U.S. commander in Iraq says troops facing revenge attacks (3 New on Wed)

[Khephra]

U.S. commander in Iraq says troops facing revenge attacks; three attacks on Americans north of Baghdad

By Tarek Al-Issawi, Associated Press, 9/17/2003 05:27

BAGHDAD, Iraq (AP) The commander of the U.S.-led coalition in Iraq said in an interview published Wednesday that U.S. forces, already under pressure from a guerrilla-style resistance, now face revenge attacks from ordinary Iraqis angered by the occupation.

North of Baghdad, there were at least three separate attacks on U.S. forces with roadside bombs in less than 1½ hours Wednesday morning. Witnesses reported injured soldiers, but details were unclear. The attacks hit U.S. Humvees about 12 miles north of Baghdad near al-Taji.

While U.S. forces increasingly patrol Iraqi hotspots with American-trained local militiamen, citizens voice growing anger with tactics that are seen as heavy-handed and insensitive to Iraqi social and religious customs.

''We have seen that when we have an incident in the conduct of our operations, when we killed an innocent civilian, based on their ethic, their values, their culture, they would seek revenge,'' Lt. Gen. Ricardo Sanchez was quoted as telling The Times newspaper in London.

more

http://www.boston.com/dailynews/260/world/U_S_commander_in_Iraq_says_tro:.shtml

[IndianaGreen]

1. Welcome to the Middle East boys!

A blood feud you wanted, a blood feud you got, just ask the Israelis how their occupation of Palestine is coming along and you will see what is coming your way.

Had the US accepted France's UN proposal, our troops would be home by this Thansgiving and the people of Iraq would have their own government. Bush turned the French down because it would have meant abandoning all those lucrative contracts Paul Bremmer gave to the likes of Halliburton.

To the Bush regime, blood is cheaper than oil!

[saigon68]

2. The MIC ( Moron in Charge) failed to consider this suggestion

In spite of numerous examples to the contrary of what would happen.

His unwillingness to change will bring about the deaths of thousands of innocent civilians and hundreds, possibly thousands of U.S military members (especially after the next Beirut happens)

[0007]

3. Did this fucking U.S. Commander just get out of bed?

Or was it Beetle Baily speaking?

[tabasco]

12. Rummy's Hand-picked Commander

One of those remaining after the disloyal generals were purged. We fired our greatest military minds to ensure goose-stepping to Rummy's tune. The victims are the rank and file soldiers, who now labor under commanders who care more about their careers than the troops.

[teryang]

4. How about based upon human nature...

...they would seek revenge? Ordinary Iraqis risk their lives to set improvised explosive devices to kill Americans. Contrary to the 911 mythology, before the invasion the overwhelming majority of Arab peoples loathed Americans for our middle east policies. International poll results showing this were reported widely.

But the facts were ignored in favor of the total falsehood that we would be welcomed as liberators. The lying and corrupt charlatans in our illegitimate junta want to be rewarded with more resources for their ill conceived and diastrous policies. Now that we have set about systematically killing Arabs in a fraudulent and illegal war of conquest, they are moved as a people to kill us. Neocon ideologues committed to Israel, have placed Americans in the same unethical and insane position, by choice. What a suprise.

Weak willed and poorly informed leaders in response say we must give the 87 billion dollars now to do more of this fine work. The first 70 billion wasn't enough to destroy a country already on its knees from years of bombing and sanctions. Democrats in Congress say we are going completely and diastrously broke but we must stay in Iraq even though it will destroy the great Democratic legacy since FDR. This Pentagon is already costing the nation more than at the height of the Vietnam war. Can anyone remember the economic aftermath?

[ze_dscherman]

5. I never took off the "No war in Iraq" sign

It was evident for any straight minded person that this war was not finished May 1st.


What a senseless waste of lifes.

[tabasco]

13. I wonder what happened to MSRNC's "Wall Of Heroes"?????

I guess they aren't heroes after "Mission Accomplished."

[TacticalPeek]

6. If the situation were reversed, I guess Lt. Gen. Ricardo Sanchez

would just smile and throw roses at the occupiers killing his friends and relatives? Must be his kulture.

[Tracer]

7. Gen. Sanchez ...

... is obviously a victim of the Peter Principle.

[Dhalgren]

8. I say this to anyone who says we have to "stay the course"

and "finish the job". Fuck you! We should load up and get out. Now! Everyone one knows that whenever we do eventually get out, it will be with our tail between our legs and a shattered country before and behind us! We need to get our maccho heads out of our lying ass and leave now! There is nothing we can do but make things worse by staying. We have to leave, as in start loading up today, start flyingout tonight! To hell with all this "we broke it we fix it" bullshit! US OUT OF IRAQ!!

[JohnyCanuck]

9. Stan Goff agrees.

It Was the Oil and It Is Like Vietnam
By STAN GOFF

If, as a child, I had told lies as transparent as this administration's, Mother would have sent me out to the privet hedge to get her a switch. But white America (Let's be clear here. The Republican Party's single unifying principle is white supremacy.) finds the real world just too much to bear, and so clings desperately to the skirts of its simplified, racialized world view . That's why even "liberal" white America finds itself incapable of perceiving the Iraqis as capable of self-governance, and now calls for a UN occupation, imagined under the direction of European-extracted officials bearing the white man's burden now recoded as "democratization"

<snip>

Rumsfeld's Defense Policy Board has usurped the Department of Defense, just like Lyndon Johnson's Defense Secretary Robert McNamara's "whiz kids" that oversaw the Vietnam defeat. If McNamara was Johnson's bad counsel, Rumsfeld appears to be Bush's Rasputin. Another flim-flam artist, with his silly robo-war doctrine. Even the generals despise this arrogant pretender. The generals apparently still remember Vietnam, about which Bush's cabinet has experienced a deep amnesia, but even they--especially they--will protect their careers and remain largely silent as they are led into the swamp.

Perhaps we need to revisit some good advice from Vietnam. When asked how we could get out of Vietnam, one simple answer was tragically ignnored: With ships and airplanes. The Iraqis--a talented people with 5,000 years of experience in civilization--are more qualified to determine their own future, however painful that process may be, than Bush's cabinet, or the UN for that matter. End the occupation. Bring the troops home now.

http://www.counterpunch.org/goff09152003.html

[Dhalgren]

10. Thanks,

this is a great article and says pretty much what I feel. Each day we stay in Iraq, is a crime against the Iraqis and against the American people - the latter just don't know it yet.

[wtmusic]

18. You're right, but it won't happen

It would be conceding defeat for * and would sink him in 2004. So basically what we have is a situation where American (and Iraqi) lives are paying for *'s reelection chances.

If * was to leave Iraq tomorrow, he would actually (unbeknownst to him) salvage an iota of his reputation for history.

It'll never happen.

[underpants]

11. BREAKING:Sun to rise in the East, Taxes due annually

No Shi'ite Sherlock

[Junkdrawer]

19. Translation: The "Saddam Loyalists and Foreign Terrorists" line...

was getting so ridiculous, that the US press was becoming even more of a laughing stock in the eyes of the world than they already are.

[study_war_no_more]

20. 37,000 civialians had family members it seems

gonna be hard to round them all up and send them to cuba, gonna take a long long long time...

[denverbill]

14. I say "Bring it on!!!" n/t

[gratuitous]

15. Gee, you kill an innocent civilian

And it's "their culture" that dictates that "they would seek revenge," is it Lt. Gen. Sanchez? Did you have a second helping of extra stupid before The Times came calling for an interview?

[Dhalgren]

16. And didn't some "American" soldiers

have "revenge" posters in their tents and tanks regarding 9/11 (even though Iraq had nothing to od with it!). What "culture" are they from?

[wtmusic]

17. Revenge? Whatever for?

[Aristus]

21. Yeah, we only murdered ten thousand innocent civilians and are

now robbing their country of its one precious resource. What could they possibly want revenge for? :grr:

[saigon68]

22. Gen Sanchez decided to get naked and use a stick

To beat up two nests filled with hornets. Now he's crying like the little baby he is.

Its real brave to sit behind hundreds of armed bullies, and whine your sorry ass off about terrorists and other like minded foreigners who want to kick you in the same ass.