Given that the death certificate proved that the Iraqi died by being suffocated, and that it’s known that this American was responsible for putting the man in a position to be suffocated, such a slap on the wrist is proof that the US Army has no interest at all in seriously dealing with human rights abuses by its thugs… err… soldiers.
I, for one, am glad that I live on the Correct Side of the border and that my tax dollars are not being used to pay for men to do to terrible things like this.
A US officer who faced up to three years in jail for killing a captured Iraqi general has been punished with a reprimand and a $6,000 fine.
Chief Warrant Officer Lewis Welshofer Jr was convicted last week of the negligent homicide of Maj Gen Abed Hamed Mowhoush in 2003.
Prosecutors said Gen Mowhoush was tied, placed headfirst in a sleeping bag and died with an officer sitting on him.
Welshofer has thanked his military “family” for supporting his defence.
“The military is a family when you get right down to it,” he told a TV station in the US state of Colorado, according to the AFP news agency.
“I can’t thank them enough for their support,” he said.
The jury in Welshofer’s court martial trial said he must receive a reprimand for his actions and ordered him to forfeit $6,000 of his salary.
He was also ordered to be confined to his base and place of worship for 60 days.
A death certificate published by the Pentagon gave the cause as asphyxia due to smothering and chest compression.
Re: How do you kill a Muslim and get away with 2 months house arrest & a $6000 fine?
An interesting quote from his defence lawyer
"After the sentencing, Welshofer's lawyer, Frank Spinner, was quoted by the Associated Press news agency as saying: "When you send our men and women over there to fight... you've got to give them enough room to make mistakes without treating them like criminals."
Interesting but not terribly suprrising to see that an American thinks that people who commit war crimes such as abusing the rights of captured Army officers should not be treated as criminals.
Re: How do you kill a Muslim and get away with 2 months house arrest & a $6000 fine?
"After the sentencing, Welshofer's lawyer, Frank Spinner, was quoted by the Associated Press news agency as saying: "When you send our men and women over there to fight... you've got to give them enough room to make mistakes without treating them like criminals."
Interesting but not terribly suprrising to see that an American thinks that people who commit war crimes such as abusing the rights of captured Army officers should not be treated as criminals.
Hypocrisy has always been our best trait. We haven't punished any of our army generals for the crimes committed by them in 1971, but we are so prompt to bash the Americans.
At least the US gave the guy a six-month sentence for torturing an army general. How many jail sentences did we hand out to our generals who raped, killed and pillaged our muslim brothers in east pakistan? Farcical indeed.
Re: How do you kill a Muslim and get away with 2 months house arrest & a $6000 fine?
Which general personally did that? Pakistan did investigate and found no evidence of orders being issued from the military leadership to do such things. They seem to have been spontaneous actions by junior personnel.
At any rate, Pakistan has never tried to wear the mantle of being the morale leader of the world. At a time when the USA is pointing out to Cubans how they are being denied full human rights, it’s ridiculous for the USA to be issuing such a slight slap on the wrist to its soldiers for their human rights abuses and war crimes.
Re: How do you kill a Muslim and get away with 2 months house arrest & a $6000 fine?
Maddy, that is a nice way of saying that I only drink beer because it has 2% Alcohol. The fact remains that you benefit from American economy and strength, and you help this machine going…in other words you are supporting the war.
Re: How do you kill a Muslim and get away with 2 months house arrest & a $6000 fine?
“Junior personnel?” :hehe: You mean junior officers, and not jawans, right? Like the junior officer in the American army who tortured the Iraqi general and got six months in the slammer, right?
How many junior officers did we punish?
Only a revisionist denier like yourself would make an absurd claim to absolve the generals of any wrongdoing by saying that “they didn’t ‘personally’ kill anyone, so they should not face any trials.” In the same vein, let’s us not blame Bush for anything, since he didn’t “personally” put a bullet through an Iraq’s head. Let’s undo the Nurmburg trails and acquit all the german generals. Great logic and hypocrisy at its best.
Whether Americans are equally or more hypocratic is a moot point, but for us pakistanis to debate that issue is ludicrous and akin to pot calling the kettle black. May be the bhutanese can do that, but not us.
Re: How do you kill a Muslim and get away with 2 months house arrest & a $6000 fine?
That's the key issue on 1971. Nothing from the army's documents of orders issued (and modern armies are dependent of written documentation) was ever found to prove that the military leadership ordered these things.
The allegations against Army generals were only made by Bengalis with a vested interest in demonising their military opponents, and willingly believed by all too many Pakistanis wishing to imagine those who commanded during the defeat to be bad humans.
False Propaganda against enemy militaries is extremely common. You need only look at how in WW1 it was claimed that the German Army was raping Belgian Nuns, and more recently, how it was exposed that some of the cruelest acts the Iraqis did when invading Kuwait did not occur either. The Bengalis are no different.... just as with their 3 million killed fabrication, they had motive to demonise the Pak Army generals.
I'm not denying that innocents were killed and rapes took place. There are too many witnesses to that, including the family of some of the Bengalis I know. However, such actions can only be proven to have been done at the initiative of junior officers. As far as the people I heard from about those trials could remember, none of the junior officers used the "following orders" defence.
Re: How do you kill a Muslim and get away with 2 months house arrest & a $6000 fine?
Rightfully speak up and condem US Army killings and torture, but do not remain silent when Pak Army is doing the same, esp against its own countrymen. This simply makes your condemnation ring hollow
THE Pakistani Army has been accused of carrying out summary executions as fighting intensifies between rebel tribesmen and security forces in the southwestern province of Baluchistan
*“There were alarming accounts of summary executions, some allegedly carried out by paramilitary forces,” the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (HRCP) said in a report last weekend. *
It also said that there was evidence that indiscriminate bombing by the security forces had resulted in deaths and injuries among the civilian population. Asma Jehangir, the chairman of the group, said that there was a warlike situation in the province. “The HRCP team found widespread instances of disappearance, of torture inflicted on people held in custody and on those fleeing from their houses,” Ms Jehangir, a former UN human rights rapporteur, said.
Re: How do you kill a Muslim and get away with 2 months house arrest & a $6000 fine?
[QUOTE]
The allegations against Army generals were only made by Bengalis with a vested interest in demonising their military opponents, and willingly believed by all too many Pakistanis wishing to imagine those who commanded during the defeat to be bad humans.
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Hamidoor commission report was published in pakistan. next!!
[QUOTE]
False Propaganda against enemy militaries is extremely common. You need only look at how in WW1 it was claimed that the German Army was raping Belgian Nuns, and more recently, how it was exposed that some of the cruelest acts the Iraqis did when invading Kuwait did not occur either. The Bengalis are no different.... just as with their 3 million killed fabrication, they had motive to demonise the Pak Army generals.
[/QUOTE]
I dont care what the benglas are claiming or claimed. It doesn't matter. That is not the issue we are debating here. The issue we are debating is whether or not any of our army officers was punished for atrocities committed. Answer is "no." So, let's not judge the americans. Drop it, dude.
[QUOTE]
I'm not denying that innocents were killed and rapes took place. There are too many witnesses to that, including the family of some of the Bengalis I know. However, such actions can only be proven to have been done at the initiative of junior officers. As far as the people I heard from about those trials could remember, none of the junior officers used the "following orders" defence.
[/QUOTE]
And did we conduct an investigation and punish them? Anyone care to hazard a guess?
So, it is okay to raise clamor over an american officer torturing a muslim iraqi, but not when it is one of ours killing bengla muslims? And the justification you stated for this was because America claims to be a bastion of democracy and Pakistan doesn't, so it is okay for Pakistan to act in an immoral way and not be questioned?Bravo.
