"We killed them all. Daesh, men, women and children. We killed everyone."
Submitted by gjohnsit on Thu, 07/27/2017 - 11:13am
It doesn't get much attention in the U.S. press, but Iraq has managed to solve their prison population problem - they don't take prisoners.
The major scoffs at claims made by some Iraqi soldiers that the jails in Baghdad were already too full to take any more IS prisoners.
"It's not true, we have plenty of prisons, but now we are not treating the prisoners like we did before," he says. "Earlier in this war, we arrested a lot of Daesh and brought them to the intelligence services. But now, we make very few arrests."
When the offensive stalled out in Western Mosul, the orders changed to reflect the situation.
"There are many civilians among the bodies," an Iraqi army major tells MEE. "After liberation was announced, the order was given to kill anything or anyone that moved."
Speaking on condition of anonymity, the major said the orders were wrong, but the military had to follow them.
"It was not the right thing to do," he said. "Most of the Daesh fighters surrendered. They gave themselves up, and we just killed them."
"There is no law here now," the major said. "Every day, I see that we are doing the same thing as Daesh. People went down to the river to get water because they were dying of thirst and we killed them."
More than 40,000 are feared dead in Mosul, a number that dwarfs the destruction of east Aleppo.
The difference is that we directly participated in this war crime.
"The US military should find out why a force that it trained and supported is committing ghastly war crimes," Whitson said. "US taxpayer dollars should be helping to curtail abuses, not enable them."
It's not over yet. The assault on Tal Afar is about to begin.
The cost in lives is unlikely to be nearly as high as Mosul, but then a standard for war crimes has been established.
Comments
Shhhhhhhhhh.......
Hardly a peep about the civilian carnage in Mosul at TOS compared to the rampant biased reporting on Aleppo. Any diaries they do are usually based on highly propagandized shit from MSM like the WaPo, NYT and CNN. Obama and Her Heinous have sure fucked over the Democratic party membership during the last two terms.
And all I hear is Russia, Russia, Russia.
why the fuck does amerika do this shit?
what an exceptionally fucked up country we live in.
I never knew that the term "Never Again" only pertained to
those born Jewish
"Antisemite used to be someone who didn't like Jews
now it's someone who Jews don't like"
Heard from Margaret Kimberley
If you name the
self-touted exceptional nations of the last century we have Nazi Germany, Stalinist Russia, Mao's China, Pol Pot's Cambodia, the Sauds.... "Exceptional" must be politicalese for "blood thirsty."
Orwell: Where's the omelette?
Suharto's Indonesia, backed by CIA & Kissinger…
Mass slaughter in 1965 and in East Timor.
Early 1990s Army-led anti-Chinese pogroms.
@jim p
The notion of being 'exceptional' is one characteristic of psychopaths, certain that they are much better than all of those disposable others out there.
America has been inundated by psychopathic propaganda for a very, very long time and the fact that so many Americans still retain human concepts is a tribute to human survival capacities.
Psychopathy is not a political position, whether labeled 'conservatism', 'centrism' or 'left'.
A tin labeled 'coffee' may be a can of worms or pathology identified by a lack of empathy/willingness to harm others to achieve personal desires.
Is there a place
Where this information won't sear a hole in our brains and our hearts? I ask because while I have been following your reports for quite some time I have never commented on them. The inhumanity that fellow human beings perpetrate on other human beings has left such an unspeakable shadow on our collective souls that I fear we will never be able to address it.
God help us. And I say that as a practicing Buddhist because there are no other words to adequately express the anguish I feel for so many children who endure unimaginable terror and suffering with the help of my tax dollars.
You do the work here I could not. You do the work here that must be done so I offer my sincere apologies for personalizing my response to you but I couldn't help wondering if this is how I feel reading them, what must you feel posting them?
There is always Music amongst the trees in the Garden, but our hearts must be very quiet to hear it. ~ Minnie Aumonier
Simple
I feel a responsibility to speak for the dead. To not let their deaths happen in a vacuum so that we can ignore it. Lawd knows Americans will ignore this if they can.
Good on you
And, yes. Fellow Americans will ignore it if they can. But what to do with those who feel "collateral damage" in war is "unfortunate" but still believe we should be fighting over there?
*sigh*
There is always Music amongst the trees in the Garden, but our hearts must be very quiet to hear it. ~ Minnie Aumonier
Germany eventually found a cure for jingoism
but it was unspeakably harsh. America may have to go that route too, if the behaviour is to change. I hope not, but I no longer believe that America has any better angels.
"Obama promised transparency, but Assange is the one who brought it."
Well said gjohn
That's why I keep Nora as my avitar.
People must remember.
I want a Pony!
That Democrats ignore
this, and the genocide we are helping commit in Yemen, is cause for deeper despair.
"Shit on humanity, and all that is decent if it will help keep the party's leaders near power." is the mind set of the Partybots.
Orwell: Where's the omelette?
If the Democrats ignore genocide
then we ignore the Democrats... simple. I won't vote for any party that supports neocon scum and their filthy plans.
"Obama promised transparency, but Assange is the one who brought it."
@gjohnsit Bear witness, gjohnsit.
Bear witness, gjohnsit. As we all must.
"We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false." ---- William Casey, CIA Director, 1981
@gjohnsit
From the OP:
And thank you for the awareness raising. I know we must be aware and bear witness, if nothing else, but I must admit to having put reading this off all of yesterday, and until I felt I could bear it a little better. How people actually living within such horror as this can deal well enough to try to keep their children alive/keep going themselves, I've no idea but this has to be stopped. US-trained and supported mass murderers, indeed...
The Psychopaths That Be must be eliminated from politics and policy.
I'm not a religious person, apart from my Pastafarian leanings, but I do like whatever promotes sanity and this springs to mind.
Wherefore by their fruits ye shall know them.
https://www.kingjamesbibleonline.org/Matthew-7-20/
Please note that this concept of a god doesn't want to hang out with the corrupt, no (edit: matter) what else they may have claimed to have done - and fundamentalist/Dominionist religious fanatics in or interfering in politics really ought to take note.
Nobody sane wants them anywhere near themselves. The devils are to be cast out, not permitted/cheated into public office, hired as admin or used as advisors.
That's just common sense and survival basics.
Psychopathy is not a political position, whether labeled 'conservatism', 'centrism' or 'left'.
A tin labeled 'coffee' may be a can of worms or pathology identified by a lack of empathy/willingness to harm others to achieve personal desires.
The U.S., I try not to say "we",
not only participated in this crime it caused it to happen. It is the reason it happened. This is just as much on Bush, Obama and Trump and our congress and senate as anyone.
The POS HRW won't say that instead obfuscating the issue by insinuating it was war crimes by an Iraqi unit "trained" by the U.S. What bullshit that is.
So it wouldn't matter if the media broadcast this, it still wouldn't touch those really responsible.
Walmart lady approves
" In the beginning, the universe was created. This has made a lot of people very angry, and is generally considered to have been a bad move. -- Douglas Adams, The Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy "
Empires
kill people to maintain power. It's what they do.
"You can't just leave those who created the problem in charge of the solution."---Tyree Scott
The ISIS jihadis occupying Mosul purposely
used many thousands of civilian hostages, hiding and disguising themselves among civilian captives, in a way that made the horrendous death toll almost inevitable. I would not be too quick to blame Iraqi soldiers, or coalition airstrikes, for failing to always distinguish innocent victims from enemy combatants. Tragic and lamentable though this failure clearly was, how could it have been otherwise? Could Mosul have been liberated from the grip of ISIS without the help US airstrikes, or without a bloody siege? Probably not.
I would rather place the blame for these atrocities where it rightly belongs -- squarely on the shoulders of the ISIS fanatics whose evil and insane creed enables them to use the immoral and utterly merciless tactics they habitually use. The very tactics that precisely define who and what they are. I mourn all the civilians they directly killed, or that they indirectly caused to die. I do not mourn the death of ISIS fighters. That a few thousands of these sub-human creatures were summarily executed on the field of battle, bothers me not at all.
native
And who facilitated the
creation, funding, and arming of Daesh? But read the story again: people going to drink water weren't human shields; kill anything that moves was the order.
And US White Phosphorus and cluster bombs are not more humanitarian ways to murder people than what Daesh does.
Orwell: Where's the omelette?
William Calley or LBJ?
ISIS is a proxy army for the U.S.A. and it's CINC's just like the U.S. military serves the CINC.
Yes, up to a point.
But the US has been dealing from both ends of the deck regarding ISIS. In Syria it has served as a useful anti-Assad proxy, but in Iraq it is being attacked as an enemy. Don't ask me why, but the USG is now providing substantial support to Iraqi Kurdish forces fighting Daesh.
native
That's the game they play, they've done it
with Al Qaeda for decades, pretend to fight it then support it when it benefits the U.S. They may want Iraq cleaned up to better occupy and control it while shifting ISIS to the Philippines, Russia and China and elsewhere to create havoc there.
Otoh, we may be at a cross road with the war OF terror and U.S. imperialism. I doubt it myself. I was tempted to write an essay about it but here's one from Eric Zuesse.
https://www.strategic-culture.org/news/2017/07/27/the-historical-turning...
I agree, that's the game they've been playing
for decades. But they played their last best card by supporting the Syrian jihadists, and then got trumped when Vladimir Putin stepped in and foiled their lovely plot. That particular game of bluff is over, and Russia won it big time. The MENA region was supposed to be ours, and now it is anything but. The Russians will not be forgiven for this, no matter how earnestly they sue for peace.
native
Good article
this part stood out for me:
Isn't this the decision that Putin came to when Obama and his poodle nations decided to overthrow Assad?
It wasn't just because Russia has been a partner of the Syrian government, but because Russia is now in a position to challenge the USA's military?
Plus he decided to knock back the world's bully and stop it from creating another failed state.
The speeches that Obama gave when he accepted his Noble Peace prize and his speech to the US military academy commencement ceremony proved that he was on board with the USA's hegemony.
The deaths and devastation that this country has committed to other countries will hopefully one day be held accountable at the next Nuremberg type trials.
Which AIPAC/MIC/pharma/bank bought politician are you going to vote for? Don’t be surprised when nothing changes.
@Big Al I'm curious on this
I'm curious on this topic Al. I don't know, perhaps you should write it. Somewhat curious on trying to force these "groups" to deal with superpowers like Russia and China. One thing to deal with the Middle East, but another to deal with those two.
The fucking USG allowed ISIS to take Mosul in the first place.
It was done to take out Maliki. The first time the US started bombing them was when they went after Erbil where all the US oil companies were based. The US did not touch the thousands of ISIS oil convoys until the Russians entered Syria and put a stop to it.
True, but USG seems to have changed its tune,
albeit very belatedly. Maybe now they're trying to curry favor with Iraq's government, by coming in a day late and a dollar short. If so, that's not working very well either.
native
Shorting the dollar
sounds like a great idea these days.
"Obama promised transparency, but Assange is the one who brought it."
The people responsible
for killing innocent civilians are the people who pulled the triggers and gave the orders.
Simple as that.
Trying to shift the blame anywhere else is futile.
Daesh is responsible, just like the Iraqi forces, just like the U.S. and Iraqi governments.
As for excusing summary executions, there are precedents for that, and it never turns out well for anyone.
To blame everyone is to blame no one.
To the extent that the governments of Iraq, Syria, Iran, Russia, and Lebanon all share the common goal of eliminating ISIS from the region, I believe their efforts deserve to be supported. Even if they result in substantial civilian casualties. And it seems to me that most of the civilian populations that live in the affected areas, and now suffer under the yoke of jihadi rule, would agree with that assessment -- if they had any say in the matter.
Even the Americans, who have done so much to cause and perpetuate the problem of Daesh, seem to be slowly coming around to a more common sense view of what can and cannot be done about it. Though not of course, until their original plans had gone so badly awry.
native
I don't understand where you are going with this
Those civilians would never have been under the yoke of jihadi rule if this country hadn't created Al Qaida in the first place when they did after Russia invaded Afghanistan. Every terrorist organization since then has grown out of this first group.
The terrorists who recently bombed the concert in the U.K. had been used by the government to fight and help overthrow Gaddafi. The government was able to arrest so many so quickly because they knew where they lived.
ISIS and every terrorist group in the Middle East have been funded by our government and our allies. The civilians have been caught in middle of and too many had no way to leave the war zones. The ones who were able to leave are now living in refugee camps in deplorable conditions.
They will never be able go back to their countries because their homes and infrastructures have been deployed.
The civilians in Yemen aren't caught between two terrorists group, they being murdered because Saudi Arabia will not accept the Yemen government. And this country helping them commit genocide while the world watches. Again!
Which AIPAC/MIC/pharma/bank bought politician are you going to vote for? Don’t be surprised when nothing changes.
I do not disagree with anything you are saying.
but in regard to the liberations of Mosul, Aleppo, and Raqqa, and the fact that ISIS' military formations are now clearly on the run, I think it is relevant to ask these questions:
Is it a good and necessary thing that ISIS has been expelled from most of its territory? Or not? And has this bloody and destructive expulsion been worth the terrible price paid for it? Or not? Would it have been better, or even possible, to oppose Daesh in some other, less violent way? Or not?
Regardless of who or what is responsible for creating Daesh, it exists. It can either be ignored, or accommodated, or resisted, or attacked tooth and nail. Those are the only four options that I can see, and none of them are good. Of course it would have been better not to have created the problem in the first place. That much is obvious.
native
Daesh can now be destroyed. They served their purpose.
Iraq, Libya and Syria have been destroyed. They can no longer project power outside their borders. It will take generations for these countries to rebuild the fabric of their societies. Their diverse religious groups had lived in relative harmony for hundreds of years and is has now been ripped asunder.
The latest carnage has fuck all to do with oil and oil pipelines. There is no longer any shortage of oil in the world due to fracking and other advanced technologies and necessary pipelines and delivery systems are already in place for the most part. The real problem is the fucking 800 pound gorilla in the region.
Maybe in Iraq, Syria and Libya,
but a goal has always been to use the same tactics to go into Iran, Russia and China, and elsewhere like we see in the Philippines, to destabilize.
http://landdestroyer.blogspot.com/2017/07/as-asean-shifts-east-isis-foll...
Bingo on the Yinon plan and the neocons, something we've been bringing up for a decade but as you remember could not on Daily Kos.
This:
"It would be hard to believe that the neocons, who were closely tied to the thinking of the Israeli right, have not been aware of this Likudnik strategic destabilization goal."
Not even possible, they knew, it was all set up with 9/11.
Did you see this? Interesting take on what might happen next in Syria.
https://www.strategic-culture.org/news/2017/07/26/secrets-syrian-war-isr...
The US will destroy them in the ME and move them into Russia
Iran and China in an attempt to put a crimp into the Belt and Road Initiative. Fortunately, both Putin and Li understand how to deal with ISIS through the SCO.
The success of the BRI will put an end to American world hegemony. The only thing the US can do is increase its defense spending as a response. But this will eventually destroy the country from within. Just look at rot occurring as we speak. The country is now operating more like a banana republic than a great nation.
That has to be the next step domestically,
greatly increasing the defense budget. If you look at what the Pentagon is saying about world hegemony, they simply can't do it and recommend the end to a unilateral world if that can't change. Big budget, deficit and debt wars ahead. Nothing seems sustainable but they still have the most power on the planet. You can see what they're doing to Venezuela without as much of a peep from Putin and China.
@Big Al
Thanks especially for the strategic-culture.org site - just spent ages on that and it seems very interesting.
Psychopathy is not a political position, whether labeled 'conservatism', 'centrism' or 'left'.
A tin labeled 'coffee' may be a can of worms or pathology identified by a lack of empathy/willingness to harm others to achieve personal desires.
The pint-size bully has always been
full of big ideas and distorted facts. But if Syria ever manages to pull itself together, and Hezbollah continues to gain momentum, the Izzies could be swimming in troubled waters before long. The dreaded "Shia Crescent" might well become a fait accompli, and then what?
native
The Saudis told Kerry that they would pay for the Syrian war
to remove Assad from office. He had turned them down when they along with Qatar wanted to build their own oil and gas pipelines.
This article is where Kerry was testifying before congress where he told them that the Saudis would pay for the Syrian war.
I wonder if they kept their part of the bargain?
John Kerry reveals Arab countries have offered to PAY America to carry out full-scale invasion of Syria
You are correct that one of the reasons for the wars in the Middle East is to make Israel the only superpower in the Middle East.
But why would the Saudis want this to happen and where do they stand?
Which AIPAC/MIC/pharma/bank bought politician are you going to vote for? Don’t be surprised when nothing changes.
The Saudis and Israelis got in bed together because they
share the same enemies - Iran and the Muslim Brotherhood under Hamas.
Here's more detailed info. The low oil price is starting to bite. Due to renewable's, I doubt oil price will skyrocket. This will eventually doom the Gulf countries. It was the sole source of their power.
Middle East Chaos
July 28, 2017
No, it's not as simple as that.
That's like saying the violence in the Chicago projects is solely on the blacks, without evaluating the root cause.
That's not exactly what I said
As for your example, I don't blame "blacks" for someone getting shot.
But you are crazy if you think the guy who pulled a trigger isn't responsible for a murder. Both the law and juries would disagree.
As for the war crimes in Mosul, the responsibility starts with who declared war. The responsibility then goes to who gave the orders to kill anything that moved. Finally, anyone who follows an order to commit war crimes share in the responsibility.
I'm surprised this is even debatable.
I wasn't debating that.
I was simply pointing out who I believe has the ultimate responsibility for why this happened. I'm not sure why that's debatable.
What about . . .
the large numbers who surrendered and were then executed. Whether they were combatants or innocents their murder is a war crime.
Yes, it's a war crime... by the rules
of all civilized warfare. But ISIS fanatics obviously do not abide by the rules of civilized warfare. They are not ordinary soldiers deserving of an honorable soldier's captivity, so much as they are lawless criminals who have abandoned all respect for common human decency -- and who will most likely remain a toxic threat to everyone but themselves, for as long as they are left alive.
native
Neither is our military
They haven't followed the Geneva convention or international law since, well forever.
Besides the war crime of invading countries that haven't threatened us first (Nuremberg law), our military has committed war crimes in every war they have been involved in.
Even when congress found out that our military as well as the CIA were torturing prisoners, they did jack-shit about it.
This country has been doing war crimes since its inception.
When it's not actually going into other countries, it trains those country's military to do the war crimes for us.
Which AIPAC/MIC/pharma/bank bought politician are you going to vote for? Don’t be surprised when nothing changes.
This is true, and it should also be noted
that the middle east shapes a certain mentality that enjoins such things. When you're fighting for things as visceral as home and family, these things come easier.
"Obama promised transparency, but Assange is the one who brought it."
And yet the strategic geniuses in Washington wonder...
why Iraq wants closer ties to Russia.
Gee, can't imagine why.
The current working assumption appears to be that our Shroedinger's Cat system is still alive. But what if we all suspect it's not, and the real problem is we just can't bring ourselves to open the box?
Even in Lebanon
some people are starting to hope that Russia may be their savior and a solution. The US clearly isn't.
"Obama promised transparency, but Assange is the one who brought it."
Heh!
I'm blaming it on George Bush."