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America Has REPEATEDLY Committed War Crimes By Bombing Civilians

George Washington's picture




 

The U.S. criticized Russia for killing civilians in Syria.

But just last week, the U.S. intentionally bombed one of the only hospitals in Northeastern Afghanistan (run by Nobel prize-winner Doctors Without Borders), killing hundreds.  This occurred 3 months after U.S.-backed Afghani special forces raided and threatened the hospital, and after the hospital had repeatedly given its gps coordinates to the U.S. military … and repeatedly called saying they were under attack.

And the Washington Post notes that incendiary bombs may have been used:

The AC-130U plane, circling above in the dark, raked the medical compound with bursts of cannon fire, potentially even using high explosive incendiary munitions, for more than an hour. The assault left at least 22 people dead, some of them burned to death.

It’s a war crime to bomb a hospital without giving adequate warning so patients can leave:

Delete

This is not the first time the U.S. has bombed civilian targets:

  • On February 13, 1991, the U.S. purposefully targeted an air raid shelter near the Baghdad airport with two 2,000-pound laser-guided bombs, which punched through 10 feet of concrete and killed at least 408 Iraqi civilians.
  • On April 23, 1999, NATO intentionally bombed a Serbian television station, killing 16.   President Clinton said of the bombing: “Our military leaders at NATO believe … that the Serb television is an essential instrument of Mr. Milosevic’s command and control. … It is not, in a conventional sense, therefore, a media outlet. That was a decision they made, and I did not reverse it.” U.S. envoy Richard Holbrooke said right after the attack that it was “an enormously important and, I think, positive development.” Amnesty International noted it was “a deliberate attack on a civilian object and as such constitutes a war crime.”
  • On October 16, 2001, the U.S. attacked the complex housing the International Committee of the Red Cross in Kabul, Afghanistan. After detailed discussions between the U.S. and the Red Cross about the location of all of its installations in the country, the U.S. bombed the same complex again two weeks later. The second attack destroyed warehouses clearly marked with the Red Cross emblem containing tons of food and supplies for hungry refugees
  • On April 8, 2003, the U.S. bombed the Al Jazeera bureau in Baghdad, killing a reporter. The British home secretary at the time subsequently revealed that – a few weeks before the attack – he had urged Prime Minister Tony Blair to bomb Al Jazeera’s transmitter in Baghdad.
  • Also on April 8, 2003, a U.S. tank fired a shell at the 15th floor of the Palestine Hotel, where most foreign journalists were then staying. Two reporters were killed.  The Committee to Protect Journalists found that the attack “was avoidable”

The U.S. has also carried out numerous war crimes by killing civilians with drone strikes. This includes “double tap” strikes which target rescuers attempting to save those injured by drone strikes, and “signature strikes” that kill people whose identities aren’t even known, based on metadata on their phones or their proximity to war zones.

And the U.S. has committed a slew of other war crimes, including:

  • The use of depleted uranium, which can cause cancer and birth defects for decades (see this, this, this, this, this and this)

None of this is intended to excuse any civilian casualties inflicted by Russia.   But America should not throw stones in glass houses …

 

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Mon, 10/12/2015 - 12:22 | 6658747 PoasterToaster
PoasterToaster's picture

America hasn't murdered anyone.  The US Government has.

Mon, 10/12/2015 - 11:14 | 6658451 GreatUncle
GreatUncle's picture

All governments use brutal force against innocent citizens to keep control they always have and always will. If anything under the curret economic conditions expedct more, much more of this kind of behaviour.

Mon, 10/12/2015 - 11:09 | 6658435 Polymarkos
Polymarkos's picture

WAAAAAAAH!

Mon, 10/12/2015 - 10:55 | 6658358 xavi1951
xavi1951's picture

Another Hate America piece.  Blah blah blah!  Ass wipes!

Tue, 10/13/2015 - 22:24 | 6665421 roddy6667
roddy6667's picture

Go wave your flag somewhere else. Israel likes people like you.

Mon, 10/12/2015 - 10:38 | 6658277 Reaper
Reaper's picture

The American psychopaths declared themselves the vicars of god. What ever they do is defined as good.

These vicars flatter their sheeple as exceptional. Praise controls fools.

Mon, 10/12/2015 - 09:46 | 6658061 TeethVillage88s
TeethVillage88s's picture

why make expensive new Treaties if you never keep them in the first place, unless it is a total Fraud meant to transfer wealth and power to the few Wealthy.

RENUNCIATION OF WAR

RENUNCIATION OF WAR^

Treaty providing for the renunciation of war as
an instrument of national policy.

Signed at Paris August 27, 1928.
Entered into force July 24, 1929.
46 Stat. 2343; TS 796; 2 Bevans 732; 94 LNTS 57.

Parties
Afghanistan
Australia
Belgium
Canada
China
France
Germany
Iran
Iraq
Japan
Netherlands
Turkey
Union of Soviet Socialist Republics
United Kingdom
United States

Mon, 10/12/2015 - 09:47 | 6658018 Tortuga
Tortuga's picture

War is hell.

The author's unmoral equivilents, failure to ever highlight the atrocities of the Islamic cult, the commies, and or phycotic midgets, identifies him as a hater and a pos fraudulent human being. 

Mon, 10/12/2015 - 12:24 | 6658755 PoasterToaster
PoasterToaster's picture

The Islamic Cult is largely a fiction, and was created by Western Aristocrats to further their policies in the Middle East.

Mon, 10/12/2015 - 11:35 | 6658528 Teh Finn
Teh Finn's picture

Word up.

Mon, 10/12/2015 - 12:33 | 6658796 Max Steel
Max Steel's picture

enjoy your type of bellends chest thumping patriotic morons who can't learn facts and admit their crimes. Empire of Chaos apologists like you sickens this country even more asshholes.

Tue, 10/13/2015 - 22:26 | 6665429 Teh Finn
Teh Finn's picture

Rus web troll said WHAT?

Mon, 10/12/2015 - 09:33 | 6658007 cn13
cn13's picture

The United States has become the "Beast" we are supposedly fighting against.

Sad days for Amerika.

Mon, 10/12/2015 - 08:31 | 6657764 bullchit
bullchit's picture

Putin and the Iranians have a very simple plan. They don't want to destroy ISIS, they're just going to push the whole shitshow back into Iraq.
I'm reminded of "you say you can skin grizz pilgrim?" "Skin this one, and I'll get you another", 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FcsXC2xFis4

Regards.


Mon, 10/12/2015 - 06:37 | 6657584 ToSoft4Truth
ToSoft4Truth's picture

Edward Snowden says. 

Edward Snowden didn’t tell anyone about Bush dropping DU bombs on Iraqi children or Hiroshima. 

Mon, 10/12/2015 - 12:24 | 6658758 PoasterToaster
PoasterToaster's picture

Edward Snowden told everyone that the internet was full of shills.

Mon, 10/12/2015 - 02:45 | 6657423 nnnnnn
nnnnnn's picture
"America Has REPEATEDLY Committed War Crimes By Bombing Civilians"

 

now thats something new

Mon, 10/12/2015 - 09:33 | 6658004 TeethVillage88s
TeethVillage88s's picture

Fire Bombing in Germany and Tokyo seem to stick out.

Pretty horrendous stuff.

Mon, 10/12/2015 - 02:39 | 6657418 Fish Gone Bad
Fish Gone Bad's picture

Every single Canaanite was supposedly killed by "God's chosen people".  People will do whatever suits them if they can get away with it.

Mon, 10/12/2015 - 08:36 | 6657783 justdues
justdues's picture

So one Nobel (peace) prize winner is bombing another Nobel prize winner ?

Mon, 10/12/2015 - 07:29 | 6657635 Roanman
Roanman's picture

Replace "supposedly" with "supposed to be" and your sentence is correct, biblically speaking. That they didn't was the beginning of their demise ..... supposedly.

Your present day "chosenites' of course have little to do with Isreal and nothing to do with God, being rather of the "synagogue of Satan" mentioned in Rev 3:9.

Just keeping the facts straight.

Mon, 10/12/2015 - 00:47 | 6657286 PADRAEG
PADRAEG's picture

Those silly enough to claim US war crimes by citing ww2 figures will never have any credibility. Just look at the numbers of casualties of all types, and whatever such crimes were committed, is less than 2% of the major killers. USSR raped, murdured & tortured its way to Berlin. That ALONE surely equals the Jap & German murders. 

Even by VNam, it was Americans who intervened to stop MyLai massacre, & then prosecuted. Give us an examply of any other nation, especially non-Anglo, ever doing so. ANYONE?

 

Mon, 10/12/2015 - 07:42 | 6657649 not dead yet
not dead yet's picture

It was Americans under the command of Lt Calley that killed over 500 innocent people in MyLai most of whom were women and children. On the same day another American troop did the same thing in another village not too far away. There were many more massacres by US troops in Vietnam but the command did a better job of keeping it under wraps and away from the press, unlike MyLai. One has to wonder if these massacres were ordered from the top to teach the civilians not to help the Viet Cong. Lt Calley was prosecuted but Nixon himself led an intervention and Calley served only a few months.

 

You need to get rid of that American superiority complex and wake up to the truth. You think those couple of US soldiers in Afghanistan who went out of their way to murder civilians were the only ones? What about the thousands of innocent people killed by US drones? Or those that get killed during the night with a visit from JSOC commandos working on bad intelligence and who always shoot first and could care less about their victims. Now that they are getting old and can't be prosecuted plenty of US vets from WW2 have admitted on camera they killed civilians and prisoners. Every side shot pilots in their parachutes. In Vietnam it was common for a GI to pull a woman away from the checkpoint and rape her and many times kill her afterwards. We could go on all night with this stuff about how the US is no different than anyone else when the war starts. Their is no moral high ground in war for any side. There is a reason war is hell and it sure isn't like those propaganda packed the US does no wrong pablum for the masses war movies Hollywood puts out.

Mon, 10/12/2015 - 09:53 | 6658090 Tortuga
Tortuga's picture

War is hell.

The solution is to don't fuck with Americans because "that American superiority complex" might put you on the list.

The commies, cultists, phycotics kill everybody including their own people, without provacation.

All you America haters can eat shit and die.

Mon, 10/12/2015 - 12:30 | 6658781 Max Steel
Max Steel's picture

Solution is you dumbfucks stop fucking and messing with things around the world. Sheeple like you need to learn facts and let them sink in before opening you filthy mouth and speaking clueless shit like a bellend. GEt your facts straight muritard. 

Mon, 10/12/2015 - 03:41 | 6657466 Joe A
Joe A's picture

"USSR raped, murdered & tortured its way to Berlin."

That was after the Nazis raped, murdered & tortured their way to Moscow. They reaped what they had sown.

Might not have been nice but you know...revenge. And you state that it surely equals Germand and Jap crimes? I think you need to read up on history.

Mon, 10/12/2015 - 06:39 | 6657587 ToSoft4Truth
ToSoft4Truth's picture

USSR was out there planting olive trees.

Mon, 10/12/2015 - 03:35 | 6657458 silvermail
silvermail's picture

US Army - the undisputed champion of the world in the number of killings of civilians and the rape of women and children. Type in the search for Google, "US forces killed" and "US soldiers raped" so you can verify this with the evidence.

Mon, 10/12/2015 - 07:32 | 6657639 Roanman
Roanman's picture

I'd put UN "peace keepers" at number one. They have accomplished so much more rape and murder with so much less real opportunity.

Mon, 10/12/2015 - 03:24 | 6657444 silvermail
silvermail's picture

Source: http://US-lies-blah-blah-blah

Mon, 10/12/2015 - 00:09 | 6657213 VW Nerd
VW Nerd's picture

Any evidence of US using white phosphorous??

Mon, 10/12/2015 - 03:29 | 6657452 silvermail
silvermail's picture

If the United States - the only country in the world that has used nuclear weapons against two peaceful cities in Japan, what prevents the United States to use other types of prohibited weapons against civilians?
I mean munitions with uranium cores, or white phosphorus, as it did in Fallujah.

Sun, 10/11/2015 - 23:13 | 6657127 Jstanley011
Jstanley011's picture

1969 and 70? Oh hell. Germany, Great Britain and the U.S. targeted civilian during World War II as a strategy. Patton hated it and called it "terror bombing." Thank goodness for the Holocaust to divert everybody's attention. It was a godsend for FDR, Truman, Churchill, Eisenhower and the rest. They jumped on publicizing the piles of bodies in Germany's camps like a Texan on a pork chop. The pictures of Germans and Japanese incinerated and blown apart are bad too.

https://www.google.com/search?rls=com.microsoft:en-US:IE-SearchBox&biw=1280&bih=585&tbm=isch&q=dresden+bombing+victims&revid=1477583498&sa=X&ved=0CCIQ1QJqFQoTCIuXn4r7u8gCFcGdgAodM1QH9w

Mon, 10/12/2015 - 08:38 | 6657789 Hans-Zandvliet
Hans-Zandvliet's picture

You're absolutely right. That's why bombing cities from the sky still is not a war crime, but shelling them with artillerie is.

Sun, 10/11/2015 - 23:51 | 6657181 Savyindallas
Savyindallas's picture

There was no fucking 'holocaust"-just the holohoax. The only holocaust in WW2 was killing millions of germans and japanese in firebombings and nukes. Stalin and Mao had holocausts before the war, killing over 50 million of their own. There was also an Armenian holocaust killing 1.5 million Chrstians during WW1. 

Mon, 10/12/2015 - 01:57 | 6657384 o r c k
o r c k's picture

I guess my Dad was lying. Ain't that somethin'.

Mon, 10/12/2015 - 08:50 | 6657812 All Risk No Reward
All Risk No Reward's picture

Hitler was bad. The Debt-Money Monopolist (DMM) controlled and manipulated West is bad, too.

I know the DMM West establishment serially lies today.

Did they also lie about WWII? Almost assuredly. Does that mean Hitler gets wings pinned on him like an angel?

No.

Power corrupts. Absolute power corrupts absolutely. And those that seek that power are invariably corrupt.

The bottom line is that Hitler likely wasn't as bad as the DMM West portrayed him. But that doesn't make him angelic, either. So how bad was Hitler? I can't quantify it.

Then again, he's dead and gone. I have a good idea how bad the Debt-Money Monopolists are, though...

They use debt-money to systematically impoverish people through fraud and starve ordinary people to death to the tune of about 30 million people a year - right up to this present day.

Those that don't die end up with compromised immune systems.

That's who I'm fighting and trying to expose... But I'm not promoting another thug to take their place.

Sun, 10/11/2015 - 22:52 | 6657066 Teh Finn
Teh Finn's picture

Wow somebody call Putin.  He's bombed three hospitals this MONTH.

Tue, 10/13/2015 - 22:28 | 6665438 Teh Finn
Teh Finn's picture

Rus web troll queers on TEH march.

 

One Professional Russian Troll Tells All

More and more, posts and commentaries on the Internet in Russia and even abroad are generated by professional trolls, many of whom receive a higher-than-average salary for perpetuating a pro-Kremlin dialogue online.

There are thousands of fake accounts on Twitter, Facebook, LiveJournal, and vKontakte, all increasingly focused on the war in Ukraine. Many emanate from Russia's most famous "troll factory," the Internet Research center, an unassuming building on St. Petersburg's Savushkina Street, which runs on a 24-hour cycle. In recent weeks, former employees have come forward to talk to RFE/RL about life inside the factory, where hundreds of people work grinding, 12-hour shifts in exchange for 40,000 rubles ($700) a month or more.

St. Petersburg blogger Marat Burkhard spent two months working at Internet Research in the department tasked with clogging the forums on Russia's municipal websites with pro-Kremlin comments. In the following interview, he describes a typical day and the type of assignments he encountered.

???RFE/RL: Marat, you wrote on your blog that your time at Internet Research gave you enough material for an entire book. Why did you decide to write there? Entertainment? Adventurism?
 
Marat Burkhard: 
Yes, adventurism is the right word. Because in my opinion, this kind of work doesn't exist anywhere else.
 
RFE/RL: Was it hard to get the job?
 
Burkhard:
 Yes, it was hard. You have to write sample texts first, and then they decide if you're suitable for the work. They weed people out that way.
 
RFE/RL: What kind of texts?
 
Burkhard: 
First they make you write something neutral -- Vegetarianism: Pros And Cons. After that, the assignments start to get more to the point -- for example, what do I think about humanitarian convoys in Donetsk?
 
RFE/RL: Were you forced to hide your real beliefs?
 
Burkhard:
 Yes, I'm pro-Western. That's natural for me and for them, of course, it's not. I didn't write anything about my views. Otherwise, they wouldn't have hired me; they would have thrown me out immediately. They're constantly running ideological checks on everything you write. I got caught a couple of times; I had some irresponsible moments.
 
RFE/RL: Did they immediately offer you a salary of 45,000 rubles, or did you get gradual raises before you reached that point?
 
Burkhard:
 No, I got it immediately -- as long as I met my quota. It's a real factory. There are production quotas, and for meeting your quota you get 45,000. The quota is 135 comments per 12-hour shift.

RFE/RL: How many departments are there at Internet Research?
 
Burkhard:
 It's a modern building, four floors. There's a LiveJournal department, a news department, a department where they create all sorts of images and demotivators (Editor's Note: Demotivators are satirical graphics that tend to undermine their subject matter), a department where they make videos. But I was never in those departments. Each of them has its own office, tables, and computers, and no one prowls around from place to place. Everyone stays in their spot.
 
RFE/RL: How many people were in your department?
 
Burkhard: 
Twenty.
 
RFE/RL: Did you work 12 hours a day?
 
Burkhard:
 Yes. There were daytime and nighttime shifts.
 
RFE/RL: Did you need to sit in the office or was it possible to work from home?
 
Burkhard:
 There's no working by remote. At night, a different shift comes in. I worked the day shift.
 
RFE/RL: So you sit in an office for 12 hours without ever going out? Why such gigantic shifts?
 
Burkhard: 
It's two days on, two days off. So they figure that you need to work 12 hours at a time instead of eight.
 
RFE/RL: So what did your department do?
 
Burkhard:
 Our department commented on posts. Every city and village in Russia has its own municipal website with its own comments forum. People would write something on the forum -- some kind of news -- and our task was to comment on it. We did it by dividing into teams of three. One of us would be the "villain," the person who disagrees with the forum and criticizes the authorities, in order to bring a feeling of authenticity to what we're doing. The other two enter into a debate with him -- "No, you're not right; everything here is totally correct." One of them should provide some kind of graphic or image that fits in the context, and the other has to post a link to some content that supports his argument. You see? Villain, picture, link.
 
RFE/RL: So all three of you sit together, agreeing on who's going to do what in this performance?
 
Burkhard: 
Yeah, that's the kind of absurdity that goes on. We don't talk too much, because everyone is busy. A single comment isn't supposed to be less than 200 characters. You have to just sit there and type and type, endlessly. We don't talk, because we can see for ourselves what the others are writing, but in fact you don't even have to really read it, because it's all nonsense. The news gets written, someone else comments on it, but I think real people don't bother reading any of it at all.

So in this way, our little threesome traverses the country, stopping at every forum, starting with Kaliningrad and ending in Vladivostok. We create the illusion of actual activity on these forums. We write something, we answer each other. There are keywords, tags, that are needed for search engines. We're given five keywords -- for example, "Shoigu," "defense minister," "Russian army." All three of us have to make sure these keywords appear all over the place in our comments. They can't even be conjugated or declined. Sometimes it's very hard to write when you can't use any declensions!??

??

A TYPICAL ASSIGNMENT

Topic: NATO troops are embedded with Ukrainian armed forces
 
Keywords: ukraine news, russia and ukraine, ukraine policy, ukraine, NATO, PMC (private military company)
 
Task: Raise this topic on 35 municipal forums

Work begins after an initial post, written by a troll in a different department, is published on the LiveJournal social-networking site under the username flcrbgrjn. The post argues that foreign mercenaries are fighting on the side of Ukrainian soldiers and links to a video that purports to show two American soldiers in the southeastern Ukrainian city of Mariupol.

"The Kyiv junta regularly sics its media on Russia, and they lie shamelessly and recklessly. They argue Russian armed forces are fighting on the territory of Ukraine, but they refuse to provide any proof (because there isn't any). But when it comes to the matter of Ukrainian armed forces, the American puppets entrenched in Kyiv say there's no evidence that foreign mercenaries and Western intelligence agents are joining their ranks -- they lie and don't even blush!"

This post soon appears, according to an alphabetized list, on the Astrakhan city forum. Then the Villain Troll, working under the name Yana24, begins the troika's work, posting a comment that takes issue with flcrbgrjn's post:

"What NATO mercenaries are you talking about? So they filmed some kind of American there, so what? It's still not clear what they were doing there. Russia as usual blames Ukraine for the things it's doing itself. Everyone's been talking about your own mercenaries for a long time, and you still haven't pulled them out!"

The Link Troll then angrily responds to the Villain, rejecting Yana24's argument and linking to a second report on the alleged presence of American soldiers in Mariupol:

"Did you read the text at all? If you're up to date with the topic, you should know how much evidence has already been provided that shows the war in Ukraine is continuing because the West and Poroshenko are reluctant to pursue peace. They've found things belonging to Western soldiers, and now they've found the soldiers themselves. Have they found proof that Russian troops are in Ukraine? Or troops themselves? No!"

Next in line is the Picture Troll, who accuses the West of hypocrisy and adds a demotivator for extra emphasis:

"The West is so two-faced: in every discussion about the Ukrainian conflict the West blames Russia even as it's providing the Ukrainian armed forces with PMC soldiers representing NATO. It's a policy of double standards!"

??
Translation: Ukraine, rise up! Southeast, sit down, don't make a fuss, and put up with it.
 
After Astrakhan comes Biysk. And from there, BryanskVeliky NovgorodVladivostokVolgograd, two forums in Voronezh, several Russian-wide forums -- for example Chupakabra -- and, at the end of the Russian alphabet, Chita and Cherepovets.

There are few other comments, but the theme flies to the top of Yandex.

RFE/RL: Marat, can you recall the strangest or funniest task that your team was given?
 
Burkhard: 
The funniest was when U.S. President Barack Obama chewed gum in India and then spit it out. "You need to write 135 comments about this, and don't be shy about how you express yourself. Write whatever you want, just stick the word Obama in there a lot and then cover it over with profanities." In the assignment, there's always a conclusion you've got to make, it's already written, that Obama is a black monkey who doesn't know anything about culture. You stick him in ancient India and he chews gum there. It's funny in the sense that they're ready to grab onto any little thing. On the other hand, it's not funny. It's absurd and it crosses a line.
 
RFE/RL: The main task of the factory is to write on visitor forums, in particular forums run by Russia's ideological enemies. Who does that?
 
Burkhard: 
There's a Ukrainian department, an English department. They bombard the websites of CNN and the BBC. They have their own type of targets -- The New York Times, not the Samara city site. It's a little simpler for us, of course.

??

RFE/RL: You know foreign languages. Didn't they offer you a position in one of the foreign departments?
 
Burkhard:
 They did. I had a job interview in the English department, but they started to ask me about my beliefs, to which I replied that I was apolitical, I don't know anything, I don't follow anything. Apparently, that ended my prospects there. To get a job with them, I should have answered that I follow certain trains of thought. The salary for employees with foreign language skills is more than 45,000 -- it's 65,000 and higher.
 
RFE/RL: And are some of the people working on social networks -- on Facebook, in particular?
 
Burkhard:
 Yes, there are special people working on Facebook. There are about 40 rooms with about 20 people sitting in each, and each person has their assignments. They write and write all day, and it's no laughing matter -- you can get fired for laughing. And so every day, any news does the trick -- it could be Obama, could be [German Chancellor Angela] Merkel, could be Greece, North Korea.

The young people doing this work are barely capable of formulating what's important about these stories. Even a political scientist can't be an expert about the entire world, but here people are expected to write about everything. And how you write doesn't matter; you can praise or scold. You just have put those keywords in.

Then, in order to plump up the political content, they send in a guy to talk about the topic of the day, so that at least the employees have a little background on the topic. But the guy himself has an extremely low level of understanding, so it all looks completely absurd. Incidentally, they gave us a test on ideology, with 15 or 20 questions you need to answer. Anyone who makes a couple of mistakes has to retake it. But anyone who's simply hopeless just gets fired.
 
RFE/RL: What do they ask on the exam?
 
Burkhard: 
For example: "What does Russia want to happen in the Donetsk People's Republic?" It's very difficult to answer, and you have just two or three words. Or, for example, easier questions like "Who's Psaki?" (Editor's Note: State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki is a frequent target of Russian trolls.)
 
RFE/RL: The topic of Ukraine probably dominates.
 
Burkhard:
 Yes, they throw everything they've got at Ukraine.
 
RFE/RL: How does your troika work when the assignment is to praise Russia instead of criticizing Ukraine or America?
 
Burkhard:
 I once had occasion to write that the majority of Germans support Putin's policies. That's how the assignment was worded -- "Say that the majority of Germans support Putin's policies and are unhappy with Merkel's." Where they get this from I don't know, but I have to write about it. It's funny to write, "The majority of Germans..."
 
RFE/RL: Does the Villain have a role in such assignments?
 
Burkhard: 
If something is pro-Putin, the Villain will have doubts. For example, for Orthodox Christmas, Putin went to Mass at an ordinary village church outside Voronezh and there was sweetness and light all around. A story gets posted along the lines of, "How wonderful, how marvelous, how great, what an amazing man he is." But the Villain disagrees: "OK, come on, Putin went to Voronezh to boost his popularity with the public." To which we answer, "What's the matter with you, what popularity are you talking about? Yes, he's popular, but he doesn't need popularity, he just wants to meet with ordinary people." That's a funny example.

Next Assignment

Topic: Build a positive attitude toward the domestic policies of Vladimir Putin; the president personally celebrated Christmas with ordinary Russians.
 
Keywords: president rf, putin news, putin policies, christmas, vladimir putin
 
Again, the assignment begins with a post published on a LiveJournal account. The post about Putin is prefaced by a fragment from a poem by Marina Tsvetayeva, "It's a sin to soar over a golden-domed chapel and not to pray in it," which in this context seems to take on a double meaning. 

Christmas unites!
 
The blessed holiday of the Nativity is upon us. And on such a miraculous day, which unites all citizens of Russia -- no matter whether you're a believer or, as they say, "unchurched" -- on the way to the Lord, the Russian president VP was, as always, with the people! Where else but in the provinces, far away from the urban hustle and bustle, is it possible to really experience this holy day? So this year Vladimir Putin visited the village church in honor of the Holy Virgin, located near Voronezh in the village of Otradnoye. And on such a holiday, one of the main holidays in Russia (and in the entire Christian church), at such a difficult time the president was with the people and congratulated all the clerics and faithful parishioners!

On the Barnaul forum, the Link Troll kicks things off with praise and a link to a December 31 vesti.ru article, Putin Congratulates Obama And Reminds Him Of The Principles Of Mutual Respect.

"Great article! By the way, the president of Russia, also congratulated the American president, the German chancellor, and other Western politicians on New Year's Eve. He's to be commended for expressing his peaceful intentions and conducting normal policy -- something that's hard to get from Barack Obama."

The Villain Troll appears incensed:

"And what did you find that was so totally amazing in his Christmas message??? I don't understand!!! Vladimir Putin is an ordinary person!! So what if he's the president?? If I get on TV and wish everyone a nice Christmas, will you write a nice article about me too??? Finally we've found something to talk about!"

The Picture Troll posts a photo of Putin at the church and retorts:

"This is idiotic! Putin is our president. And it's really great that he went to a village church to congratulate everyone on the holiday. Christmas is a miracle. I envy the congregation. I would have loved to have been there on that great holiday."

??

Elsewhere, on the Yekaterinburg forum, the Villain Troll attacks Putin's Christmas appearance as a stunt aimed at distracting the public from the country's massive economic woes:

"Give your neighbor a sack of buckwheat this year!! Now that's a good deed!!! Vladimir Putin represents everything that awaits us in the future!! He just went to pray for his ass and ask for forgiveness. He's driven the country straight to hell, and now what can he do??? Pray, and that's it!"

The Picture Troll issues a stern reprimand, illustrated with a bucolic photo from the scene:

"Good lord, your language! Christmas is a blessed holiday, and here you are swearing. It's not worth it. There's enough buckwheat for everyone, our country will survive the anti-Russian sanctions, no problem. So I congratulate everyone on a blessed holiday and wish everyone peace and goodness. Especially YOU!"

??

And thus the troika spends the day sweeping through 35 forums. 

RFE/RL: Were people ever fired for ideological mistakes?
 
Burkhard:
 Yes, they were. One person got fired right in front of me. I also got in some trouble. There are so many cartoons out there that once I made a mistake and put up a caricature of Yanukovych instead of one of Poroshenko. And you can't make fun of Yanukovych; Yanukovych is one of the good guys. They immediately called me on the carpet: "How dare you? You really didn't know that it was Yanukovych?" All this goes on with terribly serious faces. There are tons of managers there who constantly monitor and follow everyone.
 
RFE/RL: And who are the managers?
 
Burkhard:
 People from Internet Research who've been there a long time and apparently worked their way up. Their salary, by the way, is two times higher. I happened to see a salary list, and I was just horrified -- 70,000-80,000 rubles for reading the crap I write and wagging their finger at me if I make a mistake.
 
RFE/RL: So who goes in for this work? Are there people there who honestly want to fight Obama or Merkel over the Donetsk People's Republic?
 
Burkhard: 
Yes, there really are people like that. That's the worst thing: When there's a lunch break, there's a kind of cafeteria, with vending machines and coffee, and you hear people -- who write all day about these things -- instead of drinking coffee and talking about something else, they start to furiously foam at the mouth about the very same things. Still something to prove. So there are fanatics.

But the basic majority are just young people who want to make money. They're so politically illiterate that Putin, Obama... They don't know the difference. Of course, they're all for Putin, but they're absolutely politically illiterate. "Whatever we're told, that's what we'll write about, no questions asked, and we don't want to know."
 
RFE/RL: Have you met people in other departments?
 
Burkhard: 
The different departments don't particularly socialize. Friendship isn't encouraged. The system is very repressive. If you're late by a minute, there's already a 500 ruble fine. The employees are under constant pressure. There's a fine for even the smallest deviation. You're constantly under threat of being fired, constantly being ordered around. It's not a very civilized atmosphere.
 
RFE/RL: Did you get fired or did you decide on your own to leave?
 
Burkhard: 
I decided myself, because I can't engage in absurd work. In terms of life experience, I got it, and to keep going didn't make any sense -- it's all absurd. I don't share this ideology, I'm absolutely against it, I was located in the enemy camp. Two months was enough to understand how everything there is done. To keep on working made no sense, even for money, because it's such hard work that -- just forget it, forget the money. Just don't make me go there any more.

 

By the way, any time a journalist shows up and tries to get in or ask something, they go on high alert. All the curtains are kept closed. We're all forbidden from going out on the street during the day. They're really afraid of journalists.
 
RFE/RL: But there are still a lot of leaks. Three people gave us interviews last week. It's like a parody of an Orwell novel.
 
Burkhard:
 Yes, that's right, the Ministry of Truth. You work in the Ministry of Truth, which is the Ministry of Lies, and everyone kind of believes in this truth. Yes, you're right, it's Orwell.

Mon, 10/12/2015 - 11:23 | 6658481 atthelake
atthelake's picture

Please, be specific. Which hospitals? Where? When?

Mon, 10/12/2015 - 04:42 | 6657512 HowdyDoody
HowdyDoody's picture

Sure, kitten up a tree, sure.

 

Mon, 10/12/2015 - 00:05 | 6657206 Flybyknight
Flybyknight's picture

bull shit

Sun, 10/11/2015 - 22:57 | 6657081 George Washington
George Washington's picture

Link?

Mon, 10/12/2015 - 03:18 | 6657439 silvermail
silvermail's picture

Link: www.US-blah blah-blah

Sun, 10/11/2015 - 23:59 | 6657192 falconflight
falconflight's picture

Sorry I couldn't find a supporting story in TASS, Ivestia, Pravda or @the Vineyard of the Saker, ect.

Sun, 10/11/2015 - 23:51 | 6657182 falconflight
falconflight's picture

You fcking low rent stooge, Doctors without Borders made the assertion about Putin's 'crimes against humanity', the same Marxist shills that allege the US intentionally bombed that hospital in Afghanistan. Maybe you can serve as a forward observer for the NeoSoviet air arm.

http://www.thestar.com/news/world/2015/10/05/russians-blamed-for-attack-...

http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2015/10/06/why-are-the-russians-bo...

http://www.albawaba.com/news/hospital-staff-accuse-russia-bombing-childr...

http://news.yahoo.com/major-hospital-syrias-aleppo-shuts-because-bombing...

http://english.aawsat.com/2015/05/article55343292/major-hospital-in-syri...

Mon, 10/12/2015 - 12:26 | 6658763 Max Steel
Max Steel's picture

retard falconcunt russians weren't occupying afghan and moreover they're not corrdinated . MSF called US after they bombed them for first time meanwhile they didn't listen. As was revealed in earlier coverage of this incident, the GPS co-ordinates of MSF's hospital had been conveyed to all of the belligerent parties. Therefore this attempt to blame the Afghan authorities for what was clearly a premeditated crime is pure BS. Furthermore, anyone who would regard this attack as being an 'accident' would also be daft enough to believe that NEADS failed four times on the morning of Sept. 11, 2001 because of a "failure of imagination".

"...In fact, the fire from the AC-130 appears to have been so accurate that only the hospital building itself was hit, and not residential buildings located in the same cramped Doctors Without Borders compound, said one of the officials,..

...The military’s “description of the attack keeps changing — from collateral damage, to a tragic incident, to now attempting to pass responsibility to the Afghanistan government,” Christopher Stokes, the general director of Doctors Without Borders, said in the statement.

“The reality is the U.S. dropped those bombs. The U.S. hit a huge hospital full of wounded patients and M.S.F. staff,” his statement continued, referring to the group by the initials of its French name, Médecins Sans Frontières. “The U.S. military remains responsible for the targets it hits, even though it is part of a coalition. There can be no justification for this horrible attack.”..."

Hospital staff have reported they called US military officials and begged them to stop but it continued for 30 minutes. Patients in Intensive Care were burning in their beds. There was nothing doctors could do. Doctors Without Borders' medical staff and their patients were targeted because they were neutral to the war and treated all patients.

Learn some facts before bringing strawman arguments into context . Acting like a stupid troll who knows nothing except spinoffs isn't worthy. Daily Beast isn't a reliable source , another murdoch bought msm . Consider yourself educated now.

Sun, 10/11/2015 - 22:50 | 6657064 silverer
silverer's picture

I decided some time back I would not hang an American flag in front of my home or on my property.  Because what it represents to me, it doesn't represent to the US leadership.

Mon, 10/12/2015 - 01:26 | 6657338 roddy6667
roddy6667's picture

I moved to a different country. I can't say I left America. It was gone years before I packed up. What is the name of the rogue nation between Canada and Mexico?

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