Washblog

I remember doing a nightsweep and when I got back on the base at Hurricane Point we got back really late and the guys on this platoon were bragging how they shot up innocent people and they bragged about it, how they just shot up, that night, innocent people and it was kinda like a joke.  They were saying 'Look at that guy, I shot him in the stomach and he was running.'

This platoon used to have brain matter from people they had killed from .50 Cals.  They used to grab brain matter and bring it on the base and put it into the refrigerator.  They literally went crazy.  I know this isn't an isolated incident, this happens everyday in Iraq.  The news doesn't catch it. No one's going to confess to these things unless they get caught.

The Rules of Engagement got so bad in Iraq that if you did get engaged you just opened up on the city.  The day I got wounded we went, in reaction to whiskey two platoon, they were in the marketplace, the souk, and they had one or two pop offs from an AK and they just completely opened up on the whole market.  And I remember driving through in the humvees checking out the area and I remember seeing bodies on the sidewalks, broken glass and blood everywhere.  At that, at...(he is trying to control his voice)...it's, it's  difficult when you see things like that.

Families trying to shop gunned down in cold blood.  Imagine if China invaded the U.S.  Wouldn't you fight against them?  Imagine Chinese troops opening fire on your family while they were shopping at the mall.  wouldn't you join the insurgents?

Imagine if they kept your kids brains in a fridge for a "trophy".  

Would you EVER stop trying to kill them?  Even if they left?  Wouldn't you rightfully cry out for justice?  I'd try to sneak into China just to get revenge on the motherfuckers.  Wouldn't you?

Chanan Suarez-Dias testified to further injustices witnessed in Iraq.

I saw this really beautiful Iraqi family.  They were caught up in an engagement.  The Mujihadeen attacked a convoy.  There's Iraqi's trying to live a normal life, because they can't over there, just walking down the street and a marine just completely mowed down one family, a complete family.  All of them.  And there was another family next to them.  This 13 year old girl was shot in the stomach and her mother was shot two times in the leg.  This was from .50 Cal.  I don't know if you've seen it, but it's a really long, it's a big bullet and the exit wound was huge.

That was an everyday thing over there in Iraq.

I wanted to post this last week.  I just couldn't.  The whole thought of this story just made me freeze up inside.  I couldn't write for a week.  I knew I had to pass on his story.  I just didn't want to.

I want to wrap this up with some smartass, snide comment, but I just can't.  I'm sickened by my countrymen.  I'm sickened that any politician can argue with a straight face that we shouldn't pull out of Iraq today.

We need to leave Iraq YESTERDAY.