True, I think it was a bad thing, a terrible thing, that soldiers from Vietnam were treated in such a way. Australia was the "other" nation in that war, and the soldiers were abused or ignored for a long time afterwards. Why? Because the war was wrong, fought for all the long reasons, in the wrong way. IS that the fault of the soldier? No, but rather their governments, unless it was the soldier who did something atrocious- such as the massacre of a village. It is these acts that inadvertently tarnish all soldiers. It is unacceptable for people to say "War - accidents happen" in any circumstance. No it happens doesn't mean one has to accept it. It is even worse when people decide to ignore it completely. It is not disrespectful to want a person guilty of a crime to go to jail. Nor is it unpatriotic to want ones soldiers to uphold what a nation says it stands for. I say if a soldier betrays his nation by acting in a way that is both morally and criminally wrong, then he is far from deserving. And as to a previous post - yes, civilians die in wars, a terrible fact, still, it is slightly different to set out to kill innocents on purpose then them dieing accidentally. Yes, Sept 11 was terrible, but it had nothing at all to do with Iraq. If truth be known the majority of the hijackers came from Saudi Arabia, which is an American ally. Iraq had no reason to happen, it was not a threat to the US, or its neighbours, in fact on most political scales Israel and Iran are far more dangerous. And once again I emphasise, the articles to do with this claim do not say that the US soldiers had any excuse to kill the people in question. They were not, apparently, threatening the soldiers, it was said the soldiers willfully killed people they knew they had no reason to kill. This is a crime that can not be explained away with ease, and nor should it.