Translating the New York Times on alleged U.S. “concern” for Afghan civilians

The New York Times has published a very interesting and revealing report on U.S. Special Operations raids in Afghanistan.

The article reveals, perhaps inadvertently, the total and callous disregard for the lives of Afghan civilians by the U.S. military; the overwhelming concern of U.S. officials with managing and influencing news coverage in order to minimize or deny U.S. responsibility for civilian casualties and manipulate public perceptions of the war; and the anti-democratic, if not outright neocolonial, attitudes expressed by these officials towards the Afghan government and political process.

Central to the concerns expressed by the The New York Times report comes in the wake of recent controversy over several U.S. Special Forces raids in Afghanistan, three of which in particular killed roughly 50 civilians in the span of barely two weeks.

Three recent U.S. Special Forces operations killed 50 people – the vast majority civilians, Afghan officials say – raising the ire of villagers and President Hamid Karzai… Afghan officials say an overnight raid Jan. 7 in the village of Masmoot in Laghman killed 19 civilians. A raid in Kapisa on Jan. 19 killed 15 people, mostly civilians. And a second Laghman raid Jan. 23, in Guloch village, killed 16, they say.

[http://www3.signonsandiego.com/stories/2009/jan/31/afghan-civilian-deaths-013109/]

[http://warvictims.wordpress.com/2009/03/10/afghanistan-us-halted-some-raids-in-afghanistan/]

[http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/10/world/asia/10terror.html?&pagewanted=all]

Last month, it was U.S. air strikes which received the NYT’s special attention for their admirable precision and great discretion…

[http://www.iht.com/articles/2009/02/24/asia/24carrier.php]

Similarly, in July 2008, Thom Shanker wrote a fantastic press release for the U.S. military…

In it, he wrote..

[http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/23/world/asia/23military.html?ei=5124&ex=1374552000&en=432eead6b7d6fae9&pagewanted=all]

Thankfully, this propaganda effort was eviscerated by Patrick Martin at the World Socialist Web Site, who wrote…

[http://www.wsws.org/articles/2008/jul2008/afgh-j24.shtml]

The timing of Shanker’s July 2008 New York Times article was rather remarkable, coming just two weeks after the U.S. had killed 17 civilians in an airstrike on July 4th, and 47 civilians (as usual, mostly women and children) at a wedding on July 6th. Just one month after his account of the great lengths to which the U.S. goes to “protect” civilians, another 90 civilians were killed in the bombing of Azizabad.

[http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/23/world/asia/23military.html?ei=5124&ex=1374552000&en=432eead6b7d6fae9&pagewanted=all]

Two days after Thom Shanker’s NYT article, Pamela Constable of the Washington Post noted that 78 civilians had been killed in just three airstrikes during that month alone.

[http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/07/24/AR2008072403465.html]

That number itself was based on only the most widely publicized incidents, when in fact many more such incidents occur on a regular basis but receive very little attention.

[http://stopwarblog.blogspot.com/2008/07/airstrike-kills-more-civilians.html]

It’s also rather fascinating to observe the regular U.S./NATO announcements of “revised” and “improved” policies to prevent civilian deaths, and the seriousness these announcements receive in the corporate media — despite the fact that nothing of substance changed between the last announcement and the latest one, which seem to be announced and publicized during or just after the latest score of civilians killed.

Thus, we have the May 2007 announcement (followed by June/July bombings)…

September 2008… followed by October/November bombings…

October 16th, when the NYT reported: “The strike occurred at a time when General McKiernan, who took command here in June, had made curbing civilian casualties a high priority. At the moment when the airstrike in Nadali was said to have taken place, 1 p.m. Thursday, senior officers on the general’s staff were holding a briefing in Kabul, 340 miles away, at which they laid out for reporters and Western aid groups the new measures that General McKiernan had ordered for the purpose of “protecting the civilian population” during combat operations.”

Given this background, the following translation is being provided for the New York Times’ newest (March 10, 2009) in an ongoing series of apologetics and justifications for the indiscriminate murder of peasants in an occupied country, veiled as it is in the usual euphemisms, obfuscations, and ideological dogma.

“The commander of a secretive branch of America’s Special Operations forces last month ordered a halt to most commando missions in Afghanistan, reflecting a growing concern that civilian deaths caused by American firepower are jeopardizing broader goals there. The halt, which lasted about two weeks, came after a series of nighttime raids by Special Operations troops in recent months killed women and children, and after months of mounting outrage in Afghanistan about civilians killed in air and ground strikes. The order covered all commando missions except those against the highest-ranking leaders of the Taliban and Al Qaeda, military officials said.”

NYT: “Military officials said the halt was ordered in part to allow American commanders time to impose new safeguards intended to reduce the risk of civilian deaths.”

Translation: All of the thousands of times throughout the past 8 years, when U.S. & NATO officials righteously declared that they “always take all possible precautions to prevent civilian deaths” in countless press releases, public speeches, press conferences, interviews, meetings, memos, policy documents, and so on, they were in fact lying in every case.

This conclusion is logical necessity, since, if they had already been taking “all possible precautions” (as they regularly claim), it would clearly be logically impossible to take any further steps in this area.

NYT: “The rising civilian death toll in Afghanistan has soured relations between American commanders and the Afghan government led by President Hamid Karzai, who has vocally criticized the raids.”

Translation: The American military deeply resents that the government of an occupied country has the astonishing audacity to criticize the killing of its own citizens by the occupying military forces. The proper role for the government of a U.S.-occupied country is to praise the efforts of the noble, virtuous, benevolent occupying U.S. military forces, while denouncing all of its own citizens who resist occupation. Furthermore, Karzai’s criticism of air strikes which massacre civilians is very popular and accurately reflects Afghan public opinion, which is harmful because it legitimizes unfavorable views of the occupiers and fosters the dangerous misperception that government policies and statements should reflect Afghan public opinion rather than the elite interests of the occupying powers.

NYT: “Some top civilian and military officials in Afghanistan say they believe that Mr. Karzai and some of his aides have at times exaggerated reports of civilian casualties to fuel anti-American sentiment for domestic political purposes. Mr. Karzai will run for re-election this year and is under political pressure to speak out against Afghan deaths at the hands of American troops.”

Translation: Public opinion in Afghanistan is so overwhelmingly opposed to US military operations which kill civilians that in order to maintain any credibility, Afghan political leaders sometimes have to make statements which reflect widespread public revulsion and accurately describe the civilian cost of these attacks. Afghans running for political office are under “pressure” (from their own population) to criticize the occupying forces, and their adherence to public opinion in this regard poses extreme threats and must be criticized strongly.

“Exaggerated” in this context means making any statement which even insinuates any U.S./NATO culpability whatsoever for policies which inevitably and necessarily result in civilian deaths, such as dropping 2,000 pound bombs on villages and overnight house raids during which anyone can be shot for any reason.

NYT: “They said it [the halt in raids] was also intended to help the military release information about civilian casualties more quickly, to pre-empt what some said have been exaggerated accounts by Afghan officials.”

Translation: Accurate information that reflects poorly on western imperialism is categorically labeled “inaccurate”, regardless of the facts or evidence. The Afghan government often conveys accurate information about the civilians regularly being killed in their villages by the US military, and these accounts are sometimes (rarely) reported in the Western media. However, even these rare exceptions are dangerous and intolerable, because even intermittent access to accurate information about U.S./NATO atrocities in Afghanistan threatens to affect U.S. and European domestic opinion, where the narrative of our noble, virtuous, and benevolent efforts in Afghanistan must be maintained without challenge.

Therefore, appropriate measures have been taken to ensure the U.S. military propaganda version of events is quickly disseminated to the proper outlets and authorities.

NYT: “One senior official said that procedures had been set up to allow American troops to report more quickly the number of enemy and civilian deaths after a specific operation, and to quickly disseminate the information to Afghan officials in Kabul, the capital, and at the local and provincial levels.”

Translation: New measures have been taken to ensure that the U.S. military’s propaganda version of events is disseminated as broadly and quickly as possible. The source of accurate information about Afghan civilians being killed has been identified as Afghan officials at the local, provincial, and federal level.

In order to guarantee that US mainstream media reporting reflects the US military’s views of its own military operations, the US military will now directly address the source of accurate (aka “inaccurate”) information in the hope that Afghan officials will obediently transmit the US military version of events instead.

NYT: “Officials also said the military had adopted new procedures aimed at reducing civilian casualties, but they did not specify what those procedures were.”

Translation: No policy changes of any significance have been made, although the propaganda apparatus has been streamlined for greater speed, scope and efficiency.