TYPICAL - U.S. GETS BLAMED WHEN TALIBAN USES HUMAN SHIELDS

Posted on June 30, 2007

The news report starts out, of course, with a body count of civilians killed or wounded by US led forces in Afghanistan. Well, it is true - sort of.

An AP count based on figures from Afghan and international officials found that militants killed 178 civilians in attacks through June 23 and that Western forces killed 203.

Even with these raw numbers, civilian deaths from NATO action would be about 7% of the number of Taliban and insurgents killed. But the raw numbers attributing blame don’t tell the real story. The latest attack with 30 civilian “killed or wounded” was:

Taliban fighters tried to ambush a joint U.S.-Afghan military convoy in Helmand province’s Gereshk district late Friday before fleeing into a nearby village for cover, said Mohammad Hussein, the provincial police chief.

The Taliban flee into local villages intentionally drawing fire at themselves and the civilians they are using as shields. So saying that NATO forces killed or wounded 30 civilians is really not the case. In fact if we sent a CSI crew in to sift the evidence like they do on TV, they would probably find that some of the dead and wounded would have wounds caused by the Taliban to keep the shields in place and drive up the body count. But regardless of whose bullets or rockets caused the wounds, the blame for the casualties is really on the Taliban.
The Taliban and their allies have an interest in blaming us. If they can convince the Afghans that it is we who are to blame, then the Afghans will demand we leave and the Taliban will again try to take over.

We should try to devise tactics that minimize the Taliban’s ability to use human shields, but unless we can change the battlefield to areas without local civilian populations, there will be civilian deaths and we will be blamed - just as the Taliban want us to be.

» Filed Under World politics, National Politics