US Soldier kills 16 civilians in Afghanistan-NOW WITH POLL

[a6m5]

If a soldier snap in middle of a chaos, or confusion during a battle, I can sort of accept that kind of breakdown. When a soldier snap, loads his equipment & guns, sneaks out of the base(from what I understand), goes door-to-door & shoots families in their homes, that really scares me.

It's going to sound really barbaric, but I don't see anything wrong with this soldier possibly suffering the consequence. If he's mentally ill, I don't think there is a thing we can do for a man who is so crazy that he premeditate committing mass-murder, then execute. I mean, if I become that crazy, please, please do put me out of my misery.

 

[Sach]

Really wish they could get a hold on this stuff.

 

[Zenith]

Jesus Barbie World, Sach.

He was being satirical. Hence:

My bad, the "respectfully submitted" signature threw me off.

 

[Sach]

 

[niky]

Steve always submits, respectfully.

Terrible tragedy. And it's not going to help much with the eventual pull-out.

 

[Dotini]

A decades-long military campaign in Central Asia conducted in the national interests of an entire nation, the US, obviously is of the utmost seriousness, and has a lot at stake.

Just as it is intolerable for a single demented sailor to sink his own battleship by blowing up the boiler, it is similarly intolerable for one or several out-of-control soldiers to scupper the entire campaign by pissing on corpses, burning holy books or shooting sleeping women and children in the night. Yet here they are doing it!!

Somewhere among them, our Commander in Chief, general officers, and professional volunteer soldiers are somehow screwing the pooch. It is a catastrophic breakdown of strategy, resources, character, training, luck or something. You tell me what?

Respectfully submitted,
Steve

 

[Crispy]

This is terrible. (Keep in mind, I'm not making an excuse for him killing those people, and I think he should be punished accordingly)

Bram Turismo, when you see the things that these soldiers see on a day to day basis, it would probably take a massive toll on your mental capacity. If you saw your friends you've gotten to know for years, gone to party's with, fought side to side with, become practically brothers, and saw them get their faces mangled by bullets, die screaming in pain, anything you can possibly imagine that could be terrible, yet worse, I'm sure that would screw you up good. War doesn't however make it right for someone to shoot up a bunch of women and children like their deer. See, what the news shows of war, is not what war is. In fact, they have almost as far of an opinion of war as the eight year old Call of Duty fanboys. They think it's just shoot him, and him, and him, yet they don't realize the emotional toll it takes when you kill someone, or watch your best friend die, knowing the family he grew up with will be hurt like nothing else in a couple hours, knowing that even though that person shooting at you is the enemy, he's much more than that. He's a man just like you, a man who might have a wife, maybe two children, one is just starting school and the other is starting their 4th year, two teeth missing and one growing in, with parents and siblings, all who will grow up from now on missing one person they loved more than words. When someone who's seen all this, who's felt all these emotions, who lost people they cared about, well that tends to screw you up. I'm not making an excuse for him shooting people, I'm just saying, it's not right to compare him to people who killed because they wished all death to Americans, because this guy didn't wish all death to Afgans, he went crazy and killed innocent people. Now, what does that sound like? Oh yeah, those crazy people who start killing innocent people. We should charge him just like any of them, not hand him over to a country which will cause him to get ripped to shreads or stoned to death. If your going to execute him, do it by lethal injection in the States, not by some cruel and terrible punishment by a country who is biased to all Americans, let alone one who just killed 16 innocent lives.

However, Burning a Holy Book or pissing on dead corpses? That's screwed up. That indicates problems before war. I don't agree with any religion, however you don't see me burning every book on the matter. And I wouldn't think about pissing on a dead person, even if they were shooting at me ten minutes ago. It's a huge disrespect for someone who's fighting for what they believe in, regardless of which side their on.

 

[Mark T]

What the soldier did was shocking but as others have said he must have been in a fragile mental state. Unfortunately it wasn't picked up earlier and I'm sure there will be a long investigation into exactly what happened.

Without experiencing warfare first hand it's hard to say how anyone will cope in a highly stressful and emotional situation. I don't think there is any training that can prepare you for what you're going to see.

I have seen gruesome videos on the internet (as most people have). One was so bad that I actually couldn't stop thinking about it for days and it made me depressed. It's funny how when you try to block something out of your mind your brain seems to regurgitate the images just to mess with you.

Obama has said that he aims to withdraw most troops in 2014 but for the moment the force will stay in place.

 

[Dapper]

Dang crispy, you last paragraph doesn't jive with the rest of your post. You apologized for murder but condem urinating on an already dead body and the accidental burning of a book.

And a point I think is worth adding to your post is that a lot of the military, at least the Marines and infantry from the other branches, are trained to kill. Boot camp isn't just physical training. My brother told me how they would sit around at boot camp and the drill instructors would tell inspiring stories about pink mist...

Gomer Pyle was fiction, but he is real.

Seven-six-two millimeter. Full metal jacket.

 

[berty1979]

No amount of training can prepare your humanity for up close and personal combat. You can be trained so you can clean, load and fire your rifle. You can be taught tactics, drills and obediance to orders but nothing can prep your mind to seeing someone die, be they enemy or a friend. People dont die clean like in the movies and a build up of those images and the mental damage can make people lose their minds.
I feel sorry for the guy and all his victims. Crispy said it better than me but I agree with him 👍

 

[Sphinx]

No amount of training can prepare your humanity for up close and personal combat. You can be trained so you can clean, load and fire your rifle. You can be taught tactics, drills and obediance to orders but nothing can prep your mind to seeing someone die, be they enemy or a friend. People dont die clean like in the movies and a build up of those images and the mental damage can make people lose their minds.
I feel sorry for the guy and all his victims. Crispy said it better than me but I agree with him 👍

I bet you wouldn't feel sorry for him if it were your family. The man is a coward whom preyed on defencless woman and children who couldn't fight back with his big gun. He's also a coward for not having enough balls to blow his brains out afterwards. But hey, he's one of our own, not one of them, so let's suddenly find a heart and try to understand him and amazingly attempt to somewhat sympathise with the mass murdering **** head instead of condemning him like we've usually done to those who came before him.

 

[Joel]

I bet you wouldn't feel sorry for him if it were your family. The man is a coward whom preyed on defencless woman and children who couldn't fight back with his big gun. He's also a coward for not having enough balls to blow his brains out afterwards. But hey, he's one of our own, not one of them, so let's suddenly find a heart and try to understand him and amazingly attempt to somewhat sympathise with the mass murdering **** head instead of condemning him like we've usually done to those who came before him.

This. Imagine if there was a Chinese military base on US soil, and a Chinese soldier went postal and killed 16 Americans. Would the same people be here saying "you don't know what he's seen man", and try to make excuses for his actions?

 

[ROAD_DOGG33J]

This. Imagine if there was a Chinese military base on US soil, and a Chinese soldier went postal and killed 16 Americans. Would the same people be here saying "you don't know what he's seen man", and try to make excuses for his actions?

They probably wouldn't, but maybe they should be. People are trained to kill. They get sent out to war. It's not surprising that some breakdown totally.

 

[niky]

Somewhere among them, our Commander in Chief, general officers, and professional volunteer soldiers are somehow screwing the pooch. It is a catastrophic breakdown of strategy, resources, character, training, luck or something. You tell me what?

Respectfully submitted,
Steve

I have a feeling this is 'Nam, all over again.

Same thing. Camped in a foreign country for months on end, a nameless, faceless enemy entrenched amongst civilians, a very real, very obvious racial divide between the soldiers and the civilians...

Perhaps military commanders have that "Us versus Them" thing so deeply ingrained into soldiers' psyches that it's impossible to root out.

Even after the conflict, when you're supposed to be "friends", years of demonizing your enemy to make it easier for your soldiers to kill them have taken their root. Programming complete. Skull:censored:ed, man.

 

[berty1979]

Sphinx
I bet you wouldn't feel sorry for him if it were your family. The man is a coward whom preyed on defencless woman and children who couldn't fight back with his big gun. He's also a coward for not having enough balls to blow his brains out afterwards. But hey, he's one of our own, not one of them, so let's suddenly find a heart and try to understand him and amazingly attempt to somewhat sympathise with the mass murdering **** head instead of condemning him like we've usually done to those who came before him.

How would you feel if it was your father/brother/son that had lost his mind for the reasons previously stated by myself, niky and others. You wouldnt throw him to the villagers then would you!
Its easy to make it sound personal but its not to me as I wasnt a victim, however I can still voice my opinion and that is he should be tried and punished by his own people.

 

[Ellis]

You just don't know what goes on in peoples heads. He might have got up that morning, did what he usually did in the morning. Did some of duties. Something may have twigged this, god knows what but I imagine being out there is awfully stressful on the brain. I am not justifying what he did, It is a scandal and shameful to the US forces. But to say he is a sicko for doing it like he had previously planned it is an assumption that could well be wrong

 

[Sach]

Well I can tell you that I have a friend who joined the Marines two years ago, currently stationed in South Korea near the border. He said he never thought he'd be able to kill anyone until watching the videos the military showed him of North Korean militants (and others) committing atrocities against innocent people. Now he says he could kill one of them without a second thought. He said they basically want you to hate them, and want to pay them back, and that they condition you to be this way. He's aware of how they have changed him in that way, but he said he's okay with it.

 

[Crispy]

This. Imagine if there was a Chinese military base on US soil, and a Chinese soldier went postal and killed 16 Americans. Would the same people be here saying "you don't know what he's seen man", and try to make excuses for his actions?

I would not make an excuse for it, just like I didn't make an excuse for the US Soldier murdering all these people. It's wrong on some of the highest counts, but to call him the same thing as people who want to kill innocent people just to kill innocent people, that I'm not okay with. I would say the exact same thing about the Chinese Soldier who did the same thing under the same conditions, same with an Afgan Soldier, Iranian Soldier, American Soldier, or any other soldier, provided it was the same condition of stress. It's not an excuse and a "Get out of crime free card" like you guys think were saying, it's a stop branding someone something completely different and have him tried here argument. None of us think it's an excuse, none of us.

 

[Caz]

Just heard this asshole will be tried within the us law system. He lucked out big time there. IMO the crime happened on Afghan soil against Afghan citizens and should be tried within the Afghan judicial system.
You can be sure if this was on us soil with a foreign troop he would be labeled a terrorist and put through the harshest of our jail system.
The incident alone is going to bring enough negatives impact on our troops still there, but our government taking this Guy out may be worse as far as impact on safety over there. Fuel for the fire. Its time to bring them home, this generation of troops going in were only 7 or 8 years old when we went into this occupation. There whole angst ridden teen years have been overshadowed by war in the middle east.......

Losing my thought here, sorry for the rant.
I am an American.
I support my troops., not the war.
I love my country, not my government.

I can sympathize with these nations who hate us. Some if the arguments make sense. Some don't. Actions like this tho, only help to build on the fanaticism that's thrives over there.


I vote. Therefore I can whine.

 

[Zenith]

You do understand he was a soldier, right? He's acting as an extension of the US. Sorry, but that doesn't work.

 

[Caz]

Yes, I do. This was a non sanctioned event off base. Its different than an act of war. If it was a foreign soldier on us soil killing us citizens he would be tried here under our laws. Not brought home and tried by his own government.


I may be wrong on that. And i eill in all honesty get schooled in a sebate aboit the laws. but my opinion stands.
It was not an act of war.
It was not a military sanctioned assassination.
It was not collateral damage during an active firefight.

It was a slaughter on innocents.
Just because this soldier was on location per order does not give diplomatic immunity ( or does it? I really don't know)

 

[Sach]

Yes, I do. This was a non sanctioned event off base. Its different than an act of war.

That will never fly though, I hate to say.

 

[Caz]

Sadly, your right.

 

[berty1979]

He has been flown out of Afganistan today, I hope the backlash is contained by the coalition with minimum damage to the mission and the lads out there.

 

[ExigeEvan]

I bet you wouldn't feel sorry for him if it were your family. The man is a coward whom preyed on defencless woman and children who couldn't fight back with his big gun. He's also a coward for not having enough balls to blow his brains out afterwards. But hey, he's one of our own, not one of them, so let's suddenly find a heart and try to understand him and amazingly attempt to somewhat sympathise with the mass murdering **** head instead of condemning him like we've usually done to those who came before him.

I'm pretty sure ending your life with a bullet to the head is far easier than living, going to trial, staying in solitary and then being executed years later in front of a baying audience.

I'd sympathise with a Taliban soldier who'd decided to fight because he lost his family in a coalition bombing, it may not make his country a better place but I can understand why he feels he needs to do that.

I also think the "Kill squads", "human trophy" and "urinating on bodies" soldiers are complete disgraces and should face major punishment for their actions. I have no sympathy for their actions.

Yes, I do. This was a non sanctioned event off base. Its different than an act of war. If it was a foreign soldier on us soil killing us citizens he would be tried here under our laws. Not brought home and tried by his own government.


I may be wrong on that. And i eill in all honesty get schooled in a sebate aboit the laws. but my opinion stands.
It was not an act of war.
It was not a military sanctioned assassination.
It was not collateral damage during an active firefight.

It was a slaughter on innocents.
Just because this soldier was on location per order does not give diplomatic immunity ( or does it? I really don't know)

He was in uniform, on deployment overseas. From the moment the plane leaves the tarmac in the US to the moment he goes him he is a soldier, under military jurisdiction. At no point in that time is he a civilian and therefore does not come under civil law.

 

[Caz]

He was in uniform, on deployment overseas. From the moment the plane leaves the tarmac in the US to the moment he goes him he is a soldier, under military jurisdiction. At no point in that time is he a civilian and therefore does not come under civil law.

Makes sense, and I agree with the first half of this post aswell.

 

[nk4e]

This. Imagine if there was a Chinese military base on US soil, and a Chinese soldier went postal and killed 16 Americans. Would the same people be here saying "you don't know what he's seen man", and try to make excuses for his actions?

Given that the Chinese will probably back him up or punish him.

 

[CMvan46]

He was in uniform, on deployment overseas. From the moment the plane leaves the tarmac in the US to the moment he goes him he is a soldier, under military jurisdiction. At no point in that time is he a civilian and therefore does not come under civil law.

If that's true that's disgusting. He should be tried in Afghanistan under the laws of the country in which the crime was committed. He should not be allowed to hide behind an army uniform and the US should be ashamed that they'd be that hypocritical to fly him back here to try him here.

He slaughtered innocent, unarmed, civilian people and if that was done on US soil, as others have said, that guy would wind up enduring torture in Guantamano Bay before the other government could even pick up the phone.

A great way to show the Middle East that the West is there to "help" and is there in the best interest of the citizens of those countries.

Ontop of the disgustingness of the actual crime itself is the selfishness that he does that for his own sick personal reasons and decides to leave his "brothers" in arms there to deal with the fallout. Guess the guy didn't have enough brain cells to think that one out.

 

[ExigeEvan]

If that's true that's disgusting. He should be tried in Afghanistan under the laws of the country in which the crime was committed. He should not be allowed to hide behind an army uniform and the US should be ashamed that they'd be that hypocritical to fly him back here to try him here.

Hide behind a uniform? He will face justice, he will probably be given the death penalty, but he will do so in accordance with how the military has operated for centuries. Why you think this should change for one incident baffles me but please try to.

He slaughtered innocent, unarmed, civilian people and if that was done on US soil, as others have said, that guy would wind up enduring torture in Guantamano Bay before the other government could even pick up the phone.

Well as the US is not a war zone, and the person probably wouldn't be wearing a uniform or operating as part of an army it's quite a different story.

A great way to show the Middle East that the West is there to "help" and is there in the best interest of the citizens of those countries.

Ontop of the disgustingness of the actual crime itself is the selfishness that he does that for his own sick personal reasons and decides to leave his "brothers" in arms there to deal with the fallout. Guess the guy didn't have enough brain cells to think that one out.

Clearly the guy wasn't thinking straight. But we've been over that one already.

 

[CMvan46]

Hide behind a uniform? He will face justice, he will probably be given the death penalty, but he will do so in accordance with how the military has operated for centuries. Why you think this should change for one incident baffles me but please try to.

Well as the US is not a war zone, and the person probably wouldn't be wearing a uniform or operating as part of an army it's quite a different story.

Clearly the guy wasn't thinking straight. But we've been over that one already.

I don't care how the military has operated, it's wrong how this is handled and I have no prior experience with the laws regarding this. If this is how it is it should be changed.

Secondly who declared Afghanistan a war zone? It was the US was it not? I don't remember the civilians of Afghanistan pleading for American help. This is the "war on terror" and Afghanistan's population never asked for that.

My example was that if a uniformed soldier, as was given in an example with a Chinese army base on American soil, was to do exactly as he did on American soil he would be in Guantamano Bay faster than you could blink and no matter what country in the world it was there is no way they were getting him back.

Only because of America's virtual monopoly on nuclear weapons and the money and power behind their armed forces would the country of that soldier not declare the entire US as a war zone and demand their soldier back home.

Because Afghanistan has no real organized military and no solid government means the US can claim the country is a war zone and this was an act of war... That is wrong. Last I checked the bedrooms of those families was NOT a war zone and children were not armed threats on American lives.?

He should be tried there and I don't give a crap how the military has or does operate. In my opinion he deserves to serve his time there and deserves to suffer whatever happens as a result.

To be clear I don't think it should change for one incident, it should change period. Acts of war are one thing, shooting up innocent family homes is not one of them. The war is not against Afghanistan its against terrorism, this was not an act of war.