[IslamCity] What about moral training for thug armies of Egypt, Pakistan, Morrocco, etc.?

Tue, 06 Jun 2006 17:12:19 -0700

Moral training for US troops in Iraq

David Fickling and agencies
Thursday June 1, 2006

US soldiers in Iraq have been ordered to take extra training in moral and ethical standards, it emerged today.
The move comes amid growing concern over the fallout from the alleged massacre of 24 civilians in the town of Haditha last November.
General George Casey - the highest-ranking US general in Iraq - ordered the training two days after US troops shot dead a pregnant mother and her cousin as they travelled to a maternity hospital.
Nabiha Nisaif Jassim, who was 35, was killed along with her 57-year-old cousin, Saliha Mohammed Hassan, when they failed to stop at a checkpoint in Samarra, north of Baghdad.
A military spokesman said troops had fired at the car, which was being driven by the pregnant woman's brother, in an attempt to "disable" it.
Lieutenant general Peter Chiarelli, the commander of Multinational Corps Iraq, said the ethics training, to take place over the next 30 days, would reinforce the education that troops receive before being sent into battle.
It would emphasise "professional military values and the importance of disciplined, professional conduct in combat", he said.
"As military professionals, it is important that we take time to reflect on the values that separate us from our enemies," he said. "The challenge for us is to make sure the actions of a few do not tarnish the good work of the many."
In the past week, the US military has been rocked by a series of leaks indicating that US marines carried out a massacre of 24 civilians in insurgent-controlled Haditha last November.
Reports of the alleged massacre first surfaced in Time magazine in March, but credibility was still given to the marines' story of how 15 of the dead had been killed by a roadside bomb until the current spate of leaks.
The New York Times yesterday reported that death certificates confirmed the contention of Iraqi human rights activists that the majority of the dead had been killed by execution-style point-blank gunshots to the head and chest.
The alleged massacre is already being compared to the 1968 My Lai massacre and the Abu Ghraib scandal, and the US president, George Bush, yesterday said any troops found responsible for it would be punished.
Around a dozen marines are thought to be under scrutiny by Pentagon investigators, who are conducting separate reports into the incident itself and the question of whether there had been a cover-up.
A comrade of the accused marines yesterday told a Seattle television he believed they "were just blinded by hate ... and they just lost control".
Safa Younis, a relative of people killed in the attack, survived by hiding in a bedroom next to the bodies of her mother and siblings and pretending to be dead.
A video released yesterday showed her saying: "The Americans knocked at the door. My father went to open it. They shot him dead from behind the door, and then they shot him again after they opened the door."
Last week US, marine commandant General Michael Hagee warned that troops in Iraq were in danger of becoming "indifferent to the loss of a human life".
Paul Robinson, a former army intelligence officer and an expert on military ethics at the University of Hull, warned that the effects of formal training would be blunted by peer pressure, military loyalty, and public desire in the US for revenge and forceful action.
"Teaching the individual soldiers is not enough," he said. "Moral leadership needs to be exerted from on high, all the way down the chain of command.
"You will look at the example of your leaders. If your leaders give the impression that they think Iraqi lives are not worth the same as American of British lives, and if they order the deployment of large amounts of force, you'll get the impression that that's how you're meant to behave."





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{Invite (mankind, O Muhammad ) to the Way of your Lord (i.e. Islam) with wisdom (i.e. with the Divine Inspiration and the Qur'an) and fair preaching, and argue with them in a way that is better. Truly, your Lord knows best who has gone astray from His Path, and He is the Best Aware of those who are guided.} (Holy Quran-16:125)

{And who is better in speech than he who [says: "My Lord is Allah (believes in His Oneness)," and then stands straight (acts upon His Order), and] invites (men) to Allah's (Islamic Monotheism), and does righteous deeds, and says: "I am one of the Muslims."} (Holy Quran-41:33)

The prophet (peace and blessings of Allah be upon him) said: "By Allah, if Allah guides one person by you, it is better for you than the best types of camels." [al-Bukhaaree, Muslim]

The prophet (peace and blessings of Allah be upon him)  also said, "Whoever calls to guidance will have a reward similar to the reward of the one who follows him, without the reward of either of them being lessened at all." [Muslim, Ahmad, Aboo Daawood, an-Nasaa'ee, at-Tirmidhee, Ibn Maajah]
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