U.S. Military Resorting to Collective Punishment

[conjur]

http://www.ipsnews.net/interna.asp?idnews=27077

BAGHDAD, Jan 18 (IPS) - The U.S. military is resorting to collective punishment tactics in Iraq similar to those used by Israeli troops in the occupied territories of Palestine, residents say.

Military bulldozers have mown down palm groves in the rural al-Dora farming area on the outskirts of Baghdad, residents say. Electricity has been cut, the local fuel station destroyed and the access road blocked.

The U.S. action comes after resistance fighters attacked soldiers from this area several weeks back.

"The Americans were attacked from this field, then they returned and started cutting down all the trees," says Kareem, a local mechanic, pointing to a pile of burnt date palms in a bulldozed field. "None of us knows any fighters, we all know they are coming here from other areas to attack the Americans, but we are the people who suffer from this."

The military action follows a similar round of attacks and retaliation earlier this month.

U.S. Army Brigadier-General Mark Kimmit told reporters then that the military had launched 'Operation Iron Grip' in the area to send "a very clear message to anybody who thinks that they can run around Baghdad without worrying about the consequences of firing RPGs (rocket propelled grenades), firing mortars."

Gen. Kimmit said "there is a capability in the air that can quickly respond against anybody who would want to harm Iraqi citizens or coalition forces." Then as now, local people denied any knowledge of harbouring resistance fighters.

And now, as then, they say they have to pay the price.

"They destroyed our fences, and now there are wolves attacking our animals," said Mohammed, a schoolboy. "They destroyed much of our farming equipment, and the worst is they cut our electricity. They come by here every night and fire their weapons to frighten us."

People need electricity to run pumps to irrigate the farms, he said. "Now we are carrying water in buckets from the river, and this is very difficult for us," Mohammed said. "They say they are going to make things better for us, but they are worse."

Going into fields littered with unexploded mortar shells after the U.S. retaliation has become hazardous now. "We asked them the first time and they said okay, we'll come take care of it," said a farmer who called himself Sharkr. "But they never came."

Other residents say soldiers beat them up during random home raids. "I was beaten by the Americans," said Ihsan, a 17 year-old secondary school student. "They asked me who attacked them, but I do not know. My home was raided, our furniture destroyed, and one of my uncles was arrested."

People in Abu Hishma village in the area spoke of similar experiences earlier. After U.S.. soldiers were attacked, the entire village was encircled with razor wire. Residents were forced to acquire military identity badges and enter through a military controlled checkpoint.

The main farm road was blocked by four large concrete slabs after attacks several weeks ago. Residents used tractors to remove the blocks, but last week they say the military installed four larger blocks.

"They humiliate us when we talk to them," said Hamoud Abid, a 50-year-old farmer. "They would not tell us when they will remove these blocks, so we are all walking now."

A military spokesperson in Baghdad declined to comment on the statements by the people in al-Dora, and declined a request for his name. But he said there were ongoing security operations in al-Dora.

Winning the hearts and minds of the people who are greeting us as liberators.

 

[dgevert]

Collective punishment has always been the military's preferred way of punishment...it's just usually applied to its own, not the other side...

 

[Starbuck1975]

The American military is not structured, organized or equipped to contend with insurgent and peacekeeping operations in heavily built up urban environments. While urban combat was fairly common during WW2, it usually consisted of razing entire cities.

Warfare in urban areas has always resulted in a heavy toll on civilians...it certainly doesn't help that these insurgents hide behind the protective garb of civilians, and are utilizing protected areas such as mosques and the likes as command, control and bunker facilities.

If these reports are true, collective punishment is certainly not going to win the hearts and minds of these communities.

 

[BBond]

Great.

What's the next step in our drive to rid Iraq of WMD...

Oh, I mean our drive to bring freedom and democracy to Iraq???

Internment camps? Oh, we already have those.

Concentration camps?

This feeds the "insurgency" and terrorist recruitment better than any enemy could. And to think America had a chance to get these imbeciles out of power and blew it.

 

[GrGr]

Time for a UN resolution protesting US treatment of the people on the occupied territories?

 

[Starbuck1975]

This feeds the "insurgency" and terrorist recruitment better than any enemy could. And to think America had a chance to get these imbeciles out of power and blew it.

Our greatest mistake was disbanding the Iraqi Army...they were actually quite professional by Middle Eastern standards...the irony is that because Saddam had yet to name a successor for his regime, there were numerous Iraqi generals that had ambitions for removing Saddam from power themselves...not to mention that with the exception of perhaps certain units of the Republican Guard, most of the Iraqi units would have cooperating with American forces...that Saddam's regime was secular also means that his military had no love for Islamic fundamentalists.
But we put thousands of Iraqi soldiers out of the job, and unleashed an unemployed yet relatively highly trained force into the civilian population...huge mistake...one of the reasons why the occupation of Nazi Germany went so smoothly was that we disbanded the SS units but incorporated the Bundeswehr forces into organized local police forces.

 

[Rainsford]

Originally posted by: Starbuck1975
The American military is not structured, organized or equipped to contend with insurgent and peacekeeping operations in heavily built up urban environments. While urban combat was fairly common during WW2, it usually consisted of razing entire cities.

Warfare in urban areas has always resulted in a heavy toll on civilians...it certainly doesn't help that these insurgents hide behind the protective garb of civilians, and are utilizing protected areas such as mosques and the likes as command, control and bunker facilities.

If these reports are true, collective punishment is certainly not going to win the hearts and minds of these communities.

Reminds me of something the General played by Bruce Willis (himself a hard core conservative) said in "The Siege": "The Army is not a big green police machine." That's not what they are trained or set up to do, how can we expect them to be good at it?

 

[Starbuck1975]

Reminds me of something the General played by Bruce Willis (himself a hard core conservative) said in "The Siege": "The Army is not a big green police machine." That's not what they are trained or set up to do, how can we expect them to be good at it?

Or it is a testament to the professionalism of our men and women in uniform that they have adapted to a mission they are not trained or equipped for...the mission in Iraq has not reached the state of hopeless just yet, although it will take a rethinking of our overall strategy and international involvement to stabilize the situation.

 

[maddogchen]

I remember reading about the Army sectioning off a town last year. After a bunch of attacks they did that and it dropped the number of attacks down drastically. Don't know what happened after that though.

 

[Rainsford]

Originally posted by: Starbuck1975

Reminds me of something the General played by Bruce Willis (himself a hard core conservative) said in "The Siege": "The Army is not a big green police machine." That's not what they are trained or set up to do, how can we expect them to be good at it?

Or it is a testament to the professionalism of our men and women in uniform that they have adapted to a mission they are not trained or equipped for...the mission in Iraq has not reached the state of hopeless just yet, although it will take a rethinking of our overall strategy and international involvement to stabilize the situation.

I've got to say I'm somewhat impressed with the way (most) of our soldiers have adapted to their new mission. What I was more commenting on was the attitude of many people (oddly the same attitude as in The Siege) where they expected our soldiers to overthrow Saddam (which they are VERY good at doing) and suddenly start acting like the Police and keep things under control (which they are not as good at).

I think they are reacting as well as can be expected, but some people are still hammering the round peg into the square hole and wondering why it's not fitting. What kills me is the same people who said, at the beginning, that the round peg was PERFECT for the square hole, what could go wrong?

 

[Starbuck1975]

I think the ease of our peacekeeping missions in Bosnia and Kosovo set expectations a bit high for our military's ability to transition from warfighting to nation building and peacekeeping.

But in the Balkans scenario, all of the various factions didnt have any fight left in them when we arrived, so the resistance we faced was minimal and disorganized.

What we should have done was defeat the Iraqi military machine, pull back, let the various factions have their pissing match, and then pull back in to clean up.