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| Staff in shock following bombing of Kunduz hospital. PHOTO: Doctors Without Borders/AFP/Getty Images. |
When the staged violence of 9/11 occurred, this history major was shaken to the core. "It's the sinking of the Lusitania," I remember telling colleagues in Silicon Valley. They pooh-poohed my analogy and told me to calm down. Self-proclaimed "liberals" with big stock portfolios, they planned to vote for George W. Bush in order, they said, "to protect my wealth."
Fifteen years down the road, the U.S. has just marked the anniversary of the beginning of the endless war on terror by bombing a Doctors Without Borders (Medecins Sans Frontiers aka MSF) hospital in Afghanistan. Described as a trauma center, the facility was reportedly the only working hospital in Kunduz.
The Washington Post, faithful stenographer to the Pentagon, is reporting it this way
In a statement, the U.S.-led coalition confirmed it carried out an airstrike about 2 a.m. Saturday in response to “individuals threatening the force.”
“The strike may have resulted in collateral damage to a nearby medical facility,” said Col. Brian Tribus, a coalition spokesman. “This incident is under investigation.”
Twitter had several posts from MSF and others to the effect that NATO and the U.S. were well aware of precisely where the hospital was located e.g.
Several tweeters commented that the war had been announced as "over" or "over next year" for a long time, now e.g.
Predictably, there was some dark humor as well. Very dark.
And reference was made to the fact that the Golden Rule never seems to apply when it comes to the U.S. or NATO military. Here's Glenn Greenwald's headline for his
report of the incident in
The Intercept:
One Day After Warning Russia of Civilian Casualties, the U.S. Bombs a Hospital in Afghanistan
excerpt: This last week has been a particularly gruesome illustration of continuous U.S. conduct under the War on Terror banner, including under the Nobel Peace Prize-winning president who celebrates himself for “ending two wars” (in the same two countries where the U.S. continues to drop bombs). The formula by now is clear: bombing whatever countries it wants, justifying it all by reflexively labeling their targets as “terrorists,” and then dishonestly denying or casually dismissing the civilians they slaughter as “collateral damage.” If one were to construct a list of all the countries in the world based on their credibility to condemn Russia for using this exact rhetorical template in Syria, the U.S. would literally be last on that list.
Remember the sinking of the Lusitania and
what happened afterward? So do I.
