Although I assume most American soldiers are upholding honor and dignity in a war that should never have been, the following described behaviour is shocking and hurts my heart.
SALON.COM Article
http://www.salon.com/opinion/feature/2007/05/30/embassy/
Imperial life in a brand-new city:
What plans for a gigantic new U.S. Embassy in Iraq say about the Bush administration, the occupation of Iraq, and Americans themselves.
It is worth remembering that, when the American commanders whose troops had just taken Baghdad wanted
their victory photo snapped, they memorably seated themselves, grinning happily, behind a marble table in
one of those captured palaces; that American soldiers and newly arrived officials marveled at the former
tyrant’s exotic symbols of power; that they swam in Saddam’s pools, fed rare antelopes from his son Uday’s
private zoo to its lions (and elsewhere shot his herd of gazelles and ate them themselves); and, when in
need of someplace to set up an American embassy, the newly arrived occupation officials chose — are you
surprised? — one of his former dream palaces. They found nothing strange in the symbolism of this (though
it was carefully noted by Baghdadis), even as they swore they were bringing liberation and democracy to
Saddam’s benighted land.
And this is more confirmation of the behaviour:
According to Harper’s Magazine, April 22, 2003:
Marines stationed outside Tikrit were eating fresh gazelle from Saddam Hussein’s personal hunting preserve. For fear
that gunshots in the woods might be mistaken for enemy fire,
“We hunted them with rocks, as Stone Age as that sounds,” said one soldier. “We gutted them and skinned them and pretty much carried them over our shoulders barbarian-style.”