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Wednesday, September 21, 2005

No Skin Off My Nose

Wow! I missed this item.
A Chinese cosmetics company is using skin harvested from the corpses of executed convicts to develop beauty products for sale in Europe, an investigation by the Guardian has discovered.

[...]
Steve has the story, excerpt at The Word Unheard , full story at Blue State Conservatives. He examines this practice, and others, equating them with the Nazis harvesting gold fillings, organs, and skin (for lampshades!) from executed Jews during World War II, making a case that China is a Moral Adversary to the United States. A must read.

In an update, he adds excerpts from the testimony of Wang Guoqi, a former doctor at a PLA hospital, before a House subcommittee hearing on renewal of normal trade relations with China in 2001:
[...]

My involvement in harvesting the skin from prisoners began while performing research on cadavers at the Beijing People's Liberation Army Surgeons Advanced Studies School, in Beijing's 304th Hospital. This hospital is directly subordinate to the PLA, and so connections between doctors and officers were very close. In order to secure a corpse from the execution grounds, security officers and court units were given "red envelopes" with cash amounting to anywhere between 200-500 RMB per corpse. Then, after execution, the body would be rushed to the autopsy room rather than the crematorium, and we would extract skin, kidneys, livers, bones, and corneas for research and experimental purposes. I learned the process of preserving human skin and tissue for burn victims, and skin was subsequently sold to needy burn victims for 10 RMB per square centimeter.

After completing my studies in Beijing, and returning to Tianjin's Paramilitary Police General Brigade Hospital, I assisted hospital directors Liu Lingfeng and Song Heping in acquiring the necessary equipment to build China's first skin and tissue storehouse. Soon afterward, I established close ties with Section Chief Xing, a criminal investigator of the Tianjin Higher People's Court.

Acquiring skin from executed prisoners usually took place around major holidays or during the government's Strike Hard campaigns, when prisoners would be executed in groups. Section Chief Xing would notify us of upcoming executions. We would put an order in for the number of corpses we'd like to dissect, and I would give him 300 RMB per cadaver. The money exchange took place at the Higher People's Court, and no receipts or evidence of the transaction would be exchanged.

Once notified of an execution, our section would prepare all necessary equipment and arrive at the Beicang Crematorium in plain clothes with all official license plates on our vehicles replaced with civilian ones. This was done on orders of the criminal investigation section. Before removing the skin, we would cut off the ropes that bound the criminals' hands and remove their clothing. Each criminal had identification papers in his or her pocket that detailed the executee's name, age, profession, work unit, address, and crime. Nowhere on these papers was there any mention of voluntary organ donation, and clearly the prisoners did not know how their bodies would be used after death.

We had to work quickly in the crematorium, and 10-20 minutes were generally enough to remove all skin from a corpse. Whatever remained was passed over to the crematorium workers. Between five and eight times a year, the hospital would send a number of teams to execution sites to harvest skin. Each team could process up to four corpes, and they would take as much as was demanded by both our hospital and fraternal hospitals. Because this system allowed us to treat so many burn victims, our department became the most reputable and profitable department in Tianjin.

[...]
Doesn't sound like the type of people we would want to do business with, as was quickly pointed out by most of his commenters.

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Tuesday, September 20, 2005

What is an undercover soldier? (Updated)

* * * Update * * *

The picture is becoming a little clearer...

Two UK servicemen are back with British forces after troops staged a dramatic rescue mission at an Iraqi jail.

Basra governor, Mohammed al-Waili, said British soldiers used more than 10 tanks and helicopters to break down the walls and free the pair, thought to be special forces officers.

He said they had been arrested for allegedly shooting dead a local policeman and wounding another.

[...]
Starting to make more sense now. The rescue operation sounds like something the Brits would do, also. However, if you read the article, the police moving the officers from a jail to a house sounds fishy. If I remember correctly, Stephen Vincent made some interesting observations about the local Basra police forces in his In The Red Zone blog, before he was murdered.


* * * Original Post 7:49PM 09/19/05 * * * * *

Thanks to the fine Nashville Is Talking blog, we get a link to this story:

BASRA, Iraq (Reuters) - Violence erupted in Basra on Monday after Iraqi authorities said they had detained two British undercover soldiers in the southern city for firing on Iraqi police.

[...]
Go read the whole thing, then answer me this...

What is an undercover soldier?

A soldier, out of uniform and conducting operations, British or otherwise, is... a SPY! Subject to summary execution.

So these two blokes were driving along in a civilian car (nothing wrong with that, soldier or no), in civilian clothes (Tommie, contractor, spy, or what?), and get into a gun battle with an Iraqi Police patrol. And get captured! And taken to jail.

That story in itself is enough to make you ask 'What is wrong with this picture?' But wait, there's more, from this Reuters story:
BASRA, Iraq (Reuters) - British tanks smashed the walls of an Iraqi prison to free two undercover British soldiers seized earlier on Monday by Iraqi forces, an Interior Ministry official said.
The official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said half a dozen tanks had crushed the walls of the jail in the southern city of Basra and British troops then freed the soldiers. The governor of Basra confirmed the jail had been broken into

[...]
It's going to be interesting to see what really happened in Basra.

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Ready And Forward (Updated)


Retired 1st Sgt. Mark Matthews, 111, one of the last of the nation's legendary Buffalo Soldiers, died of pneumonia Sept. 6 at Fox Chase Nursing Home in Washington.

Sgt. Matthews, who also was the oldest Buffalo Soldier, was heir to a proud military heritage that originated with the black soldiers who fought in the Indian wars on the Western frontier. Historians say that the Cheyenne, Kiowa and Apache tribes bestowed the appellation because the soldiers' black, curly hair reminded them of a buffalo's mane.

[...]
sgt_matthews.jpg
One of 1st Sgt. Mark Matthews's duties was assisting the 1916 search for Pancho Villa in Mexico. (Family Photo)
(Credits: Original link - Free Republic, Story, image and caption text - Washington Post)

I particularly liked this quote from the WaPo article: "I did it all," Sgt. Matthews told The Washington Post a few years ago. "Yes, I was there."


Some history of the Buffalo Soldiers, the 9th and 10th Cavalry Regiments, here re-posted. These, and more recent segregated military units served with distinction up through World War II.

CharlesHall.jpgThe 99th Pursuit Squadron is well known, from the HBO film The Tuskogee Airmen.

On July 21, 1943, Charles B. Hall became the first black fighter pilot to down an enemy aircraft. (image credit)







historyb.jpg


Less well-remembered is the 761st Tank Battalion,
(image credit)


essaygroupfront.GIF


the USS Mason,
(image credit)







PC-1264.gif



and the USS PC1264.
(image credit)




To paraphrase Sgt. Matthews... They did it all, they were there.

* * * Original Post * * * * * *

From the Booker Rising blog comes a link to the St. Petersburg Times article about a reunion of Buffalo Soldiers. This reunion was for members and decendants of members of the all-black Army units during the period when these units were segregated.

[...] They were named by Cheyenne warriors in 1867 because they fought with the ferocity of a cornered buffalo. The nickname carried through the years, and members of the 9th & 10th (Horse) Cavalry Association have accepted it proudly. [...]
And proud they should be, fighting both for the United States, and against segregation and racism. Although no longer all-black units, the 9th and 10th still serve with distinction in Iraq today. I salute them all.

For those interested, here is some history of the units.

On June 28, 1866, an Act of Congress authorized the creation of six regiments of Black troops, two of cavalry and four of infantry. These troops went on to play a major role in the history of the West, as the "Buffalo Soldiers."


ninth.jpg(Image and Text Credits: The Buffalo Soldiers)

On September 21, 1866, the 9th Cavalry Regiment was activated at Greenville, Louisiana under command of Colonel Edward Hatch.

WE CAN! WE WILL!

tenth.jpg

and the 10th Cavalry Regiment at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas under command of Colonel Benjamin Grierson.


And it turns out that the Buffalo Soldiers were unknowingly ahead of their time, as among their ranks was a female soldier. Read the story of Cathay Williams.

(Trackback to Mudville Gazette)

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Monday, September 19, 2005

What is an undercover soldier?

Thanks to the fine Nashville Is Talking blog, we get a link to this story:
BASRA, Iraq (Reuters) - Violence erupted in Basra on Monday after Iraqi authorities said they had detained two British undercover soldiers in the southern city for firing on Iraqi police.

[...]
Go read the whole thing, then answer me this...

What is an undercover soldier?

A soldier, out of uniform and conducting operations, British or otherwise, is... a SPY! Subject to summary execution.

So these two blokes were driving along in a civilian car (nothing wrong with that, soldier or no), in civilian clothes (Tommie, contractor, spy, or what?), and get into a gun battle with an Iraqi Police patrol. And get captured! And taken to jail.

That story in itself is enough to make you ask 'What is wrong with this picture?' But wait, there's more, from this Reuters story:
BASRA, Iraq (Reuters) - British tanks smashed the walls of an Iraqi prison to free two undercover British soldiers seized earlier on Monday by Iraqi forces, an Interior Ministry official said.
The official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said half a dozen tanks had crushed the walls of the jail in the southern city of Basra and British troops then freed the soldiers. The governor of Basra confirmed the jail had been broken into

[...]
It's going to be interesting to see what really happened in Basra.

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Hello?

Many apologies to my loyal readers out there (all three of you!). Due to other commitments, postings have been few and far between the past couple of weeks.

One commitment, gainful employment, continues to elude me. The bright side of that is that I have more time to spend reading all of the wonderful blogs out there. One the other hand... no paycheck!

The other major commitment is to finish repairing/painting my house. By tomorrow evening I should be down to one final task... painting the window trim. Heh, I always seem to save the hardest, most tedious part for last.

Anyway, I've got a couple of posts on the burner... maybe soon. Be patient.

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