Four former Blackwater security contractors (mercenaries employed by the U.S. government) have been sentenced for shooting Iraqi civilians in 2007. One received life in prison and the other three received 30 year sentences. I have mixed feelings about this. Prosecutors called what happened an “atrocity.” The whole war in Iraq was an atrocity. Why just punish Blackwater guards? U.S. soldiers did the same things. Why not punish them? And don’t forget George W. Bush, Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, military leaders, and the members of Congress who voted to fund the war over and over again. They are all guilty of having a hand in the atrocity that was Iraq. If this incident in Iraq in 2007 had not been made public, the U.S. government wouldn’t be doing a thing about it. The government has no conscience about killing civilians.

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