Lessons We Seem Doomed To Repeat

In war, it helps a soldier's conscience to think of the enemy as only "the enemy", and not as a person, or as a human. That is what soldiers did in Viet Nam, and that is what soldiers are doing in Iraq. Of course, "winning the hearts and minds of the Iraqi people" is kind of hard to do when you look at them as vermin.

Within weeks of allegedly being scolded, seven Marines and a Navy corpsman went out late one night to find and kill a suspected insurgent...

Unable to find him, the Marines and corpsman dragged another man from his house, fatally shot him, and then planted an AK-47 assault rifle near the body to make it appear he had been killed in a shootout, according to court testimony.

Four Marines and the corpsman, initially charged with murder in the April 2006 killing, have pleaded guilty to reduced charges and been given jail sentences. ...

Lopezromo, who was not part of the squad on its late-night mission, said he saw nothing wrong with what Thomas did.

"I don't see it as an execution, sir," he told the judge. "I see it as killing the enemy."

He said Marines consider all Iraqi men part of the insurgency. ...

Lopezromo said a procedure called "dead-checking" was routine. If Marines entered a house where a man was wounded, instead of checking to see whether he needed medical aid, they shot him to make sure he was dead, he testified.

"If somebody is worth shooting once, they're worth shooting twice," he said.

The lesson for today: In modern warfare, you can have a fighting force, or you can have a peace-keeping force... but you cannot have a force fighting for peace: If one fellow is trying to kill you, it is impossible to treat a similar fellow in a similar situation the next day with respect and compassion. It's simply too much to ask of any person... even a Marine.