Secondly: you are right, I should grant President Bush the same benefitof the doubt that I would grant any other person. So, while it is evident that a number of facts he presented to the public about the WMD in Iraq and the main reason for the war were simply not true, it is yet unclear, if he gave these false information knowingly or in good faith. Hence I take that “lied” back and appologize for now. There is some small evidence because of the words of Dep.Sec. of Def. Wolfowitz about WMDs never been the real main reason for the war in the first place, but thats not enough. And it would not be the first time, that an American president fell for false or tempered evidence, just rember the bombing of the “chemical weapons production” in Sudan under the Clinton adminstration, which turned out to be nothing than a simple pharmaceutical fabrication after all. Only the CIA informer had tempered with his soil samples in order to get paid…… It seems that the US administration and its agencies have just given too much credit to unreliable sources who were pushing their own agenda – like Iraq refugees in opposition of the Sadam regime. Not all of the were poor defenseless vitcims, it would appear now.

I am well ware of the power of the first amendment in the USA. However, one thing we Germans have learned the hard way that freedom of speech does have its boundaries in a democracy. Those wo want to destroy the democracy should not be totally free. Our constitution (supervised by American law authorities in 1948 and 1949 ) has found a good balance for that. Therefore certain disgusting things are forbidden in Germany. Thats what I was hinting at.

No, I have read a couple of dozends blogs I found listed at “drink this” and in none of them did I find such a clear and concrete statement like yours, sorry. Mostly it was about denial, than about not generalizing from the deeds of a small number to the troops in toto (absolutely correct!) but not at any place did I find a rebutal to her uttering, that she carried out orders and thought it was right, just a little bit weird……..

Cheerio from old Europe

As to the issue of obeying unlawful orders, I don’t for a minute believe Lyndie England was ordered to do any of what she did – certainly not to take part in an orgy. Even if she did (unlikely), it is well known that soldiers are not to obey unlawful orders. The idea even has a name which is widely understood: “the Nuremberg defense.” If you haven’t seen any comments condemning it, you probably haven’t been looking very hard.

Director Mitch: I am getting a bit tired of these German-bashing cliches brought up by people who usually do not even find Auschwitz on a map even if it is painted bright red…. but at least we Germans learned one thing: there are certain orders you can not, need not and must not follow, even if the come from high up in your chain of command. I did not see any comments referring to this lesson learned after Private England declared, that she was just following orders…. That is the lesson from Nuremberg and we are greatful to have been taught just that by some great American lawyers and judges- so better start learning them yourselfes!

It’s fixed now.