US troops 'won't attend inquests' [Archive]

E.J.Armstrong

30th August 2007, 10:16 AM

Those.

Are you familiar with all of the treaties, MOUs, and status of forces agreements between US and UK military and political organs on shared resources, both in NATO and on a purely "special relationship" basis?

I rather doubt it.

No, it was to point to your glass half empty attitude. Coalition forces in Iraq and Afghanistan routinely cover each other's backs on taking care of the wounded, medevac, etc. Not that you care. Funny how the soldiers in the field "get on with it" while the peanut gallery pisses and moans.

Your sovereign, internal administrative processes are binding on your citizens. If a formal request for extradition is made, see above, the usual protocols will doubtless be in place. Note, for future reference, that US citizens are not bound by your domestic laws (unless in the UK), they are bound by the lawful intergovernmental agreements between our nations. A pity you don't care to endorse the lawful and generally friendly discourse between our two governments, and nations, but instead whinge and moan.

Friendly fire, isn't. The Special Relationship is still there. (Churchill's original bon mot on the Special Relationship as a ref)

Given that your OP was an emotive mini rant, and not a rational observation, I suspect you ought to look in the mirror when you say that, EJ.
Statement of fact.

Emotional bullspit. That short and bitter comment is embedded assumptions and assignment of value made by you, and attribution of emotion to another party based on your emotional reaction to the original statement of fact.

You expect other than derision for that tripe? Troll bait, at best.

DR
I am happy to state that it is time for all the US military currently in all UK territory to leave, bar none, given the contempt that the US miliutary has shown both for the lives of our soldiers and their familes and our citizens.
In case you still don't understand let me repeat. Every single US military person should be barred from every single British territory. I hope that is plain enough or do you want me to repeat it again?

Once again you choose to invent claims about me that you consistently fail to back up with facts but plus ca change. That seems to be your MO and it says more about you than I possibly could.

Once again you hurl personal abuse as a sign of the paucity of rational argument or actual facts.

We are not talking here about extradition. We are talking about witnesses to help the families of the dead killed by the US military understand what happened. It is total contempt for the lives of our servicemen and their families to issue a blanket refusal to consider requests to attend inquests or to supply relevant material. It is cowardly in the extreme and clearly shows the US military running scared of the consequences of their own actions.

I am afraid that the British people now realise that a with many other countries such as Canada the relationship only benefits the US and with the fact that the US military has adopted abhorrent values it is time to remove them from all UK territories forthwith. It is time for the UK government to look after UK interests.

Your contributions seem to be based on the assumption that the US can treat its allies or any country in whatever way it choses and we all just have to lump it. I trust it will only be a short while before the US military is ejected from all UK territories. Having been ejected if the US military requests to make use of our territories on a one off basis I am sure our government will consider every request on its merits instead of issuing blanket refusals as your military has done to all our soldiers it kills. I would have no problem with that approach.

I believe that is a reasonable response to the abhorrent organisation the US military has become. You need to realise that spouting emotional verbiage and hurling personal abuse at people who call for the removal of the US military from their territory based on the actions of the US military, does nothing to change the position of those people because it simply confirms their opinion of the contempt the US has for the people of the UK. It appears you don't realise that yet.

You expect anything other than derision for your 'contribution'? Troll bait at best.

Ziggurat

30th August 2007, 10:30 AM

It is total contempt for the lives of our servicemen and their families to issue a blanket refusal to consider requests to attend inquests or to supply relevant material.

This is, quite frankly, a lie. Nothing in the story you linked to indicates any blanket refusal to provide information to inquests. There is furthermore nothing in the story you linked to which indicates US servicemen are not available to UK MOD investigators. So what I'm wondering is, why aren't the MOD investigations sufficient? If they aren't, isn't the problem then with the MOD? Oh, but that doesn't place the blame where you want it. Too bad. Grow up.

Your contributions seem to be based on the assumption that the US can treat its allies or any country in whatever way it choses and we all just have to lump it.

Agreements about force cooperation generally happen on the national level. Despite your histrionics, it is not unreasonable for the US military to want actions involving their servicemen to be handled by their counterparts within the UK. And that would be the MOD, not local coroners. If you're not happy with that arrangement, perhaps the people you need to complain to are the ones in the UK who agreed to it.

geni

30th August 2007, 10:47 AM

Likely? Maybe. But that's just speculation on your part. Which is part of my point. You're speculating, getting upset about a percieved double standard when you don't actually know whether or not it is a double standard.

If a british troop was a witness to a crime or other event resulting in a court case but the UK army refused arrange for him to attend the court what would you say the US reaction would be?

Which isn't nothing.

It is because it show that the UK goverment is extreamly comitted to helping with US legal procedings.

geni

30th August 2007, 10:53 AM

good.

Not really. If it were an effect of that it would be terminaly stupid one since the legal procedure is subnational.

geni

30th August 2007, 10:56 AM

The US will not send the soldiers for fear of them being arrested.

Doubtful there isn't really any way for that to happen. It isn't illegal to make a mistake in a warzone.

Ziggurat

30th August 2007, 11:08 AM

If a british troop was a witness to a crime or other event resulting in a court case

A crime is not the same thing as an event resulting in a court case. There is no accusation on the part of the UK or the coroner that a crime took place. Absent that, let's not try to compare it to hypotheticals which do not apply.

but the UK army refused arrange for him to attend the court what would you say the US reaction would be?

I wouldn't be surprised if people were upset. I would be surprised, and I wouldn't agree with them, if people were calling for the sort of extreme response that E.J. is calling for, and I wouldn't automatically attribute that refusal to the worst callousness. But then, I'm not E.J., thank goodness.

geni

30th August 2007, 02:24 PM

A crime is not the same thing as an event resulting in a court case. There is no accusation on the part of the UK or the coroner that a crime took place. Absent that, let's not try to compare it to hypotheticals which do not apply.

The coroner can rule that something was an unlawful killing however that ruleing awaits the completeion of the case.

Darat

30th August 2007, 02:40 PM

ImaginalDisc

30th August 2007, 03:01 PM

Darth Rotor

30th August 2007, 05:15 PM

I am happy to state that it is time for all the US military currently in all UK territory to leave, bar none, given the contempt that the US miliutary has shown both for the lives of our soldiers and their familes and our citizens.
You have just demonstrated your contempt for US military personnel based on a gross gneralization.
Once again you hurl personal abuse as a sign of the paucity of rational argument or actual facts.
I now rest my case, on the pot kettle charge.

You posted flame bait, you got the flame, and we'll get nowhere further on this topic, I suspect. Does drinking bitter make you bitter? Maybe a switch to ale is in order.

DR

geni

30th August 2007, 05:19 PM

You have just demonstrated your contempt for US military personnel based on a gross gneralization.

Not really. The complaint and suggested responce relate to the army as a unit not as a collection of individuals. Given the comand structure this is not unreasonable.

Darth Rotor

30th August 2007, 05:20 PM

It is regrettable that there is this apparent blanket refusal to co-operate with the UK on this matter. All that has been requested by the coroner is that the military personal involved (and other relevant military personal) appear to give evidence so that a fair determination as to how the death(s) occurred.

No one has suggested that this is about arresting anyone or subjecting non-UK citizens to any legal process beyond giving evidence. Indeed the lack of co-operation goes beyond that in that the USA military has refused to provide documentary evidence even at the request of the UK government.
Funny, you said something similar to what EJ said, but you weren't an asshat about it.

Fancy that.

I think that the special relationship, see my ref to Churchill above, ought to allow for a protocol that could satisfy the concerns of both parties. My experience with the special relationship on a different (much lower) level tells me that it can, in many cases, sort out all manner of snags.

That it does not seem to be happening in this case indicates the usual suspect: a political motivation. The attribution of all manner of malice to "the US military" as some monolithic demon is nonsensical.

DR

Darth Rotor

30th August 2007, 05:23 PM

Not really. The complaint and suggested responce relate to the army as a unit not as a collection of individuals. Given the comand structure this is not unreasonable.
I see what you are saying, but how about you read EJ's words?
I am happy to state that it is time for all the US military currently in all UK territory to leave, bar none, given the contempt that the US miliutary
You got that wrong.

DR

Foster Zygote

30th August 2007, 05:38 PM

Coalition forces in Iraq and Afghanistan routinely cover each other's backs on taking care of the wounded, medevac, etc.

My brother-in-law is a Green Beret who has done two tours of Iraq. He speaks very highly of the SAS.

geni

31st August 2007, 12:06 AM

I see what you are saying, but how about you read EJ's words?

You got that wrong.

DR

Nope. You've missed that you can use the word troops while still complaining about the actions of the organisation.

E.J.Armstrong

31st August 2007, 02:30 AM

This is, quite frankly, a lie. Nothing in the story you linked to indicates any blanket refusal to provide information to inquests. There is furthermore nothing in the story you linked to which indicates US servicemen are not available to UK MOD investigators. So what I'm wondering is, why aren't the MOD investigations sufficient? If they aren't, isn't the problem then with the MOD? Oh, but that doesn't place the blame where you want it. Too bad. Grow up.

Agreements about force cooperation generally happen on the national level. Despite your histrionics, it is not unreasonable for the US military to want actions involving their servicemen to be handled by their counterparts within the UK. And that would be the MOD, not local coroners. If you're not happy with that arrangement, perhaps the people you need to complain to are the ones in the UK who agreed to it.

If you wish to call your own straw men lies feel free but it demonstrates more adequately than I could that you regard yourself as a liar.

Now for the facts - that I am sure you are quite aware of: -
The BBC reported the following in the link I provided: -

"I find the decision of the US authorities not to allow the relevant persons to attend to give evidence, or to themselves provide full transcripts of questions those people were asked during the Friendly Fire Investigation Board, hard to understand."
It is quite clear that the US military refused to provide the information requested. It is quite clear that the US military refused to allow the responsible people to attend the inquest.

As well as hurling personal abuse, which incidentally, appears to be a characteristic of those defending the unacceptable actions of the US military, you claim the US military prefers the matter to be handled by their counterparts in the UK. If so why did it barred them from releasing relevant information to families of the dead killed by the US military.

You also bizarrely claim that the people to blame for the contemptible policy of the US military are not those responsible for the refusal but those to whom it was conveyed. You just cannot make this stuff up.

It appears that US military personnel can present themselves at 2000 feet and kill our soldiers but at ground level will runs away from the families of allies it has killed. Not very brave is it?

As US military personnel persistently run away in the face of friendly questioning by British authorities after killing our soldiers the US military should not be allowed to station any military personnel on British territories.

E.J.Armstrong

31st August 2007, 02:44 AM

You have just demonstrated your contempt for US military personnel based on a gross gneralization.

I now rest my case, on the pot kettle charge.

You posted flame bait, you got the flame, and we'll get nowhere further on this topic, I suspect. Does drinking bitter make you bitter? Maybe a switch to ale is in order.

DR
I am afraid that you are wrong once again.

My opinion is not based merely upon this one case as you would have found if you had actually read my second post.

The case of running away in the face of friendly questioning is merely one aspect of the organisation the US military has become. It is now a vehicle for torture of untried suspects and running concentration camps. I believe it no longer shares the values of most British people and can see no reason for it to be allowed to remain on British soil.

I am more than happy for the US to request to use UK territory for specific short term projects and am happy for our government to asses each request ion its merits.

I am afraid I will take no lessons from a poster who resorts so easily to personal abuse as a substitute for rational argument. You might be taken more seriously if you refrained from hurling emotional abuse every time you don't like what someone is saying. Incidentally, the US military is still running away in the face of friendly questioning.

Ziggurat

31st August 2007, 07:35 AM

Now for the facts - that I am sure you are quite aware of: -
The BBC reported the following in the link I provided: -

"I find the decision of the US authorities not to allow the relevant persons to attend to give evidence, or to themselves provide full transcripts of questions those people were asked during the Friendly Fire Investigation Board, hard to understand."
It is quite clear that the US military refused to provide the information requested.

But you didn't merely claim that the US refused to provide requested information. You claimed:
It is total contempt for the lives of our servicemen and their families to issue a blanket refusal to consider requests to attend inquests or to supply relevant material.
But there is no blanket refusal to provide information. Only a refusal to provide this particular information in this particular case.

You also bizarrely claim that the people to blame for the contemptible policy of the US military are not those responsible for the refusal but those to whom it was conveyed.

The MOD did not simply convey this information. The MOD has agreements with the US DOD concerning what to do in these sorts of situations. If the terms of the agreement are not satisfactory to you, damn straight the MOD has responsibility for that. And since that's who you have a chance to affect, why aren't your complaints directed at them? Because it wouldn't soothe your juvenile rage.

Darth Rotor

31st August 2007, 08:50 AM

I am more than happy for the US to request to use UK territory for specific short term projects and am happy for our government to asses each request ion its merits.
A nice rational statement. I imagine you are in contact with your MP pursuant that aim. Best of luck in your efforts to change policy.
I am afraid I will take no lessons from a poster who resorts so easily to personal abuse as a substitute for rational argument. You might be taken more seriously if you refrained from hurling emotional abuse every time you don't like what someone is saying. Incidentally, the US military is still running away in the face of friendly questioning.
It isn't what you say, EJ, its how you say it: your sloppy, inaccurate statements, and emotive choice of germs, leads to your post's receiving other than a warm reception. You come looking for a fight, you get what seek.

Note my response to Darat.

Clean up your act, and you'll get more credit for being other than someone posting flame bait. If you won't take lessons, then what in the Sam Hill are you doing on an Educational Foundation's forum, if you refuse education in simple communication skills? The art of pesuasion to your side is not in evidence in your hot headed language.
As US military personnel persistently run away in the face of friendly questioning by British authorities after killing our soldiers the US military should not be allowed to station any military personnel on British territories.
Oh, yeah, I forgot, you are too busy posting emotionally phrased and imprecise flame bait to learn anything, from anyone, who does not agree with you. (Hey, I can do the EJ tango too. See how easy it is?)

As you were.

DR

Darth Rotor

31st August 2007, 09:04 AM

Nope. You've missed that you can use the word troops while still complaining about the actions of the organisation.
You do not seem to be reading the same words I am reading.
The US military now supports torture and other activities that are abhorrent to the people of the UK
Am I to belive that you will excuse this falsehood as well? That the organization supports torture, rather than punishes such violations of regulation? How do account for the Abu Ghraib case, which was a punative case underway when it came to light, in comparison to the false statement of EJ? Broad brush wankerage, for fifty, Albion. :p

To be fair, the latter part (more precisely stated as "many of the people of the UK") ins't much to disagree with, given that considerable public UK sentiment has been expressed to support the general theme expressed.

Oh, melodrama in word choice noted. Appeals to emotion standard fare.

DR

E.J.Armstrong

31st August 2007, 10:16 AM

But you didn't merely claim that the US refused to provide requested information. You claimed:

But there is no blanket refusal to provide information. Only a refusal to provide this particular information in this particular case.

The MOD did not simply convey this information. The MOD has agreements with the US DOD concerning what to do in these sorts of situations. If the terms of the agreement are not satisfactory to you, damn straight the MOD has responsibility for that. And since that's who you have a chance to affect, why aren't your complaints directed at them? Because it wouldn't soothe your juvenile rage.
In the Feb 1991 case where the US militarty killed 9 of our soldiers the following site http://observer.guardian.co.uk/print/0,,329705451-102285,00.html reports

'But perhaps nothing will ever change. Anne Leech, whose 20-year-old son Keven died in the 1991 A-10 attack, said: 'We couldn't get anything from the Americans.'

If, as you claim, the ban only relates to this case why did the same thing happen in the other case where many more of our soldiers were killed? The US military has form when it comes to running away from friendly questions.

Its interesting that you seem incapable of constructing a post response without hurling abuse. You must be right after all truth only depends upon how much abuse you hurl. You really will only be taken seriously when you find it possible to debate rationally.

You also continue to persist in the bizarre claim that those responsible for not providing information are not to blame for their actions. Is it really now the case that the US military will not take responsibility for its own demands as well as running away from friendly questions. Weird.

E.J.Armstrong

31st August 2007, 10:25 AM

A nice rational statement. I imagine you are in contact with your MP pursuant that aim. Best of luck in your efforts to change policy.
I will don't worry. Thank you for wishing me well.

It isn't what you say, EJ, its how you say it: your sloppy, inaccurate statements, and emotive choice of germs, leads to your post's receiving other than a warm reception. You come looking for a fight, you get what seek.

Note my response to Darat.
I really won't take lessons ijn how to debate from someone who cannot seem to construct a post without hurling personal abuse. You really will only start to be taken seriously when you learn to debate properly.

Clean up your act, and you'll get more credit for being other than someone posting flame bait. If you won't take lessons, then what in the Sam Hill are you doing on an Educational Foundation's forum, if you refuse education in simple communication skills? The art of pesuasion to your side is not in evidence in your hot headed language.
Nope I still don't think it is appropriate to take advice from those, like you, who apparently cannot control themselves. I suggest that you look at your own posts on this thread and try and spot any where you did not hurl personal abuse at me and you have the cheek to try and tell others how to behave That you are unable to control your abuse hurling is your problem, not mine. Capiche?

Oh, yeah, I forgot, you are too busy posting emotionally phrased and imprecise flame bait to learn anything, from anyone, who does not agree with you. (Hey, I can do the EJ tango too. See how easy it is?)

As you were.

DR
I note that you failed to specify one so-called imprecise flame bait but plus ca change. Your absurd and emotional abuse hurling in defence of an organisation that runs away from friendly questioning is discreditible.

geni

31st August 2007, 10:28 AM

Am I to belive that you will excuse this falsehood as well?

I understand that the majority of activities at Guantánamo Bay are within army policy. Some consider some of them to fall within the definition of torture.

Darth Rotor

31st August 2007, 10:29 AM

In the Feb 1991 case where the US militarty killed 9 of our soldiers the following site http://observer.guardian.co.uk/print/0,,329705451-102285,00.html reports

'But perhaps nothing will ever change. Anne Leech, whose 20-year-old son Keven died in the 1991 A-10 attack, said: 'We couldn't get anything from the Americans.'

If, as you claim, the ban only relates to this case why did the same thing happen in the other case where many more of our soldiers were killed? The US military has form when it comes to running away from friendly questions.

Its interesting that you seem incapable of constructing a post response without hurling abuse. You must be right after all truth only depends upon how much abuse you hurl. You really will only be taken seriously when you find it possible to debate rationally.

You also continue to persist in the bizarre claim that those responsible for not providing information are not to blame for their actions. Is it really now the case that the US military will not take responsibility for its own demands as well as running away from friendly questions. Weird.
EJ, this is a serious question.

Have you inquired, of your own government, why a suitable protocol has not been worked out that will lend to a more likely participation by those whose presence is invited to the inquest?

It is well to remember that each blue on blue event is subject to a joint investigation by the Coalition chain of command. IIRC, that information is usually available to the public, or can be with a formal request. Since the service member has already participated in a formal investigation regarding the blue on blue, and may in some cases be charged and under investigation by the US government (recall the case of the four Canadians back in 2001 where the two USAF pilots were taken to court martial) a practical question (not an objection, mind you, a question) can be raised:

What do you hope to achieve, and what info do you expect to glean, that has not already been gleaned in the formal investigation undertaken by the UK and US armed forces as soon as the blue on blue happens? What, other than information sharing, can one expect to take place at such an event?

The coroner said at the time: "I find the decision of the US authorities not to allow the relevant persons to attend to give evidence, or to themselves provide full transcripts of questions those people were asked during the Friendly Fire Investigation Board, hard to understand."
The article does say the US Department of State (huh?) is investigating the incident. If the US military isn't investigating it, I'm a radish. It seems that he is either impatient for a response for a request for transcripts, has asked for one and been denied (that's a surprise, and he is right to be frustrated by that) or there is info being witheld pending the completion of a criminal investigation in the case. There is quite a bit here that is open to question. I find it difficult to understand how a Joint investigation, and its unclassified (????) results would not be available to a formal request through channels. I don't think it is unreasonable for him to ask for the releasable transcripts, from his own government, of any Joint investigation undertaken in the field by Coalition military authorities.

If those transcripts are released (unknown if that will come about) what then would be the purpose of attendance at the inquest?

DR

E.J.Armstrong

31st August 2007, 10:38 AM

Y

Am I to belive that you will excuse this falsehood as well? That the organization supports torture, rather than punishes such violations of regulation? How do account for the Abu Ghraib case, which was a punative case underway when it came to light, in comparison to the false statement of EJ? Broad brush wankerage, for fifty, Albion. :p

To be fair, the latter part (more precisely stated as "many of the people of the UK") ins't much to disagree with, given that considerable public UK sentiment has been expressed to support the general theme expressed.

Oh, melodrama in word choice noted. Appeals to emotion standard fare.

DR
See http://psychoanalystsopposewar.org/blog/2007/05/08/strong-support-for-torture-among-us-military-in-iraq-a-corollary-of-occupation/

The torture at Guantanamo Bay. See Myth number 5 from http://www.hrw.org/campaigns/guantanamo/2007/myths.htm
For the FBI on Guantanamo see http://www.abc.net.au/news/newsitems/200701/s1821091.htm

If Darth Rotor wants to declare something to be a lie he might at least find something to support his assertions. Simply because he decides that something is untrue doesn't make it so.

Seems he still can't compose a post without hurling personal abuse. Sort of seems to be his military MO. Brave or what?

Darth Rotor

31st August 2007, 10:43 AM

I understand that the majority of activities at Guantánamo Bay are within army policy. Some consider some of them to fall within the definition of torture.
I will not derail this thread with a foray into Gitmo, and note that the CO of the prison there relieved four personnel for action that was against the rules, but was well short of torture.

Your speculation on the conduct there probably ought to rely on evidence, not innuendo.

DR

Darth Rotor

31st August 2007, 10:45 AM

See http://psychoanalystsopposewar.org/blog/2007/05/08/strong-support-for-torture-among-us-military-in-iraq-a-corollary-of-occupation/
An opinion piece. Rather pointless, and based on a survey with loaded questions. That said, the sentiment among troops in combat is not a surprise to me.

ETA: I note that a minority of the respondents indicated a positive, yet you still make your general claim. I'll find you a link for General P's remarks.
http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/library/policy/army/other/petraeus_values-msg_torture070510.htm
Some may argue that we would be more effective if we sanctioned torture or other expedient methods to obtain information from the enemy. They would be wrong. Beyond the basic fact that such actions are illegal, history shows that they also are frequently neither useful nor necessary. Certainly, extreme physical action can make someone "talk;" however, what the individual says may be of questionable value. In fact, our experience in applying the interrogation standards laid out in the Army Field Manual (2-22.3) on Human Intelligence Collector Operations that was published last year shows that the techniques in the manual work effectively and humanely in eliciting information from detainees.
Consider that a policy statement.

You conveniently fail to note also General Patreaus follow on guidance, made public, in response to this survey's results, that reinforces his policy, based in regulation, that does not so condone torture. Cherry picking, which with you is no surprise.
For the FBI on Guantanamo see http://www.abc.net.au/news/newsitems/200701/s1821091.htm
I see, the FBI is now part of the US military? Care to use facts, EJ?
Seems he still can't compose a post without hurling personal abuse. Sort of seems to be his military MO. Brave or what?
I note your continued asshattery. Quelle surprise.

If you can cite for me the US military regs that condone torture, I'll be very interested to discuss this further with you. Absent that, I'll not bother.

You will also note post #46, which rather puts the lie to your claim. It appears that we cross posted. It includes "serious question" in my salutation to you.

Stick to the facts, and you might get a welcome reception.

DR

geni

31st August 2007, 10:48 AM

EJ, this is a serious question.

Have you inquired, of your own government, why a suitable protocol has not been worked out that will lend to a more likely participation by those whose presence is invited to the inquest?

What kind of protocol would you suggest?

Changes of any significance would require an act of Parliment which is time consumeing. Worst case senario is that a few of the inquests get closed with open verdicts. So from the goverment's point of view it isn't worth bothering with if the likelyhood doesn't reach near 100%.

It would be less effort to pressure the US through say threatening use the 2016 opt out on Diego Garcia but there cost benifit isn't worth it there either.

It is well to remember that each blue on blue event is subject to a joint investigation by the Coalition chain of command. IIRC, that information is usually available to the public, or can be with a formal request.

UK freedom of information act tends to be more restictive than it's US equiv.

Since the service member has already participated in a formal investigation regarding the blue on blue, and may in some cases be charged and under investigation by the US government (recall the case of the four Canadians back in 2001 where the two USAF pilots were taken to court martial) a practical question (not an objection, mind you, a question) can be raised:

What do you hope to achieve, and what info do you expect to glean, that has not already been gleaned in the formal investigation undertaken by the UK and US armed forces as soon as the blue on blue happens? What, other than information sharing, can one expect to take place at such an event?

Legaly it would help the coroner come to the correct verdict. Technicaly the ruleing of unlawful killing could be made but in this case that would seem to be extreamly unlikely. Coroner's courts main function is information sharing in so far as they are meant to publicaly establish the circumstances around a person's death.

Darth Rotor

31st August 2007, 11:00 AM

What kind of protocol would you suggest?
That would need to come from the UK side, geni, since that is who wishes to see a change in the state of play.
Changes of any significance would require an act of Parliment which is time consumeing. Worst case senario is that a few of the inquests get closed with open verdicts.
What is the significance of that outcome? I am not familiar with the law/process on that.
So from the goverment's point of view it isn't worth bothering with if the likelyhood doesn't reach near 100%.
I think I understand.
It would be less effort to pressure the US through say threatening use the 2016 opt out on Diego Garcia but there cost benifit isn't worth it there either.
What would be the aim of that restriction? Display of dissasitisfaction?
UK freedom of information act tends to be more restictive than it's US equiv.
Thank you, I was not aware of that.
Legaly it would help the coroner come to the correct verdict. Technicaly the ruleing of unlawful killing could be made but in this case that would seem to be extreamly unlikely. Coroner's courts main function is information sharing in so far as they are meant to publicaly establish the circumstances around a person's death.
OK, perhaps, considering that summary, you can understand the reluctance to be put in double jeopardy. As I noted above, these incidents are already subject to formal investigations, to include findings of fault, and possible charges. I don't imagine anyone involved in such an event would feel confident in not being placed in double jeopardy of being charged with an unlawful death in the case of an accident on the battlefield.

Would you?

DR

geni

31st August 2007, 12:08 PM

That would need to come from the UK side, geni, since that is who wishes to see a change in the state of play.

No I was asking you personaly what changes you would suggest.

What is the significance of that outcome? I am not familiar with the law/process on that.

Depends on the case. It means that the court can't decide for some reason. In this case it would probably be a statement that they really need the US troops to testify.

What would be the aim of that restriction? Display of dissasitisfaction?

A bit more than a display. Would make a bit of a mess of the US's strategic deployment in that part of the world (would also have some domestic advantages in allowing the people who once lived there to go back).

US would have a choice between geting their troops to the court or haveing to find a new base with near zero security issues. Could be tricky.

Still a seriously bad move from the UK prospective.

Thank you, I was not aware of that.

UK does not have much of a tradition of open goverment. Open parliament yes goverment not so much.

OK, perhaps, considering that summary, you can understand the reluctance to be put in double jeopardy.

Coroner's courts can't prosecute anyone. If they rule for unlawful killing the crown prosecution service may decide to take up the matter but that is a seperate issue jurisdiction in this case would be questionable to say the least.

Darth Rotor

1st September 2007, 09:52 AM

No I was asking you personaly what changes you would suggest.
Since I am not privy to all of the details of why UK domestic law should be applied to a case outside of its jurisdiction, I am content that if this is an important enough issue to the UK government, at the national rather than local level, a detailed protocol that answers the question on double jeopardy might be worked out. Note this little matter that renders double jeopardy other than moot.
Coroner's courts can't prosecute anyone. If they rule for unlawful killing the crown prosecution service may decide to take up the matter but that is a seperate issue jurisdiction in this case would be questionable to say the least.
It is in the region between "doubtful" and "won't" that I think the perceived problem arises, as well as the lack of jurisdiction of UK rules beyond UK territory. Again, I'd be curious as to why the joint and/or separate US/UK military investigations (which may result in charges) do not suffice. At least in that case, where the two nations operate together, a protocol is already in place and a jurisdiction determined for issues that arise between the respective forces.

Since the event did not transpire in the UK, the local jurisdiction is moot. The request for participation, and at least for documentation, is contingent upon national government to national government agreements.
It means that the court can't decide for some reason. In this case it would probably be a statement that they really need the US troops to testify.
Would a deposition suffice? An afidavit?

Your other comments and points are appreciated, thanks. Putting the E into JREF. :)

DR

geni

1st September 2007, 11:37 AM

Since I am not privy to all of the details of why UK domestic law should be applied to a case outside of its jurisdiction, I am content that if this is an important enough issue to the UK government, at the national rather than local level, a detailed protocol that answers the question on double jeopardy might be worked out. Note this little matter that renders double jeopardy other than moot.

You are now asking for a change in UK criminal law to grant US service personal immunity from prosecution. Not going to happen any more than the US would do the reverse.

It is in the region between "doubtful" and "won't" that I think the perceived problem arises,

Not really. The CPS don't need Coroner's ruleing to prosecute someone. In fact normaly they will prosecute someone then the Coroner will stage their investigation and ruleing.

as well as the lack of jurisdiction of UK rules beyond UK territory.

Coroner's Jurisdiction kicks in once the body enters the UK. So legaly someone from the RAF would have to report that there was a body at RAF Brize Norton at which point the Coroner gets involved. If the bodies had never entered the UK it would not be a matter for the Coroner.

If a memeber of the US services were to die within England or Wales the Coroner could investigate the death.

Again, I'd be curious as to why the joint and/or separate US/UK military investigations (which may result in charges) do not suffice.

Because the UK is run by a civilian administration.

Thats the short answer anyway. Long answer involves about 900 years of English history (Scotland is of course a seperate issue).

At least in that case, where the two nations operate together, a protocol is already in place and a jurisdiction determined for issues that arise between the respective forces.

Actualy no. There is no common agreement on jurisdiction. Technicaly the case could fall under Afghan juristiction in so far as there could be charges against individuals.

Since the event did not transpire in the UK, the local jurisdiction is moot. The request for participation, and at least for documentation, is contingent upon national government to national government agreements.

Not exactly. Given the time this kind of thing takes it is not imposible that US troops could leave the service and attend of their own accord.

Would a deposition suffice? An afidavit?

That is a matter for the coroner. They appear to think not.

Darth Rotor

4th September 2007, 09:03 AM

You are now asking for a change in UK criminal law to grant US service personal immunity from prosecution. Not going to happen any more than the US would do the reverse.
Not hardly. The jurisdiction of the coroner is confined to the body in this case. (As you pointed out a few paras down.)
Coroner's Jurisdiction kicks in once the body enters the UK. So legaly someone from the RAF would have to report that there was a body at RAF Brize Norton at which point the Coroner gets involved. If the bodies had never entered the UK it would not be a matter for the Coroner.
Which means that the corpse is the sole matter under UK jurisdiction, and the complaint in the OP has to do with other parties.
If a memeber of the US services were to die within England or Wales the Coroner could investigate the death.
Agreed, and thank you for confirming that.
Because the UK is run by a civilian administration.
That does not answer the question. The coroner wants evidence, and a governmental body of the UK has acccess to evidentiary material. Thus the reference to the UK / US investigation into the matter. The claim, which may be false, is that what the coroner wants is evidence, and or testimoney that will provide evidence.
Thats the short answer anyway. Long answer involves about 900 years of English history (Scotland is of course a seperate issue).
Accepted as true.
Actualy no. There is no common agreement on jurisdiction. Technicaly the case could fall under Afghan juristiction in so far as there could be charges against individuals.
Insofar as the dead bodies, that depends upon the agreements the UK and Afghan governments are jointly parties to. Insofar as the living, that is generally governed by Status of Forces agreements.
Not exactly. Given the time this kind of thing takes it is not imposible that US troops could leave the service and attend of their own accord.
I see, you are demanding that US troops try to get out of multi year enlistment contracts for the convenience of a UK administrative procedure?

Methinks you are missing a few details. They are not subject to English law while in Afghanistan, which is why the coroner correctly requested their participation. He cannot, and quite correctly did not, demand it. See double jeopardy matters noted above for the rest.
That is a matter for the coroner. They appear to think not.
Your remark does not match the words in the article linked in the OP. If you go back and read that, you would see a reference late in the article that the coroner wanted evidence in written form, and was frustrated to not even be allowed that.

DR

geni

4th September 2007, 09:36 AM

Not hardly. The jurisdiction of the coroner is confined to the body in this case. (As you pointed out a few paras down.)

Which is why prosecution for any actions by US personel is not an issue in this case.

The US personell could say that they deliberately bombed them because they hate brits and the coroner still could not start legal proceedings against them.

Which means that the corpse is the sole matter under UK jurisdiction, and the complaint in the OP has to do with other parties.

Under the Coroner's Juristiction yes. The situation with regards to civil courts tends to be messy and best avoided.

That does not answer the question. The coroner wants evidence, and a governmental body of the UK has acccess to evidentiary material. Thus the reference to the UK / US investigation into the matter. The claim, which may be false, is that what the coroner wants is evidence, and or testimoney that will provide evidence.

No idea off hand how much power coroner's have to get evidence out of the goverment.

Insofar as the dead bodies, that depends upon the agreements the UK and Afghan governments are jointly parties to. Insofar as the living, that is generally governed by Status of Forces agreements.

No argument.

I see, you are demanding that US troops try to get out of multi year enlistment contracts for the convenience of a UK administrative procedure?

Only multi year? Princess Diana died over a decade ago. Still haven't finished the Coroner’s inquest (althought that has something to do with the french).

I wasn't demanding it. I was mearly adding it as something that could in theory happen.

Methinks you are missing a few details. They are not subject to English law while in Afghanistan, which is why the coroner correctly requested their participation. He cannot, and quite correctly did not, demand it. See double jeopardy matters noted above for the rest.

No a double jeopardy matter but other than that no argument.

Your remark does not match the words in the article linked in the OP. If you go back and read that, you would see a reference late in the article that the coroner wanted evidence in written form, and was frustrated to not even be allowed that.

DR

Ultimately up to the coroner what they ask for

Ziggurat

4th September 2007, 10:38 AM

What happens to a witness who refuses to answer a question by the coroner?

geni

4th September 2007, 12:18 PM

What happens to a witness who refuses to answer a question by the coroner?

Nothing although that may change at some point in the future.

Darth Rotor

5th September 2007, 09:45 AM

Nothing although that may change at some point in the future.
Just wanted to say a quick thank you for putting the E into JREF. I have learned some new things from you. Cheers. :)

DR

bigred

5th September 2007, 09:28 PM

Care to list those?

Lucky for my friend Nigel, Leftenant Commander, Royal Navy, a bit over ten years ago, when his ulcer and liver condition acted up and damn near killed him, he was rushed to the US military hospital in the foreign land where we served together and they took good care of him. IIRC Nigel's remark some weeks later as we shared a glass of brandy was (as close as I can recall his words, he was an eloquent chap)

"They took good care of me, for which I thank the largesse of the American taxpayer for building that hospital in this strange place."

Your penchant for extrapolating to the general from the specific is a consistent source of weakness in your posts. Does your wrist get sore from your continued use of the broad brush, or is it sore for the more usual reason?

LOL

I wish I had the patience (or perhaps even the talent most days) to respond to gibberish w/the eloquence you typically do and have in this thread generally. bravo

E.J.Armstrong

7th September 2007, 04:20 AM

EJ, this is a serious question.

Have you inquired, of your own government, why a suitable protocol has not been worked out that will lend to a more likely participation by those whose presence is invited to the inquest?

Let me treat this as a serious question then.
I have not enquired of my government why a suitable protocal has not been worked ourt because the US has declined to answer questions from our government on this matter and because the policy is not at the insistence of our government but at the insistence of the US military. It seems that you still blame the recipient of the policy rather than the author of the policy for the policy.

It is well to remember that each blue on blue event is subject to a joint investigation by the Coalition chain of command. IIRC, that information is usually available to the public, or can be with a formal request.
If this claim is true perhaps you could explain why the US military has refused to provide the details of those investigations contrary to your claim?

Since the service member has already participated in a formal investigation regarding the blue on blue, and may in some cases be charged and under investigation by the US government (recall the case of the four Canadians back in 2001 where the two USAF pilots were taken to court martial) a practical question (not an objection, mind you, a question) can be raised:

What do you hope to achieve, and what info do you expect to glean, that has not already been gleaned in the formal investigation undertaken by the UK and US armed forces as soon as the blue on blue happens? What, other than information sharing, can one expect to take place at such an event? I hope to achieve what the families want, namely the presence of the responsible US military personnel in front of a UK coroner to tell the family what they did and how their loved ones were killed. I want the US military to provide cockpit videos and full transcripts of the investigations carried out in the US. All the things that have been discussed in the links I posted. Your question assumes that all the information gleaned by the US military is somehow available to the families - it is not.

The article does say the US Department of State (huh?) is investigating the incident. If the US military isn't investigating it, I'm a radish. It seems that he is either impatient for a response for a request for transcripts, has asked for one and been denied (that's a surprise, and he is right to be frustrated by that) or there is info being witheld pending the completion of a criminal investigation in the case. There is quite a bit here that is open to question. I find it difficult to understand how a Joint investigation, and its unclassified (????) results would not be available to a formal request through channels. I don't think it is unreasonable for him to ask for the releasable transcripts, from his own government, of any Joint investigation undertaken in the field by Coalition military authorities.

If those transcripts are released (unknown if that will come about) what then would be the purpose of attendance at the inquest?

I am surprised that you can claim that it is a surprise that something was refused to a coroner when the US military has a track record of frustrating the request on these matters as demonstrated in the information I have posted. You do not seem to have read the links I have posted. The reason most of the material has not been made available is because of the demands of the US military. What exactly is wrong with your military personnel responsible for the deaths of our soldiers coming to tell their relatives what happened under friendly questioning?

I need to point out that the US military has, by its actions in this case, annoyed our government, our military, the people of the UK and has most importantly frustrated and annoyed the families of the people it has killed.

I fear that you do not understand that many people in this country no longer
trust the US government and/or the US military to carry out a proper investigation and feel that they no longer share the values of the people of the UK.

E.J.Armstrong

7th September 2007, 12:35 PM

An opinion piece. Rather pointless, and based on a survey with loaded questions. That said, the sentiment among troops in combat is not a surprise to me.
An opinion piece based on tabulated statistics from US military. Perhaps you have some evidence that supports your claim the questions were loaded. I note that even though you claim the questions were apparently loaded you are not surprised at the result.

I understand the troops in Guantanamo are not combat troops yet torture went on there.

I wonder - is it cherry picking to ignore the other links I provided?

ETA: I note that a minority of the respondents indicated a positive, yet you still make your general claim. I'll find you a link for General P's remarks.
http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/library/policy/army/other/petraeus_values-msg_torture070510.htm

Consider that a policy statement.

I guess that will be of comfort to the people who have been tortured under the kidnapping programme otherwise known as 'Extraordinary Rendition' but perhaps the US military has no part in that?

The handbook didn't seem to stop torture around the world by US military personnel so it seems to be a case of so what I say, not what I do unfortunately.

I understand that the torture at the Guantanamo concentration camp took place while the US military was in charge or perhaps other organisation running the torture programme and the US military never knew.

You conveniently fail to note also General Patreaus follow on guidance, made public, in response to this survey's results, that reinforces his policy, based in regulation, that does not so condone torture. Cherry picking, which with you is no surprise.
Cherry picking - now where did I see that phrase before? Hmmn. There seems to be an awful lot of torture going on for an organisation that doesn't condone it. If that is truly the case why have no officers been jailed over Abu Graibh? Surely no-one believes it was a few rogue elements especially when the photographs showed US special forces and the responsible officers didn't 'notice' and Don Rumsfeld (the man who was so helpful to Saddam Hussein) sent his military man Major General geoffrey Miller over to Gitmoise Abu Ghraib. Miller was so proud of his work at Abu Ghraib that he refused to answer questions about his activities. Funnily enough given the reason for this thread, that seems to be a recurring theme with the US military.

I see, the FBI is now part of the US military? Care to use facts, EJ?If you want to keep on knocking down your own straw men feel free but pretending that I claimed the FBI are part of the US military is a particularly bad one. If you don't like the fact that the FBI squealed on the skullduggery at Guantanamo perhaps you should take it up with them directly They are still an arm of US government the last time I looked.

I note your continued asshattery. Quelle surprise.
Nope, the message hasn't changed. You will not be taken seriously until you learn to construct posts without personal abuse.

If you can cite for me the US military regs that condone torture, I'll be very interested to discuss this further with you. Absent that, I'll not bother. Those military regs. They really stopped abuse at Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo didn't they?

However - let's assume for a moment that the US military contains only a few bad apples people who can't be bothered with the regulations and that they just happen to have commanders who don't know what is going on in their own facilities and that the military intelligence people who were present didn't actually notice the abuse occurring in their presence and that the US military does not assist the CIA kidnap people aor run away from the charges brought against them in places that are part of the axis of evil, such as Italy, and that all the prisoners who ever went into Guantanamo were happy to be kept outside the law and away from attourneys for years without charge and that every single one of them lied about being tortured that still leaves us with all the secret concentration camps that the US is transferring people to for proxy torture (Naturally they don't actually exist) and a president who won't tell us what 'interrogation' methods he has okayed and the DOD refusing to release documents describing prisoner abuse (see http://www.aclu.org/safefree/torture/torturefoia.html) and the us army received notices of abuse at Guantanamo as early as January 2002 ( same link) etc etc.

You will also note post #46, which rather puts the lie to your claim. It appears that we cross posted. It includes "serious question" in my salutation to you.

Stick to the facts, and you might get a welcome reception.

DR

Not only did I respond seriously to your post when I was able to reply in depth but I stuck to the facts. If you were able to consistently respond to facts without hurling personal abuse you might be taken more seriously.

Darth Rotor

11th September 2007, 12:26 PM

An opinion piece based on tabulated statistics from US military. Perhaps you have some evidence that supports your claim the questions were loaded. I note that even though you claim the questions were apparently loaded you are not surprised at the result.
Did you note the percentages? They do not support your general claim, in that about a third were recorded as pro torture for their enemies. That, measured against your overarching statement about American Troops" once again puts the lie to your grossly inaccurate claim.
I guess that will be of comfort to the people who have been tortured under the kidnapping programme otherwise known as 'Extraordinary Rendition' but perhaps the US military has no part in that?
No, not hardly, no comfort at all.
The handbook didn't seem to stop torture around the world by US military personnel so it seems to be a case of so what I say, not what I do unfortunately.
I think a good case can be made that the leadership, both political and military, not only issued contradictory policy, but in some cases, and not just Abu Ghraib, failed to ensure that policy and the FM"s were adhered to.

A good analysis of this problem for the first six months to a year in Iraq is explored by Ricks in "Fiasco."
==
The rest of your noise is best left to the many thread here on the prisoner treatment threads, of which this forum has had a plethora.

As to conduct in this thread, you will note that the non emotional, non asshat posters, Darat and geni, and I, were able to have a reasoned discussion. You enter screaming and emoting, and so you get what you asked for.

Clean up your act, and get a grip on your emotions before you post, then lay off the gross and inaccurate generalizations, and I will be happy to have any number of conversations with you. You let your hatred blind your reason.

Or, keep up with your whinging, and get the facial you deserve.

DR

bigred

12th September 2007, 08:18 PM

"whinging?"

Sorry I've seen it once too often, gotta ask.

Darth Rotor

13th September 2007, 09:13 AM

"whinging?"

Sorry I've seen it once too often, gotta ask.
It is a Brit usage.

http://www.thefreedictionary.com/whinging

whinge (hwnj, wnj)
intr.v. whinged, whing·ing, whing·es Chiefly British
To complain or protest, especially in an annoying or persistent manner

I first picked up on it when working with an officer in the RN (Communications) who was originally from York, and I took a liking to it.

DR

bigred

13th September 2007, 10:35 AM

So a Brit spelling/translation of "whining" then. OK figured as much just curious, thx.

Michael Redman

13th September 2007, 12:44 PM

Why does it seem characteristically British to me that a local coroner would be investigating a death that occurred in a sovereign nation? It seems like a colonial mindset holdover, as though they believed the rest of the world is uncivilized and lawless. This wouldn't happen the other way around (although there are coroner's inquests in the US) because the American coroner would understand that the death was not within the jurisdiction of his office to investigate.

I would be surprised if any country, including the UK, would allow combat participants to be taken off duty to provide testimony in domestic proceeding of another country, particularly regarding a matter like this which has implications to the diplomatic relations of the countries.

In fact, I would be surprised if any country of diplomatic sophistication would allow any person working for them in an official capacity to answer questions in a domestic forum on a matter of import to the relationship of the involved nations, especially when there exists a different, agree on forum for resolving the matter. Similar to diplomatic immunity, the reasons sovereign nations must behave this way are fairly clear.

If the US government isn't cooperating with the UK government, however, that is entirely a different matter.

Of course, any reasonable person can see that when Americans accidentally kill British troops while attempting to provide air cover to those troops, claiming that the US military has no regard for the life of British soldiers on the basis of this incident is nonsensical.

E.J.Armstrong

15th September 2007, 01:05 PM

Did you note the percentages? They do not support your general claim, in that about a third were recorded as pro torture for their enemies. That, measured against your overarching statement about American Troops" once again puts the lie to your grossly inaccurate claim.

Unlike you apparently, I am very concerned by the large numbers of personnel represented by those figures.

By the way, what grossly inaccurate claim exactly? My claim is that the US military supports torture and I stand by and have supported that claim as highlighted in my previous posts.

If the US military really did not support torture, as you seem to be claiming, surely it would refuse to allow any other agency of the US administration to practice what international agreements consider to be torture on its facilities? Surely it would not stay silent on the secret gulags to which the US administration kidnaps people for torture by proxy that is carried out there. If it had not supported torture in the past surely it would not have trained people in torture and terrorist techniques at the School for the Americas?

You do realise that the US has now effectively given every dodgy regime in the world carte blanche to treat US soldiers in the way the US treats the people it has kidnapped? Is that really what you want? Do you really want US soldiers to be disappeared into secret prisons and tortured or held for years without charge or access to counsel or proper courts? I don't.
No, not hardly, no comfort at all.
I'm glad you accept that the manual you quoted was of no use in protecting their human rights.

I think a good case can be made that the leadership, both political and military, not only issued contradictory policy, but in some cases, and not just Abu Ghraib, failed to ensure that policy and the FM"s were adhered to.
This implies that the torture at Guantanamo and Abu Ghraib and elsewhere was a relatively minor aberration. This site gives a quantitative analysis of the scale of the abuses. http://www.humanrightsfirst.org/us_law/etn/misc/factsheet.htm

A good analysis of this problem for the first six months to a year in Iraq is explored by Ricks in "Fiasco."
==
The rest of your noise is best left to the many thread here on the prisoner treatment threads, of which this forum has had a plethora.

As to conduct in this thread, you will note that the non emotional, non asshat posters, Darat and geni, and I, were able to have a reasoned discussion. You enter screaming and emoting, and so you get what you asked for.

Clean up your act, and get a grip on your emotions before you post, then lay off the gross and inaccurate generalizations, and I will be happy to have any number of conversations with you. You let your hatred blind your reason.

Or, keep up with your whinging, and get the facial you deserve.

DR
Every claim I made has been supported. The US military has a long and close association with torture and I believe no longer shares the values of the British people.

The US has lost any claim to moral authority it may have had around the world by setting up Guantanamo in the way it did, condoning torture and kidnapping people to secret gulags amongst other similarly reprehensible behaviour. I hope it will change back to decent norms in the near future.

Unfortunately the US military continues to show total contempt for the lives of British soldiers by refusing to allow the people responsible to face friendly questioning. Until that happens the other behaviours discussed above improve I continue to see little purpose served by allowing US military personnel to be based on any of the UKs' territories.

That you are unable to post without hurling personal abuse is not actually my problem and I regret that I will not take any advice on behaviour from someone who cannot do so. You appear to believe that the more ad hominem arguments you use the more correct your thesis - n'est ce pas?

Gurdur

15th September 2007, 02:54 PM

good.

One thingthat mildly amuses me and also bewilders me is Americans who will both praise to the high skies the unilateralist USA policy on not cooperating with international law, while simultaneously whining and whining and whining that allegedly no-one likes them or supports them.

One would think such a kindergarten psyche would be seen for what it is.

Darth Rotor

17th September 2007, 01:53 PM

Unfortunately the US military continues to show total contempt for the lives of British soldiers
When you tell lies, you are not worth talking to.

Persons not showing up for the inquest from an accidental death does not equal "The US Military" showing contempt, no less total contempt, for the lives of British soldiers.

We are back to where your OP began. You make a false (due to exaggeration) and unsupportable general statement about the US military, a statement based on your emotional overpainting of an event into a general verdict, with attributions made by sans evidence of said contempt as a general sentiment.

It is easy to treat your statements with contempt, since you fail to recognize the difference between a supportable statement and gross hyperbole.

The derail about Gitmo and Abu Ghraib has nothing to do with the problem of blue on blue, unless you are an Oliver style "Yank Basher" for the sake of being consistent as a "Yank Basher."

Welcome to the city of wrong, population you.

DR

E.J.Armstrong

18th September 2007, 06:26 AM

When you tell lies, you are not worth talking to.

Persons not showing up for the inquest from an accidental death does not equal "The US Military" showing contempt, no less total contempt, for the lives of British soldiers.

We are back to where your OP began. You make a false (due to exaggeration) and unsupportable general statement about the US military, a statement based on your emotional overpainting of an event into a general verdict, with attributions made by sans evidence of said contempt as a general sentiment.

It is easy to treat your statements with contempt, since you fail to recognize the difference between a supportable statement and gross hyperbole.

The derail about Gitmo and Abu Ghraib has nothing to do with the problem of blue on blue, unless you are an Oliver style "Yank Basher" for the sake of being consistent as a "Yank Basher."

Welcome to the city of wrong, population you.

DR
Contrary to your latest false claim I have supported every single one of my statements with evidence. You on the other hand have used personal abuse as a substitute for rational argument. Simply look at this thread for abundant evidence.

In relation to the so-called derail, despite the evidence of my posts, I was accused of taking my position based on one incident. I did not and listed a range of behaviours such as support for torture which demonstrate that the US military no longer has the same values of the British people.

Because of those reasons and the total contempt shown for the lives of the British soldiers the US military has killed when it has stated that it will not allow any person responsible - ever- to, in person, simply tell the families of our soldiers - and the people who supplied their sons and daughters to be your supposed allies - what happened to their family members. A coroners court has found that one of our soldiers Matty Hull, was killed unlawfully in a criminal attack on a fully marked military convoy but the US military tried to obstruct the work of the coroner. It then promoted the man largely responsible. Where is the justice for the families when the US military runs away from the result? None. That is total contempt.

Let me be very specific. If the US military did not have total contempt for the lives of the British servicemen it killed it would send the people responsible to coroners courts in the UK to face friendly questioning and help the families know directly what happened to their loved ones instead of running away repeatedly from its own actions. It refuses point blank to do so. No ifs. no buts - it refuses point blank to send the people responsible to tell the families in person what happened.

The US military refuses to supply all the evidence it gains from any investigation it carries out to the families of the servicemen killed by its own troops. The links I posted highlighted the barriers the US military puts in the way of families simply trying to find out what happened to their sons, husbands and fathers. That is total contempt for the lives of the british servicemen killed by the US military. That you don't like that simple fact is evident but your repeated hurling of personal abuse merely confirms that the US military should be removed from all British territories until it changes its behaviour and starts to display decent norms.

Finally, I couldn't help laughing at the old 'Yank bashing' argument. It really demonstrates more than anything else the lack of a rational base for your position. If you can't stand having the US military's support for torture highlighted the answer is very simple. Instead of attacking the messenger why not get them to stop supporting torture? Is that too obvious?

And, just a thought, why not try, just for once, not running away like cowards from the families of the people you have killed but actually send the US military personnel responsible to attend UK coroners courts to tell the families what actually happened. You never know you might get to like behaving decently towards your allies - before you lose them all.

Darth Rotor

18th September 2007, 07:51 AM

Contrary to your latest false claim I have supported every single one of my statements with evidence.
No, you have used an anecdote, not evidence. When you can differentiate between the two, you might be able to craft a non hyperbolic, false, argument.

Since you cannot, you continue to make a lot of sound and fury, signifying nothing other than an inability to use reason. Your OP was filled with emotion, and your failed argument remains based upon it.

Watch carefully:

You support this broad, overarching statement about a relationship between two nation's militaries that involves thousands of interactions on a daily basis.
Because of those reasons and the total contempt shown for the lives of the British soldiers the US military has killed That is total contempt.
An error, a blue on blue incident, is used by you to characterize the entirety of the extensive and deep US-UK military to military relationship. That is argument by anecdote, to the point of argument by exception.

Let me be very specific. If the US military did not have total contempt for the lives of the British servicemen it killed it would send the people responsible to coroners courts in the UK to face friendly questioning and help the families know directly what happened to their loved ones instead of running away repeatedly from its own actions. It refuses point blank to do so. No ifs. no buts - it refuses point blank to send the people responsible to tell the families in person what happened.
Your logic does not follow. Your "If not P then Q" fails to address other than your emotional connection the anecdotal item that has you attention at the moment.
The US military refuses to supply all the evidence it gains from any investigation it carries out to the families of the servicemen killed by its own troops. The links I posted highlighted the barriers the US military puts in the way of families simply trying to find out what happened to their sons, husbands and fathers.
That does not follow, regardless of your claim that it does.

I personally think that a measure of closure might be possible were the persons involved in the blue on blue to meet with the family of those who died, via accidental death, in the blue on blue event. I don't know if that will be ever done, either by correspondence or personal contact, but I think it would be helpful. Your assertion that the only venue for such contact is the British civil process of inquest is again unsupported, other than by your bias and emotion.

I direct you again to my conversation with Geni about getting testimony via sworn statement or affidavit, and excerpts from the official testimony and evidence gathered jointly by the US and UK military investigative teams. Geni indicated that in the UK such requests for information are treated less openly than in the US. Does that not bother you?
That is total contempt for the lives of the british servicemen killed by the US military.
Nope. That is your emotional characterization about an anecdote. Granted, your item relates to an event that you are displeased with. Your displeasure is rational, human, and completely understandable. Your conclusions reached above are fallacious.
That you don't like that simple fact is evident but your repeated hurling of personal abuse merely confirms that the US military should be removed from all British territories until it changes its behaviour and starts to display decent norms.
Uh, huh, Tsunami relief is more American miliary contempt, and likewise the relief for earthquake victims in Pakistan. ESAD. :rolleyes:
If you can't stand having the US military's support for torture highlighted the answer is very simple. Instead of attacking the messenger why not get them to stop supporting torture? Is that too obvious?
I am not in a position to take any action that influences the behavior of American military personnel in their treatment of prisoners. I retired about two years ago. You ignored General Patraeus' response, and policy statement, regarding the results of the survey you provided a link to.

Your blinders remain on.

Likewise, I share a concern that the uneven application of leadership and adherence to regulation has uncovered what I consider to be a disgraceful pattern of conduct in some American units in Iraq. Other units did not have that problem due to better leadership. In some cases, those involved have been punished, in some, the outcome is unclear.

What is clear is that the accountability for the failures in discipline can be traced back to at least the secretariat level in the US DoD. A good case has been made that in the first six months after Saddam left Baghdad, four different major formations, division sized, had four different command policies and guidelines, and levels of enforcement and adherence to a disciplined approach to the treatment of detainees. (Patraeus' 101st Division was one of the more disciplined in this regard.) That all units in Iraq were not fully embracing a similar policy line is a severe failure in leadership, from the top down, starting with General Sanchez, but IMO going somewhat further up.
And, just a thought, why not try, just for once, not running away like cowards from the families of the people you have killed but actually send the US military personnel responsible to attend UK coroners courts to tell the families what actually happened. You never know you might get to like behaving decently towards your allies - before you lose them all.
More emotional BS from you.

Pathetic.

You make an extraordinary claim: The US Military holds its UK comrades in arms in total contempt.

You fail to provide extraordinary evidence.

You lose, and remain in the City of Wrong, population you.

DR

E.J.Armstrong

19th September 2007, 08:10 AM

No, you have used an anecdote, not evidence. When you can differentiate between the two, you might be able to craft a non hyperbolic, false, argument.

Since you cannot, you continue to make a lot of sound and fury, signifying nothing other than an inability to use reason. Your OP was filled with emotion, and your failed argument remains based upon it.

Watch carefully:

You support this broad, overarching statement about a relationship between two nation's militaries that involves thousands of interactions on a daily basis.

An error, a blue on blue incident, is used by you to characterize the entirety of the extensive and deep US-UK military to military relationship. That is argument by anecdote, to the point of argument by exception.

Your logic does not follow. Your "If not P then Q" fails to address other than your emotional connection the anecdotal item that has you attention at the moment.

That does not follow, regardless of your claim that it does.

That 'analysis' is based on a false premise as I am sure you know.

If you would actually read my posts you might stop misrepresenting them. Contrary to your false assertions (let me remind you that simply because you say something is true does not make it true) I posted links to repeated refusals by the US military to assist the familes of the UK servicemen they killed by simply sending the people responsible and all the evidence collected to attend a coroners court.

Secondly you suggest that it is the making of an error that lead to my argument. It did not. Let me remind you. I have complained, as has a goverment minister (who did not even get the courtesy of a response to some correspondence - (contempt for our government as well as for the lives of our soldiers), as have our military, as have the people in the UK , as have the familes of the men the US military killed of the policy of refusing - point blank - that the US military will not send any of the men responsible for killing UK servicemen to attend any coroners courts to explain in person to the families what happened to their loved one, your supposed allies.

If after all this time you cannot get that simple fact right says it all about your emotive approach to debate. That you continue to imply falsely that there was only one instance suggests that you are not interested in the truth.

I have also repeatedly demonstrated that you seem to believe that hurling personal abuse makes you right. It did not previously, does not now nor never will.

I personally think that a measure of closure might be possible were the persons involved in the blue on blue to meet with the family of those who died, via accidental death, in the blue on blue event. I don't know if that will be ever done, either by correspondence or personal contact, but I think it would be helpful. Your assertion that the only venue for such contact is the British civil process of inquest is again unsupported, other than by your bias and emotion. Once again you make a claim based on a false premise. I have never stated that there is only one channel for contact and once again you failed to support your claim with evidence. The families of the dead, the UK public and our government frankly do not care what you think. They have made their position extremely clear to the US military on numerous occasions only for the US military to run away like cowards from their own actions as amply documented in my links.

I direct you again to my conversation with Geni about getting testimony via sworn statement or affidavit, and excerpts from the official testimony and evidence gathered jointly by the US and UK military investigative teams. Geni indicated that in the UK such requests for information are treated less openly than in the US. Does that not bother you?

Nope. That is your emotional characterization about an anecdote. Granted, your item relates to an event that you are displeased with. Your displeasure is rational, human, and completely understandable. Your conclusions reached above are fallacious.
Once again you demonstrate your anti-rational approach. Instead of allowing me to state what my opinions are and taking issue with what I actually said, you state them for me, then criticise what you have invented. That is the style of Uri Geller or Sylvia Browne. Once again it seems that you are unable to differentiate between what you make up and the truth.

Uh, huh, Tsunami relief is more American miliary contempt, and likewise the relief for earthquake victims in Pakistan. ESAD. :rolleyes: Exactly how does US tsunami relief provide relief to the families of our soldiers with information about how they died from the people who killed them? When did I ever say that the US military did not engage in some humanitarian actions? Yet another of your inventions. It really does seem that your reality is only defined by your own inventions rather than the truth.

I am not in a position to take any action that influences the behavior of American military personnel in their treatment of prisoners. I retired about two years ago. You ignored General Patraeus' response, and policy statement, regarding the results of the survey you provided a link to.

Your blinders remain on.
I just knew that you were a current or recently ex-US military person. Your attempt to bully me with personal abuse merely supports my view of the US military. I am not one of your soldiers who can be made to accept your view of reality simply because you hurl abuse at me. That sad practice simply does not work in the real world. I have never expected you to get the US military to do the decent thing but your propensity to attack the messenger is very unhealthy.

I did address Petraeus's comments or the policy. I demonstrated that the policy had been ineffective in protecting people from torture and showed with the links I provided that personnel had been sent to Abu Ghraib to Gitmoise the place. In other words, to adopt the disgraceful practices that have come to characterise US contempt for human rights and human dignity in the concentration camp at Guantanamo. I also highlighted your president's refusal to tell the world what 'interrogation' practices he had allowed US special forces to use. You have failed to address the secret gulags the US transports people to. That is not in your manual is it but it is official US policy and you have the cheek to talk about my blinkers!

Likewise, I share a concern that the uneven application of leadership and adherence to regulation has uncovered what I consider to be a disgraceful pattern of conduct in some American units in Iraq. Other units did not have that problem due to better leadership. In some cases, those involved have been punished, in some, the outcome is unclear.

What is clear is that the accountability for the failures in discipline can be traced back to at least the secretariat level in the US DoD. A good case has been made that in the first six months after Saddam left Baghdad, four different major formations, division sized, had four different command policies and guidelines, and levels of enforcement and adherence to a disciplined approach to the treatment of detainees. (Patraeus' 101st Division was one of the more disciplined in this regard.) That all units in Iraq were not fully embracing a similar policy line is a severe failure in leadership, from the top down, starting with General Sanchez, but IMO going somewhat further up. If this really was a simple case of failure of command perhaps you can list all the officers officers who have been found guilty of dereliction of duty in relation to all the torture and deaths in US military custody and for setting up and running the concentration camp at Guantanamo bay?

More emotional BS from you.

Pathetic.

You make an extraordinary claim: The US Military holds its UK comrades in arms in total contempt.

You fail to provide extraordinary evidence.

You lose, and remain in the City of Wrong, population you.

DR
Au contraire - what I have posted is a completely accurate characterisation of the behaviour of the US military supported by specific statements from the coroners and people involved and by policy statements from the US military as reported by our Ministry of Defence.

In contrast, nothing you have posted, including the personal abuse, has in any way whatsoever refuted the facts that the US military runs away like cowards from the consequences of their own actions and causes further anguish to the most important people, namely the families of the soldiers the US military killed. That has been amply documented. Your behaviour on this thread merely confirms my opinion that is necessary to remove the US military from all UK territories until it behaves with decent norms.

I have documented with links the facts that one of our government ministers, our coroner's courts and the families of the dead have been either lied to, had their correspondence ignored, and systematically had their reasonable requests blocked or refused point blank by the US military in relation to the UK servicemen the US military killed, in one of which cases the attack was ruled to be criminal and resulted in an unlawful killing. That is total contempt.

plumjam

19th September 2007, 08:28 AM

Darth Rotor

19th September 2007, 09:49 AM

E.J. Armstrong, you're right.
Unfortunately Darth Rotor and Ziggurat seem constitutionally incapable of admitting any immorality on the part of the US government.
Do you make stuff up for a living, or is this just a hobby with you ?

In either case, you are demonstrably wrong.

From my post # 46

The article does say the US Department of State (huh?) is investigating the incident. If the US military isn't investigating it, I'm a radish. It seems that he is either impatient for a response for a request for transcripts, has asked for one and been denied (that's a surprise, and he is right to be frustrated by that) or there is info being witheld pending the completion of a criminal investigation in the case. There is quite a bit here that is open to question. I find it difficult to understand how a Joint investigation, and its unclassified (????) results would not be available to a formal request through channels. I don't think it is unreasonable for him to ask for the releasable transcripts, from his own government, of any Joint investigation undertaken in the field by Coalition military authorities.

Until you get your facts straight, or even bother reading what I wrote on this topic, attempting to make a false claim of that nature only hurts your credibility. First off, I was addressing the US military, and have also addressed the failure in leadership in Iraq that led to inconsistent and bad policy that led to the unsat matter of Abu Ghraib. I do not see how that observation constitutes a failure to criticize American policy in Iraq, in particular.

This topic is about EJ"s OP, which states as an assertion not backed up by evidence of a broad stance of the US military vis a vis the UK, which he not only has not researched, but cannot support beyond a single disappointing event, and then the addition of a red herring on another topic, which does not involve the UK, per se, that of the varying treatment of detainees in the WoT and in Iraq.

Failure of intellect on your part does not make your case, it hurts it.

Please enjoy your delusions of adequacy, until you learn to both read and comprehend.

DR

Darth Rotor

19th September 2007, 10:03 AM

That 'analysis' is based on a false premise as I am sure you know.
Having trouble keeping up with your own derail, I see.
If you would actually read my posts you might stop misrepresenting them.
Then don't write emotive BS.

Once again, for the slow of wit, you take a narrow disagreement, about the participation of Americans in a British civil procedure, and fallaciously apply that to the US military treating the UK military with contempt, which given the immense breadth and scope of US to UK military to military cooperation, is not only absurd, but both anecdotally countered in response to your anecdote, and contrary to my own personal experience in close personal dealings with the armed forces of the United Kingdom

That you are upset with the disagreement between our governments on this matter is no surprise, I would feel similarly I suspect were I in the shoes of the families involved. That isn't my disagreement with your OP. It is your fallacious use of a broad brush to generalize from the singular to the universal that is wrong, and furthermore wrong due to your emotive language.

ETA: I will restate that I do not understand why unclassified and releasable under FOIA sorts of info on the blue on blue cannot, or are not, provided to the UK government for further distribution to interested parties in the UK. I also don't understand how info already available to the UK government in a joint investiagion is not available to the coroner directly from the UK government. I find it odd that you wish to blame the American military for that, and as Geni pointed out, my lack of detailed understanding of how UK official info policy handles such matters leaves me no better than confused, if this process is of the importance that you feel it is.

Your red herring regarding Gitmo and Iraq were not germane to the OP, and remain not germane.

General Patraeus cannot undo four years of policy, but he can make a course correction, and has done so. Likewise, other course corrections have been and can be made to policy errors in the treatment of detainees, a situation that arose due to a core failure in leadership and policy implementation, a failure that can be traced directly to a profound failure in planning, in Iraq in particular, before the shooting even started.

But again, that is another topic.

As to your despicable remarks concerning my service, you are welcomed to go and screw yourself, coward. I served with pleasure alongside my comrades in arms in the Royal Navy, the Royal Air Force, the Royal Marines, and the British Army, and no amount of whinging and throwing of tantrums by you can sully my experiences in having done so.

Note, again, that on this topic, I have been able to have a very reasoned conversation with two Brits, Geni and Darat, who unlike you choose not to present themselves as whinging maggots. You get the treatment you deserve.

I re read a few of your posts, and find that you and I share a common desire: that the reputation of the US military can be restored by cleansing from its practices the holes in policy and procedure that has lead to a tarnishing of its reputation. How long that will take is in the hands of those now in charge, and in how well Congress holds them accountable.

DR

Darth Rotor

20th September 2007, 02:02 AM

Au contraire -

The dog has been chasing possums again, I can't get back to sleep after having calmed him down, and you remain wrong on a number of accounts, but riding the crest of your emotive high dudgeon, you are blinded by the salt spray of your myopia, and your agenda. American bashing, indeed. The shoe fits, Cinderella Armstrong.

Point first, from the article you first linked.

Presence of Yanks requested, information required, from the coroner himself. The requirement is for accurate information on the event.

Point second: the information he requires is available from his own government, or ought to be, based on an investigation of that incident by the CJTF in Afghanistan. (CJTF is a Combined Joint Task Force, FAC is Forward Air Controller.)

Even so, it is not bad for the US State department to forward such simple evidence as time and place, in a cleared for release to UKAUSCAN format as is done routinely for a variety of matters. Your own government has access to the information he needs, or at least should, now or as soon as various investigations are concluded, yet you rant and rave at those dreaded Americans.

More on this later. It is important, and is a point where you and I have an agreement in principle.

Point third: Did the British FAC attend the inquest? I did not see any reference to that in the article.

Point fourth: you assert a military decision on the "no, no one is coming" message when you cannot show it. A simple reason for that, EJ, is that such a policy statement between governments/nations is political in nature, not military.

Government to government contacts between the US and UK are political, not military, and indeed, the military does not have the authority to make the policy statement you referenced -- about declining generally to make such persons available -- without political authorization to do so. It is thus a political decision. Those distinctions are rather stark in our form of government.

An observation and analysis: the penchant for the Press in general, and the UK press in particular, for sensationalism and emotive tripe like your tone in this thread is not lost on American politicians. It is not unreasonable to conclude that the requests fulfilled,
-given current sentiments that you referenced earlier in the UK vis a vis Iraq in general,
- UK sentiment on President Bush in particular,
- the emotion laden tragedy of a fratricide

that any visit by American servicemen involved would be turned into a grotesque media spectacle as only British journalists can do. (It's a gift.) This prediction is not a certainty, as the Brit establishment also has the wherewithal to conduct such a visit in a low key manner, but the Brit establishment does not control the families, nor that coroner.

That simple analysis points to a contributing factor in the denial for the request at the political level, but is no excuse for not providing the information, the simple facts of the case: what happened, when and where. Note, if that is the political decision, the servicemen technically cannot go in any official capacity without technically breaking the law, though the last is a very fine point.

To sum up: you overstate the requirement, you understate the role of your government, you ignore the FAC, and you get wrong who made the call from the US side, fresh out of the gate. You ride the emotion, thinking it suffices for argument. The derails will remain off the tracks.

Your emotion is understandable, given that blue on blue means good guys are dead, and that hurts like hell. I gather you have some familiarity with the Pat Tillman case, an American blue on blue that has run afoul of atrocious handling by our Army.
[Sarcastic thought] If Pat Tillman's family can't get a straight answer in three years, what makes you think you, the coroner, or anyone outside the system can get one? [/sarcastic thought]

However, one hopes that the lessons of the Tillman fiasco are being applied to do a better job in future cases, which this fratricide is: a new case.

Even though the policy is not "US Military" but "US political," I can understand you being unable to see that, due to your chosen myopia. With that in mind, I offer you another point contra your idiotic "US military holds in contempt UK military" rubbish.

The earlier anecdote was a simple medical matter, and hardly at the institution to institution level. Here is a more telling illustration of how wrong you are in your generalization.

From here: http://www.outsidethebeltway.com/archives/2006/01/armys_iraq_work_assailed_by_briton/
A senior British officer has written a scathing critique of the U.S. Army and its performance in Iraq, accusing it of cultural ignorance, moralistic self-righteousness, unproductive micromanagement and unwarranted optimism there.

His publisher: the U.S. Army.

In an article published this week in the Army magazine Military Review, British Brig. Nigel Aylwin-Foster, who was deputy commander of a program to train the Iraqi military, said American officers in Iraq displayed such “cultural insensitivity” that it “arguably amounted to institutional racism” and may have spurred the growth of the insurgency. The Army has been slow to adapt its tactics, he argues, and its approach during the early stages of the occupation “exacerbated the task it now faces by alienating significant sections of the population.”

The article itself, which I read when it came out and found to be well thought out, if a bit acid in tone:

http://usacac.leavenworth.army.mil/CAC/milreview/download/English/NovDec05/aylwin.pdf

The US Army, as an institution, if it held in contempt the British military and its members, would not have published in its professional journal an article so critical of its work to date in Iraq. IT took respect for his experience, and the school of thought his article represented, to publish it in the US Army's professional journal: Military Review.

Responses to the article were mixed. Some were knee jerk dismissive, some defensively so, some more open to outside critique. The commander of the Combined Arms Command, representing the institution of the US Army, was of the latter sort. There was not unanimous agreement with Alwyn's points, but there was the professional respect accorded him due to his experience and presentation, that is anything but contempt. Note who was writing a COIN doctrine manual at the time, at the CAC: LT Gen Patraeus.

Note who was commander, CAC.
Lt. Gen. David Petraeus, who runs much of the Army’s educational establishment, and also oversees Military Review, said he does not agree with many of Aylwin-Foster’s assertions. But Petraeus, who commanded Aylwin-Foster in Iraq, said “he is a very good officer, and therefore his viewpoint has some importance, as we do not think it is his alone.”
So, once again, no, EJ, the US military does not treat the military of the UK with contempt. You remain, still, wrong about your fallacious conclusion due to your flawed logic in misapplying from a specific item a general conclusion.

I will estimate that, given the publishing last fall of the COIN doctrine, revised, that some of Brigadier Alwyn's input was part of what went into our new doctrine. I do not find the timing coincidental.

You are not wrong in being frustrated by what seems a simple requirement for information running afoul of politics.

There is no dispute that the fratricide is a terrible error in execution of the allied effort in Afghanistan, or Iraq, as are all such battlefield errors. Your assertion of malice and contempt in the events of blue on blue incidents is also rubbish.

Now, to the "more on that later" bit.

Given that the coroner needs facts and information to complete his inquest, it is not unreasonable to request, or expect, that he be provided such by the US Department of State via the UK foreign ministry, or by the US DoD via the UK MoD. All that would be required, on the assumption that no info was shared within the CJTF in Afghanistan between UK and US flag officers (highly unlikely, based on my experience working in CJTF's with Brits and others) is the good faith gesture to examine the official investigation undertaken by the USAF, extract the facts germane to the event that led to the accidental death on the battlefield of soldiers form the UK, and forward it in the usual releasable format.

From there, it should be no problem for the coroner to get it from his government. If that latter is a problem, the issue you have is with Brits, not Americans.

With that in mind, I shall consult with some of my vet friends and take the opportunity of your raising this matter to correspond to both of my Senators, and inquire as to why this has not been done, or if it has already been done. I shall provide you a draft of the letter this weekend.

Such a letter is about the limit of what is within my power to do, and as I see it, simply providing the coroner factual information is the least the US Government can do in this case. It can't hurt to ask my elected representative that our government do so.

DR

plumjam

20th September 2007, 04:25 AM

Do you make stuff up for a living, or is this just a hobby with you ?

In either case, you are demonstrably wrong.

From my post # 46

Until you get your facts straight, or even bother reading what I wrote on this topic, attempting to make a false claim of that nature only hurts your credibility. First off, I was addressing the US military, and have also addressed the failure in leadership in Iraq that led to inconsistent and bad policy that led to the unsat matter of Abu Ghraib. I do not see how that observation constitutes a failure to criticize American policy in Iraq, in particular.

This topic is about EJ"s OP, which states as an assertion not backed up by evidence of a broad stance of the US military vis a vis the UK, which he not only has not researched, but cannot support beyond a single disappointing event, and then the addition of a red herring on another topic, which does not involve the UK, per se, that of the varying treatment of detainees in the WoT and in Iraq.

Failure of intellect on your part does not make your case, it hurts it.

Please enjoy your delusions of adequacy, until you learn to both read and comprehend.

DR

that's me told ;)

Denial

20th September 2007, 04:42 AM

The assumption that friendly fire incidents happen due to contempt of UK personell by US personell to be tasteless, to say the least.

I found the following videos insightful with regards to how friendly fire incidents happen, they also provide a glimpse of the initial reactions of the person pulling the trigger. It makes me more sad than angry.

February 17, 1991, Iraq. AH-64 kills 2 US. troops, wounding 6.
http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=480_1175140494

March 28, 2003. Two A-10s engage a british convoy, killing L/Cpl Matty Hull. Video contains some coarse language.
http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=e06da463d7

You'd be well advised to skip the comment sections on Liveleak, the place attracts more uneducated, biased and hateful monkeys than usual for an internet video site.

While I understand the families wishes to get all the facts on the table, I don't see what difference it makes having the pilots attending the inquiry, provided all the non-classified information is released to the coroner and the victims families.

Personally, I'd never want to have the responsibility these pilots have.

E.J.Armstrong

20th September 2007, 06:29 AM

E.J. Armstrong, you're right.
Unfortunately Darth Rotor and Ziggurat seem constitutionally incapable of admitting any immorality on the part of the US government. Instead they'll go on and on and on and on trying to pick up on minor legalistic and pedantic points while avoiding the central moral issues in question.
Well done for crushing them.
Next time I wouldn't invest so much time and effort in them, if I was you. :)

Darth Rotor seems to believe that the more he bullies people and the more he hurls pdersonal abuse as he demonstrates with his reponse to you.

It is clear that he believes because he says something it must be right.

E.J.Armstrong

20th September 2007, 07:18 AM

Having trouble keeping up with your own derail, I see.
Have you really got so few rational arguements that you now have to resort to non-sequiturs. I simply have no idea what you are talking about here because
1/ You fail to explain yourself
2/ I provided a complete description of whay what you claimed was false yet you have nothing to say in response to any fact in it.
3/ Your saying something does not make it right

Then don't write emotive BS. As you know I have supported every claim I made with supporting evidence. You, however have chosen to systematically misrepresent my position as demonstrated repeatedly in the posts above.

Once again, for the slow of wit, you take a narrow disagreement, about the participation of Americans in a British civil procedure, and fallaciously apply that to the US military treating the UK military with contempt, which given the immense breadth and scope of US to UK military to military cooperation, is not only absurd, but both anecdotally countered in response to your anecdote, and contrary to my own personal experience in close personal dealings with the armed forces of the United KingdomOnce again you cannot properly represent my position.
In what way exactly is your personal experience of any relevance in the facts of this matter? The US military has lied, procrastinated, erected blockages to the work of our court system and point blank refused to provide a single one of the people responsible to attend for friendly questioning. The person largely responsible for the death of Matty Hull in a criminal attack on fully marked convoy has been promoted without ever coming to explain himself to the familes of the men he killed or one single member of the US military attending. The US military consistently runs away from responsibiity for its actions. That is cowardice of the meanest order and total contempt and no attempt by you to misrepresent me or the facts or the coroner or the UK government will change that.

That you are upset with the disagreement between our governments on this matter is no surprise, I would feel similarly I suspect were I in the shoes of the families involved. That isn't my disagreement with your OP. It is your fallacious use of a broad brush to generalize from the singular to the universal that is wrong, and furthermore wrong due to your emotive language.
Let me repeat. All my claims are accurate and factually based. I will never take any lessons in language from a person who seems to believe that the more he bullies people with personal abuse the more correct he is.

ETA: I will restate that I do not understand why unclassified and releasable under FOIA sorts of info on the blue on blue cannot, or are not, provided to the UK government for further distribution to interested parties in the UK. I also don't understand how info already available to the UK government in a joint investiagion is not available to the coroner directly from the UK government. I find it odd that you wish to blame the American military for that, and as Geni pointed out, my lack of detailed understanding of how UK official info policy handles such matters leaves me no better than confused, if this process is of the importance that you feel it is.
What you do or do not understand is irrelevant. I blame the US military for their policy because it is US military policy. How simple does this have to be made for you?

Your red herring regarding Gitmo and Iraq were not germane to the OP, and remain not germane. How many times does it take to tell you a fact before it registers. I guess N times, where N is a large positive integer approaching infinity, especially where you continue to chose to ignore them. Nevertheless let me try again for the Nth time.

In response to one of the many misrepresentations of my position I stated that there were many reasons why the US military was no longer fit to be based on UK territories and described in detail why. If you continue to misrepresent me you will continue to be told the facts. That you are unable, or as I now believe unwilling, to properly represent my position I think says it all about your increasingly distant relationship with the truth.

General Patraeus cannot undo four years of policy, but he can make a course correction, and has done so. Likewise, other course corrections have been and can be made to policy errors in the treatment of detainees, a situation that arose due to a core failure in leadership and policy implementation, a failure that can be traced directly to a profound failure in planning, in Iraq in particular, before the shooting even started.

But again, that is another topic. When is General Petraeus going to even criticise the 'course correction' of kidnapping people into secret gulags for torture by proxy. When is General Petraeus ever going to refuse to supply US military personnel to the 'course correction' of the US concentration camp on Cuba, where people are denied access to legal representation and are put through a kangaroo legal farce and where they are not even charged for years? That is the test of whether the US military is against torture. Much of the world no longer believes what the US military says, for multiple documented reasons. It's what you do that counts. Stop supporting torture and start treating the families of your allies with respect and you may get some respect. You earn respect, you can't demand it by force or torture.

As to your despicable remarks concerning my service, you are welcomed to go and screw yourself, coward. I served with pleasure alongside my comrades in arms in the Royal Navy, the Royal Air Force, the Royal Marines, and the British Army, and no amount of whinging and throwing of tantrums by you can sully my experiences in having done so. Once again you resort to hurling personal abuse instead of engaging in rational argument. If you chose to interpret my disgust with your approach to people on this site with criticism of your service so be it. I would merely point out that, unlike the US military, I have never run away from friendly questioning.

Note, again, that on this topic, I have been able to have a very reasoned conversation with two Brits, Geni and Darat, who unlike you choose not to present themselves as whinging maggots. You get the treatment you deserve. I am happy to be attacked by you as your consistent hurling of personal abuse shows the lack of substance to your position.

I re read a few of your posts, and find that you and I share a common desire: that the reputation of the US military can be restored by cleansing from its practices the holes in policy and procedure that has lead to a tarnishing of its reputation. How long that will take is in the hands of those now in charge, and in how well Congress holds them accountable.

DR
I do not believe that there are merely a few holes in policy and procedure. I believe that much of the entire edifice is rotten. Guantanamo Bay and the secret torture gulags that General Petraeus has nothing to say about epitomise the problem. The cowardly point blank refusal to assist the families of you so-called allies at the worst times of their lives, namely the deaths of their loved ones killed by the US military is merely one more corroboration of the contempt for decency and international law that characterises much of the US military presence around the world. Because of these things taken in the round I no longer believe that the US military shares the values of the UK population and should not be allowed to occupy any bases on any UK territory until it reverts to decent norms.

Darth Rotor

20th September 2007, 08:21 AM

Have you really got so few rational arguements that you now have to resort to non-sequiturs. I simply have no idea what you are talking about here
That is due to you being in transmit mode, solely, since the OP. Try listening for a change. It requires dropping your filters.
3/ Your saying something does not make it right
Hello pot, meet kettle. Your asserting a conclusion with powerful emotion does not make it right. The facts of a fratricide, or even more than one, does not indicate contempt for UK forces, it indicates an error, yet you attempt to show otherwise. You can't, and don't. Since you cannot seem to get that right, I am not sure how your alleged reasoning works.
As you know I have supported every claim I made with supporting evidence.
No, you have not. You have imbedded a series of assumptions about the entire nature of American/Brit relations based on a small facet of it. That is intellectually dishonest. To illustrate for you.

A large boxcar on a train is filled with boxes of diverse goods. This represents US/UK military to military relationships. You detect an odor, and investigate what smells "not quite right." This is the lack of information flow to the coroner in his inquest, represented by some cheese badly sealed (representing a flaw in the Special Relationship the US and UK enjoy.) You then conclude that since two boxes of bottled water are broken (Gitmo and Abu Ghraib) that the entire shipment is rotten, without having bothered to check into the boxes that contain toys, paper procudts, shoes, make up, Disney costumes, bourbon, and other goods. Your reasoning power is a loss, as is this cargo, potentially, if one were unwise enough to follow your reasoning to a conclusion, and thus a decision to trash the whole carload for the flaw in a few boxes.

You further erode your case by claiming from the survey that the general position of US forces is for torture, when your own link shows a 38 percent queried in a survey to hold a general positive reaction to it regarding insurgents which leaves about two thirds of them in the survey group, NOT for it. You can't get that right either, and it isn't even math, it is arithmetic.

Yes indeed you provide links, but they do not support your claim as made, though they do show a variety of things that you are unhappy about regarding Americans. Your attribution of intent and attitude in the general case, which is what my objection to your hyperbole began as, remains empty of support.

Denial is not the only responder here to note your failure in reasoning.

We are now repeating ourselves, with no value added. The next time I respond to you, I will endeavour not to crap all over you, as I have done sufficient of that in this thread. I'd be interested to see you use less intellectual dishonesty in your future efforts, but am not holding my breath.

In any case, best of luck in what you are doing IRL, since on this forum, you are shooting yourself in the foot while under the impression that you are using reason.

You make an extraordinary claim, and instead of backing it up with your references and the standard extraordinary evidence, you merely highlight that there are things that you don't like about what Americans are doing, and the American military in particular, but the diverse links do not support your premise of contemptual treatment of the UK by the US military (which I can only guess means "the institution" thanks to Geni's comments) beyond anecdotal linkage.

DR

Darth Rotor

20th September 2007, 08:39 AM

When is General Petraeus going to even criticise the 'course correction' of kidnapping people into secret gulags for torture by proxy. When is General Petraeus ever going to refuse to supply US military personnel to the 'course correction' of the US concentration camp on Cuba, where people are denied access to legal representation and are put through a kangaroo legal farce and where they are not even charged for years?
Non sequitur, as his current job is the task at hand in Iraq, his previous as the 101st's commander, and as CAC commander. He is bound by law to keep his criticisms' of his political/civilian leadership temperate, and within channels. This means that internal critiques are hard to come by in attributed mode, but only get to you and I, the reading public, via journalists' sources on background, who are constrainted to speak without attribution.

Thus two points:

Your criticism needs to be directed to both the CJCS and the Secretary of Defense, past and present if you like, and the President, for the set of policies that you, and many others, find lacking.

You may be surprised to note that as far back as 2003 American military JAG officers also disagreed with the policies as practiced, and in concert with private law firms raised this disagreement, legally and professionally, to the level of the Supreme Court with the result of a change (albeit small) in policy regarding status of detainees at Guantanamo Bay.
That is the test of whether the US military is against torture.
I see, the Generals open policy statement is lost on you. Got it. Senator McCains's efforts in Congress to change policy likewise lost on you. Got it.
Much of the world no longer believes what the US military says, for multiple documented reasons.
You are correct, and both civilian and military senior leadership are to blame for the atrocious information and media efforts for the past six years. Their grade in the Informational element of national power is between a D and an F.
If you chose to interpret my disgust with your approach to people on this site with criticism of your service so be it. I would merely point out that, unlike the US military, I have never run away from friendly questioning.
You once again mischaracterize the response as military, rather than political, but what are facts to you? More verbal volleyballs, as evidenced by your conduct from OP to present.
I do not believe that there are merely a few holes in policy and procedure. I believe that much of the entire edifice is rotten. Guantanamo Bay and the secret torture gulags that General Petraeus has nothing to say about epitomise the problem.
I understand, but you again engage in non sequitur. General P's "non comment" is irrelevant, as Gitmo is not in his lane. His policy statement, which I linked for you, addresses his AOR. It stands on its own merit.

I suggest you direct your complaint to those who are in fact responsible for those policies, Gitmo being a pet peeve of yours obviously, which does not inlcude this particular general.

Again, to restate the obvious, since they are not in h is lane, his lack of comment is correct, based on his role and assigned mission.

You will note that Major General John General Batiste also had little to say in criticism of his civilian superiors until he retired, due to the above mentioned rules of civil control of the military. Once he was able to speak freely, he and others have been very open in their criticism of numerous policies and practices.

DR

E.J.Armstrong

30th September 2007, 09:36 AM

The dog has been chasing possums again, I can't get back to sleep after having calmed him down, and you remain wrong on a number of accounts, but riding the crest of your emotive high dudgeon, you are blinded by the salt spray of your myopia, and your agenda. American bashing, indeed. The shoe fits, Cinderella Armstrong.
Is hurling abuse at people now a sign of a lack of emotion? Hmmm.

Are you seriously trying to claim that, because I complain about US military support for torture and its penchant for running away from friendly questioning, I am American bashing. Since when did Americans as a group support cowardice and torture?

Point first, from the article you first linked.

Presence of Yanks requested, information required, from the coroner himself. The requirement is for accurate information on the event.Still no answer as to why the US military runs away from friendly questions whether a request or a requirement. The US military has refused ever to supply anyone - ever. The Coroner believes that he has not been given all the requested information. Contempt on both counts.

Point second: the information he requires is available from his own government, or ought to be, based on an investigation of that incident by the CJTF in Afghanistan. (CJTF is a Combined Joint Task Force, FAC is Forward Air Controller.) I have repeatedly shown that the information is not made available by the US military. What you think ought to happen is completely irrelevant. It is what the US military does, not what it says, that we are concerned about.

Even so, it is not bad for the US State department to forward such simple evidence as time and place, in a cleared for release to UKAUSCAN format as is done routinely for a variety of matters. Your own government has access to the information he needs, or at least should, now or as soon as various investigations are concluded, yet you rant and rave at those dreaded Americans. All the requested information is not made available as has been amply demonstrated. Once again you seek to place the blame on people other than the originators of the policy.

More on this later. It is important, and is a point where you and I have an agreement in principle You have failed to demonstrate any aspect of the issues I have raised where I agree with you.

Point third: Did the British FAC attend the inquest? I did not see any reference to that in the article. It is the presence of the men who killed their loved ones that is required, together will all the relevant information and it is that that the US military point blank refuses to provide in its consistently cowardly way.

Point fourth: you assert a military decision on the "no, no one is coming" message when you cannot show it. A simple reason for that, EJ, is that such a policy statement between governments/nations is political in nature, not military.

Government to government contacts between the US and UK are political, not military, and indeed, the military does not have the authority to make the policy statement you referenced -- about declining generally to make such persons available -- without political authorization to do so. It is thus a political decision. Those distinctions are rather stark in our form of government. Once again you resort to blaming others without any evidence to support your assertions. If there has been a law/regulation/policy from their political masters that US military personnel will not be sent to UK coroners courts and evidence that the US military is opposed to it, can you please post a link to the details instead of merely claiming that some such thing exists.

An observation and analysis: the penchant for the Press in general, and the UK press in particular, for sensationalism and emotive tripe like your tone in this thread is not lost on American politicians. It is not unreasonable to conclude that the requests fulfilled,
-given current sentiments that you referenced earlier in the UK vis a vis Iraq in general,
- UK sentiment on President Bush in particular,
- the emotion laden tragedy of a fratricide

that any visit by American servicemen involved would be turned into a grotesque media spectacle as only British journalists can do. (It's a gift.) This prediction is not a certainty, as the Brit establishment also has the wherewithal to conduct such a visit in a low key manner, but the Brit establishment does not control the families, nor that coroner.

That simple analysis points to a contributing factor in the denial for the request at the political level, but is no excuse for not providing the information, the simple facts of the case: what happened, when and where. Note, if that is the political decision, the servicemen technically cannot go in any official capacity without technically breaking the law, though the last is a very fine point. To sum this point up - the US military personnel do not come partly because of fear of the press. This admission confirms my point that the refusal is based on cowardice. We have a free press here and the fact that US military runs scared of a bunch of people with notepads confirms my view that they are not fit to be based in UK territory.

To sum up: you overstate the requirement, you understate the role of your government, you ignore the FAC, and you get wrong who made the call from the US side, fresh out of the gate. You ride the emotion, thinking it suffices for argument. The derails will remain off the tracks.

Your emotion is understandable, given that blue on blue means good guys are dead, and that hurts like hell. I gather you have some familiarity with the Pat Tillman case, an American blue on blue that has run afoul of atrocious handling by our Army.
[Sarcastic thought] If Pat Tillman's family can't get a straight answer in three years, what makes you think you, the coroner, or anyone outside the system can get one? [/sarcastic thought]That the US military choses to treat the families of US servicemen with contempt merely supports my arguments rather than undermines it.

To sum up, you blame anyone other than the originators of the policy and accuse those who disagree with you of riding emotion when it has consistently been you who has hurled abuse in place of rational argument. Newspeak indeed. All my points have been factually supported unlike you who has made assertion a substitute for fact, and your irrelevant assumptions of what 'should' be the case in place of real evidence the mainstay of your position

Even though the policy is not "US Military" but "US political," I can understand you being unable to see that, due to your chosen myopia. With that in mind, I offer you another point contra your idiotic "US military holds in contempt UK military" rubbish. As you have completely failed to provide any evidence of any policy/order/law that stops the US military from attending UK coroners courts you rather have indicated the consistency of your apparent view that what you say is the same as the truth. It is not until you back up your assertions.

I have supported all my contentions with facts as documented in the thread above.

The policy of which I complaln shows total contempt because it applies to the totality of the UK armed forces. The US military has already killed many of our soldiers and not once has supplied a single soldier responsible attended inquests and answered friendly questioning to help the familes understand what happened.

It now has a policy that means that, beyond all those already killed, if another gung ho US pilot ignored visible warnings and shot down a transporter plane of 100 soldiers, he would not tell the familes of all the dead what happened. It the US military dropped an atomic bomb on Iran in an area containing a division of UK soldiers, not one single US military person would come to tell potentially thousands of families what happened. In fact the US military could theoretically kill the entire British army and this policy states that not one of those responsible would attend the inquests. That defines total contempt in my book.

Because the policy affects the total UK armed forces the policy demonstrates total contempt for the lives of our soldiers. No matter how the men die, whether by accident or by criminal intent, not one single US military person responsible would attend a UK coroners court.

The scale of the contempt is truely breathtaking and we have already seen the contempt in action. One of our soldiers has been unlawfully killed in a criminal act and what has the US military actually done? They obstructed the court, they delayed the proceedings, they lied to the court, they failed to supply all the relevant information and the coroner believes to this day that they have not received all the available information and they have promoted the man largely responsible for the attack on clearly marked UK military convoy.

The earlier anecdote was a simple medical matter, and hardly at the institution to institution level. Here is a more telling illustration of how wrong you are in your generalization.

From here: http://www.outsidethebeltway.com/archives/2006/01/armys_iraq_work_assailed_by_briton/

The article itself, which I read when it came out and found to be well thought out, if a bit acid in tone:

http://usacac.leavenworth.army.mil/CAC/milreview/download/English/NovDec05/aylwin.pdf

The US Army, as an institution, if it held in contempt the British military and its members, would not have published in its professional journal an article so critical of its work to date in Iraq. IT took respect for his experience, and the school of thought his article represented, to publish it in the US Army's professional journal: Military Review.

Responses to the article were mixed. Some were knee jerk dismissive, some defensively so, some more open to outside critique. The commander of the Combined Arms Command, representing the institution of the US Army, was of the latter sort. There was not unanimous agreement with Alwyn's points, but there was the professional respect accorded him due to his experience and presentation, that is anything but contempt. Note who was writing a COIN doctrine manual at the time, at the CAC: LT Gen Patraeus.

Note who was commander, CAC.

So, once again, no, EJ, the US military does not treat the military of the UK with contempt. You remain, still, wrong about your fallacious conclusion due to your flawed logic in misapplying from a specific item a general conclusion. When the US military employs a policy that involves every single member of the UK armed forces and means that however they were killed, whether deliberately or by accident, not one single person responsible will ever attend a UK coroners court - that defines total contempt. The mere fact that they publish a paper by a Uk soldier in no way addresses that contempt, one single iota.

I will estimate that, given the publishing last fall of the COIN doctrine, revised, that some of Brigadier Alwyn's input was part of what went into our new doctrine. I do not find the timing coincidental.

You are not wrong in being frustrated by what seems a simple requirement for information running afoul of politics.

There is no dispute that the fratricide is a terrible error in execution of the allied effort in Afghanistan, or Iraq, as are all such battlefield errors. Your assertion of malice and contempt in the events of blue on blue incidents is also rubbish. Let me tell you for the Nth time (where N is now an enormous positive integer) that my concern is not simply for information. It is for the attendance of the responsible people at the inquests that is the core of the cowardly policy as well as the repeated lying, obstruction and failure to provide all the requested information.

Now, to the "more on that later" bit.

Given that the coroner needs facts and information to complete his inquest, it is not unreasonable to request, or expect, that he be provided such by the US Department of State via the UK foreign ministry, or by the US DoD via the UK MoD. All that would be required, on the assumption that no info was shared within the CJTF in Afghanistan between UK and US flag officers (highly unlikely, based on my experience working in CJTF's with Brits and others) is the good faith gesture to examine the official investigation undertaken by the USAF, extract the facts germane to the event that led to the accidental death on the battlefield of soldiers form the UK, and forward it in the usual releasable format.

From there, it should be no problem for the coroner to get it from his government. If that latter is a problem, the issue you have is with Brits, not Americans.

With that in mind, I shall consult with some of my vet friends and take the opportunity of your raising this matter to correspond to both of my Senators, and inquire as to why this has not been done, or if it has already been done. I shall provide you a draft of the letter this weekend.

Such a letter is about the limit of what is within my power to do, and as I see it, simply providing the coroner factual information is the least the US Government can do in this case. It can't hurt to ask my elected representative that our government do so.

DR
Once again you use the word 'should'. There is no 'should' about it. What we have is actual US military behaviour that has involved lying, obstruction, contempt for our government minister and refusal to supply any one to our court system for friendly questioning, even if they have intentionally killed a potentially unlimited number of UK troops.

Once again you blame the sufferers from the policy, not the originators.
In highlighting the case of the total contempt I stated that the US military should not be allowed to have a base on any UK territory. While I welcome any effort to get the US military to behave better your letter does not address what the families are asking for, does not address the policy of refusing to send anyone to UK coroners courts, even if they intentionally killed as many of the UK army as they could and does not address all the other myriad reasons why the US military should not be allowed to have bases on UK territory. These include support for torture, running concentration camps, doing nothing to stop the US secret gulags, keeping people without access to legal advice for years and doing nothing about Bush permitting torture by other US agencies etc.

Until that happens I do not see why we should continue to support the armed forces of a country that treats our soldiers with such contempt and behaves in such a way by permitting them to base troops on UK territories and invite all UK residents to view the e-petition at http://petitions.pm.gov.uk/YankeeGoHome/ with a view to signing it if they support the motion.

E.J.Armstrong

30th September 2007, 09:54 AM

...claiming that the US military has no regard for the life of British soldiers on the basis of this incident is nonsensical.
If this was the claim that would be true but that is not the claim. Neither I nor the coroners , nor the UK government, nor the families of the dead has claimed that it is merely this incident that they are complaining about.

If the crime is supposed to be tried in a sovereign country why wasn't it tried in Iraq instead of the USA giving its citizens, like those in Blackwater, immunity from prosecution

It is the policy that no matter how many soldiers (potentially up to and including the entire Uk army) are killed by US servicemen, either by accident on intent, not one will come to attend for friendly questioning. The reality is that the US military has obstructed the work of our courts.

The UK government has indicated that it has no problem in principle with UK servicemen attending US courts in the manner requested. In fact the UK has a track record of allowing extradition of its citizens to the USA (see Natwest three case http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Natwest_Three )when the USA has refused to ratify the agreement to permit the same thing of its people and won't even extradite IRA terrorists to the UK where their crimes were committed.

E.J.Armstrong

30th September 2007, 10:50 AM

That is due to you being in transmit mode, solely, since the OP. Try listening for a change. It requires dropping your filters. Pardon. You made a false claim. I rebutted it in detail. Instead of dealing with my points you posted a non-sequitur and now make further unsupported claims. Who is in transmit mode here? The thread shows who.

Hello pot, meet kettle. Your asserting a conclusion with powerful emotion does not make it right. The facts of a fratricide, or even more than one, does not indicate contempt for UK forces, it indicates an error, yet you attempt to show otherwise. You can't, and don't. Since you cannot seem to get that right, I am not sure how your alleged reasoning works. Cinderella, pot, facial. What an interesting lexicon of name calling.

As you don't seem to want to be told. It is not because of an accident, it never has been because of an accident, it never will be because of an accident.

It is because of the policy of total contempt for the entire Uk armed forces as detailed repeatedly and in much detail above. The conclusion is based upon the actions of the US military in relation to the entirety of the UK armed forces, whether the killings are accidental or intentional.

Once such case has been found to be unlawful and a result of a criminal act. The US military response promotion of the man largely responsible and a policy of total cowardice and contempt for the UK government minister, coroners courts and families of your so-called 'allies'.

No, you have not. You have imbedded a series of assumptions about the entire nature of American/Brit relations based on a small facet of it. That is intellectually dishonest.
I have patiently tabulated the details of a cowardly policy that affects the totality of the UK armed forces. Not one dead soldier, not ten, not ten thousand but the entirety of the UK armed forces. Total contempt.

To illustrate for you.

A large boxcar on a train is filled with boxes of diverse goods. This represents US/UK military to military relationships. You detect an odor, and investigate what smells "not quite right." This is the lack of information flow to the coroner in his inquest, represented by some cheese badly sealed (representing a flaw in the Special Relationship the US and UK enjoy.) You then conclude that since two boxes of bottled water are broken (Gitmo and Abu Ghraib) that the entire shipment is rotten, without having bothered to check into the boxes that contain toys, paper procudts, shoes, make up, Disney costumes, bourbon, and other goods. Your reasoning power is a loss, as is this cargo, potentially, if one were unwise enough to follow your reasoning to a conclusion, and thus a decision to trash the whole carload for the flaw in a few boxes.
This is an inappropriate simile. Respect for human rights is at the core of how any country is perceived by the rest of the world as the US so often rightly accuses other countries. What then are the realities of US behaviour on human rights around the world?

The US military has run a concentration camp in which people have been held for years without charge, trial or even access to legal counsel. A camp in which people have been driven to suicide by the inhumane conditions, where torture has been carried out and not one single senior military officer or politician has been found guilty of any dereliction of duty or crimes against humanity. The US runs a programme of kidnapping untried people and transporting them into a secret gulag programme for torture by proxy. When it is charged violates the laws of its 'allies' such as where it kidnapped people in Italy it runs away and refuses to submit to the approprite law in a policy of cowardice.

The USA has provided financial and military aid to undermine democracies, the latest being the financial aid to overthrow Chavez and it has acted to subvert the UN when it suits it as in the illegal invasion of Iraq based on lies and for oil and geopolitical advantage and the enrichment of companies close to the administration.

The reality is that the US military no longer shares the decent norms of decent nations.

You further erode your case by claiming from the survey that the general position of US forces is for torture, when your own link shows a 38 percent queried in a survey to hold a general positive reaction to it regarding insurgents which leaves about two thirds of them in the survey group, NOT for it. You can't get that right either, and it isn't even math, it is arithmetic. As you know I did no such thing. I supplied many lines of evidence to support my argument of which the survey was merely one. 38% is and remains a huge number of soldiers to take that view. No one ever claimed it was a numerical majority and you have never provided evidence to support your claim.
Yes indeed you provide links, but they do not support your claim as made, though they do show a variety of things that you are unhappy about regarding Americans. Your attribution of intent and attitude in the general case, which is what my objection to your hyperbole began as, remains empty of support.

Denial is not the only responder here to note your failure in reasoning. If they did not then show where they did not. That you say something does not make it true. My links supported all my claims as demonstrated conclusively in the thread above. Once again you make a claim with no supporting evidence. If you had any no doubt you would quote it.

We are now repeating ourselves, with no value added. The next time I respond to you, I will endeavour not to crap all over you, as I have done sufficient of that in this thread. I'd be interested to see you use less intellectual dishonesty in your future efforts, but am not holding my breath.

In any case, best of luck in what you are doing IRL, since on this forum, you are shooting yourself in the foot while under the impression that you are using reason. Au contraire I have happy to show that while calling other people emotional you have been the one hurling personal abuse. Whie accusing others of not supporting their claims you repeatedly make assertions with no support. That you have been the one failing to answer simple questions about your unsupported claims. If anyone is showing dishonesty it is those who espouse those sad methods.

In short your whole presence here has been an object lesson in failed bullying as witnessed by your behaviour in this thread.

You make an extraordinary claim, and instead of backing it up with your references and the standard extraordinary evidence, you merely highlight that there are things that you don't like about what Americans are doing, and the American military in particular, but the diverse links do not support your premise of contemptual treatment of the UK by the US military (which I can only guess means "the institution" thanks to Geni's comments) beyond anecdotal linkage.

DRLet me repeat that there is not one anecdote at the base of my claims. It is all based on fact and supported extensively.

The US military now operates a policy that effectively means that, no matter how many members of the British armed forces are killed by its personnel, whether accidentally or intentionally, it will never supply a single one of those responsible to attend a coroners court for friendly questioning to explain to the bereaved relatives what happened.

That is, by definition, a policy that applies to the totality of the UK army forces and in denying the wishes of our coroners' courts, government minister and the families of the dead, is also a policy of contempt hence total contempt QED. My thesis is therefore based in the real, demonstrated and ongoing behavior of the US military as documented extensively and repeatedly above and no unsupported assertion, personal abuse, or assumption by you has changed those facts one iota.

E.J.Armstrong

30th September 2007, 11:54 AM

Non sequitur, as his current job is the task at hand in Iraq, his previous as the 101st's commander, and as CAC commander. He is bound by law to keep his criticisms' of his political/civilian leadership temperate, and within channels. This means that internal critiques are hard to come by in attributed mode, but only get to you and I, the reading public, via journalists' sources on background, who are constrainted to speak without attribution. This is very much at the core of the matter (where are all these criticisms tabulated?).

German military officers were prosecuted after the second world war by US and other prosecutors for abusing human rights and their defence that they were only obeying orders was found by US prosecutors and international law to be no defence. Petraeus can not hide behind the claim that he was only obeying orders in operating facilities where other arms of the US government practised torture.

Thus two points:

Your criticism needs to be directed to both the CJCS and the Secretary of Defense, past and present if you like, and the President, for the set of policies that you, and many others, find lacking.

You may be surprised to note that as far back as 2003 American military JAG officers also disagreed with the policies as practiced, and in concert with private law firms raised this disagreement, legally and professionally, to the level of the Supreme Court with the result of a change (albeit small) in policy regarding status of detainees at Guantanamo Bay. Evidence of the range of their concern please? No Us military person has to obey an illegal order and the Nuremberg principles are enshrined in US la and the military manual.

It is a fundamental part of Petraeus' job to implement the US military manual that includes any of the principles that may have been flouted in Iraq at the request of civil leaders. If he shows dereliction of his duty he is not fit for command.

I see, the Generals open policy statement is lost on you. Got it. Senator McCains's efforts in Congress to change policy likewise lost on you. Got it. I have repeatedly stated that it is not what the general says but what he does. It seems you think that the world should take the words of a US general at face value. Don't you understand yet that because of the lies and the torture and the secret gulags and the disrepect for your allies laws and for international law and for the UN that will never happen again. Who believes your institutions any more? The families of UK soldiers killed by your forces certainly don't.

The world will only take notice of what the US military actually does and sadly, that is as I have extensively described.

You are correct, and both civilian and military senior leadership are to blame for the atrocious information and media efforts for the past six years. Their grade in the Informational element of national power is between a D and an F. If only it was PR. No amount of PR will ever excuse torture or concentration camps or contempt for allies laws or secret gulags or the extensive abuse of human rights operated by the agents of the US administration.

You once again mischaracterize the response as military, rather than political, but what are facts to you? More verbal volleyballs, as evidenced by your conduct from OP to present.

I understand, but you again engage in non sequitur. General P's "non comment" is irrelevant, as Gitmo is not in his lane. His policy statement, which I linked for you, addresses his AOR. It stands on its own merit. It does not. If Petraeus stands by and allows torture on his watch, in his camps, he is co-responsible for the torture and human rights violations, even if he does not dirty his own hands directly. If he stands by and does nothing about the kidnapping of people into secret gulags and transporting them for torture by other arms of the US government he is guilty by association, as in your own internal laws on murder.

You cannot have your cake and eat it by having one arm of the US administration blaming the other. If there are abuses of human rights by any arm of the US administration all arms of the US government are duty bound to stop it, if they are made aware of it.

No part of the US governmental organisation can say that they were not made aware of torture by the CIA, illegal human rights abuses at Guantanamo or the secret gulag programme that even Bush has admitted to, kidnappimng people for torture by proxy and trying to subvert democratically elected governments that the US doesn't like.

The entire organisation, if it is aware and does nothing, is guilty. By cooperating or even staying silent they are complicit. Petraeus has a responsibility to stop all human rights abuses a a senior member of the US adminstration and has been signally ineffectual. Simply mouthing platitudes does not hack it any more.

I suggest you direct your complaint to those who are in fact responsible for those policies, Gitmo being a pet peeve of yours obviously, which does not inlcude this particular general.

Again, to restate the obvious, since they are not in h is lane, his lack of comment is correct, based on his role and assigned mission. It does include this general. he cannot absolve himself from what goes on at his bases. If they go on at his bases on his watch he is complicit.

You will note that Major General John General Batiste also had little to say in criticism of his civilian superiors until he retired, due to the above mentioned rules of civil control of the military. Once he was able to speak freely, he and others have been very open in their criticism of numerous policies and practices.

DR
In the US military manual orders only have to be obeyed if they are lawful. That certain military men have flouted that imperative is cowardice personified.

This site clearly lays down the illegal activities that contravene the US military manual that you and Petraeus cite as being the guide for his activities - http://cgi.stanford.edu/group/wais/cgi-bin/index.php?p=7873

plumjam

30th September 2007, 09:34 PM

Wow.
this thread is still going strong.
Respect is due.

Darth Rotor

2nd October 2007, 08:41 AM

If Petraeus stands by and allows torture on his watch, in his camps, he is co-responsible for the torture and human rights violations, even if he does not dirty his own hands directly.
Wrong. He didn't run Abu Ghraib. He had his own sector to run. Sanchez was the guy in charge in Iraq when that began, you are pointing your finger at the wrong general.
If he stands by and does nothing about the kidnapping of people into secret gulags and transporting them for torture by other arms of the US government he is guilty by association, as in your own internal laws on murder.
Wrong. Patraeus is not the person running Gitmo. Plenty of folks in that chain of events have accountability for whatever is, or may be, wrong with that. Hell, why not fire Admiral Fallon, when he was CINCPAC, for Gitmo?
You cannot have your cake and eat it by having one arm of the US administration blaming the other.
Yes, you can, that is how our government works. Sorry if you don't like it, but that is precisely what is done here.
If there are abuses of human rights by any arm of the US administration all arms of the US government are duty bound to stop it, if they are made aware of it.
I see, the postmaster general was bound by EJ Armstrong law to stop Gitmo.

Absurdity does not an argument make.
No part of the US governmental organisation can say that they were not made aware of torture by the CIA, illegal human rights abuses at Guantanamo or the secret gulag programme that even Bush has admitted to, kidnappimng people for torture by proxy and trying to subvert democratically elected governments that the US doesn't like.
Got it, hang the surgeon general and the head of the Labor Department.
The entire organisation, if it is aware and does nothing, is guilty. By cooperating or even staying silent they are complicit.
Keep digging, you will get to China eventually.
Petraeus has a responsibility to stop all human rights abuses a a senior member of the US adminstration and has been signally ineffectual. Simply mouthing platitudes does not hack it any more.
He is not a senior member of the US administration. We, in the US, actually have a distinct differentiation between the civilian government, and the military which serves.
It does include this general. he cannot absolve himself from what goes on at his bases. If they go on at his bases on his watch he is complicit.
OK, again, you seem to confuse Patraeus with Sanchez. Facts, EJ, help your case, lack of them hurt your case. The other obligation for any commander is, when he finds in his AOR, a breach of regulation, to investigate it and where the evidence warrants, bring formal charges, etc.
In the US military manual orders only have to be obeyed if they are lawful.
Any regulation that makes it to print is, on its face, lawful. Should a challenge to it arise, two branches of government, Congress and the Courts, can either amend it, or over turn it, or cancel it. So too can the Executive, where a regulation is shown to be unlawful. This is a finding, not an EJ opinion, that is usually required to so change a reg.
That certain military men have flouted that imperative is cowardice personified.
Rhetoric. Hyperbole. Thanks for playing.
This site clearly lays down the illegal activities that contravene the US military manual that you and Petraeus cite as being the guide for his activities - http://cgi.stanford.edu/group/wais/cgi-bin/index.php?p=7873
Thank you for the link. Appeal to emotion noted, and the vigilance committee also noted. I have been following 1stLT Watada's case with some interest. I'll be interested to see how Watada's case is finally resolved, due to the question on what is going on in re lawful orders.
By the way, this is a lie:
3. The Panel heard testimony that soldiers receive minimal or no training to aid them in recognizing potentially illegal orders. Instead they are consistently taught to follow orders without question.
As stated, that is a blatant falsehood.

Too bad, as many of the sentiments in that letter I am in general accord with.

When you get your facts straight, your points are far more interesting than when you bloviate. Not your fault, I suppose, that you were only following someone else's rhetoric in the link. Their lie is now yours, based on your rationale.

Is that fair to you?

DR

Beerina

3rd October 2007, 06:59 AM

I cannot say that I am surprised about this news.

A few years back there was a move to give the World Court more authority, and while many nations signed on to the plan, the USA refused to do so under the grounds that US military personnel or citizens may be legally forced to appear before such a court.

Anyway, I would have to say that the decision made in this case is another manifestation of how the USA is refusing to get involved with international legal proceedings.

It was transparently obvious that such was intended to be used by factions who wanted to politically embarass the United States, rather than for its true purpose.

So the US, correctly, refused to sign up to it.

plumjam

4th October 2007, 12:38 AM

It was transparently obvious that such was intended to be used by factions who wanted to politically embarass the United States, rather than for its true purpose.

So the US, correctly, refused to sign up to it.

I bet murderers and rapists too would just love to use that excuse.

"Sorry, your honour, I don't recognise this court. It is a blatant attempt to embarrass me."

3point14

4th October 2007, 07:57 AM

It was transparently obvious that such was intended to be used by factions who wanted to politically embarass the United States, rather than for its true purpose.

So the US, correctly, refused to sign up to it.

This seems to imply that the US has something to be embarassed about?

E.J.Armstrong

8th October 2007, 07:35 AM

Wrong. He didn't run Abu Ghraib. He had his own sector to run. Sanchez was the guy in charge in Iraq when that began, you are pointing your finger at the wrong general. There is not one single thing wrong with my quote so I'll use it again 'If Petraeus stands by and allows torture on his watch, in his camps, he is co-responsible for the torture and human rights violations, even if he does not dirty his own hands directly.'

Wrong. Patraeus is not the person running Gitmo. Plenty of folks in that chain of events have accountability for whatever is, or may be, wrong with that. Hell, why not fire Admiral Fallon, when he was CINCPAC, for Gitmo? There is not one single thing wrong with the words of mine you quoted so I'll just use them again. 'If he stands by and does nothing about the kidnapping of people into secret gulags and transporting them for torture by other arms of the US government he is guilty by association, as in your own internal laws on murder.'

Yes, you can, that is how our government works. Sorry if you don't like it, but that is precisely what is done here. And could I just say that is why the world despises your administration. Bush demands that other countries do things that he won't implement in the US which by virtue of all the cowardice laws he issued holds itself above decent international standards.

I see, the postmaster general was bound by EJ Armstrong law to stop Gitmo.

Absurdity does not an argument make.

Got it, hang the surgeon general and the head of the Labor Department.

Keep digging, you will get to China eventually. Unfortunately your argument didn't work at Nuremburg and it doesn't work now. The US Surgeon General is exactly the sort of person who should be standing up for human rights. Yet the US medical establishment has been criticised for failing to do their duty over the behaviour of US doctors in relation to the human rights abuses in Guantanamo and Abu Ghraib.

He is not a senior member of the US administration. We, in the US, actually have a distinct differentiation between the civilian government, and the military which serves. Petraeus was appointed commander of all US military forces in Iraq inn Jan 2007. As such he has enormous power and it is his duty to refuse to carry out illegal orders. As such he was used by the Bush administration to provide cover for the 'surge' during which a private army from the US was declared to be above the law (ring a bell anyone) and murdered many innocent women and children.

When has Petraeus ever stated that the US military should not provide assistance to human rights abuses carried out in contravention of the Geneva Convention by other US agencies to which the US military provides assistance such as the CIA, which is currently transporting illegally detained people into secret gulags for torture by proxy.

OK, again, you seem to confuse Patraeus with Sanchez. Facts, EJ, help your case, lack of them hurt your case. The other obligation for any commander is, when he finds in his AOR, a breach of regulation, to investigate it and where the evidence warrants, bring formal charges, etc. Comprehension of english helps your case, deliberate misrepresentation hurts it.

Are you seriously now trying to argus that if Petraeus witnesses torture he is not under a duty to do anything? It didn't work at Nuremburg and it doesn't work now.

Any regulation that makes it to print is, on its face, lawful. Should a challenge to it arise, two branches of government, Congress and the Courts, can either amend it, or over turn it, or cancel it. So too can the Executive, where a regulation is shown to be unlawful. This is a finding, not an EJ opinion, that is usually required to so change a reg.

Rhetoric. Hyperbole. Thanks for playing. Once again, that argument didn't work at Nuremburg and it doesn't work now.

There is not one thing wrong with my argument as it referred to both written and verbal orders. Under the US military manual all soldiers are under an obligation not to obey an illegal order whether written down or verbal. The fact that Lieut Calley was treated gently after supervising the barbarous sexual abuse and slaughter of women and children at My Lai did not make his behaviour and the behaviour of the US military any less illegal.

Thank you for the link. Appeal to emotion noted, and the vigilance committee also noted. You still don't seem to have learned the lesson yet so let me repeat. I will never take any advice on emotion from a person whose sees fit to hurl abuse at people merely because they disagree with him. You have also failed to specify what the appeal to emotion was. This is probably because my description of the link was completely accurate. Let me repeat - simply because you say something doesn't make it true. After your behavior on this thread, if ever, you will only be taken seriously if you support your assertions with minor things like evidence.

I have been following 1stLT Watada's case with some interest. I'll be interested to see how Watada's case is finally resolved, due to the question on what is going on in re lawful orders.
By the way, this is a lie:

As stated, that is a blatant falsehood. Once again you make an assertion as though it is true and once again you fail to provide one single piece of evidence for it. You still seem to be of the opinion that simply because you state something it must be true.

You will not be taken seriously while you continue to adopt the triple approach of misrepresenting those who disagree with you, making assertions as a substitute for fact and hurling personal abuse.

Too bad, as many of the sentiments in that letter I am in general accord with.

When you get your facts straight, your points are far more interesting than when you bloviate. Not your fault, I suppose, that you were only following someone else's rhetoric in the link. Their lie is now yours, based on your rationale.

Is that fair to you?

DR
What facts?

How on earth am I supposed to know that any of your assertions are true when you decline to provide evidence. You now seem to be saying that not only must I read your mind to find out if there is a problem with the contents of any links I post but I must take as true anything I find in your mind. You just cannot make this stuff up.

Let me clarify there is no way on god's green earth that I will ever take an assertion by you as true until it is verified and as you seem to believe there is no reason to support your assertions or to answer simple questions I see little prospect of that ever happening.

Darth Rotor

12th October 2007, 04:09 PM

There is not one single thing wrong with my quote so I'll use it again 'If Petraeus stands by and allows torture on his watch, in his camps, he is co-responsible for the torture and human rights violations, even if he does not dirty his own hands directly.'
If a dog bites your balls, will it not hurt? Since you do not have evidence of Patraeus doing that, in his AOR in the 101st, or now that he has the larger AOR, I don't understand why you raise this strawman.
'If he stands by and does nothing about the kidnapping of people into secret gulags and transporting them for torture by other arms of the US government he is guilty by association, as in your own internal laws on murder.'
David Patraeus is not a Messiah, EJ, he is a general with a job to do. Why are you conflating what has been Bush administration policy since about the Afghanistan war, and US policy since Clinton was President (the rendition program) with General Patraeus' mission assigned as of January 2007.
And could I just say that is why the world despises your administration.
You missed the point, again. Nice goalpost move. I was pointing out to you how our form of government functions, and you come back with "you current administration is unpopular."

Uh, EJ, no kidding. We don't disagree on that point.
Unfortunately your argument didn't work at Nuremburg and it doesn't work now.
Goalpost move.
The US Surgeon General is exactly the sort of person who should be standing up for human rights. Yet the US medical establishment has been criticised for failing to do their duty over the behaviour of US doctors in relation to the human rights abuses in Guantanamo and Abu Ghraib.
Oh dear, criticised for not making a change not within their remit, by law, in their duty. Slowly, for you: the Surgeon General does not make defense policy.
Petraeus was appointed commander of all US military forces in Iraq inn Jan 2007. As such he has enormous power and it is his duty to refuse to carry out illegal orders.
This is a true statement. What does that have to do with anything else?
As such he was used by the Bush administration to provide cover for the 'surge' during which a private army from the US was declared to be above the law (ring a bell anyone) and murdered many innocent women and children.
Wrong again, the contract mercs (who I have never been keen on for parochial reasons) were in place, and a standing policy. How he addresses that is, as I see it, a work in progress. You assert, without proof, that Rummy's tool of using mercs is illegal. I do not see support of that position other than in your opinion. If what Rummy did was illegal (it isn't, as far as has been determined, under US law) then the illegal order is certainly in need of cancellation, and soon. If you can show that, under US law, that the contract for mercs is illegal, I shall join you in calling for that policy's cancellation. It would be my pleasure. I didn't like it in the first place, but that's a different matter.

Note for the record: I find Prime Minister Maliki's position on the mercs a sound one, and his objections rational. What I don't have in front of me is what documents, what MOU, there exists between the US and Iraq governments regarding the status, so I can't comment futher, other than to note that the news reports indicate a licensing requirement, and he has threatened to revoke at least one unless a change is made in how those security forces are conducting their operations. I think he is right to do so. Your assumption that, due to his not taking the EJ method of bellowing from the rooftops, General Patraeus is not working with PM Maliki and his defense ministers on this matter is a problem of your not being party to what he does 24/7, but only knowing what you selectively you read in the papers. Absense of evidence to you is not evidence of absense.

Stay tuned, this matter will arise, and be reported on, again.
When has Petraeus ever stated that the US military should not provide assistance to human rights abuses carried out in contravention of the Geneva Convention by other US agencies to which the US military provides assistance such as the CIA, which is currently transporting illegally detained people into secret gulags for torture by proxy.
Nice CT speak, EJ.

If they are doing it in his AOR, and if it is illegal under US law, he is bound to go to his chain of command and demand correction. That is his duty. Your opinion does not equal US law, so, again, show me that he has, since January, wilfully violated a US law, and I'll agree with you. He is not required to scream in the press, a la EJ, if he so finds things out of whack. He also doesn't have to come out with a public statement against rape, or drunken behavior, if any of his soldiers do either of those things. He simply has to deal with those infractions withing the UCMJ. It does not all have to play out on the on the public stage, just because you want to be entertained.
Comprehension of english helps your case, deliberate misrepresentation hurts it.
Not moving the goalposts all over the map would add coherence to whatever argument you might have.
Are you seriously now trying to argus that if Petraeus witnesses torture he is not under a duty to do anything?
No, I am not, but you seem to be. Per our other thread, he has made public a memorandum on how he sees torture, and if you recall that link I provided for you, his guidance is "no, don't do it."

Isn't that clear enough for you?
It didn't work at Nuremburg and it doesn't work now.
Red Herring, Mr Godwin. You need to remember that Nuremburg was victor's justice. So too was the treatment of some Japanese generals on the other side of the globe.
Once again, that argument didn't work at Nuremburg and it doesn't work now.
I guess the fish are biting today.
There is not one thing wrong with my argument as it referred to both written and verbal orders. Under the US military manual all soldiers are under an obligation not to obey an illegal order whether written down or verbal.
Agreed. Your problem is that you seem to think your opinion equals a lawful, or unlawful, standing. There is another matter, in application, that you have to recognize an order as lawful, or unlawful, in order to make that determination. When you do, you are bound to so advise you seniors in command. (Having done this myself a while back, on some minor matters, I am slightly familiar with the process but it was not in combat, but on staff duty.)

Here's a clue for you: why do you think Generals have a team of lawyers on their staffs? Called "Staff Judge Advocates." It's to research, and advise, the General on the legality of a whole hell of a lot. How often do you think a lawyer advises his General incorrectly on the law?
The fact that Lieut Calley was treated gently after supervising the barbarous sexual abuse and slaughter of women and children at My Lai did not make his behaviour and the behaviour of the US military any less illegal.
Calley was court martialed. He was convicted. Please check your facts. Captain Ernest Medina, his superior, was acquitted, which many American critics, in uniform and out, were not pleased with. (Indeed, at the time, there was some sentiment in America that people further the chain needed to swing for that one. I remember the outrage over that case very well. )
You still don't seem to have learned the lesson == snip == more emotional rot.
After your behavior on this thread, if ever, you will only be taken seriously if you support your assertions with minor things like evidence.
Oh dear, an emotional ultimatum from the master of histrionics. What shall I do? Offer friendly advice:

Get over yourself.
You will not be taken seriously
From someone who rants all over the map, this is no loss. I consider the source.
What facts?
Those you wilfully ignore, see Calley case above, for a simple instance, your inability to link where Patraeus was, and is, and his command responsibilities.
You now seem to be saying that not only must I read your mind to find out if there is a problem with the contents of any links I post but I must take as true anything I find in your mind.
No, I am not, but you made that up, which is fascinating, given your next line.
You just cannot make this stuff up.
You just did.
Let me clarify there is no way on god's green earth that I will ever take an assertion by you as true until it is verified and as you seem to believe there is no reason to support your assertions or to answer simple questions I see little prospect of that ever happening.
From one who can't keep a post organized, on topic, and in reference to facts relevant to his chosen topic, you now have me giggling with the delicious irony.

Thanks, EJ, again, for the laugh.

Have a lovely weekend.

DR

WildCat

12th October 2007, 04:26 PM

Slowly, for you: the Surgeon General does not make defense policy.
It's very confusing, he is a General after all!

Darth Rotor

12th October 2007, 04:32 PM

It's very confusing, he is a General after all!
No, he is an admiral. I hope that clears it up for you. :)

From the summary at wikipedia.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Surgeon_General_of_the_United_States
Original source: http://www.usphs.gov/aboutus/uniforms.aspx
The Surgeon General is a commissioned officer in the Public Health Service Commissioned Corps, one of the seven uniformed services of the United States, and by law holds the rank of Vice Admiral[1].

DR

E.J.Armstrong

18th October 2007, 12:43 PM

If a dog bites your balls, will it not hurt? Since you do not have evidence of Patraeus doing that, in his AOR in the 101st, or now that he has the larger AOR, I don't understand why you raise this strawman. My statement is a simple fact and you have yet to provide one iota of evidence to show it is not.

David Patraeus is not a Messiah, EJ, he is a general with a job to do. Why are you conflating what has been Bush administration policy since about the Afghanistan war, and US policy since Clinton was President (the rendition program) with General Patraeus' mission assigned as of January 2007. Where did I state that Petraeus is a Messiah? No where is the answer you were looking for. I have highlighted Petraeus' role and his responsibilities. If he does not refuse an illegal order he is breaking his obligations under the military manual. That is a simple fact.

You missed the point, again. Nice goalpost move. I was pointing out to you how our form of government functions, and you come back with "you current administration is unpopular."

Uh, EJ, no kidding. We don't disagree on that point. Can I just point out that quote marks are normally used for actual quotes not something you made up as you did here.

When you explain how your government functions is it now the law that I am prohibited from comment on a discussion forum?

Goalpost move. Statement of fact.

Oh dear, criticised for not making a change not within their remit, by law, in their duty. Slowly, for you: the Surgeon General does not make defense policy. Au contraire. Criticised for dereliction of duty.

If he is part of an administration that uses US doctors in torture then he has a duty to spell out their professional duties. If he does not or does not call for the administration of which he is a part to cease torturing he is culpable by his action/inaction.

This is a true statement. What does that have to do with anything else? If the CIA continues to fly kidnapped people illegally into secret gulags for torture for Bush by proxy and they are aided by the US military then Petraeuas as a very senior military man has a duty to refuse to support it.

Wrong again, the contract mercs (who I have never been keen on for parochial reasons) were in place, and a standing policy. How he addresses that is, as I see it, a work in progress. You assert, without proof, that Rummy's tool of using mercs is illegal. I do not see support of that position other than in your opinion. If what Rummy did was illegal (it isn't, as far as has been determined, under US law) then the illegal order is certainly in need of cancellation, and soon. If you can show that, under US law, that the contract for mercs is illegal, I shall join you in calling for that policy's cancellation. It would be my pleasure. I didn't like it in the first place, but that's a different matter. Au contraire. If you actually read my post you would find that I did not state that Rumsfelds use of private armies was illegal. I stated that '...a private army from the US was declared to be above the law (ring a bell anyone)' ie Blackwater.

See 'They have not been prosecuted under US civilian law; US military law and the Bush administration banned the Iraqi government from prosecuting them in Iraqi courts beginning with the passage of Coalition Provisional Authority Order 17 in 2004. The message this sends to the Iraqi people is that these hired guns are above any law.' from http://www.thenation.com/doc/20071008/scahill0921 My point was completely accurate. Apology awaited. I note that Bush was again telling Iraq what it could and couldn't do in its own country. The 'War for Freedom to do what Bush wants or else' in a nutshell.

Note for the record: I find Prime Minister Maliki's position on the mercs a sound one, and his objections rational. What I don't have in front of me is what documents, what MOU, there exists between the US and Iraq governments regarding the status, so I can't comment futher, other than to note that the news reports indicate a licensing requirement, and he has threatened to revoke at least one unless a change is made in how those security forces are conducting their operations. I think he is right to do so. Your assumption that, due to his not taking the EJ method of bellowing from the rooftops, General Patraeus is not working with PM Maliki and his defense ministers on this matter is a problem of your not being party to what he does 24/7, but only knowing what you selectively you read in the papers. Absense of evidence to you is not evidence of absense.

Stay tuned, this matter will arise, and be reported on, again. Plus ca change. Personal abuse - again. Your inability to construct a post without hurling invective has been commented on repeatedly so it is clearly a matter of honour for you to continue to do so. Bully for you.

Your inability to find evidence of their special status of being above the law is not evidence that there was none. Let me help you. See http://www.guardian.co.uk/usa/story/0,,2183843,00.html?gusrc=rss&feed=networkfront. THis would not have been necessary if they weren't above the law unless the US government is used to doing things for nothing.

It seems that you comment without actually knowing very much if anything about what you comment on. Don't tell me you are going to quote selectively from what any newspapers say on anything ever again?

Nice CT speak, EJ.

If they are doing it in his AOR, and if it is illegal under US law, he is bound to go to his chain of command and demand correction. That is his duty. Your opinion does not equal US law, so, again, show me that he has, since January, wilfully violated a US law, and I'll agree with you. He is not required to scream in the press, a la EJ, if he so finds things out of whack. He also doesn't have to come out with a public statement against rape, or drunken behavior, if any of his soldiers do either of those things. He simply has to deal with those infractions withing the UCMJ. It does not all have to play out on the on the public stage, just because you want to be entertained. Undefined acronyms don't help comprehension.

I have never stated that me opinion equals US law or any law. He is a senior member of the US military. If he knows that the US military is assisting in illegal kidnapping and kidnapping of people into secret gulags for torture on behalf of Bush by proxy and does nothing he is an accomplice to human rights abuses.

Not moving the goalposts all over the map would add coherence to whatever argument you might have. Your non sequitur is of no relevance to my post so I will repeat it. 'Comprehension of english helps your case, deliberate misrepresentation hurts it.' I commend it to you.
No, I am not, but you seem to be. Per our other thread, he has made public a memorandum on how he sees torture, and if you recall that link I provided for you, his guidance is "no, don't do it." Isn't that clear enough for you? So you agree that if Petraeus sees torture he is duty bound to actually do something about it - good. But what should he do? How about if he is made aware that the US military is aiding the CIA in illegally transporting kidnapped into secret gulags for torture by proxy? What is his duty?
1/ Ignore it completely.
2/ Note it but take no action if it is outside his AOR and allow others to continue to act illegally and torture people.
3/ Report it and try to stop it.
4/ Refuse to support such actions.
5/ anything else you can think of.

I have noted a number of times now that what US generals say is often not believed because of their past behaviour. What they actually do is as important.

Red Herring, Mr Godwin. You need to remember that Nuremburg was victor's justice. So too was the treatment of some Japanese generals on the other side of the globe. No idea who you are talking about.

Nuremburg was US and international justice. The Nuremburg principles are enshrined in the US military manual as I am sure that you know. Are you saying the US military manual is flawed in incorporating such principles of justice?

See also: -
'Indeed, the domestic law of Great Britain, the United States, and Prussia had long since held that a person does not escape liability for a crime by insisting that he was following orders. What the Nuremberg tribunal did do was to apply the converse of the superior-orders rule: namely, that the persons giving the orders, up to and including the political leaders of the nations, could also be guilty of war crimes. Thus, among those found guilty were German generals who had ordered the killing of prisoners of war, the civil administrators of occupied territories, and the economic ministers who had exploited slave labor. In addition to the trial of the major criminals, the Allies decided that lower-level German officials should be tried by national or occupation courts of each occupying power.' from http://law.jrank.org/pages/2308/War-Crimes-War-crimes-trials.html

I guess the fish are biting today. Please explain, as your post is 100% opaque.

Agreed. Your problem is that you seem to think your opinion equals a lawful, or unlawful, standing. There is another matter, in application, that you have to recognize an order as lawful, or unlawful, in order to make that determination. When you do, you are bound to so advise you seniors in command. (Having done this myself a while back, on some minor matters, I am slightly familiar with the process but it was not in combat, but on staff duty.)

Here's a clue for you: why do you think Generals have a team of lawyers on their staffs? Called "Staff Judge Advocates." It's to research, and advise, the General on the legality of a whole hell of a lot. How often do you think a lawyer advises his General incorrectly on the law? Unfortunately for you I have never stated that my opinion equals the law.

Bush had a lawyer on his staff. Were his torture memos lawful? It seems that some decent lawyers in the US don't think so.

I have no idea how often any lawyer advises a general. What is their advice on supporting the illegal transportation of people around the world for torture by proxy?

Calley was court martialed. He was convicted. Please check your facts. Captain Ernest Medina, his superior, was acquitted, which many American critics, in uniform and out, were not pleased with. (Indeed, at the time, there was some sentiment in America that people further the chain needed to swing for that one. I remember the outrage over that case very well. ) I did check my facts. You dod not appear to be familiar with them. Let me help you.

See 'According to testimony at the court-martial of Lieutenant William Calley, Jr., held in March 1971, Calley had ordered his men to kill everyone and had personally killed a number of the inhabitants, including a two-year-old child. He was found guilty of the premeditated murder of twenty-two Vietnamese civilians and sentenced to life imprisonment. The sentence was reduced to twenty years' imprisonment by the commanding general of Fort Benning, and was further reduced to ten years by the secretary of the army. Calley was paroled after serving one-third of the sentence (Calley v. Callaway, 519 F. 2d 184 (5th Cir. 1975)).' from http://law.jrank.org/pages/2308/War-Crimes-War-crimes-trials.html

The big brave hero who personally murdered a two year old child had his sentence reduced by a general of the US military and further reduced by the secretary of the army. My statement was therefore completely accurate. The US military deliberately and treated a military monster extremely leniently. Plus ca change. Your apology is awaited but not anticipated due to your past behaviour.
Oh dear, an emotional ultimatum from the master of histrionics. What shall I do? Offer friendly advice:

Get over yourself. Until you stop hurling personal abuse and misrepresenting and lying about those you debate with (as documented extensively in this thread and elsewhere) you will simply not be taken seriously.

From someone who rants all over the map, this is no loss. I consider the source. Hurling personal abuse does not make your theses correct.

Those you wilfully ignore, see Calley case above, for a simple instance, your inability to link where Patraeus was, and is, and his command responsibilities. I have posted extensive evidence for the extremely lenient of the military monster Lieut Calley as demonstrated above and that is freely available all over the internet if you had bothered to look. Your apology awaited but not anticipated given your behaviour in this thread and elsewhere.

Your non-sequitur about Petraeus is noted. I have patiently supported all my arguments with links as patiently shown in this thread and elsewhere. I just don't accept your statements as the truth given your propensity for misrepresentation and lies about me, as tabulated in this thread and elsewhere.

No, I am not, but you made that up, which is fascinating, given your next line. It would appear to be impossible to do what you ask without reading your mind, which as I have repeatedly said I don't do.

You just did. Please see what you demanded I do as it appears you have forgotten your own words.

From one who can't keep a post organized, on topic, and in reference to facts relevant to his chosen topic, you now have me giggling with the delicious irony.

Thanks, EJ, again, for the laugh.

Have a lovely weekend.

DR
If only your words could be believed.

'Ultimately, Calley served 3½ years of house arrest in his quarters at Fort Benning, Georgia.' from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Calley

The US military intervened to treat a monster leniently.

In contrast some people in Guantanamo Bay have been held longer without charge than Calley served under house arrest for ordering a massacre and personally murdering a two year old child. Calley in his defence claimed he was only obeying orders.

US military justice at its previous and current best.

dudalb

18th October 2007, 01:07 PM

EJ seems to be determined to surpass Ion in the amount of hatred he can spew toward the US.

Gurdur

18th October 2007, 01:10 PM

No, he is an admiral.

Now THAT is a smack-down! A thing of beauty and a joy forever.

Disclaimer: I mean no disrespect or criticism whatsoever of WildCat and his original post here, I just mean the inter-services rivalry culminating in such a touch-down. Elegant and fast like a leopard hunter sub.

E.J.Armstrong

18th October 2007, 01:25 PM

EJ seems to be determined to surpass Ion in the amount of hatred he can spew toward the US.

Unless you support your claims with any evidence your argument seems to imply that no-one can criticise specific US policies without being accused of spewing hated towards the US?

That would mean that many members of congress who criticise the US involvement in invading Iraq were spewing hatred towards the US.

A sign of maturity in any nation is that those who wield enormous power justify their behaviour under simple questioning.

Only despots and tyrants demand power without taking the responsibility to account for their behaviour to those affected by their actions.

Darth Rotor

18th October 2007, 03:33 PM

See 'They have not been prosecuted under US civilian law; US military law and the Bush administration banned the Iraqi government
Wrong. Again. Mostly due to you being sloppy.

US military law cannot ban the Iraq government from anything, unless the US military is acting as General Clay did in Germany: as the occupying power. That has long since been over come by events, though for about a year that was the state of play, and if you want to stretch that to the term of the Alawi provisional government, I'll buy that as well. During that time, charges were preferred in 2003, by the military, against certain personnel in Abu Ghraib. Months before you ever knew about it, or I. The case had been in the works for months before those infamous photos were made public by defendants in the case. (For my money, some people higher in the chain deserved harder treatment than they got, but no one asked me.)
Undefined acronyms don't help comprehension.
I note the deliberately obtuse mode, yet again.
He is a senior member of the US military.
That is irrelevant. What is relevant is his responsibility within his area of command authority. Now, if he comes across evidence, rather than rumor, of maltreatment, then see below.
If he knows that the US military is assisting in illegal kidnapping and kidnapping of people into secret gulags for torture on behalf of Bush by proxy and does nothing he is an accomplice to human rights abuses.
In that case, so is the Admiral running the Nimitz battlegroup in the Northern Pacific. Your attempt to cookie cutter the Wehrmacht and Kriegsmarine examples is a very weak Godwin move, and it completely ignores agency, as well as limitations in span and control. I wouldn't expect you to understand, EJ, unless you are professionall educated in command and control.

You also claim he is "doing nothing" which you cannot support, since, as noted, you do not have 24/7 access to his activities. He is not obliged to you, or me, to live his life under a 24/7 microscope. All you and I see in the press is a sliver of all that goes on. Get your arms around that, and grasp it, before you go off again about your absence of evidence rubbish.

Again, the memorandum for the record, once in charge and learning of a dangerous sentiment in his command, is something suitable to a policy position. What don't you see about that?

"I only know what I read in the Papers." EJ's motto. Heck, not even that.
So you agree that if Petraeus sees torture he is duty bound to actually do something about it - good. But what should he do?
If it is in his unit, he has the Manual For Courts Martial and his JAG, and IG, to handle each case. He has to. It's his job. Each case hinges upon evidence, not merely on charges.

Failure, where the evidence of an Article 32 investigation shows that a case of breach in military regs has taken place puts his head on the block. You seem to equate charges with evidence.

You are from the UK. Do you understand what is wrong with that?
How about if he is made aware that the US military is aiding the CIA in illegally transporting kidnapped into secret gulags for torture by proxy? What is his duty?
Are they in his chain of command? If so, see above.

If not, the correct course of action is to contact the Sec Def via his Combatant Commander, USCENTCOM commander, now Admiral Fallon, and advise him that another cabinet office needs to do something about it. That's called using the chain of command, and that is also his job.
3/ Report it and try to stop it.
The "Try and stop it" is a bit vague, unless it were you or I, sergeants the both of us, in a unit handling things. The immediacy of "stop it" at that level are very different from the half dozen echelons up actions, which tend to take the shape of directives, or orders.
No idea who you are talking about.
I believe you.
Nuremburg was US and international justice. The Nuremburg principles are enshrined in the US military manual as I am sure that you know. I note that you can't name that manual. Please go on, before we discuss this further.
'Indeed, the domestic law of Great Britain, the United States, and Prussia had long since held that a person does not escape liability for a crime by insisting that he was following orders. What the Nuremberg tribunal did [/url]
You really don't understand what victor's justice is. It's the same thing as "the winners write the history books."

Until such time as you, and your ilk, have America prostrate before you as Germany was before the Allies, victors justice isn't an option.

Now, do you get it? That's reality. Justice isn't objective, it is subjective.
Bush had a lawyer on his staff. Were his torture memos lawful? It seems that some decent lawyers in the US don't think so.
Correct. The argument continues, and the Supremes seem to be siding with those attorneys.
I did check my facts. You dod not appear to be familiar with them. Let me help you.
You then post a great deal.
The sentence was reduced to twenty years' imprisonment by the commanding general of Fort Benning, and was further reduced to ten years by the secretary of the army.
All within the law. What's your problem? I stated that he was courtmartialed, he was and he was punished. You don't like the punishment? So be it. Don't feel bad, many other people IN AMERICA didn't, and as I noted, they did not care for Captain Medinah getting acquitted.

But that is what happens, in courts of law: sometimes, people charged get acquitted. That is a system we Americans inherited from the Brits. Taste the irony. Why do you hate your own legal system?
Calley was paroled after serving one-third of the sentence (Calley v. Callaway, 519 F. 2d 184 (5th Cir. 1975)).' from http://law.jrank.org/pages/2308/War-Crimes-War-crimes-trials.html
Correct. Last I heard, he ran a pawn shop, in North Carolina, and did not tend to give interviews.
My statement was therefore completely accurate.
No, I was precisely correct, see my point above. You really need to quit reading BS into what is written, here and elsewhere.
The US military deliberately and treated a military monster extremely leniently.
True to form, unable to handle any topic without emotive language.
Plus ca change. Your apology is awaited but not anticipated due to your past behaviour.
Me, apologize for you being wrong? Why? I was precisely and exactly correct about what happened to Calley. He was court martialed. Convicted, Punished. And, as you point out, as The Law allows, later paroled. That is all within the law.
Hurling personal abuse does not make your theses correct.
Hurling personal abuse? Hypberbole, the EJ Armstrong method. When I hurl actual personal abuse at you, you'll know it. Mild mockery is not personal abuse, except to self important blowhards with thin skins.
I have posted extensive evidence for the extremely lenient of the military monster Lieut Calley as demonstrated above and that is freely available all over the internet if you had bothered to look.
I am keenly aware of the Calley case. We did a study of it at staff college under the ILOAC section. A crime. An Army helicopter pilot, in the mid 1990's, was awarded an honor, thanks to petitions by persons at the scene for some years afterwards, for his part in getting out of his Huey, seeing what was going on, and on his own initiative, getting soldiers to stop it. But for him, it might have been worse. Good for him, but bad that he had to unscrew Calley's failure.

What you seem unable to do is refer to this topic without foaming at the mouth. Your problem, not mine.
In contrast some people in Guantanamo Bay have been held longer without charge than Calley served under house arrest for ordering a massacre and personally murdering a two year old child. Calley in his defence claimed he was only obeying orders.
Ah, you finally stop bloviating, and you raise an interesting point.

The difference in treatment between one protected by laws, and persons whose legal status is, quite franklly, still in debate. While the cases in juxtaposition are a non sequitur, it raises a very good point about being an outlaw, per many (but not all) of those taken in Afghanistan and sent to Gitmo, and being part of a lawful society, and having an attorney represent you, and having resort to appeal.

Again, as I noted elsewhere, I do not think that holding prisoners taken in Afghanistan anywhere other than in the theater of war where taken the correct course of action, in the case of Taliban actors, though Al Qaeda members, as stateless outlaws, are another matter. That the two groups were conflated, and in some cases treated the same, is IMO an incorrect policy, which stems from the DoD and NCA level. Problem is, some attorneys, as you noted, looked into the various laws concerning all this (Cylinder has cited numerous times the law about unlawful combatants that dates back to F Roosevelt) and made the case to do so.

The result, as noted, is hardly clean, and in many cases, unsatisfactory, particularly in the cases of mistaken identity.

This difference in legal status is the key to the argument made by military lawyers, civilian lawyers, and recently, the Supreme Court Justices who agreed that what is going on in Gitmo has smelled of a loophole from the beginning.
US military justice at its previous and current best.
Rhetorical rubbish.

EJ, if you would get to the point, and stay focused, our conversations would be more productive. Bloviation and emotional hyperbole interferes with the discourse, but that is the style of each of your OP's. And some of your posts. Oddly, you wonder why you get your face rubbed in it. Self awareness needs work, sir.

I can be a real nice guy, or a real sonofabitch. You get what you rate. When you discuss something objectively, you'll get objective back. When you foam at the mouth, you'll get mockery.

Ball's in your court.

DR

Darth Rotor

18th October 2007, 03:58 PM

That would mean that many members of congress who criticise the US involvement in invading Iraq were spewing hatred towards the US.
Congrats, you graduate emeritus from Fox News principles, 101. ;)

For the 200 level course, and credit, you'll need to correctly classify what a left wing liberal is, and why school vouchers are like manna from Heaven.

Best wishes, the exam begins in five minutes.

DR

E.J.Armstrong

19th October 2007, 02:10 PM

Wrong. Again. Mostly due to you being sloppy.

US military law cannot ban the Iraq government from anything, unless the US military is acting as General Clay did in Germany: as the occupying power. That has long since been over come by events, though for about a year that was the state of play, and if you want to stretch that to the term of the Alawi provisional government, I'll buy that as well. During that time, charges were preferred in 2003, by the military, against certain personnel in Abu Ghraib. Months before you ever knew about it, or I. The case had been in the works for months before those infamous photos were made public by defendants in the case. (For my money, some people higher in the chain deserved harder treatment than they got, but no one asked me.) Once again you have chosen to misrepresent me and I now accept that it is a matter of honour for you to do so. Where did I state what you claim? Honest men try and support their assertions once in a while.

I note the deliberately obtuse mode, yet again. What exactly is so difficult about the simple concept of explaining you own acronyms?

That is irrelevant. No it is not. See, anyone can do the Rotor assertion thing. Please take at look at what happened at Nuremburg.

In that case, so is the Admiral running the Nimitz battlegroup in the Northern Pacific. Your attempt to cookie cutter the Wehrmacht and Kriegsmarine examples is a very weak Godwin move, and it completely ignores agency, as well as limitations in span and control. I wouldn't expect you to understand, EJ, unless you are professionall educated in command and control. [/QUIOTE] My goodness are you starting to see the light? Despite me telling you I have no idea who you are talking about you persist in doing so. If you continue to refuse to explain yourself I cannot help you.

Where did I cookie cut? What did I cookie cut? For once at least try and explain your assertions by supplying evidence.

[QUOTE]You also claim he is "doing nothing" which you cannot support, since, as noted, you do not have 24/7 access to his activities. He is not obliged to you, or me, to live his life under a 24/7 microscope. All you and I see in the press is a sliver of all that goes on. Get your arms around that, and grasp it, before you go off again about your absence of evidence rubbish.

Again, the memorandum for the record, once in charge and learning of a dangerous sentiment in his command, is something suitable to a policy position. What don't you see about that?

"I only know what I read in the Papers." EJ's motto. Heck, not even that. You invented the 'motto', yet you put it in quotes. That shows clearly the dishonesty at the core of your posts. Lying about me doesn't mean you are correct. I certainly don't take you seriously for the reasons I have repeatedly tabulated.

If it is in his unit, he has the Manual For Courts Martial and his JAG, and IG, to handle each case. He has to. It's his job. Each case hinges upon evidence, not merely on charges.

Failure, where the evidence of an Article 32 investigation shows that a case of breach in military regs has taken place puts his head on the block. You seem to equate charges with evidence.

You are from the UK. Do you understand what is wrong with that?

I do not equate charges with evidence. Never have done. Where is your evidence?

Are they in his chain of command? If so, see above.

If not, the correct course of action is to contact the Sec Def via his Combatant Commander, USCENTCOM commander, now Admiral Fallon, and advise him that another cabinet office needs to do something about it. That's called using the chain of command, and that is also his job. Has he done so?

The "Try and stop it" is a bit vague, unless it were you or I, sergeants the both of us, in a unit handling things. The immediacy of "stop it" at that level are very different from the half dozen echelons up actions, which tend to take the shape of directives, or orders. It is really very clear.

I believe you. You really are refusing to explain yourself. I really cannot help you any more when I say I don't know what you are talking about.
I note that you can't name that manual. Please go on, before we discuss this further. It seems that you do recognise the difference between not doing something and not being able to do it. Not very honest is it?

You really don't understand what victor's justice is. It's the same thing as "the winners write the history books."

Until such time as you, and your ilk, have America prostrate before you as Germany was before the Allies, victors justice isn't an option.

Now, do you get it? That's reality. Justice isn't objective, it is subjective. I note your apparently deep seated contempt for the Nuremburg principles. Sad. Was there any point in incorporating the principles into the US military manual when people like you are so contemptuous of them?

Correct. The argument continues, and the Supremes seem to be siding with those attorneys. Decent people around the world already know what torture is even if your legal system has yet to make up its mind.

You then post a great deal. To support my claim. A concept you appear to find difficulty with and which you even even seem to be sneering at. I clearly demonstrated the leniency with which the mass murderer Calley was treated.

All within the law. What's your problem? I stated that he was courtmartialed, he was and he was punished. You don't like the punishment? So be it. Don't feel bad, many other people IN AMERICA didn't, and as I noted, they did not care for Captain Medinah getting acquitted.

But that is what happens, in courts of law: sometimes, people charged get acquitted. That is a system we Americans inherited from the Brits. Taste the irony. Why do you hate your own legal system? Where did I ever say what it was very lenient treatment as I demonstrated conclusively with my links. Calley served less than two months under house arrest for every person he personally killed, never mind the others who were killed under his orders. That's US military justice for you. Interestingly it is not UK military justice.

In terms of your acquittal argument the only problem is that he actually murdered those people unlike many of the people in Guantanamo Bay who have endured much worse conditions than Calley without even being charged.

A monster kills a two year old child and gets treated extremely leniently by the US military and you blame it on British Justice and then accuse me of hating my own system? Do you never ever have the courage to accept what the US military actually does? Just like the despicable and cowardly policy that started this thread. I have been even more sure that it is right to remove all US forces from all UK territories if your attitudes are reflective of US military behaviour. It really makes my blood run cold.

Correct. Last I heard, he ran a pawn shop, in North Carolina, and did not tend to give interviews. Bully for the mass murderer who was treated enormously leniently by the US military.

No, I was precisely correct, see my point above. You really need to quit reading BS into what is written, here and elsewhere. When I stated that Calley was treated leniently you stated 'Calley was court martialed. He was convicted. Please check your facts.' My facts were 100% accurate.

It seems that you regard the fact that a mass murdered who murdered a two year old child personally and was freed after a shorter period than some inmates of the Guantanamo Concentration camp served without even being charged was not treated leniently, otherwise what was the point of your post?

True to form, unable to handle any topic without emotive language. I think that the word 'monster' perfectly adequately describes a coward who personally murdered a two year old child, never mind over twenty other people. That you don't is noted. Maybe you feel he is just an ordinary Joe? Who knows? Who cares?

Me, apologize for you being wrong? Why? I was precisely and exactly correct about what happened to Calley. He was court martialed. Convicted, Punished. And, as you point out, as The Law allows, later paroled. That is all within the law. As noted apology not anticipated.

Once again I never claimed that what happened to Calley was illegal and interestingly once again you have failed to provide a single teeny weensy bit of evidence to suggest that I did.. Your repeated straw man arguments are noted. Why not try debating what I actually said for a change? Your misrepresentations are getting to be legion.

A big brave USA soldier personally murdered a very dangerous two year old child terrorist that was clearly an immediate threat to the safety of the big brave US soldier. Calley was treated extremely leniently by the US military as demonstrated by my post, despite your demand that I check my facts, interestingly in letters you chose to bold, presumably because you were so adamant I was wrong.

Hurling personal abuse? Hypberbole, the EJ Armstrong method. When I hurl actual personal abuse at you, you'll know it. Mild mockery is not personal abuse, except to self important blowhards with thin skins. The facts speak otherwise and I have already posted where you did it. At least try and be honest for once Rotorvator.

I am keenly aware of the Calley case. We did a study of it at staff college under the ILOAC section. A crime. An Army helicopter pilot, in the mid 1990's, was awarded an honor, thanks to petitions by persons at the scene for some years afterwards, for his part in getting out of his Huey, seeing what was going on, and on his own initiative, getting soldiers to stop it. But for him, it might have been worse. Good for him, but bad that he had to unscrew Calley's failure.

What you seem unable to do is refer to this topic without foaming at the mouth. Your problem, not mine. Au contraire. Calley was treated extremely leniently and you were the one who found the need to bold you own words (no me) when I stated the truth.

Let me ask you directly because you seem o feel that spreading chaff is an approprite MO in this case. Do you believe that Cally was treated leniently or not? I look forwards to a straight answer for a change

Ah, you finally stop bloviating, and you raise an interesting point.

The difference in treatment between one protected by laws, and persons whose legal status is, quite franklly, still in debate. While the cases in juxtaposition are a non sequitur, it raises a very good point about being an outlaw, per many (but not all) of those taken in Afghanistan and sent to Gitmo, and being part of a lawful society, and having an attorney represent you, and having resort to appeal. What a load of BS. Time to get real. Their status is clear all around the world. The USA would be appalled if their own soldiers were treated in the same way people have been treated in Guantanamo. It is a concentration camp and you have the bare cheek to say their status is being debated as if dishonest navel gazing by the Bush administration should be taken seriously by any decent people in the world.

It is truly this contempt for decent principles like Habeas Corpus that demonstrates the need to remove US military forces out of UK territories as soon as possible. Thank you for demonstrating so clearly to the world the sheer depths of humbug indulged in by those who cannot see the wood for the trees.

Again, as I noted elsewhere, I do not think that holding prisoners taken in Afghanistan anywhere other than in the theater of war where taken the correct course of action, in the case of Taliban actors, though Al Qaeda members, as stateless outlaws, are another matter. That the two groups were conflated, and in some cases treated the same, is IMO an incorrect policy, which stems from the DoD and NCA level. Problem is, some attorneys, as you noted, looked into the various laws concerning all this (Cylinder has cited numerous times the law about unlawful combatants that dates back to F Roosevelt) and made the case to do so.

The result, as noted, is hardly clean, and in many cases, unsatisfactory, particularly in the cases of mistaken identity.

This difference in legal status is the key to the argument made by military lawyers, civilian lawyers, and recently, the Supreme Court Justices who agreed that what is going on in Gitmo has smelled of a loophole from the beginning. You called some of the people Al Quaeda members. You do realise that until they are charged and found guilty in a decent court of law they are not guilty of anything, don't you? It seems that Calley is not being treated leniently despite being guilty of mass and child murder when people who have not even been charged with anything have been incarcerated in a US military concentration camp longer he did under house arrest. I think that is an extremely good definition of gross hypocrisy.

If they have committed a crime charge them and try them in a decent court. Stop treating Habeas Corpus with such institutionalised contempt.

Rhetorical rubbish. 100% accurate.

EJ, if you would get to the point, and stay focused, our conversations would be more productive. Bloviation and emotional hyperbole interferes with the discourse, but that is the style of each of your OP's. And some of your posts. Oddly, you wonder why you get your face rubbed in it. Self awareness needs work, sir.

I can be a real nice guy, or a real sonofabitch. You get what you rate. When you discuss something objectively, you'll get objective back. When you foam at the mouth, you'll get mockery.

Ball's in your court.

DROnce again you make a false assertion. I do not wonder why I get my face rubbed in anything. I am more than happy to have you make false assertions about me, misrepresent me and lie as it demonstrates the necessity for the action called for at the start of this thread.

It seems that you have still to learn the simple lesson that while you continue to lie about those who engage in debates with you you will continue not to be taken seriously. People who deliberately and continually indulge in such practices cannot be nice guys, by definition.