Just between 2003-5, US forces killed 15 journalists in Iraq, the majority either Westerners or working for Western news agencies. The figure is from the mainstream American Journalism Review. 94 aid workers died in the Iraq conflict, according to Reuters. I don’t have a figure for how many of those were killed by the US forces, but many. Journalists and aid workers have been among the 2,540 people killed in “collateral damage” of drone strikes since Obama became President. Now the US has just killed medical staff and aid workers in Kunduz.
I do not want to downplay the horror and cold-heartedness of the grisly ISIL executions. But the United States military has killed more journalists and NGO employees than ISIL ever will. An inconvenient fact you will never see reported in the mainstream media.
Some of those US killings of journalists were not deliberate targeting. That is of little comfort to the dead people and their loved ones. Some were not accidental.
Craig Murray
04/10/2015 10:59am
Interesting. Thank you. I wonder what United States journalists are going to have to say about the fact that they may be open to execution as “unprivileged belligerents”.
Best of luck with the speech.
Kind regards,
John
CNN slip up or truth?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p31uQWzaDv0
Those journalist who were ’embedded’ and who took the shite they were told as gospel, they were safe, whilst those who tried and make up their own minds were part of the problem.
Terry Lloyd may he rest in peace, was one of those brave none embed reporters whose last live report I saw, and visibly shaken and frightened man warned of his probable death at the hands of the US forces, and he was declared dead within hours of that broadcast.
Gaby Rado another brave reporter who was going to highlight the carpet bombing of the Iraqi positions that killed upwards of quarter of a million Iraqi conscripts and never made it. Apparently he fell off the roof of Abu Sanaa hotel at Sulaymaniyah. (dropping is actually a technique used by the CIA goons).
I recollect the Aljazeerah reporter whom videoed his own death by an strafing A10 warthog ground attack aircraft. Then there was the Reuters camera man who was shot by the US tank machine gun fire that had set up post in the square below the Al Rashid hotel in Baghdad.
The list goes on!!!
I am glad you have taken up this case. My suspicion is that any journalist (or media representative) not embedded was deliberately targeted to prevent him or her reporting the truth. Hopefully some brave person may confirm this to appease a conscience before they pass away. My figures aer different but also sourced.
“Between 2003-4 there were 58 journalists (and media workers) killed in Iraq: only 18 fewer than the number of UK soldiers killed in the same period. All deaths from war are needless. Wars being waged today, as those of the past, are about stealing land, labor and resources, for which young men must needlessly die. Few people are speaking out against this abominable situation, just as few Germans spoke out about Hitler’s illegal invasions and persecutions.”
http://newsjunkiepost.com/2013/06/04/the-united-states-of-extra-judicial-murder-and-imprisonment/
I don’t forget the bombing of RTS during the Kosovo War.
Sincere apologies for o/t, but wouldn’t want anyone to miss this:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3258996/They-don-t-want-sun-Shaker-Aamer-Briton-held-Guantanamo-Bay-gives-searing-account-14-year-ordeal.html
The motto outside Guantanamo: ‘Honor Bound to Defend Freedom’
Should read: ‘Honor Kicked Into a Drain to Defend the Indefensible’
And what you said about journalists.
re Nevermind
Craig’s source is quite clear that embedded journalists also count as ‘unprivileged belligerents’, indeed more so as they form part of the military units they are embedded with. It just depends on which side you are embedded – if you’re embedded with the US, you’re OK. But if you are embedded with the other side, God Help You.
The “information war” as Putin referred to US criticism of their Syrian bombing, is a very real threat to the prosecution of a campaign. As unpleasant as it seems, journalists have both positive and negative impacts on these campaigns and targetting them might make the difference between winning and losing. I’ll let others comment on what policies should apply to journalists interloping in theatres of war.
Seems like a hodgepodge to me where journalists’ deaths, many of them embedded in the forces which ousted the Taliban and Saddam, are equated – leaving out the many domestically located who deliberately killed for covert reasons, like Sean Hoare, Barnaby Jack, and Michael Hastings- with the victims of the war crime at the Kunduz hospital.
Craig is beginning to sound a lot like Jeb, and stuff happening.
Just one request Craig. Would you mind using the word ISIS as this joke is wearing thin among the creators of ISIS/ISIL as more people learn the occult symbolism and that Mossad refer to themselves as ISIS (Israeli Secret Intelligence Service) within CIA and MI6 communications. Evidence as follows.
https://youtu.be/sylmmj5evA4
Apologies for off topic, but Manchester on a Sunday afternoon, the Conservative Party conference and two young Tories braving the baying mob, is just too good to miss…
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yZB8_RMwFfI
From what little information has been released the latest bombing in Afghanistan was not an accident.
An Afghani army unit was on patrol accompanied by American trainers when they were attacked, came under fire. They radioed base, gave them the co-ordinates of the attackers and asked for air support. It seems they were being attacked from either in or near to the hospital.
The American air force will have either known or soon found out there was a hospital there but dropped the bombs anyway. The attackers will certainly have known there was a hospital there and probably chose the spot for an ambush thinking America wouldn’t drop bombs there.
Either way it wasn’t an accident.
Regarding the Médecins Sans Frontières hospital in Kunduz, it does seem rather unlikely that NATO, and US forces didn’t know its exact position.
The charity said that it had clearly informed representatives in Kabul and Washington of the GPS coordinates of its hospital just outside the besieged city of Kunduz on multiple occasions in the past month, most recently on September 29 – just five days before the attack.
US Secretary of Defence Ash Carter said that the bombing was a counter attack against the Taliban, and the hospital was more than likely collateral damage.
It could be a possibility that NATO thought the hospital was used by the Taliban as a safe haven, unknowns to the medical staff, though it does seem unlikely.
Whatever the circumstances, surrounding the Taliban and its position in Kunduz, the bombing of a hospital is completely unacceptable.
Understandably the bombing of the hospital should be seen as war crime. Their must be limits and no go areas even in war, and in my opinion a hospital qualifies as such a place.
No precedent has been set for dealing with such atrocities, committed by Western forces, nor Israeli forces, who have also bombed hospitals in recent times.
Can we really let this slip by, with the age old excuse of “Collateral Damage” or is it time to hold those in charge accountable, I say the latter is paramount.
Hot off the press – The Latest Strike Plan from Joint Forces Command – Northwood
+++Nuclear Secret+++ – Why Britain will use nuclear missiles against Russia and why Trident missiles are basically redundant in the ‘special relationship’ of nuclear cooperation..
Britain’s trusted role in a nuclear strike against Russia would be to use short range missiles equipped with British built EMP war-heads on command from Washington.
An EMP or Electromagnetic Pulse nuclear explosion will instantly release not only enormous quantities of neutrons alone, but electrons as well, since electrons are even more numerous than neutrons.
In addition, gamma-rays released by a nuclear explosion, would also create additional electrons, because each gamma-quant striking an atom of surrounding air would kick an electron out of it, thus ionizing the air around. Each of these electrons will be able to kick out more electrons when they strike neighbouring atoms. It would look more like a kind of chain reaction where only one gamma-quant would be able to eventually kick out of atoms up to 60,000 electrons.
Soon all these enormous quantities of freed electrons due to their relatively light weight and high speed will quit an immediate zone around the nuclear explosion where they have been just born and will fly in every direction. This will create a strong horizontal current, which, in turn, will act like a giant spark that creates extremely strong wideband electromagnetic radiation.
Also, many atoms in that area will be positively ionized with the departure of the negatively charged electrons. The positively ionized atoms left will attract a great number of electrons from neighbouring areas. These will concentrate right under the nuclear air-burst explosion area since those negatively charged electrons will become “interested” in high concentrations of positively charged ions above. This effect will additionally cause a strong vertical current that too will emit a strong electromagnetic pulse.
A combination of these electromagnetic events will severely interrupt any kind of radio communications that depend on the conditions of an electromagnetic field. In addition, it will induce extremely high-tension currents in various conductors – including electric power lines, transformers, antennas, communication cables, transistors, circuit boards, etc. These high-tension currents will cause serious damage to all these items, even thick high-voltage power lines will be damaged. Of course, such EMP will also damage beyond repair all sensitive electronic- and electric devices – such as computers, communication equipment, various electrical appliances, cars’, train’s, and aircraft electronics, not to mention smaller and more sensitive microelectronic devises such as mobile phones, all of which will be instantly destroyed. At least 100,000 Megawatts of force would be applied creating an ionized zone of about 2,500 km in radius and as thick as 80 km.
A single powerful thermonuclear explosion detonated at an altitude of 500 km would create an ionized zone of about 2.500 km in radius and being as thick as 80 km.
Russian territory would be render useless instantly, absolutely all electrical and electronic devices in the entire Russian Federation including its defensive radars and warning systems, electronics, TV, Radio and Mobile phone networks.
Thus it is one of the first options that would be used in an event of a major nuclear attack against Russia and would disable their mobile ICBM launchers.
British and American nuclear attack submarines would launch nuclear torpedoes at the remaining Russian SSBN’s tracked by satellite recon and underwater beacons in all oceans.
“CNN slip up or truth?”
________________
Beth thank you for that clip, with the Freudian slip.
Now we know what Putin means when he says he’s bombing ISIS in Syria.
http://www.vox.com/2015/9/30/9423229/russia-bombing-isis-syria
Trowbridge H. Ford 2:31 pm
I went to sixth form college with Sean Hoare.
@Mark Golding, relax there can never be a nuclear war with Russia. The US Oppenheimers (who were the real drivers of Hiroshima and Nagasaki) have been told in no uncertain terms that Russia will strike NY,N London,SF and Israel FIRST – wiping out 65% of world jewry. And that is simply a no no for the Kochs, its the cattle that are supposed to die not the chosen.
They have shifted their efforts to unseating Putin from within with the aid of davidovitch and pokhorovsky instead, calm down dear !!
” But the United States military has killed more journalists and NGO employees than ISIL ever will. ”
It won’t be for want of trying.
http://www.theguardian.com/world/shortcuts/2014/oct/19/victims-of-isis-non-western-journalists-dont-make-headlines
Rob G—Thanks for sharing that clip . Raw egg is a great cure for a smug face.
Charles Edward–thanks for sharing the clip. I wonder that newsreaders etc never seem to question why exactly Islamic state has chosen to describe itself in English.
Beth, have you watched Chunkymark to-day? Very good!
Craig,
Have you actually read the <a ref="http://www.defense.gov/Portals/1/Documents/pubs/Law-of-War-Manual-June-2015.pdf" Law of War Manual, or just trusted other peoples’ interpretation? I don’t see anything in it that I would have a major problem with.
How would you avoid killing a journalist who is in an combat vehicle that you wish to destroy is a separate matter, but sections 4.24.2 and 4.24.3.1 seem quite reasonable to me.
Whether the US forces abode by their manual is another matter.
*abide
The Americans are shit hot with “friendly fire”.
@ Mark Golding “Hot off the press – The Latest Strike Plan from Joint Forces Command – Northwood”
I would not be surprised if the Russians still have their backup system using valves which
is immune to EMP.
Not that it’s a laughing matter, but sometimes there really is nothing left.
http://off-guardian.org/2015/10/04/russia-insider-this-is-nothing-short-of-a-middle-eastern-coup/
“The US, in conjunction with Saudi Arabia and Qatar, attempted to train and support Sunni extremists to overthrow the Assad regime. Some of those Sunni extremists ended up going crazy and declaring a Medieval caliphate putting the Pentagon and Langley in the hilarious position of being forced to classify al-Qaeda as “moderate.” The situation spun out of control leading to hundreds of thousands of civilian deaths and when Washington finally decided to try and find real “moderates” to help contain the Frankenstein monster the CIA had created in ISIS (there were of course numerous other CIA efforts to arm and train anti-Assad fighters, see below for the fate of the most “successful” of those groups), the effort ended up being a complete embarrassment that culminated with the admission that only “four or five” remained and just days after that admission, those “four or five” were car jacked by al-Qaeda in what was perhaps the most under-reported piece of foreign policy comedy in history.”
Continuing on the bombing of the hospital in Afghanistan, it occurred to me that it is very unlikely anyone will be held to account on the matter, or anyone of significance that is.
I say that keeping in mind that the (P5) the Permanent Members of the Security Council, include the USA and the UK, along with France, China and Russia, these are veto weilding seats.
Afghanistan has never been a member of the Security Council, and I very much doubt France would put itself in the position of opposing other permanent members such as the US and Britain, over hospital casualties in a country that holds no sway whatsoever among the council.
There are no Muslim or African countries on the Permanent Security Council, one doesn’t have to think too hard as to why that is. It certainly wouldn’t do to have a P5 member veto an illegal sortie into, a chosen Middle Eastern country ripe for plundering.
There are no elections to the veto weilding seats of the P5, and the only open forum, the General Assembly of the United Nations, where every member has the same vote, is in my opinion an illusion of world democracy.
Of course my own opinion is that the USA, is the overwhelming force behind the Security Council, if not the entire UN. If I recall right the US had Boutros Boutros-Ghali removed from his post as UN Secretary General, because he wasn’t compliant enough for the American’s liking.
I can even recall the US veoting a visa to Yasser Arafat, who wished to speak at the UN General Assembly.
Thanks Part Timer at 3:51 pm – I admit to being concerned that an anomaly may create an uncertainty in the entanglement with the Syrian crisis. Once you are in a terrorist area you cannot be certain to know who is who, whether this is Al-Nusra or ISIL, or any. One thing that is true is that all those carrying arms against the Syrian people, against the Syrian institutions are terrorists, and the Syrian army has been fighting them for the last five years, this while Britain was looking on at Syria being destroyed – it’s people, it’s hospitals, its schools; it’s archeological heritage, all being absolutely destroyed.
It’s very easy to sit 10 Downing Street and talk about concepts, but the truth is very different in Syria. And the reality is very different from what Britain and from what the senseless British Establishment is saying.
I am convinced the majority of Arab people have for decades believed that the Russian mind understood what was going on in Iraq, in Libya and Syria; understood what’s going on in the Arab world, and they’re committed to international legitimacy and to respect any country’s sovereignty and jurisdiction, an entity alien to British/US hegemony, dominance and military power.
I myself believe the problem right from the beginning was not Assad – the target wasn’t Assad. Just as Libya is destroyed now and they were talking about Gaddafi, and Iraq is destroyed and they were talking about Saddam Hussein or about mass destruction weapons. These concepts outstandingly conspicuous in a powerful Western media. They were only used in order to destroy Middle-East countries; in order to destroy it’s civilization; in order to destroy it’s people.
Russia should be successful if bizarre events can be resolved by intention, if not, we are in considerable danger from difference.
The US cannot win this contest. And the Russians cannot afford to lose. Direct US engagement with the Russians would be an escalation of their already illegal campaign and entry into the bad books of history. What can they do? It’s not Assad’s tyranny that is the problem, but rather his refusal to cooperate with them in constructing energy transport infrastructure designed to deliver future energy security to the west.
I suspect that the US nuclear-control agreement with Iran might have been an attempt to obviate it from the equation. Perhaps the Americans promised Iran access to western markets via the intended infrastructure. If they hold back support for Assad, they will receive access to a revenue stream.
The Russians appear to be playing this game out by the book, very strictly, to gain the legal high ground. Their military strikes are most definitely directed at anti-Assad rebels, with ISIL being temporarily allowed some space to act as an irritant to NATO. Once the rebels have been terminated, ISIL will be next and that will provide Russia with the moral high ground. Having both the legal and moral high grounds is a gold medal.
If Assad wants to stay in power, then he will need to avoid embarrassing his Russian sponsors with overt acts of aggression against his own people. That will be difficult when so many Syrians will want a clean break with the past, of which he will be a constant reminder and lingering threat to revisit. But with enough money, he might be able to win some Syrians back and devolve some power to placate their political aspirations.