An article in the recent issue of The Economist shows the widespread use of rape in armed conflict. What it also displays is just how overlooked these incidents of rape are. The fact is, rape is a common form of terrorism used against poor populations by tyrannical governments and invading forces.
The article tells of various incidents of rape throughout history. Such as ancient Rome, Soviet retaliation against Nazi Germany, while ignoring American and British rapes of course) and ones committed by Moroccan regulares in Spain’s civil war.
As the reporting of rape has improved, we are now more aware of how common rapes in war time are. It was during the Bosnian war that the world began to see that rape was used as a weapon. It however took the UN Security Council until 2008 to acknowledge that rape “has been used as a tool of war”.
A position in the article caused me to look twice and shake my head at this journal of elite opinion. The article claimed that in the un-civilized world is where the rapes take place. It also underhandedly claimed that rapes are committed by “ill-disciplined private armies and militias”.
The following statement shows how the article tires to bury the known rapes caused by imperialist armies:
“At least in theory, the Geneva Conventions, governing the treatment of civilians in war, are respected by politicians and generals in decent states.”
In the same paragraph it passes blame for rapes onto the “private armies and militias”:
“But in many parts of the world, in the Hebbesian anarchy irregular war, with ill-disciplined private armies or militias, these norms carry little weight.”
This is clearly an attempt to gloss over the long history of rapes used by Western imperialist armies. This is much like the current position of the US government on Global Warming; pass the buck onto the third world.
The fact is, rapes are a common tool used by Western imperialist powers. In the US military alone there have been thousands of documented cases of US soldiers raping Iraqi women. Both men and women were raped in Abu Graib prison and in Guantanamo Bay. These incidents are buried quickly as possible and the people who bring them to the mainstream media are declared un-American.
A Filipino woman the media named “Nicole” was gang raped by Daniel Smith, a US soldiers, in Subic Bay Freeport in late 2005. Of course as usual, the Visiting Forces Agreement kept him and all other crimes committed by US soldiers the Philippines from being prosecuted.
On April 19th, 2009 a US marine raped a 22 year-old collage student, “Vanessa”, in the Philippines. She met him at a party with her cousin and a friend. He invited her back to his hotel room. But when she saw no one else present, she knew that she had been tricked. He refused to let her leave and violently raped her.
Later she managed to escape with the assistance of the hotel staff. She immediately went to the progressive woman’s rights group Gabriela to collect evidence and for protection. But as usual he too was not prosecuted.
Instead of receiving justice she was forced to accept P100,000 and a US citizenship. All this while a women, Gloria Arroyo, was president of the Philippines.
The US military has no moral ground to stand on. It is a fact by a recent study that two-thirds of all women serving in the US Army have been sexually assaulted by fellow soldiers. Women in the US army have reported that they go to the bathroom at night in pairs in order to protect themselves. It is also a proven statistical proven fact that a woman in the US army has a better chance of being raped by a fellow soldier than being killed in action.
Sexual abuse by men on other men also happens a great deal. They even have a new clinical term for it. MST: military sexual trauma.
If this is how the imperialist army treats its own women, exactly how bad are they treating the women of the occupied countries?
This subtle attempt at blaming the third world for “conflict” rapes is disgusting. this clearly shows the continuing demonizing of the third world, and the continuation of the perception that the first world needs to civilize the 3rd world.
The propaganda does not stop there, not at all. The author of the article even took the time to fraudulently claim that upward of 2 million women were raped by Soviet soldiers. In the same table they also gave stats for the Japanese, Indian, Bosnian, Sierra Leon and Rwanda.
How do I know that the claim of 2 million women were raped by Soviet soldiers is propaganda? By simply taking a look at their source for the claim.
The source of the alleged rapes? Themselves! Right there at the bottom. Source: The Economist.
This is astounding, you can actually quote yourself as a source proving something. Okay, well, I can play that game too. Watch this:
How one responds with equal sources.
The following chart shows what kind of people write for The Economist. The source for this? The Maoist Rebel News.
Interestingly the article never mentions the crimes of any Western powers.
maoistrebelnews.com 
I wouldn’t be surprised if the people acting like that “it’s all the third world’s fault” were rapists themselves. Most people that are far-right tend to be rapists who would rather see women as play things rather than human beings, and these far-right rapists usually include homophobes and tea-party supporters.