because we are killing civilians. Amercians respond in that most American of all ways: They deny everything.
We weren't there, we don't kill civilians, the British Commander never had this conversation with us, and it's the Taliban's fault anyway.
British Criticize U.S. Air Attacks in Afghan Region
By CARLOTTA GALL
SANGIN, Afghanistan — A senior British commander in southern Afghanistan said in recent weeks that he had asked that American Special Forces leave his area of operations because the high level of civilian casualties they had caused was making it difficult to win over local people.
Other British officers here in Helmand Province, speaking on condition of anonymity, criticized American Special Forces for causing most of the civilian deaths and injuries in their area. They also expressed concerns that the Americans’ extensive use of air power was turning the people against the foreign presence as British forces were trying to solidify recent gains against the Taliban.
An American military spokesman denied that the request for American forces to leave was ever made, either formally or otherwise, or that they had caused most of the casualties. But the episode underlines differences of opinion among NATO and American military forces in Afghanistan on tactics for fighting Taliban insurgents, and concerns among soldiers about the consequences of the high level of civilians being killed in fighting.
On a rare visit to Helmand in mid-July, a journalist encountered children who were still suffering wounds sustained in that bombing raid or another around that time. Their father, Mohammadullah, brought them to the gate of the British Army base seeking help.
His son, Bashir Ahmed, 2, listless and stick thin, seemed close to death. The boy and his sister Muzlifa, 7, bore terrible shrapnel scars. NATO doctors had removed shrapnel from the boy’s abdomen at the time of the raid and had warned his father that he might not survive, but two months later he was still hanging on.
The father said the bombing raid killed six members of the family and wounded five. His wife lost an arm, and the children’s grandmother was killed, he said.
Altogether, he said, 20 people were killed in the airstrikes after Taliban fighters came through the village. He figured that the planes had bombed them mistakenly, because the Taliban were fighting United States forces well below the village at the time.
He said that he opposed to the Taliban, but that after the bombing raid the villagers were so angered that most of the men who survived went off to join the insurgents. Whether people would support the foreign troops “depends on the behavior of ISAF,” Mohammadullah said, referring to the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force. “If they treat the civilians well, they will win.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/08/09/world/asia/09casualties.html?pagewanted=2&_r=1&hp
We weren't there, we don't kill civilians, the British Commander never had this conversation with us, and it's the Taliban's fault anyway.
British Criticize U.S. Air Attacks in Afghan Region
By CARLOTTA GALL
SANGIN, Afghanistan — A senior British commander in southern Afghanistan said in recent weeks that he had asked that American Special Forces leave his area of operations because the high level of civilian casualties they had caused was making it difficult to win over local people.
Other British officers here in Helmand Province, speaking on condition of anonymity, criticized American Special Forces for causing most of the civilian deaths and injuries in their area. They also expressed concerns that the Americans’ extensive use of air power was turning the people against the foreign presence as British forces were trying to solidify recent gains against the Taliban.
An American military spokesman denied that the request for American forces to leave was ever made, either formally or otherwise, or that they had caused most of the casualties. But the episode underlines differences of opinion among NATO and American military forces in Afghanistan on tactics for fighting Taliban insurgents, and concerns among soldiers about the consequences of the high level of civilians being killed in fighting.
On a rare visit to Helmand in mid-July, a journalist encountered children who were still suffering wounds sustained in that bombing raid or another around that time. Their father, Mohammadullah, brought them to the gate of the British Army base seeking help.
His son, Bashir Ahmed, 2, listless and stick thin, seemed close to death. The boy and his sister Muzlifa, 7, bore terrible shrapnel scars. NATO doctors had removed shrapnel from the boy’s abdomen at the time of the raid and had warned his father that he might not survive, but two months later he was still hanging on.
The father said the bombing raid killed six members of the family and wounded five. His wife lost an arm, and the children’s grandmother was killed, he said.
Altogether, he said, 20 people were killed in the airstrikes after Taliban fighters came through the village. He figured that the planes had bombed them mistakenly, because the Taliban were fighting United States forces well below the village at the time.
He said that he opposed to the Taliban, but that after the bombing raid the villagers were so angered that most of the men who survived went off to join the insurgents. Whether people would support the foreign troops “depends on the behavior of ISAF,” Mohammadullah said, referring to the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force. “If they treat the civilians well, they will win.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/08/09/world/asia/09casualties.html?pagewanted=2&_r=1&hp
