Somebody Else's Atrocities

[georgephillip]

"In the history of human rights, the worst atrocities are always committed by somebody else, never us," according to James Peck, international affairs scholar. Contrast the US Marine assault on Fallujah in November of 2004 with Bosnian Serb commander, Ratko Mladic's, crimes in Srebrenica

"Another major crime with very serious persisting effects is the Marine assault on the Iraqi city of Fallujah in November 2004.

"Women and children were permitted to escape if they could. After several weeks of bombing, the attack opened with a carefully planned war crime: invasion of the Fallujah General Hospital, where patients and staff were ordered to the floor, their hands tied. Soon the bonds were loosened; the compound was secure.

"The official justification was that the hospital was reporting civilian casualties, and therefore was considered a propaganda weapon.

"Much of the city was left in 'smoking ruins,' the press reported while the Marines sought out insurgents in their 'warrens.' The invaders barred entry to the Red Crescent relief organization. Absent an official inquiry, the scale of the crimes is unknown.

"If the Fallujah events are reminiscent of the events that took place in the Bosnian enclave of Srebrenica, now again in the news with the genocide trial of Bosnian Serb military commander Ratko Mladic, there's a good reason.

"An honest comparison would be instructive, but there's no fear of that: One is an atrocity, the other not, by definition."

Somebody Else's Atrocities

 

[bitterlyclingin]

"The victors write the history and I intend to be the author" Winston Churchill

As Attilla the Hun crossed the Eurasian plain any village he encountered which contained one or more individuals who refused to render tribute to him, saw all of its inhabitants slaughtered. The residents of those regions today are far more docile politically, a thousand years later, than those in other parts of the world. Some genetic memories linger for a while. Since 1918, the world's good guys have been doing a good deal of the slaughtering, or would you rather Gulags, burial pits and crematoria? "The American soldier fights, not for the lust of conquest, but to liberate" FDR

 

[georgephillip]

What have "the world's good guys" done for native North Americans?

"The lingering effects of a vastly greater nonatrocity were reported last month by U.S. law professor James Anaya, the U.N. rapporteur on the rights of indigenous peoples.

"Anaya dared to tread on forbidden territory by investigating the shocking conditions among the remnants of the Native American population in the U.S. – 'poverty, poor health conditions, lack of attainment of formal education (and) social ills at rates that far exceed those of other segments of the American population,' Anaya reported.

"No member of Congress was willing to meet him.

"Press coverage was minimal."

Good guys don't kill for Empire or Wall Street.

Somebody Else's Atrocities