Polish troops fire on pilgrims in Iraq

[JoFerret]

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=540&ncid=721&e=7&u=/ap/20040229/ap_on_re_mi_ea/iraq_shootings

[reprehensor]

1. Go Coalition!

And God help us all. I wonder how many moderates on that bus just got 'radicallized'?

[leftchick]

2. From the article.... so sad...

<snip>
Polish officials, however, denied that the bus was carrying anyone but the driver and said they suspect the incident was an aborted terrorist attack.

The bus, apparently having brake troubles, struck a minivan and swerved into a concrete barrier at a checkpoint manned by Polish and Iraqi security forces, witnesses said.

Abbas Hassan, a member of the U.S.-trained Iraqi Civil Defense Corps, said Polish troops opened up with heavy firepower for several minutes, targeting all cars coming in on the highway from Baghdad. He said the gunfire destroyed the right side of the bus.

Another witness, who was in another car at the checkpoint, said the bus appeared to be having brake troubles when it hit the barrier. He said the bus had a capacity of 44 passengers and was full.

[Aidoneus]

3. another

--snip--

Further south, hundreds of Iraqis rallied against coalition troops Sunday after U.S. soldiers fired on a car that failed to stop when a military convoy passed by. One Iraqi was killed and another critically wounded.

The shooting took place near Rumaythah, 135 miles south of Baghdad near the city of Samawah, where Dutch soldiers and some 230 Japanese troops are based. The soldiers are working to supply Iraqis with clean water, rebuild schools and bolster local hospitals.

Despite not being involved in the violence, the rally caused Japanese commander Col. Koichiro Bansho to cancel his trip to the town.

A crowd gathered around the site of the shooting, where the car sat with its windows broken, chanting "Down with America! Down with Bush!" U.S. soldiers and Dutch marines trying to clear the roadway were pelted with rocks and taunted.

"If these massacres don't stop, we shall fight the Americans!" one unidentified protester yelled. "Why do we have to be nice, to cooperate with them? Why do they do this to us?"

--snip--

from the same piece..

Massacres on Ashura such as these provoked the resistance that were the nails in the coffin of the Israeli invasion and occupation of Lebanon in the 80s. Those who lead this crusade are so foolish that their billions cannot buy them a history book to learn from these mistakes so that they may not repeat them?

[DulceDecorum]

4. The White Man's Burden

Take up the White Man's burden--
Send forth the best ye breed--
Go, bind your sons to exile
To serve your (oily) need;
To wait, in heavy harness,
On fluttered folk and wild--
Your new-caught sullen peoples,
Half devil and half child.

Take up the White Man's burden--
In patience to abide,
To veil the threat of terror
And check the show of pride;
By open speech and simple,
An hundred times made plain,
To seek (Halliburton's) profit
And work (Halliburton's) gain.
http://www.boondocksnet.com/ai/kipling/kipling.html
slightly adjusted

Pile on the brown man's burden;
And, if ye rouse his hate,
Meet his old-fashioned reasons
With Maxims up to date.
With shells and dumdum bullets
A hundred times made plain
The brown man's loss must ever
Imply the white man's gain.

Pile on the brown man's burden,
compel him to be free;
Let all your manifestoes
Reek with philanthropy.
And if with heathen folly
He dares your will dispute,
Then, in the name of freedom,
Don't hesitate to shoot.
http://www.boondocksnet.com/ai/kipling/labouche.html