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GOP Rep. Duncan Hunter: Killing innocent civilians during wartime is not a big deal.
https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2019/6/2/1862135/-Defending-war-crimes-Rep-Duncan-Hunter-says-his-unit-killed-probably-hundreds-of-civiliansRepublican Rep. Duncan Hunter, currently under indictment over his misappropriation of roughly a quarter million dollars in campaign funds, continues to go out on a limb in his party's new defense of American war criminals. First Hunter argued for a pardon of former Navy SEAL team leader Edward Gallagher, accused by his fellow soldiers of repeatedly targeting innocent civilians in Iraq, by dismissively telling a town hall that that he, too, was guilty of "taking a picture of [a] body and saying something stupid."
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more damning accusations against Gallagher, that he so consistently targeted innocent civilians with his sniper rifle that his fellow SEALs tampered with his weapon in order to throw off his aim.
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"I was an artillery officer, and we fired hundreds of rounds into Fallujah, killed probably hundreds of civilians, if not scores, if not hundreds of civilians," Hunter said. "Probably killed women and children, if there were any left in the city when we invaded. So do I get judged, too?"
Though the US-led coalition's assault on rebel-held Fallujah was indeed noted for what some considered indifference to the city's remaining civilians, accidentally killing hidden civilians in an artillery fight against heavily armed opponents is, to most minds, substantively different from targeting individual children walking on riverbanks during non-combat periods and gunning them down in front of their friends or arbitrarily killing a wounded teen prisoner with a homemade knife.
...
more damning accusations against Gallagher, that he so consistently targeted innocent civilians with his sniper rifle that his fellow SEALs tampered with his weapon in order to throw off his aim.
...
"I was an artillery officer, and we fired hundreds of rounds into Fallujah, killed probably hundreds of civilians, if not scores, if not hundreds of civilians," Hunter said. "Probably killed women and children, if there were any left in the city when we invaded. So do I get judged, too?"
Though the US-led coalition's assault on rebel-held Fallujah was indeed noted for what some considered indifference to the city's remaining civilians, accidentally killing hidden civilians in an artillery fight against heavily armed opponents is, to most minds, substantively different from targeting individual children walking on riverbanks during non-combat periods and gunning them down in front of their friends or arbitrarily killing a wounded teen prisoner with a homemade knife.
"What's the fuzz all about? He sniped little girls and stabbed a teenager, I fired artillery into an enemy-held city. Same difference."
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