Rules of Engagement? (ePub)

Blackwater, Abu Ghraib and other scandals in Iraq were presaged by the murderous Operation Iron Triangle in May 2006 when US soldiers were ordered to kill all Iraqis of military age.The soldiers were imprisoned; the officer was merely reprimanded. Mestrovic details the American leadershipA's fake commitment to the Geneva Conventions and the rule of law, fake due process for defendants, fake goals of promoting democracy, and compulsion to repeat our errors in Vietnam.Prof. Mestrovic served as an expert witness in the trial of the three soldiers in this case and in five other war crimes trials. His experience gives him a penetrating insight in analyzing a war crime that involved the murder of noncombatants, questionable rules of engagement, and the doctrine of command responsibility.Published in 2008, his book was the first to break the story of how US soldiers involved in war crimes are treated, and what makes them do it, etc. In preparing his July 6, 2009 article in The New Yorker, Raffi Khatchadourian had extensive correspondence with and received many leads from Prof. Mestrovic, although Khatchadourian fails to mention that. Furthermore, contrary to Prof. MestrovicA's professional opinion that the commissioned officers and the Bush administration were responsible for the soldersA' actions, the article appears to adhere to the official interpretation of events, protecting the chain of command by scapegoating those at the bottom. Listen to the Author on the Rick Amato Radio Show