Operation Moshtarak in Helmand, Afghanistan does seem to have a certain air of 'let's do on a larger scale what hasn't been working for the past nine years' about it.
The objective seems to be to clear the city of Taliban fighters which seems to have been a success. NATO forces telephoned ahead there intention to invade Marjah and Nad Ali, hoping that the Taliban would turn tail and run, which means the amount of actual fighting our troops have to do is minimal.
A happy offshoot of this, and i don't believe for a second that this was the main objective, that was to keep the number of US and UK fatalities down, is that the risk to civilians in these areas is reduced.
Despite this, we still managed to mistake five civilians for insurgents on day 1 and then launch a couple of rockets into a civilian home killing the 12 sheltering inside.
An original NATO statement said the rockets that destroyed the house landed 300 metres off target before changing it to the rockets were actually aimed at the house.
A spokesman said 'In any conflict situation accidents happen and we must remember that most of the civilian casualties are not caused by Isaf – they are caused by the Taliban.'
Well this one wasn't, it was caused by either yet another terrible accident which resulted in us killing the wrong people or complete ineptitude on behalf of the attacking forces.
The Government may be wringing their hands over the 4 British deaths so far but it seems a glib apology and a nifty shift of the blame onto the Taliban for our killing of 17 civilians is all we need to resolve our guilt.
You don't win hearts and minds by killing the very people you are stating to defend. If they don't begin taking a bit more care the idea of them being defenders or liberators of Helmand will be as shot full of holes as an Afghan house after a visit by NATO.
3 comments:
Wars have been around since when? I'd think that they'd have figured out that civilian casualties piss people off before now...
I see you have an interesting take on the unfortunate events in Afghanistan.
However, you have to understand that often the needs of a battle are greater than the desire to protect civilians. For example, in order to help protect the sovereignty of South Vietnam, I had to make a hard choice to bomb Cambodia in order to disrupt some VietCong supply lines. This was an unfortunate, but necessary act. Sure, it resulted in a few piddling lives being lost, but much like those killed in Helmand, we need to consider the greater benefit.
Besides, think about it. Those people didn't have much life anyway, and all that happened was a few less dirt farmers would be around.
I wish i thought like you ghost, but unfortunately having an IQ above 45 stops me.
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