According to the NYT:Under a program developed by a Defense Department warfare unit, Army snipers have begun using a new method to kill Iraqis suspected of being insurgents, planting fake weapons and bomb-making material as bait and then killing anyone who picks up them up, according to testimony presented in a military court.
If this is true (caveats buried later in the article: it emerged as part of a defense strategy for soldiers accused of murder; on an official level the military of course denied it), it sounds a lot more like just "planting weapons on people" than "baiting suspected insurgents."Update: The original WaPo article goes into better detail, and has this inane quote from the captain of an elite sniper platoon:
"Basically, we would put an item out there and watch it. If someone found the item, picked it up and attempted to leave with the item, we would engage the individual as I saw this as a sign they would use the item against U.S. Forces."
As Eugene Fidell of the National Institute of Military Justice points out:"In a country that is awash in armaments and magazines and implements of war, if every time somebody picked up something that was potentially useful as a weapon, you might as well ask every Iraqi to walk around with a target on his back,"
More here.
-Ben | Comments
| Topic: Iraq