If just once the MSM would be on the side of the military and America this kind of news would be ONLY handled by the military and the news of it would probably not even get out. They take care of things better then some freak behind a desk at one of the alphabet channels or any of the media.

God bless our military and keep them safe. The enemy they are fighting in this war is straight from hell and I am all for sending the enemy back to hell where they belong.

Advantage: the left and the enemy – hard to tell them apart.

Wasn’t that one Marine – I forget his name now – who was not so long ago accused, but later exonerated, of committing a murder in Iraq also “implicated” by another Marine? Until it turned out that the guy making the allegations was holding some kind of grudge?

Yes. Lt. Ilario Pantano was accused of murdering 2 Iraqis. His story is told in his book “Warlord : No Better Friend, No Worse Enemy.”

I reading it now.

Anyway, I’m not surprised by these charges – if you look at the way the Marine Corps treated its Marines based on mere accusations (i.e. shackles, solitary confinement, and conviction in the media), then it’s no surprised that others in Iraq have been encouraged to “come forward” with their accusations of atrocities, as they know it will create instant outrage in our media circles and from haters like BOB.

Theses soldiers are absolutely innocent until PROVEN guilty.

I bet if our policy would have been to eradicate entire city blocks using MOABs then these soldiers and marines would have never had to worry about being in situations where they could be accused of these things in the first place. But such is our western fetish for “moral superiority”, which we allow to trump the need for “victory”. And so it drags on, and we will see more accusations like this, even though 99% of them are probably bull excrement.

When it comes to these kinds of allegations, “wait and see” is the watchword of the day. Even when supposedly there’s someone who “confessed.”

Wasn’t that one Marine – I forget his name now – who was not so long ago accused, but later exonerated, of committing a murder in Iraq also “implicated” by another Marine? Until it turned out that the guy making the allegations was holding some kind of grudge?

My sentiments precisely.

On another note … how bout those UN peacekeepers? Does the American hating left keep track of what their up to? Just asking.

Wasn’t that one Marine – I forget his name now – who was not so long ago accused, but later exonerated, of committing a murder in Iraq also “implicated” by another Marine? Until it turned out that the guy making the allegations was holding some kind of grudge?

The problem I have with all such allegations is that in the era of our media’s new investigatory standards – “Fake, but Accurate!”(TM) and “It Could be True!”(TM) – I’ve been left with no choice but to take everything derogatory they say about the administration and the military with a boulder-sized grain of salt.

How many times have we seen our own “journalists” breathlessly speak and write of flushed Korans, or murder allegations, or wildly inflated civilian casualty figures, or telephone “datamining,” … only to see them tip-toe away from the same when they proved either false or exaggerated?

Too many times. Too many to take them for their word at face value anymore.

“We ain’t no thin red ‘eroes
And we ain’t no blackguards, too;
But single men in barricks, most remarkable like you.
And if sometimes our conduck isn’t all your fancy paints,
Why, single men in barricks don’t grow in to plaster saints.

An’ it’s Tommy this, ‘n Tommy that, an’ anything you please;
But Tommy ain’t a bloomin’ fool – you bet that Tommy sees!”

BUT, some thing about this story strikes me as contrived. It is almost like it sounds like some hard-left, hate the military stereotype fantasy. It is just too over the top. I remember a couple of years ago when those photos of U.S. troops raping Iraqi women came out. Yet when it was investigated, it was shown that they were nothing but fabricated South American porno pics. Yet lots of people piled on that story, mostly in my opinion, because it was so scandilous that it HAD to be true. It was too good of a story not to be true. Honestly, this story sounds like something out of a movie, not real life. Murder, gang rape, burn the bodies/burn the village, cover up, oh my! If that is what an honest investigation reveals, I will stand corrected and hang my head in shame that some U.S. troops did this.

By way of explanation of why I am suspicious of this story, consider the following scenariso: If someone told me that he was framed by the LAPD and that they planted a bag of dope on him during a traffic stop, I would say that although I don’t believe that the LAPD goes arround planting dope on people as a matter of policy, I will grant you that it is conceivable that this happened.

But if the same guy said that they planted the dope on him to keep him from revealing the truth that the Secret Service, on orders from Karl Rove, had instigated the Tupac and Biggie Smalls slayings to forment a East Coast / West Coast Hip Hop war to cover up the future connection between a Valaire Plame, Scotter Libby and Dick Cheney sorid sexual threeway, well…. all I can say to that is extraordinary claims require extraordinary proof.

Just sayin’.

*Remember, she supports the troops!

This article cites a January 2005 figure that, including both Afghanistan and Iraq, almost 1.1 MILLION had served in theater up to that point. And that figure is now 1.5 years old; I’d guess its safe to assume we’re closer to 2 million at this point. Maybe 1.5 million.

http://www.globalsecurity.org/org/news/2005/050412-gone-to-war.htm

Add to that hundreds of thousands of other coalition forces (75,000 British as of August 2005, for example).

Now compare that to Vietnam: “During the 15 years of the Vietnam conflict, around 2.4 million troops served there.”

Pretty surprising. To me at least.

But now to Honora’s point: EVEN if we assume that each and every allegation of misconduct has been true (which is laughably stupid), the rate of crimes and misconduct has obviously been amazingly low – probably the lowest in history for this scale of conflict.

For a comparison of just how much lower the rates of crime and misconduct are among our troops than they should be – check out the crime rates for 2004 for every state:

http://www.infoplease.com/ipa/A0004912.html

I’ll let you draw the obvious conclusions. Although you shouldn’t expect to see those conclusions reported in the NYT anytime soon.

How many troops have spent time in Iraq–about a million I would guess. The surprise is not that this happens, but that it doesn’t happen more often. Get the facts, exonerate or punish as swiftly–and transparently–as possible. Then move on.

Holy Keeee-rap! Honora wrote that? HONORA? I was stunned after reading that; bamboozled; kerfluffled. I was living in a bizzarro world, where suddenly the senseless were making sense.

I needed a drink. Or a nap. Or both.

If even Honora could grasp the obvious – maybe there was hope for the world? (And kudos to you, Honora. For now I’ll pretend that global warming graph never happened.)

There I was, puzzled but pleased. Ready to jump to the end of the thread and say thank you to Honora for his/her surprisingly honorable post.

But then just two posts down – this gem:

Yet again, instead of being OUTRAGED at this possible incident, you people turn the spin machine on high and point the finger of blame towards the left/media.

“Hearts and minds…”
“We will be greeted as liberators.”

Ah – there we go. That’s the world I know. Thank you, BetterOffBlue, for reminding me of who you are and what you represent.

Whew. I feel much better. Honora had me all perjinxled (patent pending on that word) there for a second. But thanks to BetterOffBlue’s predictable knee-jerk non-thinking response, up is up again, down is down again, and liberals still hate their country. Situation normal, all !#$%ed up. I feel much better.

By the way, BetterOffBlue — I’m STILL waiting to hear about your military service. This is like the 12th time I’ve asked. You DID serve …. right?

Oh, what the hell, your usual tripe leads me to a couple obvious questions I just can’t help but ask: 1) Why would any thinking human be outraged at a “POSSIBLE” (to quote you) incident?, 2) could you point to where someone here said this story – if true – is not in fact horrible and outrageous, and 3) Do liberals just basically not believe in due process of law – or is it just you?

If BetterOffBlue actually ANSWERS any of the above questions, I really am getting a drink and a nap. That would be too much surprise for one day.

No, the story really is that a liberal MSM would USE an unfortunate incident such as this to attempt to smear Bush, the US, and the rest of those there fighting and dying for other peoples freedom.

Allah: Heh.

Cyanotic Blue You look like you need a deep breath. An honest liberal might have assumed outrage at the concept of rape and murder.

Is it wrong to hope this is not true? I think not, and recent history seems to indicate, sadly, that rumors of atrocities by our soldiers are greatly exaggerated.

OUTRAGED at this possible incident

Outraged at something that MIGHT have happened?

Better off Blind, where is YOUR outrage at something that DID happen, like the jihadis butchering our two soldiers? Your hypocrisy is laughable.

U.S. troops raped, killed Iraqi woman and her family?
posted at 12:26 pm on June 30, 2006 by Allahpundit

Allegedly, and then burned her body to destroy the evidence. Five stand accused, and according to a source, one of them’s confessed. Good Chris…

More U.S. soldiers accused of mass murder in Iraq. It’s time for General Casey to go. Not because of the alleged mass murder, but because it looks like the U.S. is taking these types of allegations far too seriously and……

Five U.S. soldiers are being investigated for the alleged rape and murder of an Iraqi girl and her family:

Forbes—Five U.S. Army soldiers are being investigated for allegedly raping a young woman, then killing her and three members of her family …