The van is in no way marked to look like an ambulance. The gunship's job was to kill insurgents. They engage that first group thinking they are the enemy. When that van pulls up to grab that body, how do they know that there isn't a crew of insurgents sitting in there?
I haven't finished reading the RoE for the military at the time, but so far I'm getting the feeling that it effectively says "You're allowed to open fire on targets as there is a clear and present danger or if we had a pre-planned attack". I don't think them carrying off an injured body qualifies as either. If the guys in the car had weapons, it'd be a different story, but...
I haven't finished reading the RoE for the military at the time, but so far I'm getting the feeling that it effectively says "You're allowed to open fire on targets as there is a clear and present danger or if we had a pre-planned attack". I don't think them carrying off an injured body qualifies as either. If the guys in the car had weapons, it'd be a different story, but...
For all they know there were weapons in that van. In any case, (from their POV) they're aiding a group believed to be insurgents. Assuming that the apache thought/knew these guys had weapons, if that unmarked van comes up and starts collecting things off the ground potentially they've grabbed weapons. They're grabbing bodies which would conceivably still have their weapons with them.
It's a very unfortunate accident and I hate to sound like I'm blaming the victim but if I'm driving around a warzone that's been that way for the better part of a decade with my kids in tow in my unmarked van and I see a helicopter open fire on a group of people, I'll be outta there so damn fast...
The Following User Says Thank You to Phaneuf3 For This Useful Post:
It's a very unfortunate accident and I hate to sound like I'm blaming the victim but if I'm driving around a warzone that's been that way for the better part of a decade with my kids in tow in my unmarked van and I see a helicopter open fire on a group of people, I'll be outta there so damn fast...
Isn't that part of the point though? The whole city is basically under surveillance and has been razed up and down. What choice do these people really have? Which road and/or intersection is really safe in Iraq that we can tell people "Oh, well just avoid Al-Deerfoot north of Haj-McKnight Blvd and you'll be ok."
I remember in the lead up to the Iraq war that many commentators were saying that the US was trying to minimize casualties by telling citizens to vacate. Vacate where? Where do people go and what are they to do when you've made their whole city a war zone?
Isn't that part of the point though? The whole city is basically under surveillance and has been razed up and down. What choice do these people really have? Which road and/or intersection is really safe in Iraq that we can tell people "Oh, well just avoid Al-Deerfoot north of Haj-McKnight Blvd and you'll be ok."
I remember in the lead up to the Iraq war that many commentators were saying that the US was trying to minimize casualties by telling citizens to vacate. Vacate where? Where do people go and what are they to do when you've made their whole city a war zone?
Yup, it's a terrible situation. They're stuck between a rock and a hard place and there's no hard and fast rule of where to go. IMO, as a guy who's never been a civilian trapped in a warzone, a good rule of thumb would probably be to drive away from the explosions and gunfire when it starts; doesn't really matter which direction but any place will probably be safer than driving right into the middle of it.
Yeah, but from what I've read of the RoE, it sounds like they aren't able to do anything unless they SEE said weapons.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Phaneuf3
Assuming that the apache thought/knew these guys had weapons, if that unmarked van comes up and starts collecting things off the ground potentially they've grabbed weapons. They're grabbing bodies which would conceivably still have their weapons with them.
I'm not sure. It sounds like the second apache was aware they were solely picking up bodies, and the one body it looks like they picked up was the wounded man. It sounds like they had a pretty good idea of where the weapons were, as they were aware that he was unarmed (and would open fire had he picked one up).
IMO, as a guy who's never been a civilian trapped in a warzone, a good rule of thumb would probably be to drive away from the explosions and gunfire when it starts; doesn't really matter which direction but any place will probably be safer than driving right into the middle of it.
Unless, of course, those are my family members writhing on the ground.
It sounds like they had a pretty good idea of where the weapons were, as they were aware that he was unarmed (and would open fire had he picked one up).
With how much dust they kicked up, I'd be surprised if they had any idea where anything really was.
I don't like what happened... but I can understand why it happened. The only thing that really really gets under my skin about this and other such incidents is the cover ups after the fact.
Unless, of course, those are my family members writhing on the ground.
The logical side of me says that I'd still get out of there - there's nothing I can do. The helicopter's still circling with its guns pointed at the group. Even if I could safely get to them, if they're not dead already, they're probably pretty close. I'm not putting my kids in danger...
Keeping my kids out of harms way vs. having a very slight chance of helping my cousin... it's a very tough choice and who knows what I'd do if put into it. I hope I'll never have to find out.
None of us have enough information to really know the situation, so I'm not going to pass judgment until we get more of the story. I'm more of an "eliminate the perceived threat" kind of guy from my Marine Corps days, but I'm not going to try to justify what happened on the video since I wasn't there.
You rely on your training and experience, and adapt to your situation and mission. Every one is different.
I would certainly think that was an RPG:
Thanks for the better video editing skills, those are the guys who seemed to be the most armed and when I watched I thought that could have been a loaded rpg launcher too.
I also recall when I was hunting for pictures last night there were some soviet issue launchers which were more compact and the flared back end of them looked at a glance not too different from a telephoto lens with a lens hood on. Model is the rpg-7D
I think we can all agree it was a mistake. More than likely an honest mistake.
The problem is some of you guys are 100% convinced these guys did it for fun. And that is merely an opinion, albeit a stupid one. Hell, its more than stupid, especially given that every single person saying that they did it for fun has never served in the military.
It WAS a mistake. A horrible mistake. Hiding it for 3 years is what the military does. They don't abide by our laws. They have their own laws, their own system and their own way of handling things. Don't like that? Too bad.
The Following User Says Thank You to Azure For This Useful Post:
It WAS a mistake. A horrible mistake. Hiding it for 3 years is what the military does. They don't abide by our laws. They have their own laws, their own system and their own way of handling things. Don't like that? Too bad.
Except that it shouldn't be that way. and according to the laws of the United States, ISN'T that way. The military in the US is subservient to the citizenry. This is why there is civilian oversight of the military in the form of the Secretary of Defense and the Congress.
I understand that mistakes happen when you have 150 000 people armed with the best weapons money can buy running around a country with a license to kill, but the fact that the military feels it's necessary to conceal these mistakes when they occur is indicative of a disconnect between actions of the military and the stated goal of the action in Iraq.
Again, I understand the position of the military. They've been dealing with anti-war protests and reporting for eight years, they must feel like they need to defend EVERYTHING they do and hide anything that shows them in a negative light. Unfortunately, it just makes situations like this worse.
The Following User Says Thank You to driveway For This Useful Post:
I think we can all agree it was a mistake. More than likely an honest mistake.
The problem is some of you guys are 100% convinced these guys did it for fun. And that is merely an opinion, albeit a stupid one. Hell, its more than stupid, especially given that every single person saying that they did it for fun has never served in the military.
It WAS a mistake. A horrible mistake. Hiding it for 3 years is what the military does. They don't abide by our laws. They have their own laws, their own system and their own way of handling things. Don't like that? Too bad.
I like your post up to this point. But it's unacceptable in my mind for a military to act in such a manner. They work for us. I understand they don't want this out for safety, diplomatic, and political reasons but Bush should have thought of that before he attacked a sovereign nation that was of no threat to us.
__________________
As you can see, I'm completely ridiculous.
I think we can all agree it was a mistake. More than likely an honest mistake.
The problem is some of you guys are 100% convinced these guys did it for fun. And that is merely an opinion, albeit a stupid one. Hell, its more than stupid, especially given that every single person saying that they did it for fun has never served in the military.
Honest or not is pretty inconsequential in that such a consideration only speaks to the motivations of those directly involved in the shooting. My concern is that events like this should not be talked about as if it they exist in a vacuum. They don't. And we as citizens have the responsibility to consider all similar actions through the years to determine if there is something fundamental that requires a review. If the chain of command is creating a framework that facilitates disregard and creates a permissive environment for continued "accidents" on the part of the military on the ground, then that is important to establish.
Quote:
They have their own laws, their own system and their own way of handling things. Don't like that? Too bad.
Which, I concede, is all fine and dandy from where we sit. The true test of our character is to appreciate the perspectives of others, whether they be sitting and watching a hockey game, leaving Canada to vacation in Tunisia, or walking the streets of Baghdad.
I think it makes it sound bad when I say their OWN laws, OWN system, etc, etc.
I agree that the military, as an extension of the government should be answerable to the citizens, but we're talking about a government that does whatever the hell it wants, and the military as an extension of that opting to protect itself rather than being honest and forthright with things like this.
Its as much ridiculous as it is a consequence of 30+ years of stupid governing.
I was reading somewhere that there is speculation that the reporters that were killed in this incident were, in fact, embedded with insurgents, a practise, it turns out, that is not that uncommon.
If this was the case, and if those people they were with had weapons, I think it changes the situation quite significantly. From the military perspective, it immediately classifies them as enemy combatants, and you can see how their decision making process would lead them down the path that it did somewhat more.
I didn't comment in this thread the other day because I didn't want to watch the video at work. So I’m looking on here now and the video seems to be gone, so I went searching for it and I found it here:
(If you click on the video it takes you to a page where the video is larger and it's easier to make out some details)
I'm not sure if that is the same video that was posted before, and I don't really know too much about the story, so I’m looking at this through the view of the gunner for the first time, and the group of 8 people they engage I have no problems with.
It clearly looks like that one guy is carrying an RPG.
I have no problem with the engagement of the 8 people at the beginning. In my opinion, that was the right call made, and those targets should have been engaged from what I can see.
"Look at those dead basts"
I have no problem with this comment. These guys are going into a hostile environment every day. Their friends and fellow servicemen are getting blown up every day. They should want to engage and kill the enemy that are killing their own people. By engaging these targets, these guys are thinking to themselves "we're getting 8 guys off the street that maybe tomorrow would have killed some of our guys." I have no problem with that.
Engaging of the van:
This is a tough one. I'm not familiar with the ROE in Iraq. They were waiting for the wounded man to pick up a weapon before engaging. Therefore, clearly there needs to be a threat to engage. The van comes to pick up the wounded men and they ask permission to engage which is granted, and they do so without visually seeing any weapons.
I would venture to guess that from watching that, if the first group of people were insurgents, the people coming to pick them up would be insurgents as well.
If you were a peaceful citizen of Iraq, you wouldn't risk your life to help the insurgents that just got blown up. Who would help? Other insurgents fighting for the same cause. If they are able to make this parallel and engage in Iraq, then so be it I suppose, but again, I’m not sure on ROE.
"Their fault for bringing their kids to a battle." - I see this basically as a coping mechanism. I'm pretty sure those guys feel bad for wounding a kid. There was no evidence of kids in any of the video from the gunner. Reality of war.
"Drove over a body" - same thing. Coping mechanism. Kind of seemed like nervous laughter.
I feel terrible for those guys on the ground though. What a mess to have to see every day. No wonder PTSD is so prevalent.
I did not see any of their actions as intentionally engaging civilians. I did not see any of their actions out of line with the possible exception of engaging the van. I have no problem with them engaging the 8 people at the beginning.
The video also shows them engaging a building. They say 6 people went inside with weapons. The video is out of context because we never see the 6 people that they saw. I don't like engaging buildings because you don't know what's inside the building. But you know what? I had a Sergeant say this to me once during FIBUA training. We were stacking up and assaulting the room. You can't use grenades in some places because the walls are made of drywall and shrapnel would just carry right through them and get your own guys. So he said he's just assume put a 84mm Carl Gustav round through the wall and assault it that way instead of stacking up where the enemy is expecting you to come in and waiting there to cut you down.
These guys are following the same procedure. They're sick of losing their friends. The lines between civilian and insurgent are clouded. The ROE may have loosened up a bit in order to prevent more allied deaths.
It's a very hard thing to do. If they don't engage because they are not 100% sure, then the bad guys get to live. They need to be able to make the call in the heat of it and they did that.
I'm going to go read some articles about what supposedly happened at this location, but from just viewing the gunners tape, I really don't have a problem with this engagement and would most likely have reacted in the same way.
Perhaps 12 civilians did die that day. If that is the case, it's a horrible accident. But I don't see anywhere in this video an intent to murder civilians. I see intent to engage insurgents carrying weapons in order to keep the troops on the ground a little bit more safe.
Last edited by worth; 04-07-2010 at 08:33 PM.
The Following 3 Users Say Thank You to worth For This Useful Post:
What the US (and Israel) is doing is counter-productice. You can't win that kind of a war in that way unless you're willing to do full-scale genocide
What is it that Israel is doing? They are an independent nation with hostile neighbors. There are many other nations currently involved in major wars that truly involve mass murder of innocent civilians, yet you pick Israel? Please help me understand this. Israel sits back and gets attacked. Could you suggest an alternative from what they are currently doing that would somehow protect their sovereign nation?
