The Beheading of Nick Berg

[DarthZeth]

What do you mean, not standing up for the moral right? deposing brual autocratic governments like the Taliban abd Saddam isn't morally right? Bringing somethign better to a fucked up portion of the world isn't right? fighting the people who like to wontonly kill innocent civilians to acheive goals of.. whatever 9-11 was supposed to acheive? takign steps to make sure even our enemies are treated well isn't "right"? spending 4 times a country's GDP in one lump in order to help build it up isn't "right" or "good"? Our young men volenterring for service to go over to distant lands to hunt down murderers and torturers for the sake of people they've never met isn't "Right"?

i mean, is there any doubt people like Osama BinLaden and Abu Musab al-Zarqawi and Saddam Hussein are evil? Why is it not right to try to destroy evil? that seems silly.

"All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing"

when you see an injustice, you move to stop it. how is that not the right thing to do?

[Fifthfiend]

So, here's what's new on the torture business...

Photo may show intelligence officers in charge

WASHINGTON - Abusive treatment under the supervision of military intelligence officers may have been intentionally used as part of the interrogation of Iraqi captives at the Abu Ghraib prison, according to a previously unpublished photograph of U.S. soldiers and other personnel obtained by NBC News...

As far as this goes...

the Red Cross says that "While many detainees were quickly released, high-ranking officials in Saddam Hussein's government, including those listed on the U.S. military's deck of cards, were held for months in solitary confinement. "

-It says many, but certainly not 'most' or even 'a majority'.
-It certainly does not say that those who were held in solitary were the only ones tortured/humiliated/beaten/etc.
-Many of those charging abuse are Iraqis who have already been released, which by itself should confirm that they weren't guilty of anything significant.

are you saying we're UNPATRIOTIC! how DARE you!

Do you know what 'patriotic' means? It means to love the state like a father -- as in, with blind, unquestioning obdedience and zeal. The only person I love like a father is my father, and he taught me that America is a democracy, and in a democracy you're allowed -- in fact, you're obligated to question the state all you damn well please. And that what a democracy does not do is round people up -- whereever those people are from (unless I missed the part of the Declaration of Independence that says "all men are created equal, except for the brown-skinned ones") -- without proof, reasonable cause, or even so much as any specific suspicion, put them in cells, and beat them around just to see if they'll admit to anything in the process.

So supporting shit like that... well, I don't know about "UNPATRIOTIC," but it's damn well un-American.

[EDIT]

deposing brual autocratic governments like the Taliban abd Saddam isn't morally right?

Not if you can't be bothered to replace it with anything better.

Bringing somethign better to a fucked up portion of the world isn't right?

Afghanistan is a warlord-run, opium growing wreck, where the women still wear burqas, less from fear of the government than from being raped by thugs. Iraq -- I'm not even getting started on Iraq.

fighting the people who like to wontonly kill innocent civilians to acheive goals of.. whatever 9-11 was supposed to acheive?

Iraq had nothing to do with 9-11.

Nobody from Iraq had anything to do with 9-11.

There is nothing that remotely connects Iraq to 9-11.

Please to stop using 9-11 as a crutch for whatever we're doing in Iraq.

Why is it not right to try to destroy evil?

It's not right when you do it in a way that destroys more good people than evil ones.

It's not right when you do it in a way that only serves to breed more evil.

[MFD]

Originally Posted by DarthZeth

What do you mean, not standing up for the moral right?

I'm talking about Israel and Saudi Arabia there, I was going all over. Our allies are ignoring basic human rights and we tolerate it to get their oil.

deposing brual autocratic governments like the Taliban abd Saddam isn't morally right?

I agree. It's right that we clean up our own mess, but it IS our mess. We allowed it to happen in the first place because brutal autocracies were better than commies in our "esteemed" opinion.

Bringing somethign better to a fucked up portion of the world isn't right?

Oh, yeah. We're doing a bang-up job. Iraq will be ready for self-rule... eventually...

fighting the people who like to wontonly kill innocent civilians to acheive goals of.. whatever 9-11 was supposed to acheive?

They achieved their goal. They wanted the great America to be afraid. And we are.

takign steps to make sure even our enemies are treated well isn't "right"?

You mean, like, in Iraq? Again, a bang-up job treating our enemies "well". Or do you mean the supposed Japanese spies of WWII who we locked up?

spending 4 times a country's GDP in one lump in order to help build it up isn't "right" or "good"? Our young men volenterring for service to go over to distant lands to hunt down murderers and torturers for the sake of people they've never met isn't "Right"?

Sure, we've learned from the mistakes of Vietnam and Korea, and Cuba. We know we HAVE to rebuild the country, otherwise we can keep that country on the "They hate us" list.

i mean, is there any doubt people like Osama BinLaden and Abu Musab al-Zarqawi and Saddam Hussein are evil? Why is it not right to try to destroy evil? that seems silly.

One must learn not to fight evil with more evil.

"All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing"

I love that quote. Edmund Burke, as I recall. We gave up in Rwanda, we do nothing in our allies' countries, and we are doing nothing in China.

when you see an injustice, you move to stop it. how is that not the right thing to do?

The thing is, we're not stopping it. Think about it. All the outrage about the prisoners, but is anything being done? Court martials? Slap on the wrist. Oh, it'll never happen again, but only because Georgie Porgie wants to stay in office next term.

[DarthZeth]

Originally Posted by fifthfeind

Do you know what 'patriotic' means? It means to love the state like a father -- as in, with blind, unquestioning obdedience and zeal. The only person I love like a father is my father

so you're admitting, you're unpatriotic?

actually, i was just mocking all the people *coughohnkerrycough* who keep claiming their patriotism is being challenged.

Originally Posted by fifthfeind

unless I missed the part of the Declaration of Independence that says "all men are created equal, except for the brown-skinned ones")

yes,of course, its RASCISM! ob viously. a bunch of westerners go over to a nation full of Arabs to kill the dictator that rakes villiages with gunship cannon fire to keep them in line, get shot up while tryingto help out these people, and give them a representative government that respects their freedom. damn our biggotry and hatred!

seriously dude, that's just retarded. THE WHOLE COUNTRY IS FULL OF BROWN PEOPLE! if you arrest ANYONE in Iraq, he's going to be brown.

but anyway, if troops search a house, and find prohibited weapons or bombs, they arrest the people in the house. most of the people will eventualyl let go. The process over there is actually that you need 4 witnesses to a crime to actually punish a guy you arrested, which means MOST of those prisoners will eventually be let go, even the "high value" ones.

but many of the prisoners BOAST about the things they did! they openly admit to being fighters and insurgents! but you think they are "innocents"?

Viper sent be a good link to an interveiw with an Iraqi doctor that worked in the prison. i lost the link, but maybe Vipe will post it here. what'dya say, Viper?

[Viper Daimao]

the link is here

i havent read this blog before, but the person who's posting it says is Ali, 33 years old doctor/single/graduated from Baghdad university in 1995. Left his job for 3 years because he refused to serve in Saddam's army, then did the military service after losing hope, just to go on with his career. Now working in Baghdad as a senior resident and studying to become a pediatrician.


How do we know the Nick Berg execution was a mistake for al qaeda? because Al Jazeera is attacking its authenticity! Who are these unnamed bloggers in the story?

[DarthZeth]

there you go. its anecdotal evidence, but then again, so are the nudy pictures.

[Fifthfiend]

seriously dude, that's just retarded. THE WHOLE COUNTRY IS FULL OF BROWN PEOPLE! if you arrest ANYONE in Iraq, he's going to be brown.

You know that thing you just heard whizzing right by you? That was the point. Tell you what, I'll lob it real slow for you this time...

-America is founded on the notion that all people have certain inalienable rights
-It does not say anywhere that those rights are limited to within the specific borders of America or only to its citizens
-Thus we are bound by honor to maintain some basic standard of treatment for all people, regardless of where, when, or why
-'Arrest' does not mean forcible detention without warrant, cause, or even suspicion, followed by abuse and humiliation
-We would not stand for that shit in our own country, and we should not stand for it anywhere else

if troops search a house, and find prohibited weapons or bombs, they arrest the people in the house.

"In one operation, U.S. special operations troops detained nearly the entire male population of the village of Habbariyah, ranging in age from 81 to 13, apparently to prevent terrorists from slipping across the border from Saudi Arabia. "*

most of the people will eventualyl let go.

"The 79 men were held for weeks. "*

Please to not be making up standards of conduct which bear no relation to extant reality.

The process over there is actually that you need 4 witnesses to a crime to actually punish a guy you arrested

Officially? Maybe. The punishment in question was hardly 'official', and not restricted to any standard of guilt. Technically, it wasn't even 'punishment', it was 'interrogation', or information extraction or whatever they'd call it.

MOST of those prisoners will eventually be let go

"Eventually" most prisoners everywhere will be let go. "Eventually" is a very broad standard. Although perhaps when I say 'standard', it would be more appropriate to say 'not a standard with any kind of actual meaning in any way, shape, or form.'

i was just mocking all the people *coughohnkerrycough* who keep claiming their patriotism is being challenged.

And I was mocking people who go around challenging people's patriotism on petty and meaningless grounds but excuse barbaric, cruel, and above all unamerican behavior.

many of the prisoners BOAST about the things they did!

And many of the prisoners said they did nothing, but got the boot put in anyway.

Hell, some say they had nothing against America -- in fact, that they were jailed by Saddam -- and that after what happened to them under American detention, now want us gone.

As long as we're going by the 'what people say' standard.

*Quotes from the previously linked AP article on the Red Cross report

[EDIT] well, 2 AM. I'm off to bed. Keep the seat warm, cancel my 3 o'clock, and hold my calls until tomorrow.

[Sky Warrior Bob]

http://marc.perkel.com/archives/000228.html
http://maxspeak.org/mt/archives/000449.html

I'm not a conspiracy theorist, but being I just heard about this & it is about Berg, I thought I'd share. Basically, here's all I can confirm, Berg's father is a name listed on the Free Republic's "Enemies" list, and some more conspiracy minded people suggest that there might be a connection between that, and Berg's last minute troubles that apparently kept him from coming back before anything happened to him.

Of course, I buy into this, just as much as I buy into blaming the prison scandel on gays, as Rush tried to imply fairly recently.

http://www.theadvertiser.news.com.au...55E912,00.html

Oh yeah, as I mentioned earlier, (see the news link), the family has sought privacy in Berg's death, and so any media coverage is just as bad as if they were constantly showing the coffins of the returning dead. Just wanted to point this out, for those who suggest the media is being unfair in trying to get away from the Berg case...

(Edited to add NPR link, which isn't nearly as Fringe and has a quote from Berg's father directly blaming Bush for son Berg's death. Plus there's a lot more detail into the confusion on Berg's death. Eg. - Email from Berg claims that he planned to leave immediately. FBI claims that Berg was reluctant to leave.)

Sky Warrior Bob

[Hamelin]

But, why was the FBI in Iraq? They have no jurisdiction beyond American borders.

[DarthZeth]

fifth: about Habbariyah *:

"They treated us well and gave the young men soccer balls to play with," [Sahn Ibrahim, the 81-year-old man who was released] said.
...
He said he was offered medical treatment in prison for a deep forehead wound suffered years ago. He declined. "I did not want them to operate on me while I was there alone without my children," he said.

the men from that villiage were in Abu Ghraib. but yet, a man, who was held for over a month, said he was treated well.

this was apparently a massive news story on October 24th last year. jack shit has been reported since then, as far as i can see.

actually, there might have been a fuck up on the press release, because this is the ONLY story i see ANYWHERE about Habbariyah. The closest thing i can find to a Habbariyah is Habbaniyah (with an N). and what's right down the road from Habbaniyah?


hmm, fallujah. also, google "Habbaniyah". lots of reports of insurgents and RPG attacks and road side bombs form there.

now, maybe Habbariyah is just a small ass village that doesn't make it on any map anywhere, only in an AP story, and maybe i'm confusing Habbariyah with Habbaniyah. but i cant find any evidence that Habbariyah exists. plus, all the AP stories about Habbariyah put it in about the same exact location of Habbaniyah. but maybe they are different.

so anyway, we aren't exactly arresting people randomly with out suspicion.

and

Originally Posted by fifthfiend

"Eventually" most prisoners everywhere will be let go. "Eventually" is a very broad standard. Although perhaps when I say 'standard', it would be more appropriate to say 'not a standard with any kind of actual meaning in any way, shape, or form.'

well, if i were to argue like you, i'd say something like "You know that thing you just heard whizzing right by you? That was the point. Tell you what, I'll lob it real slow for you this time". but i won't.

the point was that, eventually, MOST of these people will be deemed "innocent". of the thousands we have in custody, few of them will be convicted of a crime. especially if they admit defeat and surrender (its generally poor form to keep POWs after the enemy ceases hostilities. General Lee road away from Appomattox Court House on his horse with his gun and his saber on him)

so, you'll get to jump up and down and say "Seeee! they were all innocent! we were capturing them and jailing them for no reason!!". not quite. there is very good reason to hold most of the people, regardless if we decide that they are "criminals" and need to be punished, or if we can live with just letting them go home when the fighting is done.

so, anyway, the justice "system" will say they are innocent when they aren't. also, justice systems generally don't live up to the same standards when they are in the middle of a combat zone. When there are rocket and mortar attacks on you, you'd don't read them their rights and let them call their lawyer and let them go after 24 hours unless you're going to press charges. It isn't exactly a PLEASANT situation. but the solution is for the civilians to do whatever they can to stop the insurgents. get the insurgents out of your town, and you won't be rounded up.


MFD: i totally missed your post. sorry

Originally Posted by MFD

I'm talking about Israel and Saudi Arabia there, I was going all over. Our allies are ignoring basic human rights

oh, alrighty then. We do tolerate certain human rights abuses with our allies. Turkey can be pretty shitty to the Kurds. and i think Restoring the Monarchy in Kuwait was the most retarded thing we've ever done. NOT taking action? ok, i can understand that position. but when you're THERE, and you have the opportunity to do good and you're already commited, why not do the right hting?

there is probably a diplomatic reason for that. We went into the Gulf War for the express purpose of defending our allies (which would be the Kuwaiti government) and we also stopped going into Iraq (when we should have) because of diplomatic reasons. Our stated objective was ONLY the liberation of Kuwait.

still, dumb move, imo.

It's right that we clean up our own mess, but it IS our mess. We allowed it to happen in the first place because brutal autocracies were better than commies in our "esteemed" opinion.

agreed. we have a much greater responsibility to clean up messes we made. secondary is the responsibility to clean up messes we didn't make. some would say we have NO responsibility to clean up messes we didn't contribute to... but i'm not so convinced

Oh, yeah. We're doing a bang-up job. Iraq will be ready for self-rule... eventually...

are you being sarcastic? i'm not sure, because i would say that, yes, Iraq not only IS better off, on the larger part, but will be much better off, with a representative government, eventually. probably with in a year.

of course, we can only carry them so far. soon or later daddy lets go of your bike and you gotta learn to ride it by yourself. Whether they succeed in the long run is out of our hands, unless we decide to make them a puppet state, which isn't the goal.

They achieved their goal.

eh, i disagree. Terorrism is a means to a politcal end. Bin Laden's GOAL is to kill ever last infidel out there. he wants to destroy the Great Satan. As it is, we've pummeled his organization instead and cut terrorism to the lowest point in 35 years. i don't think they have "achieved" much of anything.

You mean, like, in Iraq? Again, a bang-up job treating our enemies "well".

no one bats a thousand. there are faults. but we move to correct them. And next to the relatively few abuses there stands the fact that we feed our enemies well, give them the best medical treatment they've ever had, accept their surrenders, stay loyal to ceasefires with our enemies even when they continue to shoot at us. etc etc. Forgetting all the good in the face of some bad isn't quite right.

we've learned from the mistakes of Vietnam and Korea, and Cuba. We know we HAVE to rebuild the country, otherwise we can keep that country on the "They hate us" list.

we.. never.. took over Vietnam in order to rebuild it. and neither did we take over Korea. South Korea was our buddy all along, and we didn’t need to “peace keep” there.. those wouldn’t be learning experiences in this respect.

we've had a "help our enemy" military mentality for just about our whole history as a nation. the original George W is quoted as saying "Show not yourself glad in the Misfortune of another though he were your enemy". I think Lincoln officially institutionalized the principle of magnanimity towards your enemy when he tried to institute Reconstruction with a congress full of politicians who wanted to subjugate the south (as it is, Lincoln got capped and reconstruction didn't quite go off as planned. but the intention was there). After World War II we showed mercy and good will with the Marshall Plan and Macarthur’s japanese rebuilding plan.

my point is that rebuilding enemies is not something we just up and decided to try in Iraq because we fucked something up before. If anything, we learned from the mistakes of the Europeans.

One must learn not to fight evil with more evil.

in the context of Bin Ladden, i firmly reject that sentiment. If a murder comes to my door, i shoot him. that’s not evil. responding, with force, to an aggressor is not "fighting evil with evil"

The thing is, we're not stopping it. Think about it. All the outrage about the prisoners, but is anything being done? Court martials? Slap on the wrist. Oh, it'll never happen again, but only because Georgie Porgie wants to stay in office next term.

Court Martials are most definitely not a "slap in the wrist". court martials are serious criminal proceedings.

i've come to find that, if you believe that Bush would happily go around torturing people if he could only keep it secret, i can't persuade you otherwise. But i reject the idea that Bush would have torture chambers and dungeons... if he only didn't need to get reelected. I'm not alone when i say that i believe that Bush is a moral man. And i KNOW im not alone when i say that i believe the US Armed Forces are FULL of moral men. This will stop BECAUSE our country and our armed forces are full of people who want to do the Right thing.

but, like i said, i'm not going to convince anyone who doesn't believe it. Some of you will scoff and say "That idiot Zeth is delusional! Bush is Evil! the Army tortures people regularly!". scoff away, if you want.


Hammy: i dunno why the FBI was over there. perhaps because Berg was a US citizen, and maybe (pure speculation here) they were looking into the possibility of domestic terrorism coming form over seas? i'm pretty sure the FBI is allowed to leave the country, so long as they are investigating shit that's going on inside.

but i dunno.