30 Grand a month AND you get to rape young Arab men with impunity!

[scottxyz]

Why become a priest when you can work as a US mercenary* and rape young Iraqi men without getting punished?

One civilian contractor was accused of raping a young, male prisoner but has not been charged because military law has no jurisdiction over him.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,2763,1206725,00.html

When's HBO or ShowTime gonna do a series on THAT? It'll be HOT! It's so nice to live in the center of the Empire!


* "Civilian conractors" (formerly known as "mercenaries") are being paid monthly 30,000 US dollars. I imagine it must be cash, given that a planeload holding $550,000,000 in small bills gets flown into Iraq every month. Gee it's fun when you can just print the stuff up!

[fsbooks]

1. All mercenaries in iraq should be declared "enemy combatants"

n/t

[ET Awful]

4. I was actually thinking something along those lines the other day . . .

They meet the same criteria. They aren't part of an organized military. They aren't wearing uniforms. They aren't wearing insignia. They don't have a conventional chain of command.

So what's the difference between them and Gitmo detainees?

[Hong Kong Cavalier]

2. "Mercs Gone Wild"?

Hrm...the freepers would be all over that.

[aldebaran]

3. Saddam's rape rooms live on

Sheesh

[donsu]

5. well, somebody's Law has jurisdiction over him

even if Military doesn't.

[zbdent]

6. Yeah. The same "somebody" whose law allowed Saddam and Hitler

to gas a bunch of people.

[Aidoneus]

8. it may run afoul of the laws of the resistance

If the faces become known to them and the offender sticks around long enough, justice may be served at some point. Besides that, don't expect the Bush regime's apparatus to go out on any limb unless this becomes a PR disaster in need of a quick superficial fix (which is all the recent "reprimands" were--if somebody hadn't said "WHAT IN THE HOLY FUCK?!" at the pictures NOTHING would have been done about it aside from a quiet coverup).

[truthspeaker]

9. Yeah, the Geneva Conventions, which we signed.

We're his employer so we're responsible for his conduct. On the other hand, since he's not in the military there's no reason not to hand him over to the ICC. If I were him I'd go to the Hague and turn myself in because of the Iraqis catch him they'll tear him apart.

[Yavonne]

7. Wow. A twofer

[chookie]

10. How Japan treated their captured mercenaries last week

Remember the 3 who were kidnapped by the Iraqis, and threatened with death unless Japan withdrew from?

When they were released, they were not given the "yellow ribbon and teddy bears" treatment, but were castigated and fined.

Good.

These SOBs signed up for big bucks to do jobs any Iraqi can do. They are not soldiers, and they have not taken an oath of loyalty to our country.

But when they get in trouble -- our men and women in uniform have to die to save them. This pisses me off! There is enough trouble over there, enough fires to put out, than having to rescue fools.

Japan had the right approach -- punish these people for their greed and stupidity, for their role in almost starting an internnational incident and threatening the whole coalition and mission.

[plurality]

11. hello

Those Japanese prisoners were peace activists and journalists not mercenaries. Try reading a bit more, it does wonders.

http://www.cnn.com/2004/WORLD/meast/04/15/iraq.hostages.japan/

Arab television station Al-Jazeera on Thursday showed footage of the trio -- identified as volunteer workers Noriaki Imai, 18, Nahoko Takato, 34, and photojournalist Soichiro Koriyama, 32 -- sitting on sofas and arm chairs in a Baghdad office.