The two soldiers pictured above are, from left to right, Specialist Payton Jones and Staff Sergeant Jordan Bear of the 4th Brigade Combat Team, 82nd Airborne Division. These two soldiers were killed last week reportedly in response to the accidental burning of Qurans at Bagram air base.This adds two more soldiers to the growing list of those murdered by our Afghanistan “allies.” An Afghan soldier and a literacy teacher at a joint base in Kandahar province killed these paratroopers. We know they were targeted because someone burned a few books, those books being Qurans. Is there any other religion on earth that kills people over the burning of their “bible”? Of course not. You could burn a hundred Bibles on the doorstep of a church and, at worst, be arrested for starting a fire, but you would not be marked for death.
So President Obama decides he has to apologize for the burning, even though, according to reports, the Qurans were accidentally destroyed. Yes, they were destroyed because they were being used by prisoners at Bagram Air Base for passing messages--hardly a holy or reverential use. The Qurans were confiscated, placed in an office, and later they were mistaken for trash and burned. Then, apparently, some Afghan trash collectors found the burned Qurans and used the situation to spark protests and demonstrations that led to the deaths of six soldiers and these two paratroopers last week.
The UN has demanded punishment for the five soldiers the Army found responsible for the incident.
According to a news report, “the head of the United Nations mission in Afghanistan says the response to the burning by Afghanis is legitimate and that the soldiers who burned the Qurans need to be punished.” The UN Special Representative Jan Kubis said, “We were very concerned, as the UN, that the international military by mistake allowed this kind of desecration of the holy Quran. We rejected and condemned this act, it doesn't matter that it was a mistake."
Then our President not only called President Karzai, he sent him a letter with his “sincere apologies” and “deep regret for the reported incident. The error was inadvertent; I assure you that we will take appropriate steps to avoid any recurrence, to include holding accountable those responsible.”
So President Obama, President Karzai, and the UN want those soldiers punished. However, that should not happen, because they did not violate any provision of the Uniform Code of Military Justice.
What about the 76 coalition troops that have been assassinated by those we are supposed to trust, the Afghans we are training? I don’t remember President Karzai apologizing for those murders. I don’t remember the UN saying they “are very hurt” or that they “reject and condemn” those soldiers being murdered. Unlike the Quran burning, killing our soldiers was no mistake.
Where is the outrage from the UN? What about Karzai apologizing for the murders of those coalition soldiers? When is President Obama going to understand that apologizing to those fanatical Muslims only serves to flame their anger? When is he going to ask Karzai to apologize for his countrymen murdering the forces who are there to help?
I agreed with Newt Gingrich when he called President Obama’s apology “embarrassing” and a case of “a commander in chief not standing up for American troops.”
If anything, it is Karzai who should apologize for the actions of his people and the murders of almost 80 coalition troops. Then those responsible should be arrested as spies and prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.
Big Peace
