Casualties of War

If you're a citizen of an occupied nation considering ambushing contractors and mutilating their corpses you may want to think about this:

Asked about the report of 600 dead, Marine Lt. Col. Brennan Byrne said: "What I think you will find is 95 percent of those were military age males that were killed in the fighting."

"The Marines are trained to be precise in their firepower .... The fact that there are 600 goes back to the fact that the Marines are very good at what they do," he said.

And that's the attitude America expects from it's military leaders, or at least had better. Or at least once did. Do they still? (I know times change.)

Unfortunately Lt Col Byrne was responding to questions regarding the insistance on the part of the Iraqis that most of the dead are women and children. We haven't head these sort of claims since... well the heavy fighting during the war last year. Or the first Gulf War prior to that. The "attacking holy shrines" angle is being trotted out too as Marines return fire received from Mosques. That stuff plays on the Arab street though, it's what many want to hear.

Many Americans relish the opportunity to respond to those stories too, but for those that don't there's always the American casualty story.

Here's one from Little Green Footballs.

Here's what I thought when I first read it: "Bastards."

Here's the first comment on the LGF comment section: "Duplicitous bastards!"

More accurate perhaps, but why bother with the adjective?

More to come...