Pentagon spokesman Col. Steve Warren has confirmed that on Monday, the US launched its second attack on an ISIS “cash collection point” in as many weeks, destroying another pile of unspecified cash in the middle of the large city of Mosul.
As with the previous incident, there were reports of civilian casualties in the attack, though Col. Warren insisted the Pentagon was willing to accept some civilian deaths in the attack, and that the initial estimates were that they only killed “in the single digits.”
Pentagon officials had similarly indicated that in the previous attack they were “comfortable” with civilian casualties in the scores, but that they believed they’d only killed between 7-9. Those deaths have not been formally confirmed by the Pentagon, however, who usually denies reports of civilian deaths as a matter of course.
Col. Warren termed the killings “tragic” but did not indicate that the Pentagon had any qualms about launching such attacks, but warned that ISIS was likely to keep its cash in smaller amounts spread around multiple locations in the future to keep it from getting blown up.
While the first such strike was believed to have destroyed a few million dollars in cash, this latest strike is conspicuous in its lack of details, with officials making no attempt to estimate what they actually destroyed, suggesting the figure will seem less impressive, and less worth the casualties inflicted on the civilian population.
Of course, launching strikes that they know will kill civilian bystanders is widely held to be illegal under international law, and officials made a big deal with the previous attack about launching the strike late at night to limit the number of people around the area. In this case, no such assurances were given.
I think we all know that the US has never respected international law.
Actually, you can knowingly kill civilians under laws of war provided they are not the intended target and their number is proportional to the value of the target being killed/destroyed, hence the term collateral damage.
Human beings are not “collateral.” They are human beings.
Not in statecraft, they are just resources to use to achieve a goal. Not commenting on the morality of the issue, only the issue of warcrime. In essence, all war is a moral crime, but it is also the health of the state, for govt types creates rules to make is palatable to common people.
Actually they are both.
The resounding silence from the American people has proven that they’re all right with the US ignoring international law (as long as it’s us doing the breaking of law) and that killing innocent people is OK as long as it’s “them.” Look, they’ve arranged it so that there are no observers on the ground who might have visual proof of US perfidy in their reporting. So, “they only killed “in the single digits”” becomes the reality regardless of what the numbers might actually be – and the American people are fine with that.
As the 51% most wealthy are the voting majority in Empire USA,
how can anyone doubt your wisdom?
‘only killed “in the single digits.”
Bush said the same thing; ‘1’ million Iraqis slaughtered in his
bogus 2003 invasion. ‘1’ is a (single) digit.
Innocent civilians — The fine art of submission
As Empire USA is the one that ordered Saudi dictators to keep the Islamic State well funded, as their terrorists receive payment from the back of pickups, surely we make body parts of innocent civilians for only one reason, to keep terrorized and in submission innocent civilians.
Democracy is the illusion that it is OK to allow the 51% most wealthy to be the voting majority, as they are the ones most moral and most likely to keep us out of a war based economy.
So much for illusions.
Then it was okay for AQ to kill the people in the trade towers because it is war and civilian casualties is acceptable.
The U.S. Doesn’t make any effort to avoid killing civilians. Have you heard about double taps? That’s when the U.S. bombs a group, sometimes wedding parties and then when people come to help the survivors, they bomb them too.
They did not declare war before hand. Nor where they acting on part of a state. Furthermore in the 9/11 case civilians where explicitly targeted which is very different from targeting military installation and hitting some along the way. In both cases civilian losses is regrettable and in the later there are efforts to minimizer the loss.