Actually, that title is a bit of a misnomer as there was no actual confirmation that Marines killed children, but we do know that US Marines in Iraq fired on them. Here's why, Iraqis, in their desperation to fight back the American onslaught have done what many people call the unthinkable, they armed children. What's even more unthinkable is that Marines, once they discovered who the enemy combatant was, kept on firing "defending themselves". Here's a direct quote from a North Carolina ABC affilliate's website on what happened in the Iraqi city of Nasiriyah:Garvin said the Marines had faced the first wave of the attack by the Iraqi troops. During the fighting, Iraqi soldiers used women as shields and gave weapons to children. "Unfortunately some of the children have been firing at our Marines and our Marines have been forced to defend themselves," he said.
Two British soldiers have been sent home from the Gulf for refusing to fight in a war involving the deaths of civilians, according to a solicitor who advises troops.
Check out the ABC 11 article on Marines firing on Iraqi armed children here.
Read the article on the British soldiers refusing to fight here.
If either of the links have gone bad, check out page 2...
From WTVD, ABC Affilliate in Raleigh, North Carolina:
ABC 11 Exclusive: Camp Lejeune Marines Wounded in Nasiriyah Fighting
ABC 11's Keith Garvin reports at least 25 Marines from Camp Lejeune were wounded during urban combat in the city of Nasiriyah.
"We are just now hearing our first missile launches and explosions for the first time in the last two hours or so," Garvin reported just after 2:00 a.m. Thursday in Baghdad (6:00pm ET Wednesday). "Camp Lejeune Marines outside the city of An Nasiriyah began a battle about six hours ago after commanders learned about 2,000 Iraqi troops were advancing toward the camp."
Garvin spoke live over the phone as explosions were heard in the background. "We have some civilians who live behind us, where the camp is set up, and the commanders noticed some suspicious activity. They had begun digging bunkers, and when the commanders asked why they were doing that, they said that they had heard or felt that something bad was going to happen tonight." Garvin said that after commanders check with intelligence and reconnaissance crews, they learned of the Iraqi plan to attack.
Garvin says he and photographer Dave Anderson were called in to a briefing by Lt. Col. Tom Gobin around 9:00 p.m. Wednesday Baghdad time. "He told us about the plot, he told us that there would be a number of artillery units supporting us, and they thought that we would be able to quell this uprising, and as he was telling us that, shots just rang out of nowhere," Garvin said.
Explosions continued as Garvin spoke. "I hope you all can hear this because it's really quite powerful," Garvin said. "You can feel these blasts, which I believe are only about five or six miles away, you can feel them all the way into your stomach. They picked up about 20 minutes ago after not seeing any activity for about the past two hours or so, which could tell us that these troops which were laying low may be trying to advance on this camp again."
"Camp Lejeune Marines who are out in the field engaged in house-to-house combat defended their terrority as well as they could," Garvin said. "Unfortunately, we have gotten an update and there appears to be at least 25 Camp Lejeune Marines who have been wounded in the battle inside An Nasiriyah. Also, about 15 Iraqi nationals; we don't know if they are soldiers or civilians, but they have been brought to this medical facility. The problem is, there's no moon out, it's also been very overcast all day, so the Army, which is responsible for evacuating wounded soldiers and wounded enemy prisoners of war out, they have not been able to fly, so the medical staff has been forced to take the wounded to larger facilities by ground. They've had to place them in ambulances and they haven't been able to get them out as quickly as possible."
Garvin later reported at 11:00pm ET that none of the wounded Marines had died, that they had left his camp and "looked pretty good" when they left.
Garvin said the Marines had faced the first wave of the attack by the Iraqi troops. During the fighting, Iraqi soldiers used women as shields and gave weapons to children. "Unfortunately some of the children have been firing at our Marines and our Marines have been forced to defend themselves," he said.
Garvin also said the fighting was intense enough that Marines called for help. "They were inside the city fighting and they were almost being overrun. They called in for some artillery." Garvin reported "a good two hours" of missile launches and artillery firing took place.
Online producer: Shaun Chavis Benchi
Last Updated: Mar 26, 2003
From Yahoo UK News:
UK soldiers sent home from Iraq 'for refusing to fight'
Two British soldiers have been sent home from the Gulf for refusing to fight in a war involving the deaths of civilians, according to a solicitor who advises troops.
Justin Hugheston-Roberts says the soldiers from 16 Air Assault Brigade, based in Colchester, Essex, told their commanding officers they would not take part in the military action.
Mr Hugheston-Roberts, chairman of Forces Law, said they could be thrown out of the Army or have to face a court martial. It is understood they are a private and an air technician.
Mr Hugheston-Roberts said his organisation, which links service personnel with specialist solicitors across the country, had been approached by a number of people serving in the current conflict.
He said: "We had a number of enquiries from services personnel saying we want to leave now. I am acting for a client who was returned from theatre a matter of a couple of weeks ago.
"In previous conflicts we have had all personnel from all aspects of the military contact the network and find out how they can get out of the services. Normally this is just prior to the conflict."
He said he could not comment further on his client who has been returned from the Gulf, but said the case was "completely dissimilar" to that of the two soldiers.
A spokeswoman from the Ministry of Defence said: "We have no evidence that anybody has been sent back for refusing to fight.
"We do get soldiers sent back all the time from theatre for various reasons such as medical, welfare and disciplinary things that need to be dealt with back in the units."
Personnel serving in the Gulf from 16 Air Assault Brigade include 3rd Battalion The Parachute Regiment, 216 Signal Squadron and 16 Close Support Medical Regiment.
Seen here in a picture taken in 1980, Saddam Hussein, yes THAT Saddam Hussein travelled to the US for undisclosed reasons back when he was the US Government's middle eastern darling. According to an article at WNDU.com, he met with Father Jacob Yasso who explained to Saddam that his church was in debt for $170,000. Saddam simply replied that he would cover that debt. According to this same article, Hussein went on to donate more money to several churches in the area. 
ThePete, here... Well, sorry this is so minimal. I've got almost two hours of footage to get through and a lot of capping. I did cap the final excitement for the afternoon. At approximately 6:15pm, LAPD in riot gear decided to clear us out of our little protest section and began running after us. I'm not sure how serious they were about arresting us, but I didn't stick around to find out. Check out the below Real Media clip to see why I won't be getting any cinematography awards...
Hi, ThePete here... When I'm not posting articles here, I am busy with the rest of my web site. One of the things I do is shoot a weekly show called "The 5 Minute Show". Most of the episodes are dumb fun, but the last four have been much more serious and feature footage I shot at the big anti-war rally in Hollywood back on February 15. Please check out the episodes - hey, they're only five minutes a pop - and I've got more footage on the way. I shot stuff on the 20th and I plan on being at the protest within a block from the Oscars on the 23rd, as well. I'll be posting clips as I can cut them together. There's been so much going on, it's been very difficult to work out what to write about. 
All links here are streaming Real Media, but you can download them or Quicktime versions by checking out 
