War Is Murder

There was an article on the BBC News website conserning the death of a soldier in Afghanistan. A coroner in the UK had just found that his death was due to unlawful cause, in other words murder. That finding is nothing short of ludicrous. You invade a foreign country with your army and they fight back and you call any deaths that result on your side murder? No, it is war. Just possibly it is unlawful because you should not have invaded in the first place, in which case the culpable parties are the politicians who sent the troops there.

I sympathise with the troops sent to do this job and the families of the soldiers who have been killed as I would in any circumstances where troops have died doing their duty.

In this instance however, as with deaths of troops in Iraq you have to look at the politicians who have sent our troops off on these missions. If the deaths are indeed unlawful then the politcians (our politicians) are the ones who should be standing in the dock. Their failures are many, including the lack of proper materials provided to the troops and including the responsibilities for their deaths and injuries.

It is time we had an enquiry into our interventions in Afghanistan and Iraq. And not a whitewashing one like the previous ones set up by Phony Blair (or as I understand we should be addressing him, Miranda, or indeed Emily).