This Can't Be Good

Here are my 2 cents on today's "attack" on an Iraqi wedding by a U.S. gunship. In Iraq (and other Arab places), it is sometimes customary to fire guns into the air in celebration, even at weddings. Apparently, U.S. troops thought some of this celebratory fire was anti-coalition (read: anti-U.S.) forces firing on the troops... so they called in air support which quickly dispatched the forces. Unfortunately, either those anti-coalition forces were actually a wedding party, or a wedding party was near the anti-coalition forces (the news is unclear as to which), and at least 20 people in the wedding party were killed. Super. Just what we need to convince Iraqi citizens that we really mean them no harm... shooting up their wedding ceremonies.

Of course, the Pentagon denies it was even shooting at the wedding party, and insists it was only shooting at insurgents. That's worked well in the past for us... deny our mistake and then blame other Iraqis.

I wonder how Rummy or Bush would react if a wedding party in his family was shot up by even just one Arab terrorist. If history is any indication, they would attack an unrelated middle eastern country and become mired in a year-long battle with its citizens. Hmmmm.