Apparently our Marines were fired upon first before firing on the mosque in Fallujah. No shock there.
BAGHDAD (Reuters) – U.S. Marines on Wednesday defended their decision to attack a mosque compound in the Iraqi town of Falluja saying the fact insurgents were firing from inside meant it lost its status as a protected structure.
On top of that they used air power to knock down a surrounding wall instead of decimating the mosque. Sounds more like a miss to me.
“As a result, the mosque lost its protected status and therefore became a lawful military target. Nevertheless, the Marines only targeted the wall surrounding the compound in order to prevent damage to the mosque.”
Though my true feelings are that every mosque in Iraq should have exactly the same protection as every church, mosque, or synagogue in the US. Therefore we should treat any mosque that houses armedaccessorized terroristsworshippers exactly in the same manner as the Davidian complex in Waco Texas was treated. The problem of equal religious treatment has been solved.
In pretty sure law enforcement has no qualms storming a domestic church if they’re being fired upon from the church.
I agree. It is not about where the thugs are located. It is about taking the out of the picture so they can do no more harm. It is true for law enforcement locally and true for the Marines in Iraq. If you are shooting at me, I’ll shoot back…and I won’t rest until you’re captive or dead. The police would not say, “Well, they went into the church…looks like they got away.” Nor should our soldiers. The only way to ensure freedom and justice is to take out those who would undermine it, where ever they may be found.
There just seems to be an oversensitivity at this point to take a mosque by force (probably so as not to be seen as attacking Islam), but the Waco incident points out that we would do the same here in similar circumstances. I couldn’t think of an incident where a bunch of catholics, for instance, armed themselves and boarded themselves up in a church to use as an example.
The media doesn’t help either with their, ‘Oh look what we’re doing now’ type coverage.
note: we pretty much stormed, and burned to the ground the Davidian complex in Waco. Though it is debatable who started the fire. Most people would probably consider it more a cult than a church at this point as well.
This one’s simple and every military member knows it from our law of armed conflict briefings. Once a mosque, hospital, site of historical importance, etc. is used by combatants, legal or otherwise, to mount an attack, store weapons, or other military function, that building changes in status from “protected” to “big fat juicy target.”
I agree with you Timmer, that that is the way it should be, and I’m sure is within the military. Our Opponents of course would want to paint it differently.
What bothers me most is the medias willingness to portray our opponents views, and not support the military view.