tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4445844569294316288.post965236768756025001..comments2024-01-28T03:56:39.351-08:00Comments on TOM CLARK: War Unknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger4125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4445844569294316288.post-24333942897032997632015-10-06T08:47:41.684-07:002015-10-06T08:47:41.684-07:00Doctors Without Borders airstrike: US alters story...<a href="http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/oct/06/doctors-without-borders-airstrike-afghanistan-us-account-changes-again" rel="nofollow">Doctors Without Borders airstrike: US alters story for fourth time in four days: The Guardian, 6 October 2015</a><br /><br />US special operations forces – not their Afghan allies – called in the deadly airstrike on the Doctors Without Borders hospital in Kunduz, the US commander has conceded.<br /><br />Shortly before General John Campbell, the commander of the US and Nato war in Afghanistan, testified to a Senate panel, the president of Doctors Without Borders said the US and Afghanistan and had made an “admission of a war crime”.<br /><br />Shifting the US account of the Saturday morning airstrike for the fourth time in as many days, Campbell reiterated that Afghan forces had requested US air cover after being engaged in a “tenacious fight” to retake the northern city of Kunduz from the Taliban. But, modifying the account he gave at a press conference on Monday, Campbell said those Afghan forces had not directly communicated with the US pilots of an AC-130 gunship overhead.<br /><br />“Even though the Afghans request that support, it still has to go through a rigorous US procedure to enable fires to go on the ground. We had a special operations unit that was in close vicinity that was talking to the aircraft that delivered those fires,” Campbell told the Senate armed services committee on Tuesday morning.<br /><br />The airstrike on the hospital is among the worst and most visible cases of civilian deaths caused by US forces during the 14-year Afghanistan war that Barack Obama has declared all but over. It killed 12 Doctors Without Borders staff and 10 patients, who had sought medical treatment after the Taliban overran Kunduz last weekend. Three children died in the airstrike that came in multiple waves and burned patients alive in their beds.<br /><br />On Tuesday, Doctors Without Borders denounced Campbell’s press conference as an attempt to shift blame to the Afghans.<br /><br />“The US military remains responsible for the targets it hits, even though it is part of a coalition,” said its director general, Christopher Stokes.<br /><br />Campbell did not explain whether the procedures to launch the airstrike took into account the GPS coordinates of the Doctors Without Borders field hospital, which its president, Joanne Liu, said were “regularly shared” with US, coalition and Afghan military officers and civilian officials, “as recently as Tuesday 29 September”.<br /><br />It is also unclear where the US special operations forces were relative to the fighting, but Campbell has said that US units were “not directly engaged in the fighting”.<br /><br />Campbell instead said the hospital was “mistakenly struck” by US forces.TChttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05915822857461178942noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4445844569294316288.post-54612149853300275382015-10-05T23:50:25.250-07:002015-10-05T23:50:25.250-07:00Right on, man--no need to teach them human wrongs....Right on, man--no need to teach them human wrongs.vazambam (Vassilis Zambaras)https://www.blogger.com/profile/14515165428574974933noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4445844569294316288.post-42815230460058258732015-10-05T16:19:59.328-07:002015-10-05T16:19:59.328-07:00I "discovered" Walter Benjamin a short t...I "discovered" Walter Benjamin a short time ago and I have enjoyed his interesting writing...(his books are expensive here)...great man...sad ending!Sandrahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15053707892868584990noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4445844569294316288.post-68028870001239464082015-10-05T16:03:11.412-07:002015-10-05T16:03:11.412-07:00Kunduz attack may amount to war crime -- UN Human ...<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bIMjUVWQqzw" rel="nofollow">Kunduz attack may amount to war crime -- UN Human Rights Chief: euronews, 4 October 2015</a><br /><br /><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E0BhNPiq78k" rel="nofollow">"Animal must talk to human beings / teach them human rights": Fela Anikulapo-Kuti and Egypt 80: Beasts of No Nation, live at the Zenith, Paris, 1984</a>TChttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05915822857461178942noreply@blogger.com