B. wrote:
> Wow, Sy Hersh rushes to World Burns to Death's
> defense. But, like Doug asked, "Why not blame civilian
> bosses instead"?
>
> Over *600,000* dead in Iraq because of the US, right?
>
First, it would be factually incorrect to directly attribute the majority of violent deaths in Iraq since the invasion directly to US or coalition forces. The Lancet article with the 654,965 deaths estimate, states that "The proportion of deaths ascribed to coalition forces has diminished in 2006, although the actual numbers have increased every year. [...] Deaths attributable to the coalition accounted for 31% [...] of post-invasion violent deaths."
But, why is it either blame the civilian bosses OR the soldiers? Definitely there should be a gradient scale of blame, and many of the US soldiers serving in Iraq may feel that they were forced into the situation and have no choice, but soldiers DO have a choice at every moment (as we all do). For those soldiers in Iraq who actually agree with the Bush Admin policies, then, excuse me, but if they get popped, that is their problem. For the others, who have problems with what they are doing, but do it anyway...it may be a difficult decision to refuse and take the consequences of going to jail, being court martialed and receiving a level of social ostracizing, but that just means that they continue to do what they do because it is the easier thing to do. How anyone can justify continuing to do something that they find ethically problematic, which includes possibly killing others and/or getting killed, I don't really understand, and I also refuse to accept any argument that they didn't do it by choice.
This is very parallel to the issue of refusal in the Israeli situation.
Now, we can feel sorry for them on a human level as individuals who are put, or put themselves, in very difficult situations, but there is no logical reason whatsoever to support them as troops in an imperialist war with huge levels of war crimes and atrocity.
I had relatives that were called up for Miluiim during the recent war in Lebanon (and also other idiocies in Gaza and the Wes Bank) and went, even though they had apprehensions about the correctness of the military's actions. I said right to their faces, "You know I love you, but what you are doing is wrong, and even more wrong because you know it is wrong, so if you get your ass killed or get fucked up the rest of your live because you end up killing someone and leave your children fatherless, it is your own fuckin' fault."
Bryan