OT - US Soldier kills 16 Civilians in Afghanistan

[simonmark6]

I'm British and I love Americans...though I couldn't eat a whole one.

Well maybe if I was really hungry.

That was facile but my sympathies go out to both the dead of the tragedy and the soldier involved. If he was driven to this by stress or a breakdown of some sort he is a victim too.

[95th Rifleman]

In general the Americans do seem to have a distinct lack of common sense when it comes to hearts and minds. the Koran thing for instance, if you are gonna burn a coutry's holy book then burn them to ash and bury them in a pit, don't half burn them and dump them in an accessable rubbish tip!

Now as to this incident, it's a damned mess. However, despite the inflammatory nonesense at the start of this thread, it'll take a complete idiot to equate the actions of one man and turn them into a derogatory put down of an an entire nation's military.

What is really going to matter is how this situation is handled, unfortunately the chap in question will not be tried for a warcrime, it's not how the American system does things. He'll be tried for murder and either face life in prison or life in a mental hospital. The best pr job would be to hand him over to the Afghans for trial and execution, but no American president could autorise that and stay in office, especialy in an election year.

If we are going to have these, potentialy flammable, OT threads perhaps we need it's own section. Better yet, best leave them out entirely, it has nothing to do with T2K and will invariably cause tension and bad blood.