{"id":30352,"date":"2012-06-11T09:24:36","date_gmt":"2012-06-11T13:24:36","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/valorguardians.com\/blog\/?p=30352"},"modified":"2012-06-11T09:24:36","modified_gmt":"2012-06-11T13:24:36","slug":"la-times-four-seconds-in-afghanistan-was-it-combat-or-a-crime","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/?p=30352","title":{"rendered":"LA Times; Four seconds in Afghanistan: Was it combat, or a crime?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Kim Murphy, in the Los Angeles Times<\/a> tells the story of SFC Walter Taylor who, in the middle of a firefight saw a black car pull up in the middle of the engagement, a figure dressed in black emerge from the car which appeared to have wires hanging from it. SFC Taylor thought the figure was about add a massive explosion to the confusion that comes with war and shot the figure, who turned out to be a doctor, Aqilah Hikmat, a mother of four who was coming to the fight to render aid.<\/p>\n

SFC Taylor is facing murder charges as a result;<\/p>\n

Army prosecutors say Hikmat’s killing in July 2011 was not just a casualty of combat, but a crime. Charged with negligent homicide and dereliction of duty, Taylor will face a hearing June 19 before a U.S. military judge in Germany to determine whether the case goes to a full court-martial, with the possibility of three years in prison.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

You can be reasonably sure that the Afghan government is behind this prosecution – the same government that is releasing dangerous prisoners<\/a> back out into the wild to continue their murderous rampage against Afghan civilians who are doing nothing more than going to school or market. And, oh, by the way, the US government is doing the same thing<\/a>, albeit more secretly than the Afghan government.<\/p>\n

SFC Taylor thought he was saving the lives of his men who were engaged with an enemy, and although the death of Aqilah Hikmat is indeed a tragedy, if she had been displaying a red cross, red crescent or even a white flag, I’m sure SFC Taylor would have given the scene another moment’s thought before he squeezed the trigger of his M4 and ended her life. <\/p>\n

SFC Taylor is facing charges for the accidental killing, and the Army needs to decide in the favor of the sergeant, but that won’t happen without a jury of his true peers – not a bunch of sergeant majors who never saw combat. Given the conditions as reported in the Times, I would drop charges against him immediately. Oh, by the way, SFC Taylor has since had his face ripped off by an IED while on patrol a few days after this incident. The last thing him and his family needs is to face these specious charges in a court martial show trial to mollify the Afghan government and bolster Karzai’s government in the eyes of his illiterate constituents.<\/p>\n

And, oh, yeah, good on the Times and Ms. Murphy for bringing this story to light. And thanks to the large number of y’all who sent me this link.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Kim Murphy, in the Los Angeles Times tells the story of SFC Walter Taylor who, in … LA Times; Four seconds in Afghanistan: Was it combat, or a crime?<\/span>Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-30352","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-terror-war"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30352","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=30352"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30352\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=30352"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=30352"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=30352"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}