Every member of my unit abused Iraqis -Donald Payne, 1st member of the British Armed Forces to be convicted of war crimes
Bring the troops home now. There are war criminals fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan this very moment, and they're fighting in our name.
It's not just a few bad apples.
Even the very bullets, bombs, and defensive smoke we're using to supposedly protect the citizens of Iraq and Afghanistan are poisoning their land and leading to birth defects.
These too are war crimes, and they continue.
A former soldier convicted in connection with the death of an Iraqi hotel worker has accused an officer of pretending to set a young detainee on fire and claimed that every member of his unit committed abuses against civilians during the war.
Donald Payne, a former corporal and the first member of the Armed Forces to be convicted of a war crime, told a public inquiry into the death of Baha Mousa, a hotel receptionist, that he covered-up prisoner abuses when interviewed in 2003-2004 because of “misguided loyalty”.
The abuses by our coalition of the willing are deeper and more institutionalized than we admit, even now.
There are still war criminals fighting and killing in Iraq and Afghanistan. These people cannot and will not win hearts and minds. They will only make things worse.
We are all guilty of war crimes as long as we continue to blindly support them out of "misguided loyalty" or patriotism.
Payne also accused Lieutenant-Colonel Jorge Mendonca, the commanding officer of 1st Battalion Queen’s Lancashire Regiment, of being "gung-ho" and "somewhat trigger-happy" during his spell in Iraq in 2003. He told the inquiry of one occasion where Lieutenant-Colonel Mendonca held a gun to a prisoner’s face and threatened to "blow his face off".
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At the time his lawyer described him as a “sacrificial lamb” and alleged that other troops were also responsible for the abuse. Six other soldiers who faced the court martial were cleared on all counts in March 2007.
The inquiry continues.
Bring the troops home.
We can't trust their commanders with this mission. We can't trust their commanding officers to keep them in line.
We can't trust our weapons, they're poisoning Iraq and Afghanistan for decades if not centuries to come.
We are not responsible enough to be at war. Our toys are too dangerous, our soldiers' stress is too great, and our commanders are too corrupt.
Bring the troops home.
The coalition of the willing has proven time and again that they aren't able to fight this war in a way that abides by international law.
President Obama must take away their mission. It's been nine years. We have failed to fight and win this war in a way that abides by international law. It's over. We no longer have the right to decide to stay. Our very tools for fighting this war are poison to the people we claim to protect.
And Pretending it didn't happen is no longer an acceptable strategy.