McGrath:
    Does this mean that the British Army brass have learned their lesson from the Amritsar affair (colonial India)? If memory serves, the commanding officer of the detachment that dispatched a huge number of unarmed men, women and children was reported to have told the hearing officer that the reason he didn't use his machine gun (which was mounted on a truck) was that he couldn't fit it through the passsageway into the courtyard of the temple.

   Military forces are trained to respond instantly to immediate, deadly threats against the unit. It is much more of a questionable situation when there is time for reflection and reasoned decisionmaking before firing back. I wonder . . .