[Bastian]

Well.. Why is there a plethora of French civilians dead at the hands fo the US military, then, in 1944?

What I`m trying to say is.. civilian casualties will happen in a conflict, even if an army tries to prevent and minimize them. What the US Army does, in contrast to the forces they are fighting in Iraq. You can`t fight a war without civilian casulties. Of course, this doesn`t mean that you shouldn`t pay attention to civilians.. The contrary: civilian causulties should be reduced as much as possible, and sometimes even if that means a higher risk to the lives of your own soldiers. But in the end, there will still be civilian casulties, if civilians are living in the combat zone. You can`t fight a war without killing innocents.. it`s the human dilemma: there`s no perfect solution without negative aspects..

How to free Iraq from Saddam without innocent people dying? Impossible.
But keeping him in power? Still innocent people will die. More than if you invade? Very possible, if you think of the +/- 1 Million people killed during Saddam´s reign.

Of course, all this doesn`t mean I agree with every single action the US military did in Iraq. There might have been ilegitimate killings of civilians, and if those happened, I condemn them. But otherwise, I won`t call a GI a murderer if he`s fighting a just war against the real murderers, the baathists and jihadists in Iraq.