Yes, the Russians were worse. The Taliban were worse. It will likely be worse when Coalition forces, including Canada, finally leave.
But ask the 7-year-old survivor of an American bomb strike in Afghanistan (not Iraq) what he thinks of the USA after his entire family was killed. Not by accident. They targeted his family home because intelligence said two bad guys were being sheltered there.
This makes me angry. What would I do when I grew up if I was this young boy?
The TV show 60 Minutes is one of the best of American media. I rarely see the show, but can subscribe to the podcast.
A recent episode blew me away. The President of Afghanistan, an ally, asked George Bush privately to reduce the number of air strikes on his country. When that had no effect, he went public on 60 Minutes.
Turns out the American military has a formula for how many civilian casualties are acceptable when trying to blow up one bad guy with a computer guided 2000lb bomb.
This is not new. My hero Gandhi spent many years weighing how many hundreds of thousands would die when the British left India.
Problem for the US military, however, is that they rarely blow up the bad guy. Air strikes are easy. They only cost money, not American soldier’s lives.
Needless to say, there were no bad guys in the 7-year-old’s house. American troops had searched it just the day before.
You should listen to to the audiocast of that show.
President Hamid Karzai tells Scott Pelley that too many civilians are being killed in U.S. bombing raids on Afghanistan.
You can see some of the (slow streaming) video here.
Rick McCharles 