Shame on WikiLeaks: Framing Lawful Engagement as Anti-American Propaganda (Part One)
The moral responsibility for civilians killed in combat rests solely with the party that makes the combat necessary — in this case, that would be the Mahdi Army who was waging a war of their own against American troops and Iraqi Sunnis alike.
To place the blame on the Americans is to say that the right to destroy those seeking to destroy you is negated by the presence of any “innocent civilians”. Such a notion would grant to evil an unlimited license to kill — all it has to do is keep “human shields” mixed in with its members and it is safe from any retaliation.
This is not to say that American soldiers should kill civilians gratuitously — they should not, and efforts should be made to keep civilian casualties as low as the circumstances permit. But that does not mean the Mahdi army has the right to run wild on a killing spree simply because they keep “innocent civilians” close by.
The Mahdi army — not America’s troops — bears the moral blame for this.
