The cowardly art of the fake surrender

Tell me, when has war ever been honorable?

All is fair in love and war.

Remember you're invading their country.

The laws of war aren't really about honor. They are about mutual casualty mitigation. Using a white flag as a ruse is a war crime because takes away the means with which to surrender for other troops. Allied troops are now going to be more suspicious of Iraqis purporting to surrender, and much more trigger happy when presented with anything ambiguous. That inevitably will mean more Iraqi deaths.

The fact that Iraqi troops are resorting to such crimes is a sign that they either had no discipline in the first place, or what discipline they had has been lost. If that is the case, this is going to get very bloody.

As opposed to your run of the mill war?

Sorry. Let me rephrase that. This is going to get more bloody than it would otherwise had been if Iraqi forces had remained within the bounds of the laws of land combat (which are generally codified in the Geneva Convention, and which proscribe things like using faked surrender as an ambush ruse).

Surely its a bit late to be talking about the niceties of warfare? Have the US actually legally declared war?

LOL that is a great point, have they officially declared war? This is an invasion after all.

Sorry folks, the law of land warfare applies whether war is officially declared or not. Claiming the Geneva or Hague Conventions don�t appy because war was not officially declared would be quite a rediculous statement to make. That�s not what your hinting at, is it?

they're getting what is coming to them. better now than when we get deeper.


we'll never show mercy like that again.

And that is supposed to be a good thing?

well they ruined it.

we were treating their white flags with respect for them and now they use it as a tactic


so they broke a honor code and will be treated accordingly






they brought it upon themselves

An honour code? You invaded their country! Don't expect ANY sort of honour or respect! Jeez. That's just crazy.

And yes, they did bring it upon themselves; but what about those who DO want to surrender? This has made a mess, and I know what you're saying... but it isn't quite as simple as you make it out to be.

Please speak for yourself, not for the U.S. Military.

we asked - hey saddam...turn over your illegal weapons so you dont aid terrorists from attacking us and killing americans. he says: kiss my arse!

we gotta do something or we'll be living in fear for the rest of our lives wondering if/if not he is supporting terrorist


and i am not speaking on behalf od the military but theya re thinking the same thing. and i am not asking them to slaughter innocents but i suppose they will be more careful when they see a whiteflah no.


you anti-war mongers who live over seas dont get what it is like in america post 9/11

Yep. You can bet that the US military will have to stop taking chances on the "honor" of the Iraqi rank and file. Things will get much more messy over there.

There is no proof that SH has ever supported any terrorist activity.

I am quietly amused by the "you don't know what it's like" statement. I lived through some extended IRA bombing campaigns in London. And who were the main financial supporters of said IRA? Starts with a "US" ends with "citizens".

It's amazing how some folks still deny that Iraq was supporting terrorists, when it's been going on since the 1980s. I guess they have a different definition of "support" or something.

That's the point we've been making. Disciplined troops abide by the laws of land warfare because it is in their collective self-interest to do so. An armed mob on the other hand, tries to take advantage of them. But ultimately when you do that, the result is more suffering all around.

For something that is supposedly so obvious, the administration has certainly done a crappy job of making the links. The best I've seen is circumstantial at best. The strongest link is the camp in the north of Iraq, but Saddam hasn't had a whole lot of control up there since the no-fly zones went up. Not a real strong link.

If you have more specific info, please post it. I'm interested, but no one ever puts up substantial links when asked about this.

(note: I don't believe that there is no link, just haven't seen an effective argument for it yet.)

I'm sorry, but I don't remember Iraq using weapons of mass destruction... so he has about as much right to them as the US does. But that isn't the topic at hand.

How dare you presume to know how we feel about this situation. How dare you presume that Americans were the only ones affected by 9/11. Hate to tell you, but I know people in New York City. What do you think of that? Guess what? Sydney was a target too. Yep. Guess what? Australian troops are fighting too. That's right. I know what it feels like better than you could imagine. I find it especially messed up that you specify "anti-war mongers", insinuating that A) I'm an "anti-war monger", and that B) somehow pacifists are completely dead to the world and are unaffected by everything that has happened. Do you really believe that, or did you just shot off your mouth without thinking?

Oh, and by the way - being anti war-monger is a good thing. Anybody who supports war-mongers is idiotic. Another slip up? Maybe. Or maybe you know how to hyphenate properly, but couldn't think of a better term than "anti-war monger", which is totally incorrect.

Y'know what else? I'm not anti-war. I would actually consider myself pro-war. I was for the previous strikes on Iraq, actually. I'm a huge fan of military technology and weapons systems in general. I'm very interested in them. I love explosives, and find them fun to play with. I want to buy a gun, because I think they're ****ing cool. I think the destructive power of a GAU-8/A is awesome, and there's not much cooler than an AC-130 in "don't **** with me" mode, or a KA-50 in an intense dogfight. Total Annihilation is my favourite game. Don't consider me a pacifist - you have no idea what I'm like. Do I sound like a bloody pacifist to you?

I'm not for this war. That is something I want to make very clear. I am not anti-war. I realise war is a very necessary thing, unfortunately. And I do so with much dismay. I'm ashamed of this species for said fact, but still it remains.

Do I agree that something has to be done about Saddam? Sure. Assassinate him, by all means. Don't bomb the goddamn country. George is just flexing his muscles.

Again - do not lump me into some anti-war ultra-conservative pacifists-r-us group who sit around in front of state buildings naked smoking weed and whining about the war in that country with all the sand and the moustache dude.

Ahem. If we are putting this in the first person, well, so did you.
Also, "neccesary" war is a mind set.
For me, ultimately, it all comes back to this: we created this mess. We must now fix it. We MADE this war "necessary".

Ciph, you also say you don't "remember him using" WMDs. Do you doubt he has them? I don't. Not for a second. Of course, there was also all those SCUDs he didn't have, either.

TO further confuse the issue, I AM anti war. And proud of it. And confused as to why that would be a BAD thing. I deeply suspect our own armed forces are also anti war.

Yeah, I know, but equating all Iraqi troops with these animalistic individuals is unfair nonetheless.

Well, I don't think an Army that has a history of using chemical weapons in mass quantities against enemy troops (the Iran-Iraq war) is going to be stopped by anything such as the Geneva convention.

Simey. I would like your opinion on saddam's strategy. I posted this earlier.

"I have been wondering for about a week now what Saddam's strategy would be. I wondered if he would order the immediate destruction of the oil wells or if he would order an immediate mass missile attack using short range Frog missiles on US/UK forces in order to sow dissarray. In the beginning it seemed almost too easy, the way US/UK forces were advancing into Iraq. I would have thought that if one were clearly at a massive tactical disadvantage that one would have to resort to tactics where the tactical advantages were nullified. Such tactics could have included luring the opposing forces into very close proximity, either through a system of trenches in the desert or in cities where the opposing forces would have difficulties using tanks and aircraft due the proximity of friendly soldiers. Such a tactic, in order to be sustainable, would involve getting one's soldiers to beat a hasty retreat as soon as the opposing forces withdrew their soldiers in order to start artillery and aircraft support. Instead it seems that Saddam has many soldiers that will simply sit put in the trenches and cities and fight like crazy until they're all eliminated.

This brings me to your original post. I have an idea that Saddam never intended to defend the areas under the no-fly zones in the north or the south. I think that he must have thought that the allied airmen knew the area too well, and that his forces would never be able to make preparations without the risk of being spotted. I think he has concentrated his strategy on defending the larger area in the middle with massed landmines, burning oil trenches and rings of more and more loyal soldiers further towards the city. I suspect that if he has any Chemical weapons left, he would use them in the last battle for the city itself, where the death toll would be catastrophic. I think he's enough of a Hitler look alike, that he would never consider surrendering.

I think, judging from the very few actual reported Iraqi defenders up until now, that he has concentrated almost his whole army around Baghdad. I suspect the initial claim of the US/UK that the entire 51.st Iraqi division had surrendered was premature, as it seems that it is that division that is doing the brunt of the fighting in Basra, Um Qasr, Nasiria and elsewhere, supported by small numbers of Republican Guards and armed irregulars. The numbers reported in the news- 500 in Nasiria fighting 5000 marines, 150 in Um Qasr etc, are either huge lies for propaganda purposes, or the real bulk of Iraq's few million armed irregulars, 400 000 man army, including 70 000 Republican Guards and 10 000 Special Republican Guards (Saddams SS Leibwache) are still waiting for the fighting to come close enough so that they will not be completely at a disadvantge with respect to Armour and Aircraft. Talking about which, I wonder why not one single Iraqi Aircraft has taken off yet. Have they all been destroyed or are they also waiting for the really big battles to begin.

Still, this cold talking of strategy is bloody sick though."

Yeah, we did invade it, too. It wasn't Australia who initiated it. "He started it", essentially, and our prime minister just happens to be Bush's bitch, and I'm ashamed to be associated with said invasion. I'd like to disassociate myself from our governing body as much as possible.

Ah, necessary... because the US started a fight, it has the right to call it "necessary" thereafter and "finish" it? You're right. The US created the war. It started it. It made this mess. That doesn't make "finishing" it any more reasonable.



I don't doubt it for a minute.

Being anti-war isn't a bad thing, the point I was trying to make is that I'm not anti-war, that's all. I don't like war. I don't feed off it. But sometimes muscles are the only things people will listen to.

I'm not pro-war either, mind you.

No. You're missing the point. We created this mess 30 years ago when the CIA and precious Kennedy administration got involved with the overthrow of a different tyrant in Iraq. Guess who was inserted in his place?

And I have NO doubt that finishing this mess off IS necessary. Absolutely. I may differ on HOW to clean it up. But I KNOW this mess needs cleaning up.

Ah, yes. Created this mess by playing international-good-cop. Something the US never had the right to do... and something that ultimately caused this shitstorm.

It's gonna happen again. Nay, it is happening again. The situation can't be "corrected". The damage has been done, and things will only get worse. As you said - look what happened last time.

I agree with you - it needs to be cleaned up, but this is NOT the way.

Post. Proof.

.

I never said Simey did. Somebody else did.

And yeah, that's the problem - they've messed things up for others now - but that doesn't mean others weren't legitimately surrendering.

If I was a troop, I'd probably be very cautious, even to the extent of not accepting Iraqi surrenders...