Sunday, November 07, 2004

"Mercy Killing" in Iraq

When PFC Collins' Bradley fighting vehicle was disabled and he was wounded in a mortar attack in western Bagdhad, he was still moving and calling for help in broken Arabic when he died.

Seven American soldiers were killed in the attack, including Collins, military officials said. Eight others were wounded.

Rather than provide medical help to the injured man, the local citizens, who had arrived shortly after insurgents left the ambush site, treated PFC Collins as if he were "an animal struck by a car", not a human being.

They shot him, twice. Collins was 19.

Residents of the neighborhood characterized the shooting as a "mercy killing," saying they shot the wounded American "to put him out of his misery."

I am livid.

And I ask you, I ask you --

If you swap the nationalities around, so that it was American soldiers killing a 16-year-old Iraqi boy after blowing up the garbage truck he was on, are you still appalled?

Mercy and Murder at Issue in Iraq Death

There were medics. On the scene. And relatives of the wounded boy. Yet two soldiers took it upon themselves to "put him out of his misery".

Wrong. Wrong. Wrong.

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