American Soldier(s) Massacre 16 Afghan Civilians

[The Consul]

From IBN

US soldiers kill 16 civilians in Afghanistan: Kabul government Reuters


Kandhar: Western forces shot dead 16 civilians including nine children in southern Kandahar province on Sunday, Afghan officials said, in a rampage that witnesses said was carried out by American soldiers who were laughing and appeared drunk.

One Afghan father who said his children were killed in the shooting spree accused soldiers of later burning the bodies.

Witnesses told Reuters they saw a group of US soldiers arrive at their village in Kandahar's Panjwayi district at around 2 am, enter homes and open fire.

One Afghan father who said his children were killed in the shooting spree accused soldiers of later burning the bodies.
The incident, one of the worst of its kind since the US-led invasion of Afghanistan in 2001, is likely to deepen the divide between Washington and Kabul.

The US embassy in Kabul said an American soldier had been detained over the shooting. It added that anti-US reprisals were possible following the killings, which come just weeks after US soldiers burned copies of the Koran at a NATO base, triggering widespread anti-Western protests.

Afghan President Hamid Karzai condemned the rampage as "intentional murders" and demanded an explanation from the United States. His office said the dead included nine children and three women.

An Afghan minister earlier told Reuters that a lone US soldier had killed up to 16 people when he burst into homes in villages near his base in the middle of the night.

Panjwayi district is about 35 km (22 miles) west of the provincial capital Kandahar city. The district is considered the spiritual home of the Taliban and is believed to be a hive of insurgent activity.

Haji Samad said 11 of his relatives were killed in one house, including his children. Pictures showed blood-splattered walls where the children were killed.

"They (Americans) poured chemicals over their dead bodies and burned them," a weeping Samad told Reuters at the scene.

"I saw that all 11 of my relatives were killed, including my children and grandchildren," said Samad, who had left the home a day earlier.

Neighbors said they awoke to crackling gunfire from American soldiers, whom they described as laughing and drunk.

"They were all drunk and shooting all over the place," said neighbor Agha Lala, who visited one of the homes where the incident took place. "Their bodies were riddled with bullets."

A senior US defense official said Defense Secretary Leon Panetta "was deeply saddened to hear last night of this incident and is closely monitoring reports out of Afghanistan." The White House also expressed concern.

The Afghan Taliban would take revenge for the deaths, the group said in an e-mailed statement to media.

The US embassy in Kabul said an investigation was under way into Sunday's shooting and that "the individual or individuals responsible for this act will be identified and brought to justice".

The commander of NATO's International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) General John Allen said he was "shocked and saddened" by the shooting, and promised a rapid investigation.

The Minister of Border and Tribal Affairs Asadullah Khalid, who is investigating the incident, said the soldier entered three homes, killing 11 people in the first one.

"The defense minister ... is deeply shocked and saddened by the killings of 15 innocent civilians and the wounding of nine more at the hands of the coalition forces," the Defense Ministry in Kabul said in a statement.

Civilian casualties have been a major source of friction between Karzai's Western-backed government and US-led NATO forces in Afghanistan.

The shootings could intensify friction between Washington and Kabul as NATO prepares to hand over all security responsibilities to Afghans by the end of 2014, a process which has already started.

The Koran burning and the violence that followed, including a spate of deadly attacks against US soldiers, tested brittle ties between the governments of Karzai and President Barack Obama and underscored the challenges that the West faces even as it moves to withdraw.

All foreign combat troops will withdraw by end-2014 from a costly war that has become increasingly unpopular.

More than one report has mentioned the burning of victim's bodies. Children, shot then burned. Imagine somewhere in your country foreign soldier(s) break into two homes, murder everyone then light them on fire and/or pour acid on them. Imagine you are christian and this happened right after they burned a pile of bibles. Imagine you knew one of those kids. Your cousin Josiah comes over and asks you for your rifle. You give him yours and take your uncle's and leave with him as your father holds back your screaming mother. You get in the truck and scream away with Josiah in a cloud of dust, not knowing what will happen next, not being able to even think about it, for it is no longer blood flowing through your veins but hatred.

Imagine thousands of miles away, someone gets done cliping their nails and says into his ear mic: "Affirmative, light them up."

The man whipes his finger nail pairings into the trash, pushes a button on a box on his desk.

"Rupert, where's my fucking lunch!"

A storm rises up and passes over the burned, torn apart truck on the side of the road. Half of a twisted, charred body reaches out, as if trying to grab hold of the rising darkness of the storm that is heading toward the mountains.

And eight year old boy approaches the wreakage and death. He cannot spot anything living. As he walks away, the wind blows so hard he has to lean into it. He takes his sister by the hand and walks through a hole in a bullet riddled wall. He cannot tell his grandfather who they were and that he was too afraid to grab their weapons.

The girl falls asleep with her head on her brother's chest. The boy falls asleep with his head on his grandfathers chest. The grandfather wakes himself up snoring. He was dreaming of a long time ago in his father's house when his father told him about an enchanted carpet that was so beautiful it could not be bought, it could not be sold, it could only be lost to envy and deceit. He falls asleep reminding himself to pass on what he could, to find some means of giving them hope. It will not be safe to return to the village. The soldiers will come and the fighters will come and they will make their promises and their threats. In the morning, he whispers to himself, we will find a way.

[Joe Hillshoist]

More than one report has mentioned the burning of victim's bodies. Children, shot then burned. Imagine somewhere in your country foreign soldier(s) break into two homes, murder everyone then light them on fire and/or pour acid on them. Imagine you are christian and this happened right after they burned a pile of bibles. Imagine you knew one of those kids. Your cousin Josiah comes over and asks you for your rifle. You give him yours and take your uncle's and leave with him as your father holds back your screaming mother. You get in the truck and scream away with Josiah in a cloud of dust, not knowing what will happen next, not being able to even think about it, for it is no longer blood flowing through your veins but hatred.

Imagine thousands of miles away, someone gets done cliping their nails and says into his ear mic: "Affirmative, light them up."

The man whipes his finger nail pairings into the trash, pushes a button on a box on his desk.

"Rupert, where's my fucking lunch!"

A storm rises up and passes over the burned, torn apart truck on the side of the road. Half of a twisted, charred body reaches out, as if trying to grab hold of the rising darkness of the storm that is heading toward the mountains.

And eight year old boy approaches the wreakage and death. He cannot spot anything living. As he walks away, the wind blows so hard he has to lean into it. He takes his sister by the hand and walks through a hole in a bullet riddled wall. He cannot tell his grandfather who they were and that he was too afraid to grab their weapons.

The girl falls asleep with her head on her brother's chest. The boy falls asleep with his head on his grandfathers chest. The grandfather wakes himself up snoring. He was dreaming of a long time ago in his father's house when his father told him about an enchanted carpet that was so beautiful it could not be bought, it could not be sold, it could only be lost to envy and deceit. He falls asleep reminding himself to pass on what he could, to find some means of giving them hope. It will not be safe to return to the village. The soldiers will come and the fighters will come and they will make their promises and their threats. In the morning, he whispers to himself, we will find a way.

Wow, thats moving. Thanks.

[Saurian Tail]

Check this out ...

U.S. soldier in Afghan massacre had brain injury: official

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. Army staff sergeant accused of the massacre of 16 villagers in Afghanistan on Sunday was treated for traumatic brain injury after being in a vehicle that rolled over in Iraq in 2010, a U.S. official said on Monday.

The official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said it was premature to state whether there was any link between the 2010 injury and the Afghanistan incident.

(Reporting by Missy Ryan; Editing by Will Dunham)

http://ca.news.yahoo.com/u-withholds-so ... 25297.html

[compared2what?]

But wait.

It might be misleading, or even wrong. But this sounds a lot more like a drug-hit than it does like a lone-nut shooting spree to me:

Afghan villagers recount weekend shooting rampage

BALANDI, Afghanistan (AP) — As bullets flew, the Afghan woman scooped up her 3-year-old niece and ran for their lives. Moments later, the woman was dead and the girl lay bleeding from a gunshot wound.

It was the closing scene of a massacre that left 16 civilians, including nine children, dead in two villages in southern Kandahar province.

The U.S. is holding an Army staff sergeant that military officials say slipped off a U.S. base before dawn Sunday, walked to the villages, barged into their homes and opened fire. Some of the corpses were burned. Eleven were from one family. Five other people were wounded.

The military said Tuesday there was probable cause to continue holding the soldier, who has not been named, in custody. U.S. Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta has said he could face capital punishment.

Villagers — angry at foreign troops, frustrated with their government and tired of war — recounted the tragedy to a delegation sent to the scene by President Hamid Karzai. Two who lost relatives insisted that not one — but at least two — soldiers took part in the shootings.

President Barack Obama pledged a thorough investigation, saying the U.S. was taking the case "as seriously as if it was our own citizens, and our children, who were murdered."

In Afghanistan's first significant demonstration since the killings, protesters in the east burned an effigy of Obama as well as a cross, which they used as a symbol of people — like many Americans — who are Christians. The also called for the death of the soldier who has been accused.

On Tuesday, there was even more gunfire in Balandi, the village where 12 civilians were killed.

Taliban insurgents opened fire from behind some trees at members of the delegation, including two of Karzai's brothers. One Afghan soldier died of a gunshot wound to the head, while Afghan security forces returning fire killed three militants. Delegation members escaped unharmed.

Sunday's shooting rampage began in Balandi, a village about 1.5 kilometers (nearly a mile) south of the base.

Mohammad Wazir told the delegation that he was out of town when 11 of his relatives were slain at his house about 2:30 a.m. Someone called him in Spin Boldak where he works as a farmer and he hurried home to Panjwai district.

He said his sister told him that she heard gunfire and saw at least two soldiers firing inside their walled compound before she ran to hide in the kitchen of her uncle's home nearby.

"Everybody was shouting," Wazir said his sister told him. "My mother was in the yard closest to the Americans. They shot and killed her."

"My brother was shouting 'Why are you shooting?' and they killed him," Wazir said. "Everybody was running in different directions. The children were running in one direction. The women were running in another direction, but they kept shooting."

When his sister emerged from her kitchen hideout, 11 members of Wazir's family were dead: his wife, mother, two sons and three daughters, his brother and sister-in-law, a nephew and a niece. Pieces of burned blankets were found near the bodies.

"My sister said that not only had they killed my family members, but they burned their bodies," Wazir said.

Members of the delegation said another man was killed inside his home in the village. They did not provide details of his death.

Before the killings in Balandi, south of the base, four other people were gunned down in the village of Alkozai, about 1 kilometer (less than a mile) north of the base.

Sayed Jan said he was in the nearby city of Kandahar where he does construction work when the shooting occurred shortly before 3 a.m. at his house in Alkozai. He told the delegation that his cousins next door saw two men enter the house and gun down four people. The cousins ran to safety.

"First they killed my sister-in-law, then a brother," Jan told the delegation of Afghan security officials and lawmakers. "Then they killed another brother and then another sister-in-law."

Jan's 3-year-old daughter, who was in the arms of one of his sisters-in-law, survived. Jan, a widower, hasn't been able to see his daughter, who was taken to an international military coalition hospital at Kandahar Air Field, 65 kilometers (40 miles) northeast of the villages.

"They were running away and she was shot and injured," Jan said.

Marine Gen. John Allen, the top commander of U.S. and NATO troops in Afghanistan, said Monday in Washington that an Afghan soldier on guard duty reported seeing a U.S. soldier walk off the base. That report prompted a head count, which revealed that the staff sergeant was missing. A search party was organized, but others on the base could not find the missing soldier before the attacks occurred, Allen said.

Panetta said the soldier returned to the base on his own, told others what he had done and turned himself in.

Members of the Afghan delegation investigating the killings said one Afghan guard working from midnight to 2 a.m. saw a U.S. soldier return to the base around 1:30 a.m. Another Afghan soldier who replaced the first and worked until 4 a.m. said he saw a U.S. soldier leaving the base at 2:30 a.m. It's unknown whether the Afghan guards saw the same U.S. soldier.

If the gunman acted alone, information from the Afghan guards would suggest that he returned to base in between the shooting sprees.

"We're still investigating and looking at evidence, but right now everything points to one shooter," said Lt. Col. Jimmie Cummings, a spokesman for the U.S.-led coalition in Kabul.

Villagers also reported seeing helicopters circling Balandi the night of the shooting. They gave members of the delegation empty canisters that the choppers had dropped to illuminate the area. Helicopters ferried the injured to Kandahar Air Field.

Cummings said there were no combat or close air support operations in the two villages at the time of the shootings.

Col. Gary Kolb, a spokesman for the U.S.-led military coalition in Kabul, said a 48-hour probable cause assessment was completed and that the service member continues to be confined.

U.S. officials have identified him as a married, 38-year-old father of two who was trained as a sniper and recently suffered a head injury in Iraq.

At the White House, a stern Obama said "we will make sure that anybody who is involved is held fully accountable with the full force of the law."

The anger among Balandi residents was on display Tuesday.

"Today, the Kandahar governor was trying to explain to the villagers that he was only one soldier, that he was not a sane person and that he was sick," said Abdul Rahim Ayubi, a Kandahar lawmaker who was in Balandi with the delegation.

"But the people were just shouting and they were very angry. They didn't listen to the governor. They accused him of defending the Americans instead of defending the Kandahari people," Ayubi said.

The Taliban attack came as members of the government delegation left a village mosque where a memorial service was being held for the victims.

Shots were fired just as Qayum and Shah Wali Karzai, two of the president's brothers, and other top Afghan officials were leaving the mosque. They were unharmed, but one Afghan soldier died of a gunshot wound to the head. Afghan security forces killed three insurgents.

Before they left, the delegation members started to pay out compensation to relatives of victims — $2,000 for each death and $1,000 for each person wounded.

The gunbattle came as images of the aftermath of the killings spread across the country, and the public reaction — which at first seemed surprisingly muted — began to build. Photographs of dead toddlers wrapped in bloody blankets in Panjwai started to make the rounds in Afghanistan on Monday. The images were broadcast on Afghan TV stations, and people posted them on social network sites and blogs.

Students in Jalalabad protested the killings, raising concerns about a repeat of the wave of violent demonstrations that rocked the nation after last month's burning of Qurans by troops at a U.S. base. Students shouted "Death to America!" and, "Death to the soldier who killed our civilians!"

"The reason we are protesting is because of the killing of innocent children and other civilians by this tyrant U.S. soldier," said Sardar Wali, a university student. "We want the United Nations and the Afghan government to publicly try this guy."

___________________

LINK

A little elaboration forthcoming in a moment.

[compared2what?]

Most of the bolded parts are intended to draw attention to:

* the locations;
* the apparently selective, premeditated targeting of two family households in discrete places at some distance from one another;
* the apparently methodical execution of the mission (if it was one);
* the apparently base-sanctioned comings-and-goings of the killer(s);
* the perp's assassin-compatible training as a sniper (who was, I've read elsewhere, on special-forces assignment);
* the initially "muted" local response to the killings, which is really a very, very anomalous reaction to a village massacre by occupation forces, if you think about it for a moment; and
* the apparently routine and casual pay-off to the bereaved by the Afgani government, which was not responsible for the shootings.

Because all of those things are highly compatible with a drug-war hit hypothesis. That area's smack in the heart of the Golden Triangle wrt opium production, and those towns are either very near or directly on the trafficking routes into Pakistan. And the rest is self-explanatory.

The two remaining bolded details are maybe a little more equivocal, but fwiw, I highlighted them because:

* The apparent pater-familias of the most clearly targeted household is a farmer, and though there are probably other crops, too, that's an opium-farming district.
* The delegation included two Karzai brothers, about whom I know nothing, specifically. However, IIRC, that Karzai brother who got assassinated some little while ago was a drug-trade kingpin. And it's not unusual for such things to run in families. So it's suggestive.

______________________

It's just a thought.

[compared2what?]

PS --

And, yes. That would mean that the federal government of the United States is directly and actively involved in narco-trafficking.

They could always claim it was a rogue operation, of course. And maybe it (hypothetically) is. But still.

[seemslikeadream]

Up to 20 US troops behind Kandahar bloodbath - Afghan probe
Published: 16 March, 2012, 11:33
Edited: 16 March, 2012, 17:53

U.S. armoured vehicles are parked outside a US base in Panjwai district Kandahar province, March 11, 2012 (Reuters / Ahmad Nadeem)

TAGS: Conflict, Military, Afghanistan, USA
An Afghan parliamentary investigation team has implicated up to 20 US troops in the massacre of 16 civilians in Kandahar early on Sunday morning. It contradicts NATO's account that insists one rogue soldier was behind the slaughter.
The team of Afghan lawmakers has spent two days collating reports from witnesses, survivors and inhabitants of the villages where the tragedy took place.

“We are convinced that one soldier cannot kill so many people in two villages within one hour at the same time, and the 16 civilians, most of them children and women, have been killed by the two groups,” investigator Hamizai Lali told Afghan News.
Lali also said their investigations led them to believe 15 to 20 US soldiers had been involved in the killings. He appealed to the international community to ensure that the responsible parties were brought to justice, stressing the Afghan parliament would not rest until the killers were prosecuted.

"If the international community does not play its role in punishing the perpetrators, the Wolesi Jirga [parliament] would declare foreign troops as occupying forces,” he said.
The head of the Afghan parliamentary investigation, Sayed Ishaq Gillani, told the BBC that witnesses report seeing helicopters dropping chaff during the attack, a measure used to hide targets from ground attack.
Gillani added that locals suspect the massacre was revenge for attacks carried out last week on US forces that left several injured.
In response to the massacre Afghan PM Hamid Karzai called for US troops to quit Afghan villages and confine themselves to their military bases across the country. Furthermore, the Taliban announced that talks with US forces would be suspended.
Meanwhile the US military has detained one soldier in connection with the massacre and transferred him to Kuwait amid outcry for a public trial in Afghanistan. Currently, the soldier is being flown to Kansas base, AFP reported.

US authorities are currently conducting an investigation into the motives behind the attack, but maintain that the soldier’s trial must be dealt with by the US legal system.
It is believed that the soldier may have had alcohol problems and been suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder.

[seemslikeadream]

The Lariam Factor
Was Staff Sergeant Shooter On Dangerous Malaria Drug?
by MARTHA ROSENBERG
Few remember the grisly summer of 2002 when four Fort Bragg soldiers’ wives were murdered within six weeks of each other and the malaria drug, Lariam, widely prescribed to troops deploying to Afghanistan and Iraq, was suspected as a factor.

Few also probably remember the case of Andrew Pogany, a staff sergeant who volunteered to serve in Iraq in 2003, but was sent back to Fort Carson after experiencing PTSD-like panic symptoms and hallucinations related to violence in theater. He and his attorney were later able to prove his reaction was a probable effect of Lariam. Pogany went on to help other soldiers who have experienced extreme PTSD and/or drug responses.

Troops who have used Lariam blame the drug for nightmares, depression, paranoia, auditory hallucinations and other psychiatric symptoms including complete mental breakdowns, says the Associated Press. Family members have blamed for their loved ones’ suicides. The effects of Lariam can last for “weeks,
months, and even years,” after it’s stopped, warns the VA. The drug “should not be given to anyone with symptoms of a brain injury, depression or anxiety disorder,” reported Army Times, which describes “many troops who have deployed to Iraq or Afghanistan.”

Yet even though the Air Force bans pilots from using Lariam, and the Army is substituting a safer drug, the Navy and Marine Corps have actually increased prescriptions for Lariam the Associated Press reported last year. And, “numbers could be higher still because prescriptions filled overseas are frequently not counted.”

A seventeen-year marine veteran who had deployed twice to Iraq and once to Afghanistan developed extreme PTSD while serving in Afghanistan in 2009, possibly heightened by the Lariam he told his wife that he was being given. “He went from being loving on the phone, to saying he never wanted to see me and our daughter again,” she said in an interview. “He said not to even bother coming to the airport to meet him, because he would walk right past us.” When the couple did reunite, her husband was frail and thin, and “the whites of his eyes were brown,” says the wife. The formerly competent drill instructor became increasingly unpredictable, suicidal, and violent and was incarcerated in the brig at Camp Lejeune for assault in 2011.

In her nonfiction book, Murder in Baker Company, Cilla McCain also asks whether the use of Lariam might explain or partially explain the brutal actions of the soldiers accused in the death of Army Specialist Richard Davis.

Is it a stretch to ask whether the unnamed staff sergeant who allegedly crept into three houses and murdered men, women and children was under the influence of Lariam? A drug with a violent history of its own?

[seemslikeadream]

Afghan killing suspect Staff Sgt. Robert Bales is Lake Tapps resident
After five days cloaked in military secrecy, the soldier suspected in a massacre of 16 Afghan civilians has finally been identified, adding a critical detail to the still-sketchy portrait just beginning to emerge.

After five days cloaked in military secrecy, the soldier suspected in a massacre of 16 Afghan civilians has finally been identified, adding a critical detail to the still-sketchy portrait just beginning to emerge.

A senior U.S. official says the soldier accused in the killings is Army Staff Sgt. Robert Bales.

The official spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the investigation into an incident that has roiled relations with Afghanistan.

Bales, who is 38, is a husband and father of two young children and a veteran who was in the midst of his fourth tour in a war zone. But because of a tightly controlled flow of information, many of the details are incomplete and difficult to verify.

Records accessed by The News Tribune indicate that Robert N. Bales owns a home in Lake Tapps with his wife.

Kassie Holland, who grew up in the house next door to the Baleses in the Lake Tapps area, was shocked to hear that Bales was the suspect. She declined to say how she found out.

Holland said Robert Bales often played outside the house with his kids. "I was really shocked about the whole situation," she said. "I couldn't believe that it was him."

Bales, she said, was a "great guy. He was always fun to be around, great with his kids, a supportive husband and father."

He and his wife, Karilyn, bought their house in Lake Tapps in November 2005, county records show. They paid $280,000 for a 4-bedroom 2-story home built in 1990. The house was listed for sale on March 12.

The Bales family suburban split level house in a wooded Lake Tapps neighborhood has the feel of a home that was quickly emptied.

Cardboard boxes with children's toys and other items were left on the porch, along with unread newspapers dating to January. An American flag is propped against the entryway of the house.

Neighbors said they hadn't seen cars coming and going for a few months.

Holland said the family seemed happy, had a boat and that she saw them last at her job at a pizza parlor. They came in for dinner before he deployed. He didn't complain about his job or being deployed, she said. "He always had a great attitude about being in the service. He seemed just like, yeah, it's my job, it's ... what I do."

In July 2002, Bales received a deferred sentence for a misdemeanor criminal assault charge in Tacoma Municipal Court. The charge was later dismissed after Bales completed an anger management assessment, had no other law violations in six months and paid a $300 fine, court records show.

Bales was on military duty when his first child, a daughter, was born in December 2006, according to a blog written by his wife, Karilyn.

Court records show that Bales was cited for a misdemeanor hit-and-run incident in October 2008 in Sumner. He received a deferred 12-month sentence, and paid a fine of $250, which led to a dismissal of the charges.

Records state that Bales was spotted on Oct. 11, 2008, running from an accident scene shortly after midnight on the Sumner-Tapps Highway. It was a single-car rollover accident, records state. No other drivers were involved.

Witnesses reported seeing "a white male wearing military-style uniform, shaved head and bleeding," fleeing on foot and running into nearby woods. A police officer spoke to Bales, the owner of the car, who said he had fallen asleep behind the wheel.

Bales last Iraq deployment was Aug. 9, 2009, according to a statement on his wife's blog.

In a blog post last March, Karilyn wrote: "Well we found out yesterday that Bob did not get promoted to E7 this year. It is very disappointed after all of the work Bob has done and all the sacrifices he has made for his love of his country, family and friends. I am sad and disappointed too, but I am also relieved, we can finally move on to the next phase of our lives."

The family was getting ready to move that summer 2011 and hoped that the Army would allow them some say over where they went. The couple was hoping to be stationed in Germany, Italy, Hawaii, Kentucky to "be near Bob's family" or Georgia "to be a sniper teacher."

In a 2009 article on the Army website that was erased online – but still available in a cached Google version – a Staff Sgt. Robert Bales is quoted describing the Battle of Zarqa, a January 2007 operation to recover a downed Apache helicopter south of the city of Najaf.

Bales, identified in the article as a team leader in C Company's 1st Squad, describes a battle remembered both for its humanitarian component as well as its military execution. He spoke of carrying injured civilians to safety: “We'd go in, find some people that we could help, because there were a bunch of dead people we couldn't,throw them on a litter and bring them out to the casualty collection point.”

Later in the article, Bales said, “I've never been more proud to be a part of this unit than that day…. for the simple fact that we discriminated between the bad guys and the noncombatants and then afterward we ended up helping the people that three or four hours before were trying to kill us. I think that's the real difference between being an American as opposed to being a bad guy, someone who puts his family in harm's way like that.”

Most information about the suspect — before he was identified — has come from two camps, each representing particular interests.

There's the U.S. government, almost always represented by the voices of unidentified "senior military officials." On the other side, there's the civilian lawyer, John Henry Browne, a veteran criminal defense attorney from Seattle, near Bales' home base.

Until late Friday, both had refused to divulge Bales' name, placing sharp limitations on efforts to evaluate the information presented about the soldier — no chance to interview family members, close friends, neighbors or fellow soldiers. And no chance to examine official records.

Even seemingly straightforward information raises questions that are not easily answered, at least for now — such as a possible defense of post-traumatic stress disorder.

For example, the suspect now identified as Bales lost part of one foot because of injuries suffered in Iraq during one of his three tours of duty there, his lawyer said. Browne also said that when the 11-year veteran heard he was being sent to Afghanistan late last year, he did not want to go. He also said that a day before the rampage through two villages, the soldier saw a comrade's leg blown off.

The same goes for the possibility alcohol played a role.

On Friday, a senior U.S. defense official said Bales was drinking alcohol in the hours before the attack on Afghan villagers, violating a U.S. military order banning alcohol in war zones. The official discussed the matter on condition of anonymity because charges have not yet been filed.

Browne said his client's family told him they were not aware of any drinking problem — not necessarily a contradiction. Pressed on the issue in interviews with news organizations, Browne said he did not know if his client had been drinking the night of the massacre.

The soldier was being flown Friday to the U.S. military's only maximum-security prison, at Fort Leavenworth, Kan., said a senior defense official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of security surrounding the move.

The move to the U.S. does not necessarily mean an announcement of formal criminal charges is imminent, a defense official said.

Browne said the Bales is originally from the Midwest but now lives near Joint Base Lewis-McChord in Washington state. His children are 2 and 5.

The sergeant's family says they saw no signs of aggression or anger. "They were totally shocked," by accounts of the massacre, Browne said. "He's never said anything antagonistic about Muslims. He's in general very mild-mannered."

Bales, said to have received sniper training, is assigned to the 2nd Battalion, 3rd Infantry Regiment of the 3rd Stryker Brigade Combat Team, of the 2nd Infantry Division, which is based at Lewis-McChord and has been dispatched to Iraq three times since 2003, military officials say.

The soldier was injured twice in Iraq, Browne said. A battle-related injury required surgery to remove part of one foot, the lawyer said.

But Browne and government officials differ in their portrayal of a second injury, to the soldier's head, in a vehicle accident.

A government official said this week that the accident was not related to combat. But Browne said the man suffered a concussion in an accident caused by an improvised explosive device.

Browne also said his client was "highly decorated," but did not provide any specifics.

When he returned to the Seattle area, the staff sergeant at first thought he would not be required to join his unit when it shipped out for Afghanistan, the lawyer said. His family thought he was done fighting and was counting on him staying home. Until orders came dispatching him to Afghanistan, he was training to be a military recruiter, Browne said.

"He wasn't thrilled about going on another deployment," Browne said. "He was told he wasn't going back, and then he was told he was going."

Bales arrived in Afghanistan in December. On Feb. 1 he was assigned to a base in the Panjwai District, near Kandahar, to work with a village stability force that pairs special operations troops with villagers to help provide neighborhood security.

On Saturday, the day before the shooting spree, Browne said, the soldier saw his friend's leg blown off. Browne said his client's family provided him with that information, which has not been verified.

The other soldier's "leg was blown off, and my client was standing next to him," he said.

Browne said he did not know if his client had been suffering from PTSD, but said it could be an issue at trial if experts believe it's relevant. Experts on PTSD said witnessing the injury of a fellow soldier and the soldier's own previous injuries put him at risk.

"We've known ever since the Vietnam war that the unfortunate phenomenon of abusive violence often closely follows the injury or death of a buddy in combat," said Dr. Roger Pitman, a Harvard Medical School psychiatrist who heads the PTSD Research Laboratory at Massachusetts General Hospital. "The injury or death of a buddy creates a kind of a blind rage.

[AhabsOtherLeg]

Other things that make ya go hmmmm....

Coming as Afghan rage over last month’s burning of Korans by U.S. soldiers

Really? Who leaked that?

Not to mention the leaked video of the Marines urinating on Afghan corpses, supposedly those of Taliban fighters. Three "mistakes" in a row like this in the space of a few months (just as the US announces it's intention to vacate the country) does not strike me as a misfortune, or carelessness - it is enemy action, and will rightly be seen as such by Afghans.

Seriously, how can anyone be expected to believe that an occupying force in a Muslim country accidentally threw a large number of Korans into a fire and then accidentally told everyone about it? It's more likely that an escalation in violence currently suits their long-term goals.

[StarmanSkye]

A 'lone soldier' just semi-randomly killing a bunch of unarmed kids, women and men in 2 different villages and then slipping-back into camp to turn himself in -- just isn't very credible. I'm just cynical and suspicious enough to think it could have been a put-up psy/black-ops, perhaps to reinvigorate an aggressive & armed popular Afghan rural resistance that can be milked for more lucrative payoff by extending the occupation & mission, providing US combat troops, military career-path incentives & opportunities, logistics & supplies, contractors & materiel.

Wouldn't be beyond the Pentagon's deep mind-control capabilities to condition & program an assassin, or even just a patsy who conveniently 'confessed' & took the rap while a covert squad did the actual dirty. The resultant Afghan citizen backlash could be managed to ramp-up hostilities & reprisals as needed. This doesn't even need to be coordinated with Top Brass, it could have been done by a very small, well-insulated rogue op within any of a dozen private intel/mercenary companies -- that is, if it didn't originate within the Pentagon, NSA, CIA or other 'official' federal agency. Or even within a secret subset within NATO, or a foreign NGO or Intel/security org.

[Iamwhomiam]

More focus upon the burnt bodies, please. Muslim funerary practices require the bathing of the corpse and burial. Sending a definite message, but to whom? Drug deal gone bad? Revenge, obviously, but was it because of his buddy's leg being blown off the day before? That shit happens all the time, so I doubt this was the motivating factor for the carnage.

While it's entirely possible for one special forces to commit these acts, I don't think we're getting anywhere near the truth as to what occurred. Seems obvious more were involved.

Attacks in one village began around midnight. Solitary soldier seen returning into camp around 1:30am. Same seen leaving again 2:30am. Second village murders began either an hour later than the first, around 1am, or around 3am. Murderer returns to base around dawn and turns himself in while search parties try to locate him/them.

Somebody got ripped off. Some took revenge.

Looks likely we won't be the recipient of the bulk of the Afghani's rare earth minerals treasures.

One of the first NPR reports I heard soon after this occurred mentioned a drunken soldier being found laying in a garden. I've seen nothing in print substantiating this.

[Nordic]

It's going downhill (unless you're behind the Iron Curtain of American Official Media):

http://www.presstv.ir/detail/232108.html

US forces raped two women in Kandahar carnage: Probe mission

The Afghan parliamentary mission investigating the recent massacre of 16 civilians by US forces in Afghanistan says two women were raped during the deadly incident, Press TV reports.

Two members of the fact-finding mission, Hamidzi Lali and Shakiba Hashemi, told the general meeting of Afghanistan’s parliament on Saturday that the American troopers raped two Afghan women before starting the massacre.

They said between 15 to 20 US soldiers were involved in the carnage.

This is while Washington claims that the 38-year-old Army Staff Sergeant Robert Bales, who has just arrived in the US, was the only American military personnel responsible for the massacre.

Earlier on Friday, Afghanistan’s President Hamid Karzai criticized the United States for not cooperating with the Afghan fact-finding team and said the killing of civilians by foreign forces in Afghanistan “has been going on for too long.”

On March 11, a group of US soldiers went from house to house in three villages in Kandahar’s Panjwaii district and gunned down Afghan civilians inside their homes, killing at least 16 people -- mostly women and children -- and injuring several others.

AZA/ASH/MYA

[compared2what?]

It would be helpful to know what facts they found that indicated two women had been raped, though, wouldn't it?

Not that I think it mightn't well be true. It's just a little odd that none of the witnesses quoted in the first round of reporting mentioned or suggested it at all, that I saw. I mean, maybe they did and the papers just didn't quote them. Of course. But that, too, would be odd enough in itself to call for an explanation, under the circumstances. So. Six of one.

I don't know. There's just really something more than ordinarily wrong with this picture, imo.

[Nordic]

Rape is something that might not be reported right away due to embarrassment and other perfectly understandable factors.

Also, we've heard the stories as to the way rape victims might be viewed in certain fundamentalist Muslim societies. Or has that all been bullshit?

All I know is that the Afghans who are investigating are saying something completely different from what the Lie-a-gon is saying.