Dead women, children, elderly swept under the rug

Good or Evil? Whose side are we on, anyway?

Over the weekend, the BBC reported that Iraqi women, children and elderly civilians were killed in a “barbaric” attack in the city of Sadr. Our military officially claimed “49 criminals” were killed in an operation in Sadr. Iraqi civilians that were present, disagreed.

From a Reuters article printed in the BBC: Middle East - US Raid kills Iraqi “Criminals”

Clouds of black smoke rose from Sadr City, where heavy gunfire continued on Sunday morning with US helicopters circling overhead, Reuters news agency reported.

“We were waking in the morning and all of a sudden rockets landed in the house and the children were screaming,” it quoted a woman as saying.

An official loyal to Moqtada Sadr said the attack was “simply barbaric”.

“Most of those killed and wounded were women, children and elderly men which shows the indiscriminate monstrosity of the attacks on this crowded area,” Abdul-Mehdi al-Muteyri told Reuters news agency.

The US military denies that civilians were killed.

“Ground forces reported they were unaware of any innocent civilians being killed as a result of this operation,” its statement said.

We’re supposed to be the good guys, but incidents like this make it difficult to defend the Iraq invasion and occupation. This isn’t only about dead civilians, we know that it is a horrible fact of War that people must die. What is troubling is we’ve made it a policy decision to excuse questionable acts by our government, military and/or agencies. The United States owns up to nothing and everything is justified in the name of fighting terror or “criminals” in this case.

The use of the word “criminals” to minimize American accountability, especially through the press, is worrisome. It suggests to me that we’re continuing a trend of using public relations experts to keep the war afloat. Covering up unintended casualties of war may serve to silence potential dissent, but it also serves to offend Americans and undermine military operations. A disregard for humanity continues the betrayal of American trust and it gives terrorists propaganda they need to promote their mentally deranged acts of murder.

We need to reexamine our goals on this War on terror. The “if we don’t win, we lose” mentality had its chance, it has run its course. We’ve deluded ourselves into believing that in 3-4 years we could undo thousands of years of religious history and a near century of war. When the dust settles, the instability, death and destruction over seas will become apparent. Our misguided efforts at controlling a historically volatile region conflicted by religious and territorial conflict will prove to be a poor political and military calculation.

America’s dwindling reputation, the government’s incompetence and disingenuous acts by military personnel are endangering our nation’s security, not helping it. Dead children, women, and elderly, as you know, are reasons Islamic militants use to justify bombs strapped around their wastes. The likelihood of extremists blowing up American interests and innocent civilians just became higher. I ask once more, are we fighting against evil? Our actions suggest the contrary.

Fred Soto is an Attorney and Entrepreneur from the Silicon Valley.
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