Man, pretty ugly subject, but here goes.

It's definately wrong what those soldiers did, that day. Definately not the end of it either.

With that aside, I can't entirely blame them for what happened. War must be hell, I've never been there, but plenty of folks in my family have been through WWII, Korea, Vietnam, Gulf 1 and I have never heard anyone ever claim war was a good thing, no matter what the end was. I also have a friend who worked for a military contractor over there, and they have some of the same horrible stories that I heard about Vietnam, a striking parallel to Vietnam. We train our soldiers to be the world's most effective killers in battle, then expect them to differentiate between civilians and unidentified militia, and then to come home after the killing ends and live a "normal" life. I feel for the men who are put in this position, but at the same time our administration over extends them, doesn't support them on many levels and then all the while pretend that they have all they need and the cause is justified. I don't think our soldiers are monsters, but certainly affected and somewhat forgotten about by the powers that brought them there to begin with. It'll be interesting when they return to the US and try to re-integrate themelves into society. Definately more to come,that's an under-statement, I think we'll be seeing some atrocities for years to come, abroad and at home.