Some new and disturbing footage following an air raid on Azizabad seems to be forcing the US military to do a U-turn on civilian deaths in Afghanistan. [more inside]
posted by vodkaboots on Sep 8, 2008 - 37 comments

Cluster Bombs: The American Gift That Keeps On Giving. "During its air war in Afghanistan, the United States dropped nearly a quarter-million cluster bomblets that killed or injured scores of civilians, especially children, both during and after strikes, Human Rights Watch said in a new report released today....Human Rights Watch found that the United States did not take all feasible precautions to avoid civilian casualties, as required by international humanitarian law....As of November 2002, the International Committee of the Red Cross had identified 127 civilian casualties to cluster bomb duds-a number it stressed was only a partial tally of the total killed and injured since many go unreported. An astonishing 69% of the casualties were children."
posted by fold_and_mutilate on Dec 18, 2002 - 62 comments

What happened in the final days of the Gulf War? "The Battle of Rumaila was closely reviewed at the war's end by an analyst for the C.I.A., who confirmed that the Iraqi losses were great. The toll included at least a hundred tanks from the Hammurabi division. "It's like eating an artichoke," one colonel had said of combat.... 'Once you start, you can't stop.' One of the destroyed vehicles was a bus, which had been hit by a rocket. The precise number of its occupants who were injured or killed is not known, but they included civilians and children. One of the first Americans at the scene was Lieutenant Charles W. Gameros, Jr., a Scout platoon leader, who called in a Medevac team for the victims. At the time, he was "frustrated" by what he saw as needless deaths, Gameros recalled in an interview. 'Now I look at it sadly,' he said. Unresisting Iraqis had been slain all morning, but the deaths of the children troubled many soldiers."

What's happening in "the final days" of the war in Afghanistan? What will be happening in the upcoming war in Iraq?
posted by fold_and_mutilate on Sep 5, 2002 - 100 comments

"DO NOT USE wire stories which lead with civilian casualties from the U.S. war on Afghanistan. They should be mentioned further down in the story. If the story needs rewriting to play down the civilian casualties, DO IT. The only exception is if the U.S. hits an orphanage, school or similar facility and kills scores or hundreds of children...Failure to follow any of these or other standing rules could put your job in jeopardy."

from a memo re war coverage by Ray Glenn the chief copy editor of the Panama City News Herald in Florida.

Good to see that the media is doing its bit for the war effort.
posted by lagado on Dec 18, 2001 - 34 comments