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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsPurposely aiming bombs at children: "It kind of opens our aperture."
Ignoring it does not make it go away. That the President is a Democrat does not make it morally conscionable:http://www.thenation.com/blog/171582/us-military-approves-bombing-children
...But a Marine official here raised questions about whether the children were innocent. Before calling for the M142 High Mobility Artillery Rocket System mission in mid-October, Marines observed the children digging a hole in a dirt road in Nawa district, the official said, and the Taliban may have recruited the children to carry out the mission.
Shockingly, the article quotes a senior officer saying that the military isnt just out to bomb military age males, anymore, but kids, too:
It kind of opens our aperture, said Army Lt. Col. Marion Ced Carrington, whose unit, 1st Battalion, 508th Parachute Infantry Regiment, was assisting the Afghan police. In addition to looking for military-age males, its looking for children with potential hostile intent.
Opens our aperture, indeed.
leftstreet
(36,109 posts)Unbelievable
As if the 'aperture' that sucks $700+ billion through the DOD hole wasn't bad enough
roguevalley
(40,656 posts)myself.
leveymg
(36,418 posts)woo me with science
(32,139 posts)In fact, don't live here.
Now we are getting Third Way threads attempting to justify AIMING bombs at children.
leveymg
(36,418 posts)I used to believe somehow that Americans had values, even in war. So much for my last remaining illusions of national exception.
UnrepentantLiberal
(11,700 posts)leveymg
(36,418 posts)Won the Pulitzer Prize in, what was it, 1974? Also remember reading somewhere the little girl died of the napalm burns. What a waste. We haven't really learned anything about becoming human in my lifetime.
UnrepentantLiberal
(11,700 posts)leveymg
(36,418 posts)Luminous Animal
(27,310 posts)We are monsters.
WinkyDink
(51,311 posts)woo me with science
(32,139 posts)They are smaller targets, but they can't run as fast.
sabrina 1
(62,325 posts)at least they tried to hide these things.
Well, there is no one left in this country to speak out against these horrors done in our name. At least when Bush was president the Left was loudly opposed to all of it.
leftstreet
(36,109 posts)The antiwar movement = on vacation for 8 years apparently
Hydra
(14,459 posts)Torture, Drone Assassination, Billions in embezzlement, Spying on us everywhere...and now killing children so we can eventually wipe them all out. AKA: Genocide.
We have me the enemy, and they are running our Gov't.
Whovian
(2,866 posts)Under any presidency. Xan we just get the fuck out of there already????
woo me with science
(32,139 posts)Melinda
(5,465 posts)Arugula Latte
(50,566 posts)you will get piled on and told that you are a disgrace.
rhett o rick
(55,981 posts)Fantastic Anarchist
(7,309 posts)I harbor no illusions that this is just something that happened recently.
rhett o rick
(55,981 posts)Jackpine Radical
(45,274 posts)Some days I just want to slink away somewhere and hide.
6spokewheels
(11 posts)We chose to drop the H-bomb on every man, woman, child and creature in Hiroshima. And we've come up with some duzies, to explain it away. Cold-blooded murder, in the name of payback for an unfortunate targeted attack to a military installment.
Chickenhawks?...no, sometimes more like chickenshithawks.
rhett o rick
(55,981 posts)MynameisBlarney
(2,979 posts)This is horrible.
We MUST get out of there NOW!
whatchamacallit
(15,558 posts)would allow this in it's name.
Orrex
(63,215 posts)They might have gotten hurt!
ReRe
(10,597 posts)Too much bad news......
mckara
(1,708 posts)Not the commanders protecting their personnel at any cost. If you want mortality, send in the State Department, not the Defense Department. The military's tool is a hammer, not a silk glove. Criticize military leaders after you've lived a year in their reality.
Downtown Hound
(12,618 posts)If every American stood up and said that they wouldn't join the military and actually stuck to it, we'd be out of Iraq and Afghanistan before you could blink an eye.
Too many people out there willing to feed the machine in the name of country, honor, or just too much testosterone. We need to stop glorifying the military and war.
truedelphi
(32,324 posts)I hate war because the longer any nation is at war, the more likely that its service people start to become monsters. War is the most de-humanizing aspect of life on the planet. The best way to avoid being a nation of baby killers is not to have wars.
The last necessary war the people of the USA engaged in was WWII. The rest have all been wars for profit.
zipplewrath
(16,646 posts)I've been appalled at our CIVILIAN leadership in the last 4 years. They keep choosing war, repeatedly. What this world needs is not more war, but more law enforcement. Take some folks to the Hague. Put people on trial in our courts, or any courts, for murder. Arrest people like Bin Laden, don't assassinate them.
Problem being of course is we might be asked to be judged by our own standards, and I'm not sure we'd survive that.
LeftyMom
(49,212 posts)woo me with science
(32,139 posts)Good god.
Solly Mack
(90,773 posts)actslikeacarrot
(464 posts)...They couldn't send out Q.R.F to see what the hell was going on? Maybe followed the children home with a UAV and send a patrol there to ask some questions? Fuck escalation of force protocols I guess.
DaniDubois
(154 posts)Marrah_G
(28,581 posts)Those children are, in their minds, not real children like THEIR children.
sigh
woo me with science
(32,139 posts)That's approximately how old Malia and Sasha were when Obama was elected.
riderinthestorm
(23,272 posts)Who do you think the Taliban (or any region in civil strife) are going to recruit? And we make for easy recruiting with our drone strikes and other despicable actions?
We needed to be out of Afghanistan years ago.
That we are still there is the crime
But statistics don't lie. Between the average Afghani age these days, and the FACT that child soldiers have ever been in "militaries" (sic) from since war began, then our best bet to be on the "right" side of this is to GET THE HELL OUT!
Bonobo
(29,257 posts)progressoid
(49,991 posts)Our President got a Nobel Peace Prize.
xchrom
(108,903 posts)Cherchez la Femme
(2,488 posts)woo me with science
(32,139 posts)The fact that our President is a Democrat does not make it conscionable.
Our DEMOCRATIC PRESIDENT is allowing this.
We have a problem.
sabrina 1
(62,325 posts)to the Committees that were supposed to deal with torture and the restoration of Habeas Corpus and the firing of the US Attorneys, and Karl Rove's subpoenas?
What happened to Sen Leahy's Committees? It seems that as soon as we got them all elected in 2008, everything stopped. So, was it all just politics after all?
woo me with science
(32,139 posts)woo me with science
(32,139 posts)ZombieHorde
(29,047 posts)jollyreaper2112
(1,941 posts)To have one's aperture opened: to seriously contemplate the unthinkable.
Usage: "I never would have thought of having sex with a corpse but man, she was really hot and just lying there, still warm. Apertures opened, brah!"
"I'd never really considered harvesting organs from foreign orphans but then I realized nobody can tell the skin color of the person the organ came from. It kind of opened my aperture."
"I had real qualms about working for the Republicans but then they talked compensation. Opened my aperture like snorting wasabi."
woo me with science
(32,139 posts)Thank you.