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Killing of innocents and military coverups
Jragghen
Registered User regular
Registered User regular
So, as some of you might be aware because there was a bit of a row about it a week or two ago, wikileaks apparently decrypted some video of soldiers knowingly shooting innocents in Iraq, which was subsequently covered up - folks who run wikileaks were claiming they were being followed by the FBI, among other things. At any rate, the video was released this morning.
WARNING - Video is unedited gun cam footage. There will be people dying in this video.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=is9sxRfU-ik
I have not watched it in its entirety myself. According to the various reddit threads, people who were trying to recover the bodies of people had been shot were also killed, among those who were shot were some Reuters employees.
Additionally, the NYT this morning had an article where the US military admits to attempting to cover up involvement in the deaths of three Afghan women, up to and including going through the bodies to remove any bullets.
Reddit's going nuts this morning with the top four threads right now all being on the topic. Further details and links to other items/the original source of the video/etc can be found in those threads:
http://www.reddit.com/r/politics/comments/bmonp/wikileaks_video_out_classified_us_military_video/
http://www.reddit.com/r/worldnews/comments/bmnlm/wikileaks_video_showing_murder_of_iraqi_civilians/
http://www.reddit.com/r/WTF/comments/bmooi/wikileaks_video_just_got_released_its_titled/
http://www.reddit.com/r/reddit.com/comments/bmn6r/wikileaks_reveals_video_showing_purpoted_murder/
Now, obviously in the discussion over there there's a lot of hyperbole and jumping to conclusions - I've not watched the aforementioned video in its entirety myself, nor do I know how wikileaks determined anyone in the video was a Reuters employee (or otherwise innocent, although the portion of the video I watched gave me flashbacks to the helicopter portion of Full Metal Jacket). Reuters themselves have nothing posted about it yet.
So the question is, assuming the accusations are accurate, what sort of action should be taken, and against what individuals/party? And how widespread and commonplace might situations like this be?
WARNING - Video is unedited gun cam footage. There will be people dying in this video.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=is9sxRfU-ik
I have not watched it in its entirety myself. According to the various reddit threads, people who were trying to recover the bodies of people had been shot were also killed, among those who were shot were some Reuters employees.
Additionally, the NYT this morning had an article where the US military admits to attempting to cover up involvement in the deaths of three Afghan women, up to and including going through the bodies to remove any bullets.
Reddit's going nuts this morning with the top four threads right now all being on the topic. Further details and links to other items/the original source of the video/etc can be found in those threads:
http://www.reddit.com/r/politics/comments/bmonp/wikileaks_video_out_classified_us_military_video/
http://www.reddit.com/r/worldnews/comments/bmnlm/wikileaks_video_showing_murder_of_iraqi_civilians/
http://www.reddit.com/r/WTF/comments/bmooi/wikileaks_video_just_got_released_its_titled/
http://www.reddit.com/r/reddit.com/comments/bmn6r/wikileaks_reveals_video_showing_purpoted_murder/
Now, obviously in the discussion over there there's a lot of hyperbole and jumping to conclusions - I've not watched the aforementioned video in its entirety myself, nor do I know how wikileaks determined anyone in the video was a Reuters employee (or otherwise innocent, although the portion of the video I watched gave me flashbacks to the helicopter portion of Full Metal Jacket). Reuters themselves have nothing posted about it yet.
So the question is, assuming the accusations are accurate, what sort of action should be taken, and against what individuals/party? And how widespread and commonplace might situations like this be?
Jragghen on
Posts
So a van pulls up between a gun fight between...someone and the Millitary and then the people in the van got shot, right?
You're also looking at the image, blown up, in a non-stressful situation where you can take the time to look at details.
No, from what I saw, two reporters with cameras were walking with a group of people, possibly insurgents. One of the guys in the back had an AK47, another had an RPG.
The reporters' cameras and bags were misidentified as weapons, escalating the situation from an apparent one AK, one RPG to 5-6 armed insurgents. The group of guys including the two reporters stand around, not aiming at the apache or threatening anyone, weapons at rest. The apache swings around, mows down the whole crowd. The people scatter. The apache gunner picks off everyone he can. In a bit, a van pulls up and they try to drag one of the injured reporters inside to get him medical attention. They apache lights up the van, killing the reporter and a few people trying to help. They also wound two children in the van. Eventually ground troops roll in.
You can just check out the video and make up your own mind about exactly what went down.
Apache IDs group as insurgents, they get approval to engage. They engage.
They keep observation on the area as ground troops are en route. Before ground troops arrive a van pulls up and starts collecting the bodies. They request clearance to engage the van, they are approved, they engage the van.
I believe all this happens after ground troops had called in Air support after trading fire with insurgents.
Until we get a confirmed story that isn't speculation, that is what we have to go on. Even the BBC article just says that two reporters died that day -- it doesn't say that this engagement was their death.
Also, combat zone journalism is very very very very very dangerous.
This neo-feudalism would be more tolerable if our betters had fancy titles.
my broadband is throtled and i share an internet conection with four other people....
If I use up all the data for the day watching this video, I'll be the one getting massacered.
I agree gunning down people who are just trying to help is fucked up. Did you that Medics dont wear insignia anymore because Al Queda targets them specificaly? Yeah, ask Res about it.
However, there was no way of knowing they were "Just trying to help". Alot of time in war, you have to assume everyone can and will kill you.
no....
There are lots of people walking in different clusters, a couple (out of many!) of which look like they are holding ak47s, and the guys in the chopper get permission to fire.
some people think there was a civilian holding a camera, others claim it's an insurgent with an rpg. The body found was a journalist who typically goes around carrying a camera not an rpg....
but by the time the gunner gets permission to fire they've lost sight of some of the supposed insurgents behind a building so he prepares to fire as soon as they come into sight.
I pointed out that the people in his sights when he comes around about to fire do not appear to be carrying RPG's or weapons of any kind as far as I can see and I've gotten no reply.
the chopper gunner opens fire and kills/injures 8 people.
A few minutes after he opens fire and kills/injures them a black van (not photographers) pulls up by one of the injured and pulls him into the van. The gunner proceeds to fire on the van. Then ground military units find children in the van....
Honestly, I find it highly unlikely an entire war could go on without things like this happening, it's almost unavoidable, and I'm willing to cut the military some slack because shit happens, but I don't appreciate cover ups.
They didn't fire on people who were taking position to ambush their convoy, they fired on people who just happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time because their gunner is a trigger happy nut.
War is probably the most horrible thing on the planet, people die. Innocents die. There is no way to keep things like this from happening.
If there was a real cover-up I find that more apprehensible then the event itself.
This neo-feudalism would be more tolerable if our betters had fancy titles.
Like was already said, that's the problem with being the good guys, you can't just open fire on every group of people.
If you want to stop some of it, you have to stop all of it. No inbetweens when it comes to the value of life.
No, they spotted 2 individuals with weapons on a street (AK and RPG), lost sight of them behind a building, spotted another individual peeking around a corner of the same building holding a tube like object (the picture Donkey Kong posted) which they assume is an RPG, they prepare to fire on the guy at the corner and when they swing around to see behind the building they see a large group (including people dressed very similarly to those 2 seen with the weapons) gathered around the guy on the corner and open fire. The tube like object the guy was holding seems to be a camera with telephoto lens. None of the others in the group appear to be holding weapons, including a second cameraman. Later, they spot one person still alive crawling on the sidewalk, a van pulls up and some people get out and pick the wounded guy up and put him into the van. The gunner receives permission to engage and fires on the van.
It also sounded like these weren't even the targets they were originally called in for. They guys on the ground are saying that they are being fired on from the rooftops and everyone they hit was on the street.
I think that's the pilot and the gunner talking to one another
Watched the whole thing, there is nothing really shady about the engagement. Tragic and unfortunate, possibly (without more info it's impossible to ascertain the identity of the killed), but nothing unexpected. A team positively identified by the pilots as having weapons in the direct vicinity of a recent small arms fire attack on a US patrol are engaged after permission is granted by higher. The talk between the gunship crew displays that they are taking rules of engagement in to account (waiting for the injured individual to pick up a weapon) but with out context we can't tell if they were followed exactly. The injured child was evacuated for medical care, so there is no complete disregard for human live or specific targeting of civilians. My biggest concern was the individual who was walking in front of the safe house at the end, right before the first Hellfire struck. It is unclear what his role is or if he was part of the group inside the structure.
True.
And as if talking to the wounded guy trying to crawl away, "Come on buddy, just need to reach for a weapon"
Ah yes, baiting. That caused some noise as well.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wgNInWQI-qU
Well that's absolutely disgusting. But the chopper gunner was talking to himself in the vid, not addressing anyone on the ground, and any weapons on-scene would presumably not have been planted between the initial engagement and the time the van showed up.
????
Unrelated: as far as picking apart grainy images goes, someone else made this picking out who they thought the photographers were. I'm not saying this is accurate but if the rest of you are going to pick around the footage you could check against this as well to see if you think it's right.
Additionally: MSNBC began censoring "wikileaks" in their search results within the last few hours. Search for wikileaks there and you'll get
Same thing with the Van. No idea who those people are, no idea whether or not it's civilian bystanders or if it's terrorists reclaiming the bodies and weapons.
The idea of "indiscriminate slaying" is a load of shit considering what we do know.
What makes you think the military doesn't care about its repuation? They have PR personnel (though they aren't called that because technically government offices aren't supposed to have PR.)
what kind of threat was an unarmed injured man crawling to safety to the helicopter exactly?
They were operating under the idea that they were engaging insurgents.
No threat to the heli, but the heli is there to protect the convoy.
That and considering that the insurgents regularly use guerrilla/ambush tactics...
I'm not saying they don't care, it's just the response to the wikileaks people is more around the vulnerability of classified information rather than public image. There's much worse out there that hasn't achieved this kind of scrutiny. AC130 videos for example where you cant even see faces of people and they basically chase one guy around for a minute trying to lead him properly after he escapes 3-4 misses. It's war, and I'm pretty sure they're more worried about more videos showing how they operate being out there than footage of some people getting shot up.
You live in a world where firing on a van when you don't have any idea if it's enemy combatants or civilian bystanders ISN'T "indiscriminate"? That's the very definition of indisriminate - you're admiting you don't know, and then firing anyway because you don't give a shit.
Again, this is what war is. It happens, and we shouldn't pretend it doesn't. We ALSO shouldn't pretend it isn't arbitrary, senseless, and a fucking atrocity, and we should only put our forces into a situation where this will occur if we absolutely have to.
So if you're protecting a convoy and you're called in to shoot insurgents you can use that to justify shooting any and everyone disregarding the fact that the people you're shooting are obviously not the ones you were called in for or posing a credible thread at the time you pulled the trigger?
Seriously, go to 3:13 in the video, look at the people when he comes around the corner. Are they carrying weapons? Are they preparing to ambush a convoy? No! Because who the F*ck stands in the middle of the road without any weapons in their hands to ambush a convoy?
The chopper was obviously not in any danger and the convoy was still a couple minutes away. The people visible were at no time threatening in any way. The gunner wanted to fire his gun, so instead of looking at what was in front of him when he came around the corner he immediately opened fire.
That's almost the definition of a trigger happy nut and if he doesn't like the label maybe he should use his brain instead of just repeatedly begging for permission to shoot and shooting at every possible opportunity.
They weren't blocking a news story, they were blocking a criminal investigation in to the death of a journalist. This kind of data should have been available for that purpose under the freedom of information act as far as I know.
It wasn't until it got leaked that it became a news story, and rightly so.
Is it illegal to carry a weapon around in iraq? Are people licensed to carry weapons around such as body guards. If it is not illegal or if they license people to carry weapons then they had no reason to shoot other than there were gun shots in the area.
No, I am not really communist. Yes, it is weird that I use this name.
So if youre flying in a vehicle that can be destroyed by an RPG you should pull out and be in a fully visible and therefore targetable position before you fire one someone who you're pretty sure had an RPG?
Instant military tactical geniuses that are fully cognizant of the mental processes of soldiers in wartime seem to come out in droves around situations like this.
What's going on here? The error doesn't appear when searching for other things, but searching for wikileaks still returns article results. Are they trying to hide something specific?
You do realize you are being a hypocrite of the "instant military tactical genius" variety with your analysis.
Edit: If you are going to call people out for trying to analyze a military situation you probably shouldn't do it right before calling them out.
No, I am not really communist. Yes, it is weird that I use this name.
Shouldnt they tell the military they are going to be in that area filming? They ask at the start of the video if there is any friendlies in that sector.