TV Holds Off on Airing Captured Soldiers

NEW YORK (AP) -"U.S. television networks were weighing Sunday whether to air video footage, shown elsewhere in the world, of what appeared to be American prisoners of war in Iraq.

The images were picked up from Iraqi television by the Arab satellite station Al-Jazeera.

Secretary of Defense Donald H. Rumsfeld said the Geneva Conventions make it illegal for prisoners to be pictured."

USA TV Networks were warned by Donny Bumstead that they would be breaking the Geneva Convention (apparently one of the very few International protocols that the US has deigned to sign up to) by showing the pictures ... lo and behold, they aren't showing what we in Oz can see. It would be cynical of me to suggest that Donny doesn't want the images broadcast because it shows his armed forces aren't invincible and everything isn't going as swimmingly as he wants the American nation to believe ... so I will.

Damned Iraqis, they just don't know about the niceties of war ... "the proper rules of combat". We don't mind you carving up one of our chaps into a zillion pieces with a well mannered bazooka. That's within "the proper rules of combat" and will be of great comfort to grieving relatives and friends. Just don't show pictures of prisoners. That is truly despicable! Bet those damn heathens have never played cricket. I rest my case.

Remember the Alamo. Remember Vietnam.

Remember the infinite capacity
of American Presidents to fuck up.

And now a few allegedly Geneva Convention ground breaking pictures of captured/surrendered Iraqi soldiers. (Call me conspiratorial if you must, but there were a lot more 'up close and personal' photos of Iraqi prisoners on News sites a few days ago that now seem to have fallen off the edge of Washington directives the World.)



and from Iraq Part 1 ..."Desert Storm".


I dont want to tell Major-General Grandmothers how to suck eggs ... BUT ... the sooner they drag Tom Hanks and Mel Gibson away from the Oscars and get them on the ground in Iraqistan, the sooner this will be all over.

Winners, keep your acceptance speeches short! American World domination The peace of the World depends on it.

P.S. Saw on the Teev a bit about 'USAID' and the "rebuilding" of a democratic Iraq. Apart from it seeming to be mooted as a unilateral American project (with contracts no doubt being awarded to the usual coterie of suspects) there were neat little clauses and addenda referring to "banning of abortion" and a "buy American" requirement. Buggered if I can track it online. Maybe I'll just make something up. It couldn't be as bad or as bizarre as the real thing.

P.P.S. Amidst all this kerfuffle in Iraq what does one make of the apparent invisibility of Colon Powell? And people are speculating about Saddam's whereabouts!