guns v. stones

Message Bookmarked

Bookmark Removed

The US army responds to stone throwers with bullets: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/2999594.stm

what kind of cowboy outfit is the US military? didn't someone think to train them in non-lethal means of dealing with unruly crowds?

― DV (dirtyvicar), Wednesday, 18 June 2003 12:45 (twenty-two years ago)

not axl v. mick?

― teeny (teeny), Wednesday, 18 June 2003 12:49 (twenty-two years ago)

"The BBC's Chris Morris in Baghdad"

He must be very good at his job to keep it despite his name.

― Andrew Farrell (afarrell), Wednesday, 18 June 2003 13:05 (twenty-two years ago)

They've obviously been taking lessons from the IDF.

― nickalicious (nickalicious), Wednesday, 18 June 2003 13:11 (twenty-two years ago)

maybe US soldiers are all pantywaists. "Owww! stop throwing those stones at me! I'm going to shoot you know. Owww!". I mean, they do wear helmets and body armour, how much damage can a thrown stone do to them?

― DV (dirtyvicar), Thursday, 19 June 2003 11:17 (twenty-two years ago)

So does throwing a stone automatically disqualify somebody from being a target?

― dave q, Thursday, 19 June 2003 11:22 (twenty-two years ago)

what kind of NAZI are you Dave? are you seriously implying that people who throw stones at American soldiers should be shot and killed? or that if someone in a crowd throws stones at American soldiers they are entitled to fire live rounds back into the crowd?

― DV (dirtyvicar), Thursday, 19 June 2003 13:22 (twenty-two years ago)

No, I'm saying that the armies of liberation would have a better chance of smuggling grenades up to the front row if they could just spread the not-unreasonable idea that pitting rocks against heavily-armed troops is a fuckin' STUPID activity

― dave q, Thursday, 19 June 2003 14:11 (twenty-two years ago)

like at the Boston massacare.

― DV (dirtyvicar), Thursday, 19 June 2003 15:24 (twenty-two years ago)

In Skinny Legs and All, Tom Robbins puts forth an argument that much of the violence in the 'Holy Land' can be traced to there being so many rocks in Israel/Palestine. Basically, having lots of rocks to throw at each other leads to guns (bullets being the logical extension of the original rocks). I can almost agree with this logic.

― I'm Passing Open Windows (Ms Laura), Thursday, 19 June 2003 23:05 (twenty-two years ago)

Yeah, DV, you're going a bit overboard. I'm not saying I agree with this argument at all, but: I'm sure the military response to your complaint would be the less-than-Nazi-like logic that (a) soldiers being pelted with items are in no position to intuitively discern whether or not one of them might be something more dangerous than a rock, and thus (b) they treat anything being thrown at them as potentially deadly.

Again, note that I am not backing or defending this logic.

― nabisco (nabisco), Thursday, 19 June 2003 23:11 (twenty-two years ago)

NOTICE

Armed Forces now accepting enlistees

• are you physically fit? even remotely?

• are you well-informed about US and UK policy decisions in the middle east?

• are you strongly opinionated on how things should be done?

• SIGN THE FUCK UP DUDE

The Liberators of the Iraqi People need YOU to help them prevent their country from being overrun by insurgent Ba'athists and Shia radicals. Provide security, help distribute aid materials, and wear a lot of clothes in hundred-degree heat. Does this sound like fun? YES IT DOES. Don't wait! Get a free haircut today!

― Millar (Millar), Thursday, 19 June 2003 23:26 (twenty-two years ago)

"Before we leave, we visit the office of Dr. Mahmoud al-Madhoun, the hospital's director. He hands us plastic bags filled with bullet fragments he has taken out of his patients. All have the dates, the types of wounds, and the names of the victims printed neatly on the outside. Of the 1,206 killed and wounded, he says, 655 were under the age of eighteen. He cannot understand why soldiers would fire at children.

"'In thirty years of practice,' he says, 'I have never treated a patient who died after being hit by a rock.'"

A Gaza Diary

― mookieproof (mookieproof), Thursday, 19 June 2003 23:32 (twenty-two years ago)

that doctor apparently never treated women

― James Blount (James Blount), Thursday, 19 June 2003 23:37 (twenty-two years ago)

Granted, if I have to choose between one somewhat reductive characterization of things and another, I'll always opt for whichever involves less shooting people.

― nabisco (nabisco), Thursday, 19 June 2003 23:39 (twenty-two years ago)

He cannot understand why soldiers would fire at children.

Everybody knows of course that in Saddam-Iraq it was strictly illegal for anyone under 18 to carry weapons of any sort

― Millar (Millar), Thursday, 19 June 2003 23:46 (twenty-two years ago)

Apart from the sarcasm here is the official excuse for the deaths: one of the soldiers mistook his fellow soldiers' warning shots for hostile firm. An officer also notes as an aside that the soldiers don't carry anything for crowd control (e.g. rubber bullets), so one assumes their only response alternatives are warning fire and then actual fire. It would seem to me that this is a good point to equip them with crowd-control tools, so they don't always have to make soldiers-at-war responses to mildly unruly mobs.

― nabisco (nabisco), Thursday, 19 June 2003 23:53 (twenty-two years ago)

(sorry - when I said 'armies of liberation' I meant the fedayeen)

― dave q, Friday, 20 June 2003 07:29 (twenty-two years ago)

It would seem to me that this is a good point to equip them with crowd-control tools, so they don't always have to make soldiers-at-war responses to mildly unruly mobs.

this is my point, really. in western countries people often stage demonstrations. Sometimes these result in scuffles with cops. Sometimes people even throw stones at cops. But if the forces of the state were to respond with lethal force there would, justifiably, be outrage, no matter who was doing the demonstrating and stone throwing.

what is worrying about the Iraq situation, and some of the justifications put forward for the US military's action here, is the implication that somehow it is alright to kill Iraqis whenever they are causing trouble. Presumably because they are t-heads.

― DV (dirtyvicar), Friday, 20 June 2003 10:54 (twenty-two years ago)

http://www.webcolombia.com/goya/Goya_The_Shootings_of_May_Third_1808.jpg

― DV (dirtyvicar), Friday, 20 June 2003 10:56 (twenty-two years ago)

what's 'mildly unruly'? as opposed to 'extremely unruly'(Romania? Rwanda?)?

― dave q, Friday, 20 June 2003 11:00 (twenty-two years ago)

I'm not sure I'd say that, DV: what's problematic is that soldiers there are acting as soldiers and never as police or peacekeepers. They're subjecting all civilians to the rules of engagement of war. The argument that it's impossible to distinguish between civilians and potential attackers is, I think, sort of bullshitty and not particularly borne out by the facts: recent attacks on troops have been about sniping and ambush, not the slow confrontation of mobs. If groups of people are standing there in mob form, slowly seething, shouting, and throwing stones, it's safe to assume that they're engaging as civilians and not attackers. And of course you're right that it's a bad decision to always err on the side of projecting soldiers against any imaginable attack at the expense of frequently gunning down Iraqi civilians: in the long run, to be honest, I'd say it benefits everyone to potentially lose a few soldiers to attack instead of being seen as hair-trigger repressors of Iraqi civilians.

― nabisco (nabisco), Friday, 20 June 2003 13:24 (twenty-two years ago)

'firing on crowds' - worked for Napoleon's career!

― dave q, Friday, 20 June 2003 13:34 (twenty-two years ago)

napoleon <=> bush
st helena <=> ???

― mark s (mark s), Friday, 20 June 2003 13:44 (twenty-two years ago)

amritsar/bloody sunday/whatever = the big guy lost, he just doesn't know it yet

― mark s (mark s), Friday, 20 June 2003 13:45 (twenty-two years ago)

I would rather be stoned than gunned. Any day.

― Lara (Lara), Friday, 20 June 2003 20:05 (twenty-two years ago)

I'd say it benefits everyone to potentially lose a few soldiers to attack instead of being seen as hair-trigger repressors of Iraqi civilians.

everyone except the soldiers, of course, but who needs them anyway, they're just dumb infantrymen. Much better to make sure the rioters stay safe even if it costs a few lives! After all it's not like the soldiers are under orders.

Nabisco you're normally a reasonable fellow, I can't imagine you meant that seriously

― Millar (Millar), Friday, 20 June 2003 20:16 (twenty-two years ago)

You must be logged in to post. Please either login here, or if you are not registered, you may register here.