Robert Bales Army Staff Sergeant Pleads Guilty

[Gracie]

Robert Bales, Army Staff Sergeant Charged With Afghanistan Massacre, Pleads Guilty

SEATTLE — The Army staff sergeant charged with slaughtering 16 villagers in one of the worst atrocities of the Afghanistan war will plead guilty to avoid the death penalty in a deal that requires him to recount the horrific attack for the first time, his attorney told The Associated Press on Wednesday.

Staff Sgt. Robert Bales was "crazed" and "broken" when he slipped away from his remote southern Afghanistan outpost and attacked mud-walled compounds in two slumbering villages nearby, lawyer John Henry Browne said.

But his client's mental state didn't rise to the level of a legal insanity defense, Browne said, and Bales will plead guilty next week.

The outcome of the case carries high stakes. The Army had been trying to have Bales executed, and Afghan villagers have demanded it. In interviews with the AP in Kandahar last month, relatives of the victims became outraged at the notion Bales might escape the death penalty.

"For this one thing, we would kill 100 American soldiers," vowed Mohammed Wazir, who had 11 family members killed that night, including his mother and 2-year-old daughter.

So...your thoughts on this?

 

[Totino]

Hell, Obama has killed more than that with his drones. When is his trial?

 

[Gracie]

He is exempt because he is POTUS? Bales isn't.

 

[Gracie]

btw...you are new. Welcome to USMB.

 

[Totino]

btw...you are new. Welcome to USMB.

Thanks, happy to be here

 

[Esmeralda]

Robert Bales, Army Staff Sergeant Charged With Afghanistan Massacre, Pleads Guilty

SEATTLE — The Army staff sergeant charged with slaughtering 16 villagers in one of the worst atrocities of the Afghanistan war will plead guilty to avoid the death penalty in a deal that requires him to recount the horrific attack for the first time, his attorney told The Associated Press on Wednesday.

Staff Sgt. Robert Bales was "crazed" and "broken" when he slipped away from his remote southern Afghanistan outpost and attacked mud-walled compounds in two slumbering villages nearby, lawyer John Henry Browne said.

But his client's mental state didn't rise to the level of a legal insanity defense, Browne said, and Bales will plead guilty next week.

The outcome of the case carries high stakes. The Army had been trying to have Bales executed, and Afghan villagers have demanded it. In interviews with the AP in Kandahar last month, relatives of the victims became outraged at the notion Bales might escape the death penalty.

"For this one thing, we would kill 100 American soldiers," vowed Mohammed Wazir, who had 11 family members killed that night, including his mother and 2-year-old daughter.

So...your thoughts on this?

My thougths are two-fold. One is "this is what war does to people." Most soldiers are not going to be affected by war as Bales was, obviously. But some are. It does things to the mind, and it brings out the worst in some. In others, we have post traumatic stress disorder, often for the rest of their lives. Two, this is how we alienate people in other countries. If people in the US do not understand Islamic terrorism, it's cause and impetus, they only have to look at situations like this.

 

[Esmeralda]

Hell, Obama has killed more than that with his drones. When is his trial?

This is a ridiculous red herring. How man people are Bush Senior and GW Bush responsible for killing then? Let's put them on trial too? And every US president who has fought a war. How many civilians die when we go off to other countries, and sometimes invade them, to fight wars? Bales' situation is entirely different. An individual made a choice entirely counter to what he was supposed to do.

Your point is completely illogical and just baiting and trolling.

 

[Totino]

Hell, Obama has killed more than that with his drones. When is his trial?

This is a ridiculous red herring. How man people are Bush Senior and GW Bush responsible for killing then? Let's put them on trial too? And every US president who has fought a war. How many civilians die when we go off to other countries, and sometimes invade them, to fight wars? Bales' situation is entirely different. An individual made a choice entirely counter to what he was supposed to do.

Your point is completely illogical and just baiting and trolling.

I agree, let's put Bush on trial too! Don't forget Henry Kissinger!

My point is illogical and baiting and trolling? No, my point is valid. Obama stepped up the drone war immensely and is in violation of international law. This makes him a war criminal. Not to mention he's finally admitted to killing 4 US citizens, one of whom was a 16 year old boy that they killed on "accident". I don't know of any other presidents targeting US citizens and violating their constitutional rights. His kill list is "a choice". How many civilians die in other countries? Lots. Usually in WARS. It's pretty unprecedented to be killing people wherever you damn please, in countries you have no business being in. Pakistan, Libya, Yemen, I could go on and on. We're not at war there are we?
The war on "terror" is a sham and does nothing but create more terrorists.

These "wars" that Bush got us into and Obama continued does nothing but create damaged goods like Bales. And it further tarnishes our already destroyed name in the Middle East.

 

[Esmeralda]

Hell, Obama has killed more than that with his drones. When is his trial?

This is a ridiculous red herring. How man people are Bush Senior and GW Bush responsible for killing then? Let's put them on trial too? And every US president who has fought a war. How many civilians die when we go off to other countries, and sometimes invade them, to fight wars? Bales' situation is entirely different. An individual made a choice entirely counter to what he was supposed to do.

Your point is completely illogical and just baiting and trolling.

I agree, let's put Bush on trial too! Don't forget Henry Kissinger!

My point is illogical and baiting and trolling? No, my point is valid. Obama stepped up the drone war immensely and is in violation of international law. This makes him a war criminal. Not to mention he's finally admitted to killing 4 US citizens, one of whom was a 16 year old boy that they killed on "accident". I don't know of any other presidents targeting US citizens and violating their constitutional rights. His kill list is "a choice".

You know, this thing about targeting US citizens with drone strikes. We are targeting terrorists. The RW is constantly screaming their heads off to kill terrorists. They want the Boston Marathon bomber executed. Yet he is an American citizen. You will scream your heads off wanting to execute all terrorists, w/o any kind of trail, even if they are American citizens, but the killing of terrorists by the government, because that government is lead by a Democrat, and you try to claim he is a war criminal. If he were not a Democratic president, you'd being singing an entirely different tune. It's just partisanship and it's totally laughable.

 

[Totino]

This is a ridiculous red herring. How man people are Bush Senior and GW Bush responsible for killing then? Let's put them on trial too? And every US president who has fought a war. How many civilians die when we go off to other countries, and sometimes invade them, to fight wars? Bales' situation is entirely different. An individual made a choice entirely counter to what he was supposed to do.

Your point is completely illogical and just baiting and trolling.

I agree, let's put Bush on trial too! Don't forget Henry Kissinger!

My point is illogical and baiting and trolling? No, my point is valid. Obama stepped up the drone war immensely and is in violation of international law. This makes him a war criminal. Not to mention he's finally admitted to killing 4 US citizens, one of whom was a 16 year old boy that they killed on "accident". I don't know of any other presidents targeting US citizens and violating their constitutional rights. His kill list is "a choice".

You know, this thing about targeting US citizens with drone strikes. We are targeting terrorists. The RW is constantly screaming their heads off to kill terrorists. They want the Boston Marathon bomber executed. Yet he is an American citizen. You will scream your heads off wanting to execute all terrorists, w/o any kind of trail, even if they are American citizens, but the killing of terrorists by the government, because that government is lead by a Democrat, and you try to claim he is a war criminal. If he were not a Democratic president, you'd being singing an entirely different tune. It's just partisanship and it's totally laughable.

We're targeting terrorists? Tell that to the 176 children we've killed with drones and the thousands more adults.
I want the Boston bomber to have a trial. Does he deserve execution? I guess that depends if you're for the death penalty or not. At the very least he deserves a life sentence, if not the death penalty.
I scream my head off wanting to execute all terrorists? No I don't. We're CREATING terrorists in the middle east, not destroying them. BLOWBACK, look it up.
I'm being partisan? That's funny considering I didn't vote for Bush and think he's also a war criminal.

You want partisanship? How about all of those "anti war liberals" who were protesting Bush's actions, who then happily elected a president who's carried them on?

Hey guess what buddy, not everyone who dislikes Obama is a Republican. Take your partisan bullshit and your "us vs them" mentality elsewhere. As far as I'm concerned, it's YOU and THEM that this country needs to be worried about. If you're too blind to see that, I don't know what to tell you.

 

[Steelplate]

Well, if we want to talk about dead children, let's talk about the 100k or so dead Iraqi children that we killed BEFORE we ever invaded through economic sanctions. Peruse for yourself.

http://www.google.com/search?client....1.1.0.0.0..0.0...0.0...1c.1.14.mobile-gws-hp.

 

[Totino]

Well, if we want to talk about dead children, let's talk about the 100k or so dead Iraqi children that we killed BEFORE we ever invaded through economic sanctions. Peruse for yourself.

.

I'm quite familiar with the sanctions. Friedman actually wrote a good article about economic sanctions back when Carter enacted the grain embargo in 1980. An excerpt:
"All in all, economic sanctions are not an effective weapon of political warfare. They are likely to do us as much harm as they do their intended target, not only in the ways already mentioned, but also by weakening the system of free markets that is our greatest source of strength.

The resort to economic sanctions is a confession of impotence, crafted primarily for domestic consumption, to reassure the public. It will have little or no influence on the Russians."

In my opinion they're also a violation of the NAP too. It's too bad the government never learns...

 

[PratchettFan]

Robert Bales, Army Staff Sergeant Charged With Afghanistan Massacre, Pleads Guilty

SEATTLE — The Army staff sergeant charged with slaughtering 16 villagers in one of the worst atrocities of the Afghanistan war will plead guilty to avoid the death penalty in a deal that requires him to recount the horrific attack for the first time, his attorney told The Associated Press on Wednesday.

Staff Sgt. Robert Bales was "crazed" and "broken" when he slipped away from his remote southern Afghanistan outpost and attacked mud-walled compounds in two slumbering villages nearby, lawyer John Henry Browne said.

But his client's mental state didn't rise to the level of a legal insanity defense, Browne said, and Bales will plead guilty next week.

The outcome of the case carries high stakes. The Army had been trying to have Bales executed, and Afghan villagers have demanded it. In interviews with the AP in Kandahar last month, relatives of the victims became outraged at the notion Bales might escape the death penalty.

"For this one thing, we would kill 100 American soldiers," vowed Mohammed Wazir, who had 11 family members killed that night, including his mother and 2-year-old daughter.

So...your thoughts on this?

I think we let the legal process take its course.

 

[JWBooth]

So...your thoughts on this?

Um....he's guilty.

 

[Katzndogz]

He plead guilty to take the death penalty off the table.