Another Bombed Hospital, Another day in the Empire.

By Joe Clifford

October 07, 2015 "Information Clearing House" - Imagine the horror, tears, lament, and rage, if a hospital was bombed by terrorists in an American city killing doctors, children, and patients, some who were burned to death in their beds because they were unable to move?  Many innocent people living in foreign nations would die when we took revenge for that act of terrorism. We would not care who, but some nation, or nations, would be accused of the bombing, with or without proof, and retribution probably would be in the millions of deaths.  Look what we did after 9/11.  No one to this day knows who did it, but we know who financed it by deciphering the 28 pages of the 9/11 report you were not allowed to read.  Former Senator Bob Graham, who was a part of that investigation, strongly suggested it was our very good friend, Saudi Arabia. In any case, 14 years after 9/11 we are bombing hospitals in Afghanistan and millions have died in bombings and invasions by the US since 9/11, and we still do not know what country if any, was responsible for the bombing.   The terrorists who destroyed the WTC might argue that the many deaths were “collateral damage”, as the intended target was the CIA office in the WTC. Why wouldn’t that defense work? It just worked for the US, who bombed a hospital staffed by Doctors Without Borders in Kunduz Afghanistan, a city of 3000,000.  Yup, we did that, bombed a hospital.  Then claimed we didn’t, then claimed there were Taliban fighters in the hospital, then claimed it was “collateral damage”, then claimed it was “a mistake”, but, not to worry, the US military will investigate the incident. Allowing the US military to “investigate” the hospital bombing by the US military, is as stupid as allowing the police to investigate a deadly shooting by one of their own.

Was this an accident?  Hardly; the hospital had given their exact GPS co-ordinates to all the warring factions on numerous occasions, so the US knew full well they were bombing a hospital. Not only did we bomb it, but continued to do so for one half hour after we knew it was a hospital. So why was this done? Because that is what we do; we bomb hospitals!  Is this the first?  Hardly!  We have bombed many hospitals in many different countries.  This is not the first hospital to be bombed in Afghanistan, and we have repeatedly bombed hospitals in Iraq including a children’s hospital in western Iraq, and a maternity hospital. Is it legal to bomb a hospital?  Of course not; Article 18 of the Geneva Convention protects hospitals, but the rules of war are not for us, they are for countries like Russia or China or any other country we don’t like.  We are the best in the world, we are the Empire, we are above all law; we are the law!

In addition, we just love to bomb wedding parties.  It is hard to keep track, but at last count we have bombed 8 wedding parties in Afghanistan, and now this past week we must be held responsible for the bombing of yet another wedding party in Yemen, because we supply all the targeting information to our friends the Saudis.  The Yemeni wedding killed about 131 innocents, but who cares; they are not like us; they are only Yemenis, so bombs away.  Imagine the horror if a “terrorist” detonated a bomb in an American wedding, killing all the participants?  Remember the Boston Marathon bombing? Are the 3 lives, lost in the Boston Marathon bombing, any more or less valuable than the 131 in Yemen? Laws that provide protection for innocents do not apply to the Empire; they are just for the countries we don’ t like.

Torture is another great example. We water bordered and no one was held accountable or imprisoned, but when Japanese water boarded US prisoners in WWII, they were found guilty of torture and sentenced to 25 years, but then again those laws are not for us, just nations we don’t like.  The Empire is above the law; the Empire is the law!

Corporate media failed to point out that Obama lectured Russia against killing innocents in Syria, and days later bombed a hospital, but not a whisper of the deadly irony by corporate media. To add insult to injury and death, Obama would not apologize to the families of those injured, killed, or mangled, in the hospital bombing.

We have no moral compass, we justify everything, and anything, no matter how horrific, is shrugged off as though the only lives that count are American lives. We torture, we illegally attack nations for no reason, we bomb hospitals, we destroy nations, we bomb wedding parties, we have secret assassination programs, we have killed thousands by our illegal bombings, yet anything done to us requires the sacrifice of millions, regardless of who did what to us. The Empire can do no wrong for it is above the law; the Empire is the law! Might makes right!

Joe Clifford lives in Rhode Island

See also

Doctors Without Borders airstrike: US alters story for fourth time in four days: Commander of war in Afghanistan tells Senate panel that US forces had called in airstrike at Afghan request – ‘an admission of a war crime’ says MSF chief