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US Bombs Hit Doctors Without Borders Hospital
Prune writes: According to multiple news sources, U.S. airstrikes partially destroyed a Doctors Without Borders (MSF) hospital in Afghanistan, killing at least nine staff members and at least 50 overall, including patients, and this after giving its coordinates to U.S. forces multiple times. I'm especially saddened to report this given I had become one of the supporters of this charity after recommendations from Slashdot members in a discussion about choosing charities to donate to a while back.
Airstrikes on population centres cause civilian casualties you say? The cost of sending in soldiers instead is too high, justifying the cost of the collateral damage you say? But not when Assad or Putin does it you say?
""The bombing continued for more than 30 minutes after American and Afghan military officials in Kabul and Washington were first informed,” the organization said in a statement."
I guess the difference is the level competence and precision.
Arresting people occasionally puts innocents in jail.
It's impossible to completely avoid civilian casualties in war unless you conduct absolutely no military operations whatsoever. The subtext of this is, of course, that the US should have avoided this, but how? Never go to war? That's obviously impractical.
Okay, so how about only going to war when you have a really good reason? If that's your plan, and you do approve of war as long as there is a really good reason, then (since some civilian casualties are inevitable) you've just said that you're okay with civilian casualties as long as the war is for a really good reason. Needless to say, you never see anti-war people saying this.
Being more careful in war? Well, you can be more careful, but nobody's perfect; there will always be *some* civilian casualties. So you're not really objecting to civilian casualties; you just think there are too many, but fewer but still some is okay. I've never seen anti-war people saying that either.
So what exactly should be done, other than never going to war, ever?
I have some connections with amplifying information. I sent a photographer friend to Afghanistan, and he networked with some Afghani grad students I met here in Japan, especially one friend who's family is from Kunduz. Some childhood friends of my Afghani associate were doctors killed in the strike. Word is that Afghani and US Spec Ops troops are retaking Kunduz. EVERYONE knew the hospital was a hospital, it was treating a mix of Afghani security forces, Taliban, and civilians.
As someone who used to work in close air support, I just can't wrap my mind around how such a target could get approved. Places like hospitals are the main reason we have Fire Support Control Measures such as Restrictive Fire Areas and No Fire Areas. Intel pushes sensitive areas to the aviation planners and they get included in the Airspace Control Order or SPINS (Special Instructions). Then they get plotted on all the maps so the air controllers know where to deny requests for Air Support (no you can't drop a bomb there, that's inside grid xxxx). What a cluster-F.....
They were told, more than once, than a MSF hospital was there. Do they just get to ignore that because some yahoo thought there might be some Taliban in the area?
Someone might want to remind these people that they're not playing Call of Duty. This is criminal level stupid.
-- "So they told me that using the download page to download something was not something they anticipated." - Bill Gates
The Canadians learned the lesson at Tarnak Farm: Get the hell out of ANY country that is suffering US airforce attacks.
Sometimes the "writing on the wall" is blood spatter...
Keep in mind military terminology is really old. Way older then you.
They're surgical strikes, and smart bombs, compared to ones we used in the last big war against the Nazis. Both us (against the Japanese), and the Brits (against Germany) used night bombing campaigns to avoid enemy air defenses, and had to work their tails off to make sure they hit the intended city. Avoiding specific buildings was simply not possible. Day-bombing raids (used by us against the Germans), was better, but would still have been unable to avoid leveling the hospital if used against a built-up area:
As U.S. participation in the war started, the USAAF drew up widespread and comprehensive bombing plans based on the Norden. They believed the B-17 had a 1.2% probability of hitting a 30 metres (100 ft) target from 6,100 metres (20,000 ft), meaning that 220 bombers would be needed for a 93% probability of one or more hits. This was not considered a problem, and the AAF forecast the need for 251 combat groups to provide enough bombers to fulfill their comprehensive pre-war plans.[21] The bombsight was used for first time in March 1943.[29]
For all it's sins, the military we've got uses significantly less brutal solutions then were possible in any previous generation. It's not their fault that Presidents much prefer airstrikes (which have large civilian casualty-numbers if they go wrong) to special forces-ops (which can turn low casualty operations into political disasters because we really liked those 18 guys).
In this case it doesn't seem like a US Military internal fuck-up at all. It seems like some embittered Afghan police officer sent in the coordinates of the hospital on purpose because MSF treats Taliban casualties. The Afghan Police concerned are still swearing up and down they were taking fire from the building.
I agree. I would also add that if a belligerent (such as the U.S.) is not willing to sacrifice the lives of its own troops and civilians, then it has no moral justification for engaging in unilateral warfare.
In short, what the fuck are we fighting for?
Back in the 1990's, the US accidentally dropped a bomb on the Chinese embassy in Serbia. It was widely dismissed as a targetting error. Fast forward a couple of uears and I am young platoon leader. My platoon sergeant had been a general's driver during the Kosovo conflict and claimed to have been in the room when they decided to bomb the embassy. The reason was that the Chinese had purchased sensitive parts of the F-117 that the Serbs brought down andvwere storing them in the embassy untill they could get them out.
At the time I thought the story was just bravado. Then I heard the same story from a Major who had been on staff. I personally never saw anything like this while I was in, but I was neither elite nor in any high up staff offices. However, from what I know of US infantry culture I am pretty sure that it would not take a lot for a hospital to be targetted. I also would not put it past the Taliban to use a hospital as a shield. The BBC is already reporting that there were 10-15 Taliban in the hospital. If they were using it effectively as a lynch pin or if somebody of high enough position was there, I don't doubt for a second that the US would have dropped fire on it.
Whether something like that happened or not... I'll be dead before we know.
Or you could try, you know, not being a bloodthirsty imperialist? You out yourself when you repeatedly excuse U.S. bombing while at the same time repeating the dumbfuckery of "barrel bombs." There would be no war in Syria if your fellow bloodthirsty imperialists weren't arming, funding and training foreign fighters to attack Assad, who was targeted for regime change before the Arab Spring.
All the dead in Syria, all the refugees fleeing to other countries, all the people drowning in the sea - victims of regime change.
In short, what the fuck are we fighting for?
Profits of corporations, protection of the first world banking system, the military industrial complex...
You're on slashdot, you should know that...
No. They are terrorists. You are in control of professional soldiers. If you can't control your urge to hurt beyond such that you bomb doctors in hospitals, you shouldn't be in charge of anything remotely capable of doing that.
...The Doctors Without Borders people know that they are putting themselves at risk. They knew...
A big question here is whether this hospital targeting was an accident, or was it deliberate. And if it were a deliberate attack, was it because undesirables were known to be at the location, or was it simply a message the military was sending to organizations that indiscriminately help the wounded.
The US military will now investigate itself and conclude it was an accident.
(||) Nehmo (||)
I like this one
http://www.globalresearch.ca/t...
(...)
Before his next appearance on Fox, Kristol could do worse than peruse Professor Hamoud Salhi’s address, presented at the Center for Contemporary Conflict, of the (U.S.) Naval Postgraduate School in June 2004.(iii pdf) It is entitled: “Syria’s Threat to America’s National Interest.” It is arguably even more pertinent now – and another reminder of how long Syria has been in U.S. sights.
He opens: “Syria’s threat to America’s national interest in the Middle East can only be understood in the context of U.S. plans to reconfigure the Middle East. Knowing now that the motive for invading Iraq was strategic, taking over Syria would give the United States further strategic depth in the region tipping the balance of power (even more) in favour of the United States regional allies, Israel and Turkey.”
Salhi notes that “strategic pre-emption” is long central to American policy in the Middle East, citing Rapid Deployment Forces during the Carter Administration, Dual Containment under Clinton, Pre-emptive Doctrine under George W. Bush. Polices, he holds, which: “have been instrumental in maintaining hegemony in the region”, avoiding threats to U.S interests, or to those of Israel,Turkey and the Gulf States.
After the 1998 US-UK Christmas bombing of Baghdad drew world-wide criticism, Salhi points out that the often daily (illegal) bombing of Iraq by the two countries was stepped up, with often daily sorties, “using the latest technology” destroying what minimal economic infrastructure remained: “under the pretext that they represented future threats.” It was he contends, the “quiet war”, an ongoing tragedy little noticed by the world.
The ground was – literally – being prepared for invasion, the trigger finger ever itchier, any excuse sought. George W. Bush would later explain that invading Iraq was necessary: “ to advance freedom in the greater Middle East ” (Emphasis mine.)
11th September 2001 arguably gave the excuse to release the safety catches. On 20th September 2001 PNAC sent a letter to Bush: “ recommending the overthrow of Saddam Hussein, even if no direct link to the 9/11 attack were found.” Time to redeem American: “supremacy in global politics (and for) regime changes in Iraq, Iran and Syria.”
Michael Ledeen, foreign policy expert, another neo-con minded Fox News commentator, alleged to be a “strong admirer” of Niccolo Machiavelli, regarded 1991’s Desert Storm attack on Iraq as a woeful missed chance states Salhi. He notes Ledeen’s view that driving Iraqi troops from Kuwait was wholly inadequate. Strategy should have been: “regime change in Baghdad” (as) “one piece in an overall mission”, which should have been: “one battle against Iran, Iraq, Syria and Saudi Arabia.”
Addressing “The Syrian Threat”, Professor Salhi reminds of the U.S. Congress 2004 “Syria Accountability Act” which considerably financially weakened Syria’s fragile economy, with further aims clearly paving the way to regime change.
That achieved: “the United States will have completed its final stage of encircling Iran. This would further tip the region’s balance of power in favour of Israel and ultimately open new doors” for the U.S. “active involvement in toppling the Iranian regime.”
(...)
Afghanistan is just a side gig, perhaps simply an opportunity to wage war even if it's strategically useless. The "revenge war against 911" narrative needs the US to go in Afghanistan : if you only attack Iraq, every one knows it's unjustified because there's no Al Qaeda or Bin
I certainly don't expect 100% perfection when bombing anything, which is why I always call bullshit when our politicians say we'll use "smart" bombs or "surgical air strikes" when trying to justify attacking someone.
I used to feel the same, until I visited Belgrade. The Ministry of Defence building was hit by three bombs, each of which penetrated about 4 floors and then exploded. Damage to adjacent buildings (i.e. within 20-50 metres of the blast) was limited to broken windows and surface chips and abrasions. I saw another dozen or so buildings—quite pointedly left unrepaired during negotiations to enter the EU—all around downtown Belgrade that were the same.
Likewise Slobodan Milosevic's residence in a nearby suburb, located where all the diplomatic compounds were. You pass by row upon row of pretty 18th and 19th Century houses, each on a nicely tended plot of land, then there's a gap where Milosevic's house used to be, then another house, and another.
After this, I changed my estimation of how precision such bombing efforts could be....
... And then... I found out that they left all the really precision attacks to the French, because the Americans had a reputation for missing. :-)
Crumb's Corollary: Never bring a knife to a bun fight.