Iraq was the wrong war at the wrong time...

[Nightshade]

For many, this war came too late:

BAGHDAD, Iraq â?? The images were shocking.

A trench with piles of clothed bodies packed tightly together. Men, women, little children. Even unborn children. Some blindfolded. Some with their hands bound. All slaughtered in cold blood by the henchmen of former Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein (search).

All of this horror was discovered in another mass grave in the desert wasteland of northwestern Iraq, near the town of Hatra. It was discovered a year ago, and only now is it being carefully and scientifically excavated by the Regime Crimes Liaison Office (search). This agency, part of the U.S. Justice Department, is working with the Iraqi interim government to map out the horrors of the Hussein past.

The head of the unit, Greg Kehoe, who has seen more than his share of horrors in places such as the Balkans, couldnâ??t believe what he saw.

"Iâ??ve never seen women and children executed, defenseless people executed in this fashion," he said. "I mean, you look at a young woman holding her 2-year-old child with a gunshot wound to the back of the head. I canâ??t find any reason to justify that."

When I saw the images I could only think back to Hilla, a town south of Baghdad where I went in the spring of 2003, just after the fall of Saddam. A mass grave of Iraqi Shiites was discovered there.

I will never forget it for as long as I live. Thousands of bodies. Thousands of families swarming over piles of clothing and flesh. Earth-moving equipment digging through the raw humanity. Digging up the past.

Some of these people were opponents of the regime, gunned down after an uprising against Saddam in 1991 and then dumped in big trenches. Women and civilians were also among the victims.

Beyond the visual impression, though, it is the smell that I will never forget. The bodies had been underground for over 10 years, but you could still feel the rot of the past. The remainder and reminder of life, snuffed out by a horrendous regime.

The scene was pure chaos. People were running from pile to pile, looking for loved ones long lost. With so much emotion built up you could imagine and understand why no one was carefully going about the business of sorting through the human debris.

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,135652,00.html

[Flabby Chick]

Yep, saw this on the BeeB. Nuff said really.