Firstly because analysis showed that there is a strong probability that the person quoted in the article and the person who wrote the letter are not the same person. This is not final because the first sample is small. If we had a greater amount of material definitely spoken by that soldier we could be much more certain.
But while that would be confirmatory, it is not necessary to establish what probably happened. Simply because the first quote is an "immediate recollection" As I asked Joe previously: Show us what Private Guckenheimer could have been trying to say when he said, "We were told specifically that if there were women and children to kill them" and how this could be taken to mean something other than what it said.
I asked this because a little analysis should provide the answer. Why did he say exactly this? Why did this specific instruction stick in his mind? Surely because it was an unusual order? So what made it unusual? Soldiers going into combat are trained to kill people who oppose them - no matter who - even if wearing a fake uniform. Now look at the sentence again. It is already a "complex" sentence. It contains a qualifier - "if there were women and children" - not " if there were women and children shooting at you" - that, sadly, would not have been very unusual or surprising, would it? Under those circumstances he would probably not have said "specifically" would he? No. What struck this soldier him was the "specific" instruction to "kill them all."
Secondly, we know from combat scenes, and combat statistics that American troops, like the French, are not particularly careful of non-combatants. From e.g. Korea, Vietnam, Nicaragua, Panama, Kuwait and Afghanistan we have reports of the execution of non-combatants by Americans. This creates a framework where there appears to be a greater probability that the rules governing warfare were more likely to be broken by an American than if the soldier had been, say English, Danish or Dutch.
Thirdly, we know that the rules of war have been broken in Afghanistan. There are strong accusations that Americans have been involved in executing prisoners, and we know that women and children were killed in Afghanistan. We also know that the combat scenes were, as they are in Israel, off-limits to external observers and deliberately destroyed, making investigation of scene evidence impossible. Perhaps there were other reasons for this. It is not impossible, buyt it should be taken as indicative.
Fourthly we have the statements of senior members of the Administration that they preferred not to have prisoners, the sparcity of living prisoners and the evidence that prisoners were executed in cold-blood. Another massive contravention of the rules of war. Where one rule is broken, it is likely that other rules were broken too.
Fifthly, we have the evidence that the USA is working deliberately to attempt to place its military and command-structure beyond the reach of the International court, which would investigate and try such offenses. If there were nothing to fear from such investigations and trials, why would this be necessary. The innocent need not fear an honest court.
Thus despite the follow on letter, I would say that this forms a prima fascia case of a probable breach of the rules of war - and that the circumstances surrounding the writing of the letter should be investigated to discover who instigated it. It may just have been the parents attempting to protect their son. Equally it may have been those involved in issuing the order or somebody attempting to protect the tattered reputation of American soldiers. Only an investigation would show. And the internal and external evidence shows that an investigation is justified.
Regards
Hermit
---- This message was posted by Hermit to the Virus 2002 board on Church of Virus BBS. <http://virus.lucifer.com/bbs/index.php?board=51;action=display;threadid=26018>
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