Stray Bullets Kill Hearts and Minds

The following story is hardly new news. It is an event that has been repeated a thousand times since the US invaded and occupied Iraq. The details may be moderately different in each case but the result is usually the same. American GI's are attacked by some insurgent or militia group or individual and has one or more of their comrades killed or wounded. Then the human desire for revenge takes over and in their rage to seek justice for their fallen comrade they invade Iraqi homes, based some sort of intel, or hunch, or whatever. that the attacker may be at. As intel in a war zone is often notoriously lacking the result in too many cases ends with Innocent Iraqi's getting killed. Sometimes by adrenaline juiced soldiers and sometimes by the bad guys they seek. Who's to blame? Everybody and nobody. Unless you go to people who started this nightmare, the neocons, Bush, and Cheney.

Stray bullets

Leila Fadel

December 13, 2007 9:38 AM

McClatchy Newspapers

(MCT)

BAGHDAD - Suheila Hammad held her daughter in her arms before dawn on Tuesday. Outside she heard the U.S. Special Forces and the Iraqi army in her area just south of Fallujah.

First they raided a home two doors down, blew the doors out and went in looking for their target. The soldiers pulled the family out of the home and the second floor was destroyed, the family said. A picture shows a burned-out room and shattered glass.

The soldiers progressed to the second house, searching for their target, an al-Qaida in Iraq member who was believed responsible for attacks on U.S. and Iraqi forces.

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At the second house in this place, once an al-Qaida bastion, they blew the doors off and pulled the residents from the house. The Iraqi soldiers toyed with them, telling them to raise their arms up, drop their arms and raise them again.

A few soldiers walked away speaking a language the families didn't understand. It was then that a bullet pierced the window where Suheila held her daughter Hadil. The bullet pierced Hadil's neck and passed through her, embedding in the wall of the room. No one came into the house and Suheila was too afraid to call out for help, she said.

Hadil bled to death in her mother's arms. Three men were detained, two were later released. The U.S. military said the man detained is an al-Qaida in Iraq member. There were no reports of Hadil's death, they said.

Last month a child and two men were killed as they rushed through a military checkpoint while the U.S. military were conducting an operation in Bayji. A U.S. military official estimated the child was about 3 years old. In Baghdad up to four people were killed, including three women, when a minibus ended up on a road meant only for car traffic. Bank employees on the bus were killed when soldiers fired warning shots that fragmented and hit the bus.

These deaths were not deliberate. But Suheila does not have her daughter, a 3-year-old was shot as he huddled in the back of a car and two young people forever associate Americans with the fear they felt in the middle of the night when foreign soldiers burst into their home.

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When will this misbegotten war end?

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Simply Unbelievable

Hundreds of vehicles and 20 tons of lead disappear from government ware houses

By Mustafa al-Hashemi

Azzaman, December 12, 2007

Unidentified gunmen stormed government ware houses in the southern city of Basra and stole 375 government cars and 20 tons of lead, police sources say.

The robbery is reported to be the largest and most organized in the years since the U.S. invasion of the country.

The robbers were said to by carrying forged papers which enabled them to drive away with the vehicles, the sources refusing to be named said.

The lead has disappeared from government warehouses in central Iraq.

The lead robbers are also said to have used faked papers to empty the ware house of its contents. Lead can be used in the preparations of explosive materials and bombs.

The cars were in customs warehouses in Basra.

Political factions are hurling accusations at each other as reports of the robbery are leaking to the press.

The government in Baghdad is still silent as security officials express grave concern since cars and lead are the main ingredients of bombings in Iraq.

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Deep Purple - Child In Time

One of the great epic rock tunes

More Surge News, of Iraqi's killing Iraqi's

Wednesday: 71 Iraqis Killed, 152 Wounded

Updated at 4:05 p.m. EST, Dec. 12, 2007

A large triple bombing killed or wounded scores of people in the southern city of Amarah. Meanwhile a smaller blast in Baghdad left over a dozen casualties there. Overall, 71 Iraqis were killed and 152 more were wounded in the latest violence. No Coalition deaths were reported.

At least 42 people were killed and another 125 were wounded during a triple car bombing in Amarah. Although small arms attacks against civilians have been increasing in recent weeks throughout Maysan province, the news of a triple bombing in Amarah stunned Iraq this morning. The area had been relatively peaceful since the British handed over control to Iraqi forces in April. British forces promise that an expected handover of neighboring Basra province will go on schedule this Sunday despite the bombing.

This is not surprising to me. I still firmly believe that the only people who will solve the Iraq civil war are Iraqi's themselves. As long as our military are patrolling Iraqi streets they will not make the tough negotiating between the waring sides that is necessary for resolution. I doubt we can even be useful as mediators at this stage and any outside help for reaching a political settlement will have to come from someone other than the US.

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And So It Begins

Not us. We’re not going.’

Soldiers in 2nd Platoon, Charlie 1-26 stage a ‘mutiny’ that pulls the unit apart
Stories by KELLY KENNEDY - Staff writer
Posted : Saturday Dec 8, 2007 14:32:57 EST

Spc. Gerry DeNardi stood at the on-base Burger King, just a few miles from downtown Baghdad, hoping for a quick taste of home.

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Just two weeks earlier, the 20-year-old DeNardi had lost five good friends, killed together as they rode in a Bradley Fighting Vehicle that rolled over a powerful roadside bomb.

As DeNardi walked up the three wood steps to the outdoor stand to pick up his burger, the siren wailed.

Wah! Wah! Wah! “Incoming! Incoming! Incoming!”

The alarms went off all the time — often after the mortar round or rocket had struck nothing but sand, miles from anything important. Many soldiers and others at Taji had taken to ignoring the warnings. DeNardi glanced around at the picnic tables to make sure everyone was still eating. They were. The foreign nationals who worked the fast-food stands hadn’t left; so he went back to get the burger he had paid for

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The mortar round hit before he could pick up his order.

“I turned around and all of Burger King and me went flying,” DeNardi said.

He’d lived through daily explosions in 11 months with Charlie Company, 1st Battalion, 26th Infantry Regiment, at nearby Combat Outpost Apache, a no-frills fortress smack in the middle of Adhamiya’s hostile streets. He had rushed through flames to try to save friends and carried others to the aide station only to watch them die.

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“Lightning doesn’t strike twice,” DeNardi said, “so I went back. But there were body parts everywhere.” The first man’s leg had been blown off, his other leg was barely attached and he had a chest wound. “He was going to die,” DeNardi said.

The other wounded man had shrapnel to his neck. DeNardi peeled off his own shirt and fashioned a bandage out of it as other soldiers started streaming in to help.

Then, “all clear” sounded over the loudspeakers as medics arrived and took over.

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After these and other bloody attacks, killing this platoons soldiers, the remaining members got together and said no more. They told their commanders that their rage was so great that they feared committing a massacre if they went on patrol in Adhamiya, an especially violent place in Iraq. Some might say you can't have soldiers doing mutiny in a war zone. As a veteran myself, that was my first impulse. I despise the war in Iraq and have since the beginning, but it's normally bad business to refuse orders. However, after reading this article, I have to a large degree, changed my mind. This whole event is reminiscent of the latter days of Vietnam when entire units refused orders to patrol the country side. And as we know, MyLai happened. Please read this important article and mark of more to come in Iraq.

Triple Car Bombs in Iraq-But They say Al Quaida is Defeated

Today their was a triple car bombing in southern Iraq that as past events indicate has the hallmarks of Al Qaida in Iraq.. But wait a minute, hasn't Al Qaeda been wiped out of Iraq as declared by wingnut blogger The Strata-Sphere

Add to that this news about al-Qaeda’s migration back to Pakistan and Afghanistan and we see the retreat of a defeated movement.

But this horrendous event as reported by Reuters begs to differ that the defeat of AQ in Iraq have been greatly exaggerated.

By Aref Mohammed

AMARA, Iraq (Reuters) - Three car bombs ripped through a busy street in the Shi'ite city of Amara on Wednesday, killing 40 people and wounding 125 in one of the deadliest attacks in southern Iraq this year, police said.

The attacks came just days before Britain is to complete the handover of security for the four southern Iraqi provinces it has controlled since 2003, and tensions have been high among rival Shi'ite factions competing for influence.

The street was a scene of chaos, with cars torn apart. A blocked gutter along one street was red with stagnant blood washed from pools on the pavement next to a child's shoes.

The Anti-Theist/Terrorist Hordes Are Coming For You

I had not planned to blog about the tragic killings over the weekend at two Colorado churches. The young man responsible was obviously disturbed to do such a thing which unfortunately is happening in our country way to often. I don't know why this occurs, since I'm not any kind of expert in criminal sociology, and any ideas I have on the subject would be pure uninformed speculation. However, the wingnut brigades seem to claim wisdom on all things violent in and outside the United States. After stumbling across this gem of wingnuttery from the Vox Popoli I followed the first link as their main source and discovered that wingnuts have their own private Intelligence Service right here in the states that provides them with the latest on the terrorists hiding behind your tree.

Well, anyway, that is a subplot to this post. The main story is the analysis of our paranoid friends in the wingnutosphere. It seems, according to Vox Populi, this was a hate crime/terrorist attack by an atheist , and more sinister an anti-theist individual. I' not sure what the difference is but VP does so it's cool. Much of this, I suspect comes from an anonymous law enforcement source who stated the shooter, Mathew Murray "hated Christians".

Anyway VP deduces his hate crime/terrorist theory on this anonymous "law enforcement source" neglecting to consider several items of Mr. Murray's past that would tend to disprove his theory.

Things like the fact Mr. Murray wanted to be a missionary since being homeschooled within a very religious family. Also, that he had attended a program at one of the attacked churches and had been kicked out several years ago for health concerns. VP also fails to consider that Murray attended church regularly.

Now it's fair to say Murray was angry at the church for dropping him from a program that would have trained him to do what he'd dreamed about becoming --a missionary. You could even stretch that to say he hated Christian's or churches. However, this kind of anger or hatred does not seem to fit the meaning of hate crime as I understand it. His rage appears to come not from someone who has a broad ideological beef with religion but more of a specific disappointment that progressed into despair from a sense of personal failure. Any way, below is the first paragraph of the VP post with a link to the etire post.

Atheist killers
My, my, what a coincidence. As expected, yet another shooter turns out to be a militant anti-theist:


According to a law enforcement source, the man professed to "hate all Christians," and reportedly left a note or letter that he intended to murder as many Christians as possible

Following is a comment from one of VP commenters who is not buying VP's silliness.

But let's get the whole picture: "The gunman was identified as Matthew Murray, 24, who was home-schooled in what a friend said was a deeply religious Christian household."

Not sure how truly atheist he was, but he was certainly disturbed. Well, at least he didn't go to public skools--
Skillet

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The other fascinating nugget of info I mentioned is the wingnut intelligence bureau, or whatever. Their full title is

Our Mission:

The mission of the Northeast Intelligence Network consists of the following:

# To use our heavily screened and well-qualified informational and operational assets to investigate potential terrorist threats which threaten the safety and security of our nation, our neighborhoods, and our families.

# To provide accurate and well-sourced information via our web site to educate our site visitors to the true nature of the terrorist threats we face.

# To provide accurate information about incidents, events and potential terrorist threats by conducting on-site investigation by our qualified personnel.

# When appropriate, offer relevant political commentary and occasional satire where it serves to illustrate a defect in our security and defense against future attacks.

# Through a fee-based subscription to the HQ INTEL-ALERT Private Intelligence Report, we offer specific information about a variety of issues, events and security matters that we feel are too sensitive to place in the public domain. Although some of the information contained in our newsletter is obtained directly from confidential sources within various government agencies, we never violate any laws prohibiting the unlawful dissemination of classified government information. The cost of this newsletter helps us to underwrite the expenses involved in conducting on-site investigations.

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