The Battle for Iraq - Ethnic Cleansing
POSTED BY: Ghoulman
UPDATED: Sunday, June 22, 2025 01:22
VIEWED: 23789
PAGE 8 of 18
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Originally posted by Ghoulman:
Respectfully?
Quite.
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The thing is I don't make statments like ""...killing an entire city...". lightly. I've seen the shots of Fallujah yesterday. Looks like the Warsaw Getto on a bad day. You know, when the Nazis burned it down building by building.
I saw shots like that too, in newspapers, and various online sources. But, these shots are not proof that it has been burned down building by building. Certainly, some parts have been destroyed, but other parts have not. There is evidence that up until Nov 5, no destruction on the scale that you claim has occurred:
Edited: www.digitalglobe.com
/images/qb/al_fallujah_nov5_2004_ov_dg.jpg
This imagery seems to show that since April, the US military has not wiped the city off the Earth (how you put it I think.)
I admit, it predates the bulk of the ground offensive, but it is still good data and can be compared to future data to actually quantify the damage to the city.
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America is murdering, torturing, and raping innocent people in an insane war. You can go around twisting facts to prop up your opinion all you want, but it doesn't change the reality. Fallujah is a war crime on a scale not seen since Vietnam.
Which facts did I "twist"?
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About Saddam being a Sunni. Sure he was, by birth. But that isn't what he was as the Iraq tyrant. His supporters were a criminal gang of various people, many family oriented. It was like the mafia. Making a connection from the entire Sunni population to Saddam is specious at best. What you have done is use a speck of truth as proof to your opinion about Saddam and the Sunnis. But it isn't true and what's more that's common knowledge about Saddam (I've seen this subject talked about).
Saddam's supporters were (and are) more than a criminal gang. He and they controlled and entire country and put down a popular uprising by the majority ethnic group. It takes alot of people to do that and many, not all, came from the cities and towns of the Sunni triangle, including Falluja. I do not think all Sunnis support Hussein, but I do think that many did and some still do.
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Besides, what could your point actually be? That if the city of Fallujah was traditionally a Saddam stronghold it should be raised? America still looking like ethnic cleansing in that scenario too you see.
No, I do not think Fallujah should be razed, and further, I do not think it is being razed. I think that US military forces are moving through the city on foot and in vehicles. They are fighting insurgents and disarming various explosive devices. Sometimes, they are killing civilians, unintentionally. Sometimes, they are destroying structures that are suspected to be too dangerous to enter and search. They are destroying and damaging many buildings, but not unnecessarily. They are finding torture and execution locations and caches of weapons. They are seeing very few civilians, but the ones they see are being aided and transported out of the city.
I believe that it is (was now) an insurgent stronghold, and that if Iraq is to ever become peaceful again, most of the insurgents must be a) convinced to join the political process or b) eliminated (killed or captured) through the military process. Convincing was tried in Falluja, and failed.
And I see no evidence of "ethnic cleansing". If it exists, I would like to see it. Please post sources. If you do not like to post webpages, then please post whatever cites you have, including personal communication. My access to paper editions of English language newspapers and journals is limited, but I will do the best I can.
Respectfully,
debiji
Edited: Crap! Didn't mean for the image to be in the post like that! Sorry.
Edited (again): Crud! Still not right
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BAGHDAD, Iraq (AP) - A portly Shiite cleric, Abu Qusai sheds his black robe for a training suit and exchanges his white turban for a baseball cap, an effort to mask his identity for a risky trip through what has become known as the "triangle of death."
The region has become a death zone for many Shiite Muslims, Westerners and members of the Iraqi security services, many of whom have become the victims of Sunni Muslim insurgents and gunmen _ some who receive bounties of several thousand dollars.
http://wtop.com/index.php?nid=105&sid=336120
So who was it doing the ethnic cleansing, again?
"Keep the Shiny side up"
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Militants Try to Stir Arab-Kurd Violence
Updated: Friday, Nov. 19, 2004 - 3:43 AM
By MARIAM FAM
Associated Press Writer
BAGHDAD, Iraq (AP) - Insurgents battling U.S. and Iraqi forces in the northern city of Mosul have been trying to drag the Kurdish minority into their fight and set off a sectarian war, Kurdish and Arab officials say.
Violence against Kurds has escalated in recent days, officials say. The offices _ and officials _ of Kurdish political parties have been attacked. Insurgents fired on a truck carrying Kurdish peshmerga fighters. And at least one Kurd was said to have been beheaded in Mosul, a largely Sunni Arab city.
http://wtop.com/index.php?nid=105&sid=336126
Got your ethnic cleansing right here.
Damn. Ghoul was right. There is ethnic cleansing in Iraq.
"Keep the Shiny side up"
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Geezer (et al) I was attempting to summarize an entire series of posts that Geezer made into one cogent sentence. I capitalized the sentence merely to make clear that it was edited in afterwards. (SHEESH!!) Here are the quotes:
"Unfortunately, the anti-coalition forces have a history of turning hospitals, mosques, schools and the like into either strongpoints or boobytraps" (hospitals, mosques, schools = potential targets)
"If coalition troops can't tell the real ambulances from the carbombs, they can either shoot to stop them or..."
"Nothing casual about it (i.e. shooting a wounded man point-blank). A decision that had to be made in a split-second, given the knowledge that the insurgents had been boobytrapping their dead, that suicide bombing was one of their preferred weapons, and that many of their fighters were looking for martyrdom."
"If it was possible, I, and I bet the military, would like nothing more than to get only the bad guys. This just isn't doable, especially in urban combat when the bad guys use occupied homes and buildings as fighting positions."
He also justified w/holding water and aid to Falujah using the same reasons.
The best summation I can make of the situation is : Shoot first and ask question later. When the enemey is fighting a guerrilla war and is part of (mingled with, supported by) the non-combatant population, this is probably the only rational thing to do. Inevitably, non-combatants are going to be killed.
I wasn't making this point to blame the soldier, who is only responding the the situation. I have a couple of points that I'm trying to make:
Even without the INTENT of killing every single person in Falujah, under the best of circumstances a "large" number of civilians were killed. The USA and Iraqi military also have a critical interest in controlling those civilian casualty figures in order to maintain support for the war. Falujah is a good case study for examining how the casualty figures are reported, which can develop a better idea of how well the reporting is working overall in terms of accuracy.
The other point is to question why we are fighting a population in the first place. Clearly, we aren't wanted and we are not viewed as "liberators".
Off-line now.
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Quote:
Originally posted by SignyM:
Even without the INTENT of killing every single person in Falujah, under the best of circumstances a "large" number of civilians were killed.
Since no figures have been released yet, this must just be an assumption on your part. The Red Cross won't enter the city without some assurance of safety from the insurgents, and haven't been able to get it. They're probably remembering the car bomb attack on their headquarters last year.
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The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) said on Friday that its aid teams could not enter Falluja without contacting insurgents fighting US-led forces for control of the city.
"To enter the city we must be sure that all the warring parties accept our presence," ICRC spokeswoman Antonella Notari told AFP news agency.
"But one party to conflict is out of our reach - we cannot establish contact."
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/4025171.stm
The only info about civilian casualties is from a military briefing, so you won't believe it, but here it is anyway.
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GEN. SATTLER: Casualties among the civilians. We have treated probably somewhere in the area of 25 to 30 who have been injured. I don't have -- we did not have any that have gotten up to me -- that we have actually any civilians that have been killed during the fighting. But once again, we're still moving through the town and there's a number of buildings that are in fact rubbled. But I can honestly say at this point, I know of none that were killed and only a handful that have been treated. We treat those right at our medical facility, and then the Iraqi interim government made ambulances available and doctors available, so there is a procedure for the civilians to be moved into the Iraqi medical system.
http://globalsecurity.org/military/library/news/2004/11/mil-041118-dod
01.htm
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Originally posted by SignyM:
The other point is to question why we are fighting a population in the first place. Clearly, we aren't wanted and we are not viewed as "liberators".
Off-line now.
Another assumption on your part. We don't have any firm info on the makeup of insurgent forces in Fallujah, except that their leader is Jordanian and some foreigners have been captured or killed. We did find the "hostage slaughterhouses" and locations for making car bombs and other IEDs, which would indicate that there were terrorists there, not just outraged Fallujahns wanting to protect their homes. Combat reports indicate many of them were uniformed, trained fighters; again, not just locals grabbing guns. "Human Interest" newspaper articles I've seen about the insurgents in Fallujah mentioned many Wahabi Sunnis coming from all over looking for martyrdom.
"Keep the Shiny side up"
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Dang- I peeked!
Geezer, the military has said, repeatedly, despite the fact that this is contrary to what the Administration is trying to protray, that the number of foreign fighters in Falujah is small (no more than 5%) and even samller in other areas of Iraq. They said this is May, they said this just a week ago. Will you PLEASE stop repeating something that is clearly wrong????
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Quote:
Originally posted by SignyM:
Dang- I peeked!
Geezer, the military has said, repeatedly, despite the fact that this is contrary to what the Administration is trying to protray, that the number of foreign fighters in Falujah is small (no more than 5%) and even samller in other areas of Iraq. They said this is May, they said this just a week ago. Will you PLEASE stop repeating something that is clearly wrong????
Signym,
5% of what number?
5% of the estimated enemy forces in Fallujah after the coalition dropped leaflets warning the civilian population we were coming in (est 5000 insurgents and foreign fighters) comes out to about 250.
But lets not forget that we were human enough to give them all this warning before the fight began after trying to convince the Fallujah population to give up the insurgents and foreign fighters themselves.
It is known that the warning that was given made the vast majority of said foriegn fighters leave fallujah before the battle began. That includes Zarqawi himself.
So when you say 5%, I ask 5% of what population?
Give me some real numbers and your sources please.
Am I a Lion?... No, I think I'ma tellin' the truth.
BarnStormer
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Quote:
Originally posted by SignyM:
Dang- I peeked!
Geezer, the military has said, repeatedly, despite the fact that this is contrary to what the Administration is trying to protray, that the number of foreign fighters in Falujah is small (no more than 5%) and even samller in other areas of Iraq. They said this is May, they said this just a week ago. Will you PLEASE stop repeating something that is clearly wrong????
That some of the fighters are foreign? But isn't that what you just said? Did I say "most of the fighters are foreign", or even "many"? Let's review.
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We don't have any firm info on the makeup of insurgent forces in Fallujah, except that their leader is Jordanian and some foreigners have been captured or killed.
Nope. No "many" or "most" there. How'd those words get put in my mouth? Patooey!
How many of the insurgents were Fallujahns? Who knows? Not all of them. There's lots of other places in Iraq they could come from. The total of killed and captured so far is about 2,200. Many of the dead were not carrying any ID, just weapons, so final identification may be difficult. It'll probably be a while until they're sorted out.
"Keep the Shiny side up"
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Barnstormer- That's why I referred to a statement made in MAY- to eliminate the fact that non-natives might have left Falujah before the invasion. The military has repeatedly made these statements on a number of occasions reagrding many locations in the Sunni triangle. What is your problem? Is is that you can't read or can't think? If you don't like what the military says, take it up with them, OK?
Geezer- You don't know the Jordanian was "their leader". In fact, I doubt that you would find a single leader anyway- my guess is that there are several insurgencies and they may not be coordinated. One of the movements is a terrorist movement related to big, coordinated bombings and kidnappings, some unknown portion headed by Zarqawi. (But often with the collusion of local police and security.) Then there are smaller incidents involving IEDs, sabotage, RPGS and small-arms firefights that are probably just locally-based.
You're right that my statement about many civilian casualities is an assumption. Actually, it's a hypothesis based on what you said and is being tested.
I have another hypothesis, which is that the military lies like a rug when it comes to civilian casualites in Iraq. So far, the evidence points in that direction, and I'll give you the latest example (of which there are many):
As far the military briefing about civilian casulties ("I don't know of any") you said I probably wouldn't believe them and you're right. This is again partly based on what you said, which was "The total of killed and captured so far is about 2,200. Many of the dead were not carrying any ID, just weapons, so final identification may be difficult."
The military seems to have detailed knowledge on combat casualties, but they have NO IDEA of civilians casualties? Not even- "We know of at least XX number dead but there may be more"? Please, use your common sense. It doesn't take Einstein to count up the number of women and children's bodies that you can casually see. I'll bet there was AT LEAST ONE.
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Quote:
Originally posted by SignyM:
It doesn't take Einstein to count up the number of women and children's bodies that you can casually see. I'll bet there was AT LEAST ONE.
Well, there was that one Caucasian woman, found shot in the head and mutilated, but you wouldn't care about that, since the evil Americans didn't do it.
Come on. You know that the news media worldwide are just champing at the bit, wanting to report civilian casualty figures. If they got even an inkling from any source at all, cell phone call, eye-witness, escaping insurgent, it would be all over the news. I haven't seen it yet.
I'm sorry, but we are currently unable to provide you with a bunch of dead Fallujahn women and children so you can have the pleasure of railing against the horrible US war machine. Wouldn't you be brokenhearted if there weren't many and it spoiled all your righteous indignation?
"Keep the Shiny side up"
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