savior, menace or something in between -- the opinions will almost certainly change in the coming months. For Muslim countries, as for the United States, perceptions based on rhetoric and image will soon collide with reality as the policies of the new administration take form, said Pillar, the former CIA official.
"Inevitably Obama will make certain decisions that will be unpopular and which the propagandists will quickly castigate," Pillar said. "I expect that the honeymoon will be just as fragile and short as with the American electorate."
The Democrats will do everything they can to keep the Obama honeymoon alive.
Reality? You can forget it.
There's no question that civilian deaths will certainly be less of an issue for the stunningly hypocritical Democrats.
The shameless Dems who've spent years slamming our troops as murderers and criminals and incompetents are sure to be silent now.
"McCain was a fighter pilot, who dropped laser-guided missiles from 35,000 feet. He was long gone when they hit. What happened when they [the missiles] get to the ground? He doesn't know. You have to care about the lives of people. McCain never gets into those issues."
--JAY ROCKEFELLER
"If I read this to you and did not tell you that it was an FBI agent describing what Americans had done to prisoners in their control, you would most certainly believe this must have been done by Nazis, Soviets in their gulags, or some mad regime—Pol Pot or others —that had no concern for human beings."
--DICK DURBIN
"You cannot explain to me why we have not captured or killed the tallest man in Afghanistan."
--HILLARY CLINTON
"We've got to get the job done there (Afghanistan). And that requires us to have enough troops so that we're not just air-raiding villages and killing civilians, which is causing enormous problems there."
--BARACK OBAMA
8 comments:
The Obama administration tells us to expect more casualties in Afghanistan.
We all expect and understand that there will be civilian casualties in war. Had Bush prosecuted the war in Afghanistan in order to capture or kill those responsible for 9/11, the inevitable civilian casualties would have been unfortunate, but sadly acceptable. The war crimes come from the unprovoked war of aggression Bush waged in Iraq, where civilian deaths number in the tens (if not hundreds) of thousands. Saddam Hussein had nothing to do with 9/11, there was no legitimate reason to invade, and the results have been catastrophic, both for the United States and for Iraq.
It's always the evil Nazi dictator Bush's fault. Wait a minute, I guess he wasn't a dictator. He gave up his power according to law.
The incessant BS from left is beyond tiresome and is not helpful.
That's right.
It's Bush's fault. It's always Bush's fault. Everything always will be Bush's fault.
I heard that Bush gave Geithner tax advice.
Will the libs give up the tired, old talking points?
Never. As usual, the libs keep fighting the last war.
When will they assume responsibility for the country now that they have total control over two of the three branches of government?
Don't hold your breath.
AUGUST 26,
You are a hypocrite. Unfortunately for America, people like you have no consistency with the words you spew and do not understand any fundamental argument about human life.
Previously in the blog titled "Roe v. Wade 35 years later" you stated that you were 'forced' to pay for the War in Iraq which caused many civilian casualties. You used this as a sort of lame duck defense for pro-abortion advocates who believe that partial birth abortion is A-OK and that we should be funding national and international abortions worldwide with American taxpayer money, while a war aimed at reducing homeland terrorism is just too much for your humanitarian hearts to tolerate.
Now that Obama has slaughtered civilians in a mismanaged attempt to show his authoritarian style of leadership by lodging an informal, unannounced attack in a clearly civilian inhabited area, you now say that "We all expect and understand that there will be civilian casualties in war." Then you proceed to complain about Bush. Your arguments are literally nauseating.
TRY TO BE CONSISTENT FOR ONE DAY OF YOUR LIFE. JUST ONE.
You liberals don't do that though. It's all about partisan party politics. One politician does it, if he has an R next to his name it's a war crime, another even slimier politician does the same thing (with less thought) and you are suddenly ready to cry a river of pity for the politician that ordered the civilian murders.
If it was wrong when Bush did, it's wrong when Obama does it. Is this a factual statement, YES OR NO?
The war crimes come from OBAMA, you sycophant. I am simply not going to listen to you drones and borderline illiterates blame what Obama actually DOES on Bush. Bush did not commission Afghanistan to launch a terror attack, therefore, your argument is weak and pathetic, and tinged with your apparent partisanship and vile hatred for a former President of the United States.
First, we (by we, I mean the intelligent, capable Americans that try to sift through the garbage to actually find the truth about what's going on in our country) were supposed to believe that Bush was a war criminal that deserved prison time for killing civilians unintentionally in a war waged to prevent further terrorist attacks. And you remember this, there was not another attack on American soil while Bush was president. That will go down as a historical fact. Anyway, now you want us to believe that Obama the hero ordered more civilian deaths because he's a unifier. Did you know that they held a march against our military on Sunday? WHERE'S THE UNIFYING POWER OF OBAMA NOW? It's a LIE just like every other party platform he ran on was.
So, again, try consistency or do not speak at all. And May God have mercy on your soul (and mine for that matter, because you people make me sick, angry, and repulsed with your blundering nonsense and clear disregard for anything that is fact or truth).
When a country is attacked, it has every right to defend itself. To distinguish between wars of aggression and defense is not hypocrisy.
Al-Qa'ida attacked us on 9/11 and so we were justified in hunting them down, wherever they were in the world. Everyone understood that and supported that. Hell, even Col Gadhafi acknowledged we were justified in hunting down those that attacked us on 9/11 (and he hates us). The Taliban refused to either turn over or kick out Bin Laden and his cronies, choosing to side with those that attacked us. Because the government of Afghanistan was harbouring those that attacked us, we were justified in waging war against them and Al-Qa'ida.
Just to be clear - I fully believe the war in Afghanistan is a justified war - a war where we are defending ourselves against those people who actually attacked us. In times of war, civilians are frequently killed - it is sad and unfortunate, but it is largely unavoidable. Had Bush prosecuted the war in Afghanistan back in 2001-2003, perhaps he would have caught the people actually responsible for 9/11 and the world would be a safer place. Instead, Bush largely abandoned the war in Afghanistan to pursue a personal vendetta against Saddam Hussein. In 2004 there were more police and security forces guarding the Republican Convention in NYC than there were soldiers in Afghanistan searching for those responsible for attacking NYC.
The invasion of Iraq was unprovoked. No matter what weapons or capabilities Saddam Hussein might have had, he had not yet attacked us or harmed us in any way, and therefore our invasion was a war of pure aggression, with no more justification than Iraq's invasion of Kuwait back in 1991 or Germany's invasion of Poland or France back in the '30s. Wars of aggression are illegal under international law and those who perpetrate them are traditional prosecuted for war crimes and crimes against humanity (unless are US Presidents, of course).
To distinguish between civilian deaths caused in a war of defense versus those caused in a war of aggression is not hypocritical. Hitler killed a lot of civilians in London during WWII. We killed a lot of civilians in Dresden in WWII. Hitler was the aggressor, and we were the defenders. That makes makes Hitler's actions illegal and ours unfortunate but defensible.
I did not oppose attacking Afghanistan when Bush did it and I am glad that Obama is now refocusing our efforts on actually finding and capturing the people responsible for the deaths of so many Americans on 9/11 - Osama Bin Laden and Al-Qaida.
I did very much oppose Bush's invasion of Iraq - Iraq had nothing to do with 9/11, had no connection with Al-Qa'ida, and UN weapons inspectors had found no evidence of WMD (as it turns out, because there weren't any). As much as I opposed going to war in Iraq, I do not for a moment believe that we can now just simply withdraw our troops and go home. We have destabilized the entire region and now Obama is stuck with the task of fixing the mess Bush created in Iraq. Will more civilians die in Iraq under Obama's leadership? Probably. Does that change the fact that Bush ordered the illegal invasion of a sovereign nation and was directly responsible for the deaths of tens of thousands of Iraqi civilians? Not one bit.
Oh, and of course, Republicans never said that anything over the past 8 years was somehow still Bill Clinton's fault.
Obama has been President for 7 days. The problems we are facing today were in fact largely created over the past 8 years and were in fact largely due to the policies enacted by George Bush.
August 26,
No we (again the intelligent people of this country) do not say that what Bush did was all Clinton's fault. I don't believe I've ever heard anyone blame what Bush has actually DONE on what Clinton failed to do in his presidency. And he failed to do a lot of things.
What is a 'justified' war? When is war ever justified if it means that innocent people are going to die for something they had nothing to do with? Why are the innocent people in Afghanistan less innocent than those in Iraq whose deaths you did not agree with and still complain about?
Iraq and Afghanistan are different, but the idea behind targeting both countries was to secure 2 nations surrounding Iran. Iran is a hotbed of lunatics and terrorists, and while I disagree largely with Bush's military leadership style, I am still disgusted that you and others like you seem to believe that while you were hating Bush for a war that you do not agree with, now you say that civilian deaths are expected and tolerated in war, even when they are children.
You may believe the Iraq War was a war of aggression and I may agree to some extent, but I believe that the mismanaged attempt by Obama was also of aggression even if he didn't start the war. Also, I thought the long-legged mackdaddy said he knew were Osama Bin Laden was hiding...didn't he say that? So where is he? You would think if he was so clued in to the inner workings of the Afghanistan terrorist op he could properly deduce who the targets were and not kill 3 children, 2 women, and others in a vain attempt to keep a war ongoing when he said he was against war to begin with.
Also, I believe that the WMD's in Iraq argument is not completely closed, nor was it fully reported on by the drive-by news media. The congressmen and women that voted for it (Hillary Clinton, Harry Reid, John Kerry, Joe Biden, the list goes on and on) said they didn't have accurate information from Bush. Do you think that when senators are looking at backing a war that they have a responsibility to look outside of the evidence presented to them by one side? Because I sure do. So GUILTY as charged for all of those who voted for the war. And remember, one of them is the Vice President of the United States. Obama never voted against that bill because he was not in the Senate at the time.
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