According to a story reported in the Ithaca Journal, American soldiers were given orders to disregard civilian casualties in the 'clean up operation' against what was purported to be a Taliban stronghold during Operation Anaconda. The story is reported on the Portland IndyMedia site, where, to quote the story, an American soldier said that "We were told there were no friendly forces," said Guckenheimer, an assistant gunner with the 10th Mountain Division at Fort Drum. "If there was anybody there, they were the enemy. We were told specifically that if there were women and children to kill them." To see photos of the unreported (thousands) of civilian casualties in the War in Afghanistan visit the Afghan War Photos page. This reminds one of the 3,000,000 deaths caused during the bombardments of the Vietnam war, and one of the 'lessons of Vietnam' was apparently to spread the myth of 'precision killing' and censor the media (remember the censorship of the Gulf War?) When the AlJezeera offices were bombed (the news agency responsible for photos of civilian casualities in Afghanistan), and the military then purchasing all civilian satellite photos of Afghanistan, and with censorship similar to that of the Gulf War put in place (the 'lesson of Vietnam'), the points made in this author's article on American military censorship policies seemed timely... Missing on the Home Front - Wartime Censorship and Postwar Ignorance


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