Last week the butchers of al Qaeda showed their jihadist street cred by killing around a hundred or so of their co-religionists, people shopping in a bird market of all places. They did so using mentally retarded women as “suicide” bombers – scare quoted because properly defined, suicide requires an act of volition.
In any case, while it may not be clear that the women acted on their own account it certain that their victims had no say in the matter – the act was morally cowardly and perverse, all the more so since lives were lost with nothing at all gained. A hundred lives at a stroke would be a catastrophe nearly anywhere else, in Baghdad they have become a number, a footnote. A rounding error.
This week we learn that the pool of mentally retarded women too may be running out:
A video that shows young boys being trained in kidnapping and assassination was discovered during a raid on an al-Qaeda safe house in Iraq, the U.S. military said Tuesday.
The video shows about 20 boys wearing ski masks and carrying pistols, assault rifles and rocket-propelled grenade launchers. In some cases the weapons appear to dwarf the youngsters carrying them.
Boy soldiers when the men run out – now where have we seen that before?
There’s a Wikipedia page for pretty much everything. This is an interesting read, and you’ll see that using children as soldiers is quite widespread…
This whole thing sickens me so much. It is one of the rare occasions that I am left speechless.
Interesting link, JPR. I found this particularly illuminating, with the UN talking about a 15 year old detainee at Gitmo:
Sure – beat up the U.S.A. for trying to interrogate him as a terrorist. But what has been done about the countries who use these children as soldiers? Seems that Sierra Leone is the only country who acted on its own to try and convict its military for these crimes.
It’s an interesting story about that ‘Canadian’ kid. Born in Canada but his father took him around to various Al Quaeda camps when he was quite young apparently. I believe he’s the one that they tried to bring to trial quite a while ago and couldn’t, based on the definition of an “illegal enemy combatants”.
The plot thickens as they try to bring him to trial again, with this being some of the latest reported:
“In February 2008, the Pentagon accidentally released evidence that revealed that although Khadr was present during the firefight, there was no other evidence that he had thrown the grenade – and speculation had merely formed based on the fact his comrade was firing a rifle at the time the explosive was thrown. After his comrade was killed, a wounded Khadr turned away from the soldiers on his knees but was shot twice in the back before being captured”
Also of interest, it’s not the Canadian government that is trying to intervene on the kid’s behalf.
Any belief system that would allow the use of children 0r mentally handicapped adults as suicide bombers needs to be rooted out, destroyed, and then forgotten. I cannot find another answer.
“Ceterum censeo Carthaginem esse delendam.” Cato the Elder
and speculation had merely formed based on the fact his comrade was firing a rifle at the time the explosive was thrown.
Difficult to do both simultaneously.
After his comrade was killed, a wounded Khadr turned away from the soldiers on his knees but was shot twice in the back before being captured
Welcome to war – this isn’t the LAPD.
Somehow I seriously doubt the Canadians want him back. Ever.
Difference: Hitler planned the ultimate use of the Hitlerjugend in this way from the beginning.
In this context it is interesting to note that the main body of militant support for the Hitler regime did not spring up from trenches of WW1 but rather from teenagers back home enrolled in patriotic youth programmes (Wandervögel et al.) during and after the war.
Hitler last desparate bid was the Volkssturm composed of children, yes, but mainly the seniors, the old.
That being said that for whoever came up with these schemes I truly hope that I am wrong in both my estimate of God interest in us and consequently the existence of heaven or, more importantly, hell in this instance.
Lex,
While I share your indignation concerning AQ using women, mentally retarded people, children, etc., but I don’t think it’s accurate to compare AQ’s move to the Germans in WW2. AQ is fighting a different kind of war with different objectives. If we take these latest actions alone as an indication that they’re running out of men I believe we dangerously underestimate them.
AQ isn’t really fighting for or defending “the homeland” – they’re instead looking to terrorize and destabilize Iraq by inflicting max carnage. The more sensational the act the better the effect it has on the US and Western powers, as well as the Iraqi general population.
I believe that – in AQ’s mind – using women, etc. increases the chances of the success of their “mission” (and I use this term in the loosest possible way) and has the added effect of making the defense problem for the Iraqi & American soldiers, as well as the general citizenry, much more difficult. They necessitate more female soldiers to try and search more women at more checkpoints. These searches in turn cause other problems – making the general population angry with the soldiers for searching them, etc. It’s a vicious cycle that AQ can cause by only a few sensational acts such as these.
The use of children runs in the same direction. The chance for “mission success” increases because it plays into the general disposition of people to not view children as an immediate threat. It spreads suspicion between the soldiers trying to defend the general population and the folks being defended. It’s also possible that mistakes will be made and innocent kids “acting suspiciously” could be targeted/killed by mistake. Again, little to no effort by AQ yields discontent between the defenders and the general population.
AQ doesn’t care about its public reputation in the West except that we fear them. All of these acts – filming beheadings, suicide bombings in markets, showing that they’ll stop at nothing to kill infidels and anyone else around – are geared towards spreading that terror. I believe that AQ’s use of women and children is just another means to that end, driven by their general strategy and not by the logistical issue of insufficient manpower.
One other point – the Iraqi government backed (pretty quickly) away from the US assertion that the women involved in the bombings last week were indeed mentally retarded. I’m not arguing the point, but I do hope that this assertion by the US is provable, because if it’s not and AQ shows that the assertion is false then our credibility will suffer.
R – Brian
the use of children 0r mentally handicapped adults as suicide bombers
I saw noted elsewhere that this usage is probably incorrect. Suicide is an act of volition – the person committing the act has made a deliberate decision to kill themselves. If a child or a mentally disabled adult had killed someone else, it would be successfully argued in court that they could not be guilty of murder because they were not responsible for their own actions. I think the same reasoning applies here, and thus these are straight homicidal bombings, not suicide ones.
One other point – the Iraqi government backed (pretty quickly) away from the US assertion that the women involved in the bombings last week were indeed mentally retarded. I’m not arguing the point, but I do hope that this assertion by the US is provable.
Brian, do you have a link for that information? I had understood it was the opposite–that the Iraqis immediately said they had Down’s Syndrome while the U.S. said they had not confirmed that. Later I read about an American spokesman saying that pictures shown to American medical personnel had confirmed the assertions.
RonF: The homicide itself could lump the “bombers” into it, as apparently their bomb vests were remote detonated (I forget which news reports had this, me thinks I read the link from B5).
Still not an act of volition on the part of the women.
This may backfire against AQ on the simple basis of crossing a line that many tacit supporters, in country, would not cross.
FbL – so much for my career in journalism…
I re-checked the Washington Post and you are correct. The Iraqi’s made the claim and the US official backed away stating there was no evidence to that effect. I stand corrected and apologize to all for my error.
Don’t rightly know how I got that turned around (“aging” memory), but I sure appreciate your pointing it out.
Best – Brian
Thanks, Brian. But don’t worry, I think you’d fit right in with a number of journalists out there…
Btw, I found the article I recalled:
Of course, there are other ways that youth movements can serve the motherland as reported by the Daily Mail:
Remember the mammoths, say the clean-cut organisers at the youth camp’s mass wedding. “They became extinct because they did not have enough sex. That must not happen to Russia”.
Obediently, couples move to a special section of dormitory tents arranged in a heart-shape and called the Love Oasis, where they can start procreating for the motherland.
With its relentlessly upbeat tone, bizarre ideas and tight control, it sounds like a weird indoctrination session for a phoney religious cult.
But this organisation – known as “Nashi”, meaning “Ours” – is youth movement run by Vladimir Putin’s Kremlin that has become a central part of Russian political life.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/news.html?in_article_id=471324&in_page_id=1770
Thanks for this moral clarity Lex,” the act was morally cowardly and perverse”. The plainly obvious needs pointing out and repeating in this age of equivocation, root causes and relativism.
They are so desperate, they are spending their “seed corn” and will have nothing left after they kill the next generation. These children will not grow-up to be the next ‘jahadis’, they will not grow up at all.
These folks need to die.
Later,
ChrisP
No, I think I have to agree with Brian.
All part of the ‘master plan’ in their minds, as opposed to a sign of desperation.
“where have we seen that before?”
Last days of the Southern Confederacy. My maternal grandmother spoke of her then teen-aged Daddy walking home to Mississippi from Appomattox. Barefoot.
This is not the same thing as that, I believe.
Nor even the same as the Hitler-Jugend guys.
Hitler’s kids, and my great-grandparents, at least presumably had the average thinking capacity of most people their age.
These gals were duped, and taken advantage of, like those trusting dogs the Russians trained to run under German tanks with mines on their backs.
As someone who is a bit strange himself, I find this particularly and egregiously Godawful and despicably revolting
Lex, what did you do with my comment?
OK, I’ll try and reconstruct it from memory.
“now where have we seen that before”? Last days of the Southern Confederacy. My maternal grandmother told me of her Daddy walking back from Appomatox to Mississippi, as a teenager. And barefoot. The difference from that to this, is that those kids prolly at least had the usual mental equipment of kids of their age, and these gals didn’t.
This thing is just revoltingly egregiously Godawful and despicably loathesomely outrageous.
I’m particularly exercised because, hell, I’m a bit strange, too
I tried to re-construct it from memory and post again, but that one disappeared, too. Let’s see if this one gets through.
Sorry, JTG – I was getting overwhelmed by trackback spam and twiddled some settings. Hopefully you’ll be GTG from now on.
Thanks, Cap’n, and kewl, too, ’cause I get to compare the versions!
(My cussin is inspired by Doctor Maturin. This kind of thing inspires me to imitate Doctor Maturin when he was suffering from cocaine withdrawal and a beef-headed Sassenach made insulting anti-Irish remarks at him.)
I’m making placeholder, or zero, or lieutenant, or whatever comment here, just to bump this to the top.
That kind of thing really is quite evil.
The people who planned and executed that should get, at least, what Alexander Hamilton got.
(from Ron F in #9 above)
You know, I get tired of this distinction (no disrespect directed at you Ron). If they were truly suicides, only the bomber would die. The fact that their entire motivation is to kill as many people as possible, including themselves, the term suicide bomber just isn’t right to me. Call them all homicide bombers because that is their intent.
I know, I’m straining at gnats.
You sure this is a sign of desperation?
It might just be a standard Al Qaeda instructional video on childrearing.
One of my German instructors was Hitlerjugend, although he never said it. I pieced it together from various comments he had made. He described having classes at the AAA site, in between battles. He described how they would lie on the ground trembling in terror, hands over their heads, the sky literally black with American bombers and the earth rumbling and quaking from the roar of all those engines, nowhere to run or hide. No matter, the Fuehrer would turn things around. Any day now, the invading Americans and Russians would be driven back and the Third Reich would emerge victorious.
Then came the word that Hitler had killed himself, Berlin had fallen and Germany had surrendered. It took days to realize that it was truly all over, and Germany had not only been defeated, it was destroyed. In the years that followed, he overcame his indoctrination, emigrated to America and became a US citizen.
What, I wonder, would be sufficient to break the hold of the cult of death in the Ummah?
You’re right on w/ the Homicide adjective, Kris – another glaring misnomer is calling these miscreants “martyrs”. Martyrs, historically & etymologically, accept the consequences of, and suffer for a creed. It’s ridiculous to assign equivalence with “I’m takin as many with me as I can.” just as it was w/ the Kamikazi. But hey, change the language, change the culture.
Yeah, the misuse of “martyr” has ticked me off, too. A martyr is someone who is killed for his faith, not someone who kills for his faith.