By Azhar Azam
A STRONG pushback from veterans and political communities and intervention by Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison and Australian Defense Minister Linda Reynolds have pressed Chief of the Australian Defense Force (ADF) Angus Campbell to retreat from his initial promise to revoke Meritorious Unit Citation for the Special Operations Task Group (SOTG), drawn mainly from the Special Air Service Regiment (SASR), which served in Afghanistan from 2007 to 2013.
In November, Campbell released findings of the heavily redacted Brereton report that numbed nations around the globe. Under Army Reserve Maj. Gen. Justice Paul Brereton, it revealed the ADF members killed 39 Afghan civilians in 23 incidents, including men and boys who were shot in the head or blindfolded and had their throats slit by the Australian elite troops.
The report said there is “no credible information” that the commanders knew or suspected these things were happening around them and they didn’t fail to take appropriate steps to prevent or discover them. But an ABC investigation noted some say the senior leadership of the Special Forces knew for years about many allegations of this illicit and shocking conduct being practiced by Australian soldiers in Afghanistan. A four-year inquiry additionally identified that some members of the SOTG placed “throwdowns” (foreign weapons or equipment) with the bodies of the victims for the purpose of site exploitation photography to depict that the killed person had been carrying arms and was a legitimate target, thereby masking the crime and avoiding any scrutiny.
Labeled as “possibly the most disgraceful episode in Australia’s military history” in the report, the incidents seek Australian political and military leadership to admit their guilt, indemnify the human losses and take decisive action to bring the offenders involved in the mass execution of innocent Afghans to justice.
Campbell offered his apology to the Afghan people. He admitted the ADF is rightly held to account for allegations of grave misconduct as there was “credible information” over “unlawful killings,” accepting all the findings and pledging to develop a comprehensive plan to action all the 143 recommendations.
But the backing down of Campbell from one of the key recommendations, which is largely a symbolic one, shows there is a joint fort being wielded by the Morrison government and ADF to stash the whistleblower report. If it is so, the appalling attitude would not be condoned by the aggrieved Afghan families and international world.
On December 1, the Guardian published a horrific picture, exposing senior Australian soldiers drinking beer out of the prosthetic leg of a dead Taliban fighter at an unauthorized bar, Fat Lady’s Arm, in Afghanistan. Another appeared to describe two soldiers performing a dance with the limb, as if it were a war trophy. A “warrior culture,” which was being stoked by high-ranking Australian officers in Afghanistan, must not be swept under the carpet over national security or any other concerns. It recalled the ancient battles when the aggressive forces used to exterminate civilians without discrimination and build skull towers to rejoice their victory.
Scholars, writers and people across the world are furious at Canberra’s shameful and hollow assurances. Andrew Mitrovica – a journalism instructor, writer and media commentator – writing for Al Jazeera, doubted that anyone would be held to account for the massacre of 39 Afghans and blamed Canberra for “state-sponsored terrorism.” “The bitter list of Afghans that Australia’s terrorists in battle fatigues murdered reportedly includes boys who had their throats slit, a frightened child who was hiding under a blanket, farmers tending to stock, shackled prisoners and brothers and cousins running away to try to survive, only to be slowly ripped to death by Australian military dogs,” he said. He argued the Australian soldiers murdered people not to achieve a “strategic objective,” but for a “diseased, intoxicating sense of pleasure.”
The row between Morrison and Campbell is a public façade to bury the killings of the Afghan civilians. The so-called Western human rights activists, governments and media houses, which normally go lunatic even over peacemaking initiatives, have also relatively tightened their lips and turned a blind eye on the Australian brutality.
– The Daily Mail-CGTN news exchange item
