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<a href="http://www.counterpunch.org/lindorff03042010.html" eudora="autourl">
http://www.counterpunch.org/lindorff03042010.html<br><br>
</a></font><font face="Verdana" size=2 color="#990000">March 4,
2010<br><br>
</font><h1><font face="Times New Roman, Times" size=4><b>No Story Here!
US Press Sits on Story <br><br>
<br>
</i></font><font face="Times New Roman, Times" size=5 color="#990000">
Executing Handcuffed Afghan Kids?
</b></font></h1><font face="Times New Roman, Times" size=4>By DAVE
LINDORFF <br><br>
</font><font face="Verdana" size=6 color="#990000">W</font><font size=3>
hen Charlie Company’s Lt. William Calley ordered and encouraged his men
to rape, maim and slaughter over 400 men, women and children in My Lai in
Vietnam back in 1968, there were at least four Americans who tried to
stop him or bring him and higher officers to justice. One was helicopter
pilot Hugh Thompson Jr., who evacuated some of the wounded victims, and
who set his chopper down between a group of Vietnamese and Calley’s men,
ordering his door gunner to open fire on the US soldiers if they shot any
more people. One was Ron Ridenhour, a soldier who learned of the
massacre, and began a private investigation, ultimately reporting the
crime to the Pentagon and Congress. One was Michael Bernhardt, a soldier
in Charlie Company who witnessed the whole thing, and reported it all to
Ridenhour. And one was journalist Seymour Hersh, who broke the story in
the US media.<br><br>
Today’s war in Afghanistan also has its My Lai massacres. It has them
almost weekly, as US warplanes bomb wedding parties, or homes “suspected”
of housing terrorists that turn out to house nothing but civilians. But
these My Lais are all conveniently labeled accidents. They get filed away
and forgotten as the inevitable “collateral damage” of war. There was,
however, a massacre recently that was not a mistake--a massacre which,
while it only involved fewer than a dozen people, bears the same stench
as My Lai. It was the execution-style slaying of eight handcuffed
students, aged 11-18, and a 12-year-old neighboring shepherd boy who had
been visiting the others, in Kunar Province, on Dec. 26.<br><br>
Sadly, no principled soldier with a conscience like pilot Hugh Thompson
tried to save these children. No observer had the guts of a Michael
Brernhardt to report what he had seen. No Ron Ridenhour among the other
serving US troops in Afghanistan has investigated this atrocity or
reported it to Congress. And no American reporter has investigated this
war crime the way Seymour Hersh investigated My Lai.<br><br>
There is a Seymour Hersh for the Kunar massacre, but he’s a Brit. While
American reporters like the anonymous journalistic drones who wrote CNN’s
December 29 report on the incident
(<a href="http://www.cnn.com/2009/WORLD/asiapcf/12/29/afghanistan.deaths/index.html">
http://www.cnn.com/2009/WORLD/asiapcf/12/29/afghanistan.deaths/index.html</a>
), took the Pentagon’s initial cover story--that the dead were part of a
secret bomb-squad--at face value, Jerome Starkey, a reporter in
Afghanistan working for the Times of London and the Scotsman, talked to
other sources--the dead boys’ headmaster, other townspeople, and Afghan
government officials--and found out the real truth about a gruesome war
crime--the execution of handcuffed children. And while a few news
outlets in the US like the New York Times did mention that there were
some claims that the dead were children, not bomb-makers, none, including
CNN, which had bought and run the Pentagon’s lies unquestioningly,
bothered to print the news update when, on Feb. 24, the US military
admitted that in fact the dead were innocent students. Nor has any US
corporate news organization mentioned that the dead had been handcuffed
when they were shot.<br><br>
Starkey
<a href="http://thescotsman.scotsman.com/world/8-weeks-on-Nato-admits.6102256.jp">
reported </a>the US government’s damning admission. Yet still the US
media remain silent as the grave.<br><br>
Under the Geneva Conventions, it is a war crime to execute a captive. Yet
in Kunar on December 26, US-led forces, or perhaps US soldiers or
contract mercenaries, cold-bloodedly executed eight hand-cuffed
prisoners. It is a war crime to kill children under the age of 15,
yet in this incident a boy of 11 and a boy of 12 were handcuffed as
captured combatants and executed. Two others of the dead were 12 and a
third was 15.<br><br>
I called the Secretary of Defense’s office to ask if any investigation
was underway into this crime or if one was planned, and was told I had to
send a written request, which I did. To date, I have heard nothing.
The Pentagon PR machine pretended to me on the phone that they didn't
even know what incident I was talking about, but without their
"help" I have learned that what the US military has done--no
surprise--is to pass the buck by leaving any investigation to the
International Security Assistance Force--a fancy name for the US-led NATO
force fighting the Taliban in Afghanistan. It’s a clever ruse. The ISAF
is no more a genuine coalition entity than was George Bush's Iraq
War Coalition of the Willing, but this dodge makes legislative
investigation of the event impossible, since Congress has no authority to
compel testimony from NATO or the ISAF as it would the Pentagon. A source
at the Senate Armed Services Committee confirms that the ISAF is
investigating, and that the committee has asked for a “briefing”--that
means nothing would be under oath--once that investigation is complete,
but don’t hold your breath or expect anything dramatic.<br><br>
I also contacted the press office of the House Armed Services Committee
to see if any hearings into this crime have been planned. The answer is
no, though the press officer asked me to send her details of the incident
(Not a good sign that House members and staff are paying much
attention--the killings led to country-wide student demonstrations in
Afghanistan, to a formal protest by the office of President Hamid Karzai,
and to an investigation by the Afghan government, which concluded that
innocent students had been handcuffed and executed, and no doubt
contributed to a call by the Afghan government for prosecution and
execution of American soldiers who kill Afghan civilians.)<br><br>
There is still time for people of conscience to stand up in the midst of
this imperial adventure that may now appropriately be called Obama’s War
in Afghanistan. Plenty of men and women in uniform in Afghanistan
know that nine Afghan children were captured and murdered at America’s
hands last December in Kunar. There are also probably people who were
involved in the planning or carrying out of this criminal operation who
are sickened by what happened. But these people are so far holding their
tongues, whether out of fear, or out of simply not knowing where to turn
(Note: If you have information you may contact me). There are also plenty
of reporters in Afghanistan and in Washington who could be investigating
this story. They are not. Don’t ask me why. Maybe ask their editors.
<br><br>
<b>Dave Lindorff</b> is a Philadelphia-area journalist. His work can be
found at
<a href="http://www.thiscantbehappening.net">
www.thiscantbehappening.net</a>. He can be reached at
<a href="http://www.thiscantbehappening.net">dlindorff@yahoo.com.
</a><br><br>
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