>
> Just a temporary problem. The Marines may be found guilty and may even
> be sentenced to life in prison. However, after a short visit to prison,
>
> for publicity's sake, the president will pardon the men and they will
> be returned home to a parade down mainstreet. It's the whistleblowers
> that will be remembered and suffer the wrath of jingo Americans.
>
> "Every patriot believes his country better than any other country
> . . . In its active manifestation-it is fond of killing-patriotism
> would be well enough if it were simply defensive, but it is
> also aggressive . . . Patriotism deliberately and with
> folly aforethought subordinates the interests of a whole
> to the interests of a part . . . Patriotism is fierce as a
> fever, pitiless as the grave and blind as a stone."
>
> -Ambrose Bierce, Collected Works
>
> The only danger to American troops and to their families. The enemy
> will retaliate by torturing and killing any captured military personel
> or American citizens, and any previous agreements regarding prisoners
> will be ignored. Then, don't complain. "War is Hell."
>
> In Iraq, neither politicians nor soldiers are acting on the conviction
> that liberty and free enterprise ultimately triumph over
> communism and tyranny. Instead, they act on the
> shameful presumption that freedom requires the mass
> murder of people who pose absolutely no threat and
> are located on the other side of the world.
>
> see:
>
http://deoxy.org/wc/warcrime.htm
>
http://www.digitaljournalist.org/issue0212/pt04.html
>
http://digitaljournalist.org/issue0212/pt intro.html
>
> Machiavelli and U.S. Politics
> Part 5: War Crimes and Atrocities
> These same sentiments seemed to govern U.S. policy during the wars
> waged against Vietnam and Iraq.
>
>
http://www.fff.org/comment/com0508m.asp
>
> For Machiavelli, there is no deed too ruthless for rulers on the fast
> track to dictatorship. A prince who wishes to remain in power must not
> blink at opportunities for cruelty when they can advance his position.
> Consequently, in chapter 5, Machiavelli advises would-be princes to
> follow the example set by the ancient Romans in dealing with the Greek
> cities conquered by Rome as it gobbled up the Mediterranean world:
>
> [The Romans] were compelled to destroy many cities in that province so
> as to hold it. For in truth there is no secure mode to possess them
> other than to ruin them. And whoever becomes patron of a city
> accustomed to living free and does not destroy it, should expect to be
> destroyed by it; for it always has a refuge in rebellion in the
> name of liberty....
>
> These same sentiments seemed to govern U.S. policy during the wars
> waged against Vietnam and Iraq. In Vietnam, the United States dropped
> more than 7 million tons of bombs - three and one half times as much
> as were dropped in World War II. It is not surprising that in both
> North and South Vietnam, 2 million innocent civilians were killed in
> addition to 1 million Vietnamese soldiers.
>
> In Iraq, the sanctions following Operation Desert Storm - backed by
> the United States and UN - led to the deaths of hundreds of thousands
> of Iraqi children during the 1990s. This horrifying total continued to
> grow until Operation Iraqi Freedom [sic] and its aftermath finished
> off tens of thousands of additional noncombatants. Cities such
> as Fallujah have been leveled and turned into ghost towns.
>
> That Which Concerns A Prince On The Subject Of The Art Of War
> Nicolo Machiavelli CHAPTER XIV
> Bush wants to be the Prince
>
> A PRINCE ought to have no other aim or thought, nor select anything
> else for his study, than war and its rules and discipline; for this is
> the sole art that belongs to him who rules, and it is of such force
> that it not only upholds those who are born princes, but it often
> enables men to rise from a private station to that rank. And, on the
> contrary, it is seen that when princes have thought more of ease than
> of arms they have lost their states. And the first cause of your losing
>
> it is to neglect this art; and what enables you to acquire a state is
> to be master of the art.... For among other evils which being unarmed
> brings you, it causes you to be despised, and this is one of those
> ignominies against which a prince ought to guard himself, as is shown
> later on. Because there is nothing proportionate between the armed and
> the unarmed; and it is not reasonable that he who is armed should yield
>
> obedience willingly to him who is unarmed, or that the unarmed man
> should be secure among armed servants. Because, there being in the one
> disdain and in the other suspicion, it is not possible for them to work
>
> well together. And therefore a prince who does not understand the art
> of war, over and above the other misfortunes already mentioned, cannot
> be respected by his soldiers, nor can he rely on them. He ought never,
> therefore, to have out of his thoughts this subject of war, and in
> peace he should addict himself more to its exercise than in war; this
> he can do in two ways, the one by action, the other by study..
>
> The Prince
> Nicolo Machiavelli
> CHAPTER XIV
>
> Vietnam remembered:
> Remember Charlie Company, 1st Battalion, 20th Infantry Regiment, 11th
> Brigade, American Division and the massacre at Mai Lai, Vietnam. On the
>
> eve of the attack, U.S. military command advised Charlie Company that
> any genuine civilians at My Lai would have left their homes to go to
> market by 7 a.m. the following day. They were told they could assume
> that all who remained behind were either Viet Cong or active Viet Cong
> sympathizers. They were instructed to destroy the village.
>
> At the briefing, Captain Ernest Medina was asked whether the order
> included the killing of women and children; those present at the
> briefing later gave different accounts of Medina's response.
>
> The soldiers found no insurgents in the village on the morning of 16
> March 1968. Enraged because fellow platoon soldiers were killed on
> previous occasions, they gave little thought to the consequences of
> their actions that day. It is rumoured by Vietnamese that the soldiers
> asked the villagers where the Viet Cong were and that the villagers
> either didn't know or refused to reveal their location. Many suspected
> there were VC in the village, hiding underground in the homes of their
> elderly parents or young wives. Nevertheless, the American soldiers,
> one platoon which was led by Lt William Calley, killed hundreds of
> civilians - primarily old men, women, children and babies. Dozens
> were herded into a ditch and executed with automatic firearms. At one
> stage, Lt. Wm.Calley expressed his intent to throw hand grenades into a
>
> trench filled with villagers.
>
> The precise number killed varies from source to source, with 347 and
> 504 being the most commonly cited figures. A memorial at the site of
> the massacre lists 504 names, with ages ranging from one to eighty-two
> years. According to the report of a South Vietnamese army lieutenant to
>
> his superiors, it was an "atrocious" incident of bloodletting by an
> armed force seeking to vent its fury.
>
>
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/bs/thumb/7/77/My Lai massacre.j...
>
>
> The soldiers said they were convinced any and all villagers could be a
> threat.
>
> The massacre was halted when Warrant Officer Hugh Thompson, Jr., a
> 24-year-old helicopter pilot, landed his OH-23 and confronted Lt.
> Stephen Brooks about attacks on wounded Vietnamese civilians hiding in
> a bunker. Thompson threatened to have his two door gunners open fire on
>
> American servicemen with his ship's heavy machine guns if the attacks
> continued. Thompson also called in two additional helicopters to
> provide medevac for twelve wounded Vietnamese civilians.
>
> In the spring of 1972, the camp (at My Lai 2), where the survivors of
> the My Lai massacre had been relocated, was largely destroyed by ARVN
> (South Vietnamese) air and artillery bombardment. The destruction was
> attributed to "Viet Cong terrorists." However, the truth was revealed
> by Quaker service workers in the area, in testimony by Martin Teitel at
>
> the hearings before the Subcommittee to Investigate Problems Connected
> with Refugees and Escapees in May 1972. In June that year, Teitel's
> account of the event appeared in the New York Times.
>
> The carnage at My Lai might have gone unknown to history if not for
> another soldier, Ron Ridenhour, who, independent of Glen, sent a letter
>
> to President Nixon, the Pentagon, the State Department, the Joint
> Chiefs of Staff, and numerous members of Congress. The copies of this
> letter were sent in March 1969, a full year after the event. Most
> recipients of Ridenhour's letter ignored it, with the notable exception
>
> of Rep Morris Udall. Ridenhour learned about the events at My Lai
> secondhand, by talking to members of Charlie Company while he was still
>
> enlisted.
>
> Eventually, Lt Calley was charged with several counts of premeditated
> murder in September 1969, and 25 other officers and enlisted men were
> later charged with related crimes. It was another two months before the
>
> American public learned about the massacre and trials.
>
> Independent investigative journalist Seymour Hersh, after extensive
> conversations with Lt Calley, broke the My Lai story on 12 November
> 1969; on 20 November, Time, Life and Newsweek magazines all covered the
>
> story, and CBS televised an interview with Paul Meadlo. The Cleveland
> Plain Dealer published explicit photographs of dead villagers killed at
>
> My Lai. As is evident from comments made in a 1969 telephone
> conversation between United States National Security Advisor Henry
> Kissinger and Secretary of Defense Melvin Laird, revealed recently by
> the National Security Archive, the photos of the war crime were too
> shocking for senior officials to stage an effective cover-up. Secretary
>
> of Defense Laird is heard to say, "There are so many kids just lying
> there; these pictures are authentic."
>
> Courts martial
> On 17 March 1970, the United States Army charged 14 officers with
> suppressing information related to the incident. Most of these CHARGES
> WERE DROPPED.
>
> No Problem: Lt Calley's was the only conviction and was pardoned after
> the incident became muted. Nixon treated Calley as an American hero.
>
> US Army Lt William Calley was convicted in 1971 of premeditated murder
> in ordering the shootings and initially sentenced to life in prison;
> two days later, however, President Richard Nixon ordered him released
> from prison, pending appeal of his sentence. Calley served 3ВЅ years of
>
> house arrest in his quarters at Fort Benning, Georgia, and was then
> ordered freed by Federal Judge J Robert Elliot. Calley claimed he was
> following orders from his captain, Ernest Medina; Medina denied giving
> the orders and was acquitted at a separate trial. Most of the soldiers
> involved in the My Lai incident were no longer enlisted. Of the 26 men
> initially charged, Lt Calley's was the only conviction. The entire
> episode inspired what is known today as a Medina standard.
>
> Some argue that My Lai was a reversal of the rules of war that were set
>
> in the Nuremberg and Tokyo War Crimes Tribunals. The Tribunals set a
> precedent in history that no one may be excused from reprimand for war
> crimes because they were ordered to do so. Secretary of the Army Howard
>
> H Callaway was quoted in the New York Times for stating that Calley's
> sentence was reduced because Calley honestly believed that what he did
> was a part of his orders. This is in direct contradiction to the
> standards set in Nuremberg and Tokyo where German and Japanese soldiers
