🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <9103162147.2178@mydog.UUCP> gcf@mydog.UUCP (Gordon Fitch) writes:
>gcf@mydog.UUCP (Gordon Fitch) writes:
>| >Iraqi dead.  According to the Geneva Convention, the party in
>| >control of a given territory after combat is responsible for
>| >making its best effort to find, count, and identify the
>| >casualties of its adversary, including the dead.  The U.S.
>| >command has made it clear that it has no intention of doing so.
>
>twheeler@cbnewsj.att.com (theodore wheeler):
>| Fitch, you unmitigated moron, graves registration units of all
>| the services are right now combing the desert for dead Iraqis.
>| Each body is identified as closely as possible, then buried
>| with a marker. ...
>
>root@oneb.wimsey.bc.ca (Super user) writes:
>| Can you provide specific evidence that the U.S. command has 'made it
>| clear', or in any way stated it has no intention of pursuing the
>| issue? (I don't get much tv time, so may have missed something.)
>| Please provide whatever documentation is available to you which 
>| supports this allegation.
>
>Unfortunately, my sources have been radio and television.  While
>these are no more or less reliable than the printed word, they're
>harder to trace.  Here's what I have:
>
>1.  I personally saw an American general asked, on TV, about the
>Iraqi casualties.  He stated that he had no idea and that he
>didn't think the information would be available.  I believe
>General Schwartzkopf himself said that he was "not going to play
>the body-count game" but this statement could have many
>interpretations.
>

Fitch, check the dates and times that this statement was made.
The General spoke these words BEFORE the ground war even started.
If you recall, then maybe you were too young, the first question
out of reporter's mouths each day in Nam were, "what is the
body count?"  The General simply said the military was not going 
to get into that scenario again.  Besides not wanting to the
stupid and unproductive "body count" game, the real shooting war had
not even begun when this question was asked.

>2.  The radio station WBAI interviewed a woman working for a
>relief organization in the Middle East who said they had become 
>concerned about Iraqi MIAs because no one seemed to care about 
>the situation, and that her organization had been "stonewalled."  
>Because my car radio doesn't have a recording tape deck and my 
>memory isn't perfect, I can't state the names.  The telephone 
>number of WBAI is 212 279 0707 if anyone wishes to call them.  
>I called this number myself a few days ago and spoke to Robert
>Knight, who is one of the producers of "Undercurrents", a
>nationally-distributed radio program.  Knight said that they are
>aware of more than one report of this type, and that a program
>will probably be devoted to the subject in the near future.
>

Taking WBAI as a non-biased, even-handed source of information
is akin to believing the PLO just wants to be friends with
Isreal.  Radio Moscow used to take lessons from this bunch.
I would no more believe what is said on WBAI than anything
spouted over the Christian Broadcasting Network.  Both have
very narrow biased agendas and will do anything they can to
push that agenda.  Further, WBAI is notorious for not checking
sources.

>3.  I've received confirmation of the story by e-mail, and I've
>written back asking for further information.

Hell, if I send you some e-mail refuting what you say, does that
make it official?

>
>Let me add that this case may be one in which the act of
>observation changes the thing observed.  Specifically, public
>attention to a procedural "oversight" may cause the problem to be
>suddenly corrected.  As a veteran I am rather sensitive to this
>issue and I would prefer to be "wrong" than to have the situation 
>continue. 
>
I don't think we have an oversight here.  What we have is a failure
of the public to pay attention to the news and certain segments of
that public, knowing that most people don't pay attention, grinding
out half truths and downright misinformation to suit their political
ends.

>Mr. User alludes to photographing KIAs.  I had not heard of this
>before.  It might be a good idea; I understand that many of the
>Iraqi troops did not have shoes[1], and they may have lacked dog
>tags as well.  However, because a procedure exists -- and this
>refers not only to the articles I quote but to other articles as
>well -- a recitation of the steps of the procedure, or its
>demonstration in front of a television camera, does not mean it 
>is being carried out in the field.  Nor does the fact that the
>U.S. Government says something mean that it is necessarily true.
>--
>[1] Village Voice, vol. XXXVI no. 12, dated March 19, 1991, pg.
>8, third column, about 2/3 of the way down the page.
>--
How else are you going to get the news if it isn't written in
a paper or broadcast over radio and TV?  The incidents showing
Graves Registration people going about their thankless task was
filmed AFTER the shooting stopped and reporters were allowed
to wander about and gather their own stories.  One of the film
bites showed Iraqi soldiers searching the bodies of dead
comrades along the second road shootup north of Kuwait City.
One of the Iraqi soldiers told the TV crew that he was collecting
dog tags and held up a handfull.

It really puzzles me that their are those out there in netland 
that see a government conspiracy behind every news broadcast.
Just what is this so-called conspiracy out to do.  Hide the
fact that Iraqi soldiers died in the war.  We will probably
find out the exact number from the Iraqis themselves.  Are you
folks so desperate to fault the government that your grasping
at any straw that wafts by on the wind?  Do you want the news
folks to go out and film each and every body recovery, then
play it back each night during the evening news?  

Finally, I believe the coalition forces are doing everything
they can to find, identify, and list the fallen Iraqi soldiers.
The International Red Cross is satisfied.  The International
Red Crescent is satisfied.  The UN is satisfied.  The Geneva
Convention Committee is satisfied.  What makes you think that
WBAI, an organization with its own political agenda, has all of
the answers?  What makes you think the Village Voice, a newspaper
that has a credibility rating of less than zero, has all the 
answers and everyone else is wrong?  I have problems with the
main stream news sources too, but I think I am astute enough
to see through the reporting fog so that I don't have to run
to a blatently obvious political agenda mouthpiece such as
WBAI or the Village Voice.

T. C.