June 01, 2006
History Lessons Not Learned : From Korea to Iraq
Hapa9 sent me a recent Washington Post article on the discovery of a U.S. memo, dating back to the Korean War, that ordered the shooting of Korean refugees fleeing from North Korea.
The letter -- dated the day of the Army's mass killing of South Korean refugees at No Gun Ri in 1950 -- is the strongest indication yet that such a policy existed for all U.S. forces in Korea, and the first evidence that that policy was known to upper ranks of the U.S. government.
This news comes on the heels of the latest inquiry into the killing of innocent Iraqi by U.S. Marines last November. From the NYTimes article,
A military investigator uncovered evidence in February and March that contradicted repeated claims by marines that Iraqi civilians killed in Haditha last November were victims of a roadside bomb...
The three-week inquiry was the first official investigation into an episode that was first uncovered by Time magazine in January and that American military officials now say appears to have been an unprovoked attack by the marines that killed 24 Iraqi civilians.
Sometimes, we just don't learn or won't learn.
Posted by richlee at June 1, 2006 07:19 AM