posted
Wikileaks has been talking about this cover up of a 2007 US military operation that killed two journalists in Baghdad for almost two weeks. Today they finally released the video and it's pretty bad. Not only are a couple of Reuters guys killed, the US soldiers fire on a minivan trying to assist the wounded. Even worse, the minivan had two kids in it. Probably not work-safe unless you have the sound down.
quote:"There is no question that coalition forces were clearly engaged in combat operations against a hostile force," said military spokesman Lt. Col. Scott Bleichwehl at the time.
But the video appears to confirm the firefight was entirely unprovoked and one-sided.
quote:The Reuters staffers, a respected photojournalist by the name of Namir Noor-Eldeen, and his driver Saeed Chmagh are seen walking down the street with a group of approximately eight other people when the helicopters open fire on them.
When the dust settles, one individual, a driver for Reuters by the name of Saeed Chmagh, can be seen crawling away, wounded. One of the U.S. crewmen can be heard encouraging the wounded man to pick up a weapon so he could shoot him again.
quote:The van was reportedly being driven by a local man taking his children to a tutoring session when he came upon Chmagh crawling across the street.
The driver was duly killed and his two children were shot in the passenger seat.
A U.S. vehicle is then shown driving over a body as the crewmen laugh about it.
The timing is especially bad due to the following as well
quote:After initially denying involvement or any cover-up in the deaths of three Afghan women during a badly bungled American Special Operations assault in February, the American-led military command in Kabul admitted late on Sunday that its forces had, in fact, killed the women during the nighttime raid.
quote:And in what could be a scandalous turn to the investigation, The Times of London reported Sunday night that Afghan investigators also determined that American forces not only killed the women but had also “dug bullets out of their victims’ bodies in the bloody aftermath” and then “washed the wounds with alcohol before lying to their superiors about what happened.”
quote:Originally posted by Blayne Bradley: Ha haha aha hahahaha haha ha haha ha.
This is hilarious.
If by hilarious you mean some definition of the word that an astronomically small fraction of the human race shares.
Posts: 14316 | Registered: Jul 2005
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posted
Yeah. The only way this could be funny at all if there had been something particularly ironic about the coverup, but even that was pretty straightforward. There's nothing hilarious here at all.
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Blayne Bradley
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Firstly that the military has actually been successfully embarrassed by a wiki of all things and apparently tyrant style tried to suppress it is inherently hilarious.
Secondly militaries shooting unarmed civilians for kicks and making bond one liners is also inherently hilarious, made funnier by the Team America World Police doing it.
Thirdly anything in real life that begins to resemble grand theft auto on crack is inherently funny as well.
Whether or not others share my mirth is also what makes this funnier imagining your shocked horrified faces.
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You know Blayne, I don't care if you're serious or not... I'm going to have a hard time listening to anything you say from here on.
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Blayne Bradley
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That probably throws about half of the good dead baby comedy out for you. Not that you really listened to anything I've said previously with any degree of seriousness anyways.
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And I'm certain thats probably a tragedy to someone somewhere who hasn't been completely desensitized to all violence and death so why not find the inherent humor in it?
Although looking back on it I probably should have stopped the post at "Thirdly anything in real life that begins to resemble grand theft auto on crack is inherently funny as well." and left out the fourth line, bad delivery on my part.
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quote:Originally posted by Blayne Bradley: Firstly that the military has actually been successfully embarrassed by a wiki of all things and apparently tyrant style tried to suppress it is inherently hilarious.
Secondly militaries shooting unarmed civilians for kicks and making bond one liners is also inherently hilarious, made funnier by the Team America World Police doing it.
Thirdly anything in real life that begins to resemble grand theft auto on crack is inherently funny as well.
Whether or not others share my mirth is also what makes this funnier imagining your shocked horrified faces.
I guess TV Tropes doesn't have an entry on wikileaks?
quote:And I'm certain thats probably a tragedy to someone somewhere who hasn't been completely desensitized to all violence and death...
This is not a personality trait that will make you well-liked. Perhaps you should see a therapist for it, actually.
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Deaths are sad. Deaths from incompetent military operations are doubly so. The comeuppance of the people who ordered the coverup may, at least, be worthy of a bitter chuckle at the thought of justice being done. A leak, however, is no justice; I will laugh, or at any rate twist my mouth in satisfaction, when I hear of people going to prison.
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posted
The cameras do kinda look like guns from that far up. But shooting up the van was pretty ridiculous.
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Blayne Bradley
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Military personal like pilots in the airforce are trained to accurately determine what sort of blip on the horizon is not only an enemy plane but what type of plane down to the model and variant based on its profile I would be flabbergasted if ground military wasn't given similar training to at least tell a gun apart from a camera.
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Just observations, that may not be welcome here, but whatever:
quote:Originally posted by Mucus:
quote:"There is no question that coalition forces were clearly engaged in combat operations against a hostile force," said military spokesman Lt. Col. Scott Bleichwehl at the time.
But the video appears to confirm the firefight was entirely unprovoked and one-sided.
These two things are not mutually exclusive. When someone calls in close air support, the firefight *is* often unprovoked and one-sided. That is the point of close air support.
I haven't read all the links. I did watch the edited (17 min version) of the video and read the first linked page. I am not aware of the situation, politically or on the ground. I am not an expert, but I am an informed and interested amateur.
The footage appears unusually clear for combat footage. It strikes me as very odd that the people in the video are completely ignoring the helicopters. I wonder if the video came from an RPV... I know RPV operators will change their magnification as happens in the video. I don't know if helicopter gunners have that capability as I'm pretty sure they use their helmet to aim (the gun points where they look)and I don't know where the magnification would be projected.
Assuming the video is legit (I'm sorry, but a site with the URL "collateralmurder.com" inspires about as much confidence as "fakedmoonlanding.com"), the Forward Air Controller or Air Liason Officer explicitly clears the pilots to attack these guys. That makes it a combat operation against a hostile force, whether they shoot back or not.
The question is were these people, in fact, legitimate targets. They do have weapons. In certain circumstances, that may be enough to meet the Rules of Engagement. Wikileaks says they have released the Rules of Engagement for "2006, 2007, and 2008" but I did not see them anywhere and they were not linked in the article. Also, Rules of Engagement tend to be specific things to a mission, though generalized rules are out there as a default. It would not be unusual for the specific mission to have different RoEs from the standard.
As I said, I don't know the situation, this could have been a war crime, a mistake, or an unfortunate bit of collateral damage. I don't see enough to pass judgement here, or even have a comfortable opinion, but it *is* possible, in my inexpert opinion, that everything on the video is legitimate operation, however tragic the outcome.
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To be honest, I'm just tired. This happened in 2007. It's taken three years for the truth to be leaked, and there will never be any sort of justice done that could possibly atone for the mistake.
We invaded Iraq in 2003. Four years later, we were shooting journalists for carrying camera cases and vans for being in the wrong place.
Three years after that, we're still in Iraq. And still shoveling s**t.
I'm actually perfectly willing to accept that the two guns being carried by the escorts did in fact fit the Rules of Engagement, and thus the brutal assault is completely within the rules of warfare. What I am not willing to do is to pretend that something is not "murder" simply because it happens to be arguably legal.
War is ritualized murder. After ten years of it, you'd think we'd have had enough.
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Mistakes do happen, though. I doubt all these individuals were well-rested and operating at 100% under ideal conditions, at the time. That's been pointed out by many people.
There's also some context information missing from the video. What were the conditions in the area where this was recorded? What had happened in the neighborhood, recently, that justified a gunship patrol? If there were ground troops nearby, why didn't they intercept the van? Until someone fills in more of the gaps, I'm left with confused feelings about this.
None of the above should be misconstrued as an apology for events that occurred. Any resemblance between my questions and those of more intelligent people are coincidental. Batteries not included. Some assembly required. Consult your doctor before watching Wikileaks videos or reading Hatrack.
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quote:Originally posted by Jim-Me: Assuming the video is legit (I'm sorry, but a site with the URL "collateralmurder.com" inspires about as much confidence as "fakedmoonlanding.com")
Collateralmurder is directly run by Wikileaks which has been reported by MSM sources running the story.
As for the rest, the details of the engagement matter less to me than the cover-up in this case and in the more recent case of the five murders in Afghanistan. They point the to unreliability of the already disturbingly high civilian death counts which may be much higher once wrongly classified insurgent deaths are fully accounted for.
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The cover-up is more troubling to me, too. It's the sort of thing I'm most draconian on, actually. If it turned out that there was a war crime committed, honestly I would be in favor of those covering it up to receive a worse punishment than the actual offenders themselves.
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Blayne, having some idea how much time you spend in front of a computer from your own posts...you are not remotely desensitized to violence and death, much less all of it. You're desensitized to watching violence and death, perhaps.
Case in point: when was the last time you did violence to another human being, or saw it being done with your own eyes (and heard it with your own ears)?
This is one of those times when your instinctive defensiveness towards group criticism is making you come off quite badly. It's made worse by the fact that it was completely avoidable, and could even now be mitigated quite a bit. But by all means, keep lashing out in defense of finding hilarity in tragic death.
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Blayne Bradley
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Now that's just nitpicking, obviously I meant watching it.
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OK Blayne, follow along with me here. What kind of violence and death is this? TV/Internet violence? Or real violence and death shown on TV?
Just because it's on the Internet does not mean it ought to be treated like a blurb on the Daily Show.
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Blayne Bradley
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Yes it was. Which is easier to believe or more likely that yes I casually have killed people or have been in close proximity (In Canada) to enough killed people to desensitize people or that through average life experience encountered enough of it through visual and non visual media to not care about it?
From this context then yes it is obvious and yes it was nitpicking, no ifs of buts.
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By all means, pull a total malanthrop and narrow your focus to the small aspect you can defend while changing the subject.
Fine, so I was nitpicking. Even though I was nitpicking with the words you actually said, and that nitpicking was done in order to highlight why you got into this little dustup in the first place: that you were treating this violence like it was Internet violence.
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Blayne: You don't owe anybody specifically an apology, but your comments were tactless and offensive by any standard of those words, and I'm saying this as somebody who thinks the universe is big enough for sardonic humor.
The helicopter pilots were in the middle of a war zone, and they made a mistake. In the heat of the moment they probably did what they thought would ensure their safety, and the safety of their comrades on the ground. I'm not surprised they clapped themselves on the back for good shooting and laughed at the APC running over a body. Soldiers for thousands of years have found that one way to deal with killing human beings is to stop thinking about them as human beings with faces, families, or as similar to themselves. They are just the bad guys they have been trained to knock over and forget about. They saw the children being carried away, it stung them, so what did they do, they absolved themselves from the responsibility,
"Shouldn't have brought their kids with them." "That's right."
Those men, women, and possibly children are dead because they found themselves in a circumstance beyond their control. Our military, which may be the very best military in the history of the world, made a mistake. Instead of acting honorably, something that I would expect a class act outfit to do, they lied to newspapers and buried the truth. This is why we even have the Freedom of Information act, this is why after those helicopter operators fired those bullets, ground crews were required to converge on the location, take pictures, and document the scene. In this instance, at least we got the truth, rather than just believing the lie and moving on, as I am sure has been done innumerable times before on battle fields at all times.
It was a powerful video, powerful in that it told a story that needed to break out of the military archive it was relegated to. Of all the things that could have been said about it you elected to just laugh, and then explain your mirth in a most cynical fashion. You had nothing but contempt for the soldiers involved, and the Iraqis were likened to pixels on a video game.
Now some people have chosen to express disappointment, outrage, and even anger at you. In your heart of hearts do you really feel that what you said was perfectly acceptable and that all of us need to just get over ourselves and cut you some slack? Or is it possible you happened to post before you had a chance to really think about the import of your comments, and then when called out, your pride persuaded you to stand by them rather than revise or rescind?
You're not a bad person Blayne, take a step back and recognize you blundered, and that all that is required of you is to admit to that and to feel regret for it. I promise I'm more than happy to just forget you said that, and I am sure others are too. There might be some who submit to their baser natures and bring up this comment in the future, if that is the case, and you have earnestly tried to fix this mistake here and now, I will stand by you and defend you.
But you can also choose not to do any of that, and continue to pretend that what you said was a sincere and positive contribution to the thread. The only down side to that is that you will persuade more and more people that you are not worth conversing with, and I know that is not what you want to accomplish.
Do the right thing Blayne, please?
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Blayne Bradley
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Just so long as we understand, I may have said something but meant something else.
The rest me cracking bad jokes on an event that happened 3 years ago may have been over the line.
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Blayne, if you saw a video thirty years old of a woman being raped, would you make a joke on the grounds that, hey, it's been thirty years?
Yes, time dulls all wounds. That three years has elapsed since these people were murdered does not mean that enough time has elapsed that the situation -- in which the U.S. Army screwed up, murdered some people, and then lied about it -- can be considered anything but tragic.
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Blayne, stop linking to tvtropes every damn second and speak for yourself. I'm disgusted by what you said above, and I've told my fair share of dead baby jokes. Telling jokes to friends who you know and who know you is not the same as going on the internet and being a jerk.
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quote:Originally posted by Blayne Bradley: Firstly that the military has actually been successfully embarrassed by a wiki of all things and apparently tyrant style tried to suppress it is inherently hilarious.
Secondly militaries shooting unarmed civilians for kicks and making bond one liners is also inherently hilarious, made funnier by the Team America World Police doing it.
Thirdly anything in real life that begins to resemble grand theft auto on crack is inherently funny as well.
Whether or not others share my mirth is also what makes this funnier imagining your shocked horrified faces.
Blayne, you are a freaking moron. Just for the record.
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Is there any explanation as to why the Reuters employees were mixed in with folks armed with RPGs and AKs? I watched the video but didn't see any explanation on the collateral murder site.
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quote:An investigation of the shooting found that the crew of the two Apache helicopters at the scene might have erroneously identified photographer's cameras as weapons, NBC News Pentagon correspondent Jim Miklaszewski reported.
According to U.S. officials, the pilots arrived to find a group of men approaching the area of a battle with what looked to be AK-47s slung over their shoulders and at least one rocket-propelled grenade.
The investigation later concluded that what was thought to be an RPG was really a long-range photography lens; likewise, the camera looked like an AK-47.
posted
Ahh. They were approaching the scene of a battle. That might explain the maliciousness and, well, trigger-happiness of the soldiers.
However, it doesn't excuse it. This was a grave mistake, and a horrible one. You know how we keep hearing about accidental civilian deaths in these wars for all these years? Watching these good people being slaughtered on video has shown me at least one small inkling of how.
The worst thing? If this was WW2, I might be able to accept it. After all, this sort of thing happens, and though its still painful and tragic it at least would have happened in the context of something at least trying to be noble.
But with this war? This really pointless war over really nothing of true value compared to that one? Watching this just makes me sick.
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So wait, how many of them had cameras then? In addition to the two named employees the video points out, there are at least two more individuals with what do appear to be assault rifles. It's definitely pretty hard to tell.
Without having read any articles about this, just seeing the video with as little preconceived notion as possible, what the soldier in the video says about it being an RPG seemed reasonable to me. I didn't question it.
But I guess the idea is that the RPG is a telescopic camera? Huh. I can kind of see that. Sure does resemble an RPG though. Guy carrying it is also peeking around the corner in a very weird and disconcerting way...
It's certainly tragic that two innocent journalists lost their lives due to friendly fire. That the US Military tried to hide this footage is, if possible, even more upsetting. But now a few passes through the internet have revealed people touting this as an example of how the US Military are a bunch of psychopathic murderers, and I just don't see that here at all.
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quote:But now a few passes through the internet have revealed people touting this as an example of how the US Military are a bunch of psychopathic murderers...
It's the joking afterwards, which is unquestionably sociopathic.
Posts: 37449 | Registered: May 1999
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Blayne Bradley
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quote:Originally posted by Kwea:
quote:Originally posted by Blayne Bradley: Firstly that the military has actually been successfully embarrassed by a wiki of all things and apparently tyrant style tried to suppress it is inherently hilarious.
Secondly militaries shooting unarmed civilians for kicks and making bond one liners is also inherently hilarious, made funnier by the Team America World Police doing it.
Thirdly anything in real life that begins to resemble grand theft auto on crack is inherently funny as well.
Whether or not others share my mirth is also what makes this funnier imagining your shocked horrified faces.
Blayne, you are a freaking moron. Just for the record.
For the record insulting me doesn't make me want or encourage me to be more apologetic and also I believe a violation of the TOS.
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quote:Originally posted by Dan_Frank: So wait, how many of them had cameras then?
One has a long-range lens, one has a camera, confused for a AK-46 and RPG respectively. I don't see any more weapons although some US outlets have claimed to see one AK-47 that I haven't seen confirmed.
quote: Guy carrying it is also peeking around the corner in a very weird and disconcerting way...
He was taking a photo, they actually have that photo online. If he seems cautious and nervous, thats probably because the US military as of this point already has a reputation for shooting civilians (and journalists for that matter).
quote: ... an example of how the US Military are a bunch of psychopathic murderers, and I just don't see that here at all.
You don't see that. You hear it, loud and clear.
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quote:Originally posted by Blayne Bradley: Just so long as we understand, I may have said something but meant something else.
The rest me cracking bad jokes on an event that happened 3 years ago may have been over the line.
That was pretty good Blayne, but a bit too Asian for an apology to me. None of this, "I may or may not have said things that are not necessarily to my credit."
But then again, if that is how you feel, I'm not going to yank something else out of you.
------ Jebus202: I certainly care if Blayne apologizes, you should too.
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quote:You don't see that. You hear it, loud and clear.
That's one way to look at it, that this indicts the entire US military as a bunch of psychopathic murderers.
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I don't believe that's a proper reaction.
