Wikileaks video - controversial!

Manic Moran

Typical.

Well, here's the thing about giving military intelligence types a high-level security clearance. They're not supposed to leak things, and the helicopter footage wasn't the only thing he leaked either. Especially when you're talking a TS/SCI such as that chap has. They cost the government $10,000 apiece to investigate, and take quite some time, I've been waiting on mine to be processed for over a year. If he thinks the information being leaked is so important that it's his moral duty to fall upon his sword to get it out, then so be it. But he does that knowingly. (Plus he was stupid and boasted about it)

And ask yourself if it truly was worth giving yourself a criminal record over. For all the publicity, the final analysis was that the cameraman was indeed consorting with the insurgents, and was killed along with them. Whoopdeedoo. I hope he feels that his destroying his life was worth it.

NTM

BrianD

Manic Moran wrote: »

And ask yourself if it truly was worth giving yourself a criminal record over. For all the publicity, the final analysis was that the cameraman was indeed consorting with the insurgents, and was killed along with them. Whoopdeedoo. I hope he feels that his destroying his life was worth it.

NTM

How did you manage to come to that conclusion??? And the kids? They other civilians?

gizmo555

Manic Moran wrote: »

If he thinks the information being leaked is so important that it's his moral duty to fall upon his sword to get it out, then so be it. But he does that knowingly.

Indeed, and I admire him for it.

Manic Moran wrote: »

(Plus he was stupid and boasted about it)

I can't disagree with you there . . .

Manic Moran wrote: »

For all the publicity, the final analysis was that the cameraman was indeed consorting with the insurgents,

Whose analysis? What does "consorting with the insurgents" mean and why does it warrant summary execution? Most importantly, what about the car driver who came to the cameraman's aid? I can see that the cameraman could have been an honest mistake, but it was entirely clear from the video the driver was unarmed and posed no immediate threat to anyone. Manning did absolutely right to bring the circumstances of his killing into the public domain.

Manic Moran wrote: »

Whoopdeedoo. I hope he feels that his destroying his life was worth it.

I hope so too, but I think I mean it a little more sincerely . . .

gizmo555

Manic Moran wrote: »

If he thinks the information being leaked is so important that it's his moral duty to fall upon his sword to get it out, then so be it. But he does that knowingly.

Indeed, and I admire him for it.

Manic Moran wrote: »

(Plus he was stupid and boasted about it)

I can't disagree with you there . . .

Manic Moran wrote: »

For all the publicity, the final analysis was that the cameraman was indeed consorting with the insurgents,

Whose analysis? What does "consorting with the insurgents" mean and why does it warrant summary execution? Most importantly, what about the car driver who came to the cameraman's aid? I can see that the cameraman could have been an honest mistake, but it was entirely clear from the video the driver was unarmed and posed no immediate threat to anyone. Manning did absolutely right to bring the circumstances of his killing into the public domain.

Manic Moran wrote: »

Whoopdeedoo. I hope he feels that his destroying his life was worth it.

I hope so too, but I think I mean it a little more sincerely . . .

Madd Finn

concussion wrote: »

Law abiding citizens don't wander around with RPG's.

My Second Amendment rights say I can take my RPG with me anywhere I goddamn like and you'll have to prise it out of my cold dead hands if you don't like it, you goddamn Euroweenie!!

Manic Moran

BrianD wrote: »

How did you manage to come to that conclusion???

I read the report and looked at the evidence.

And the kids? They other civilians?

Put bluntly, wrong place, wrong time. I've seen it personally in both Iraq and Afghanistan. Never a nice thing to happen, but happen it does even without malice.

Whose analysis? What does "consorting with the insurgents" mean and why does it warrant summary execution?

It means exactly what it says. And it 'warrants summary execution' because that's the sort of thing that happens in a state of armed conflict. People on one side try to identify and kill the people on the other side. Works both ways.

Manning did absolutely right to bring the circumstances of his killing into the public domain.

Well, we'll just have to agree with a difference of opinion on the matter then. Obviously my opinion and Manning's are different as well.

NTM

concussion

Madd Finn wrote: »

My Second Amendment rights say I can take my RPG with me anywhere I goddamn like and you'll have to prise it out of my cold dead hands if you don't like it, you goddamn Euroweenie!!

Good man. I suspect that's exactly what will happen if you wander the streets with RPG's.

Madd Finn

That is a disturbing video but almost as disturbing are the comments by those who would try to justify these killings as an inevitable but tragic "collateral" consequences to justifiable military action.

They remind me of nothing so much as the Rodney King video and the reaction of some of the less intelligent inhabitants of Orange County California who sat on the jury deciding on it and clearly thought: "That awful black man is hitting that poor police officer on the foot with his ass".

You guys are seeing what you want to see.

Leaving aside for a time the question as to whether the overall military action in Iraq was justified, it is clear that the guys in the helicopter are over excited pumped up adolescents who can't tell the difference between a video game and the rather more real pictures they're watching over their camera guns.

It is not clear at all whether anybody is carrying an RPG. The men at the start of the video are walking down the street in a nonchalant lackadaisical way, devoid of any formation or any attempt to take cover. This is despite the fact that the radio traffic and subsequent report says that the US patrol was under fire from people on the ground. These guys are clearly oblivious to any shooting taking place in their vicinity.

Many of the men in the footage are carrying nothing at all. Two are carrying cameras, two are carrying what may be rifles, but as has been said, they many be bona fide security people for the journalists and this is not uncommon in Iraq.

There is one man carrying a long object which the helicopter crew says is an RPG. But is it? He is not carrying it in the standard manner, ie over his shoulder. Indeed, at one stage he seems to be leaning on it. Is this an advisable thing to do with such a weapon?

We are told that Al Quaida is a highly trained, ruthlessly dedicated terrorist network taking volunteers from all over the Muslim world to "training camps" in Afghanistan where they are instructed in the ways of urban warfare and whence they can export Islamic revolution around the world. The very existence of such an "infrastructure" was the justification for the NATO invasion of Afghanistan in the first place.

Looks like the guys in the footage missed a few basic lessons in field craft and insurgency. I grew up in Northern Ireland in the 1970s. Pre teen kids throwing stones at the army had more clue about street deployment than these guys.

Sure the attack was "legal". The crew sought and received clearance to open fire. But that was because they described a situation that was at odds with the reality.

"We have five to six individuals with AK 47s" Not true.

"We had a guy shooting and now he's behind the building" If anybody was shooting it wasn't the men in the footage.

"There's a guy with an RPG!" Actually, it was a guy with a camera.

"Request permission to engage?" Sure. Go get some. Hooahhh!!!


If they had said: "There's a load of fat guys dandering down the road with their hands swinging. Two of them have equipment on straps over their shoulders. They may be rifles, they may be cameras. We're not sure.

Two others are carrying AK47s. They may be terrorists, they may be bona fide security guards.

There's another guy with a long tube-like implement. It might be an RPG it might be a garden hoe. Can we kill him?".....they might have got a different answer.

As for the van coming in. They tell lies about that. They say he's collecting bodies and weapons when in fact he is clearly coming to help a badly injured man. They feed false information to their controller and get the clearance to destroy it.

Legal? Maybe in the strict sense in that they asked for clearance and got it.

Right? No. It was bloody murder.

Wrong place at the wrong time my arse.

gizmo555

Manic Moran wrote: »

Put bluntly, wrong place, wrong time. I've seen it personally in both Iraq and Afghanistan. Never a nice thing to happen, but happen it does even without malice.

The attack on the car driver and his children wasn't a case of someone caught up accidentally in crossfire. The helicopter crew had time to observe that the car driver was unarmed and posed no threat to them or the ground troops. He was aiding a casualty, an activity which, as already noted in this thread, is expressly protected by the Geneva Conventions. They decided they wanted to kill him, asked for permission, waited for it to to be granted and deliberately blew him away. IMO, it doesn't get any more cold-bloodedly malicious.

Manic Moran wrote: »

It means exactly what it says. And it 'warrants summary execution' because that's the sort of thing that happens in a state of armed conflict. People on one side try to identify and kill the people on the other side. Works both ways.

The guy was doing his job as a reporter for a reputable international news agency. He was not an armed participant in the conflict. I can accept that in his case there may have been an honest mistake, but you seem to be claiming he was on the insurgents' side and actually deserved what he got. Pretty harsh.

Manic Moran wrote: »

Well, we'll just have to agree with a difference of opinion on the matter then. Obviously my opinion and Manning's are different as well.

OK.

It wasn't me!

gizmo555 wrote: »

The guy was doing his job as a reporter for a reputable international news agency. He was not an armed participant in the conflict. I can accept that in his case there may have been an honest mistake, but you seem to be claiming he was on the insurgents' side and actually deserved what he got. Pretty harsh.

I don't think the point is that he's on the insurgents' side and deserves what he got, but that he was standing beside them and as such had to accept that there are people trying to kill them and he's put himself in harm's way by his proximity to them.

gizmo555

It wasn't me! wrote: »

I don't think the point is that he's on the insurgents' side and deserves what he got

Well, Manic claimed that the cameraman was "consorting with the insurgents" and went on to say that this "warrants summary execution". When asked what exactly "consorting with the insurgents" means, the answer we got was that "it means exactly what it says" - which of course is no answer at all . . .

It wasn't me!

gizmo555 wrote: »

Well, Manic claimed that the cameraman was "consorting with the insurgents" and went on to say that this "warrants summary execution". When asked what exactly "consorting with the insurgents" means, the answer we got was that "it means exactly what it says" - which of course is no answer at all . . .

They were among them, associating with them, consorting with them. It is an answer because that's what it means. You're the one who first used the term "summary execution", in a provocative sense, and now you're jumping on the fact that MM didn't change the phrasing in his reponse to you; in effect, you're pouncing on what you see as a failure to backtrack defensively. Ultimately, if the journalists were embedded with ISAF forces in Afghanistan and were killed by an attack by insurgents, they'd be in the same position, that being too damn close to people other people are trying to kill.

gizmo555

It wasn't me! wrote: »

They were among them, associating with them, consorting with them. It is an answer because that's what it means. You're the one who first used the term "summary execution", in a provocative sense, and now you're jumping on the fact that MM didn't change the phrasing in his reponse to you; in effect, you're pouncing on what you see as a failure to backtrack defensively. Ultimately, if the journalists were embedded with ISAF forces in Afghanistan and were killed by an attack by insurgents, they'd be in the same position, that being too damn close to people other people are trying to kill.

Well, I'll leave it to Manic to clarify his previous posts if he sees fit - all I'll say is that he is in general an intelligent and articulate poster who is capable of expressing himself far more clearly and unambiguously than he has in this instance.

Manic Moran

gizmo555 wrote: »

The attack on the car driver and his children wasn't a case of someone caught up accidentally in crossfire. The helicopter crew had time to observe that the car driver was unarmed and posed no threat to them or the ground troops. He was aiding a casualty, an activity which, as already noted in this thread, is expressly protected by the Geneva Conventions. They decided they wanted to kill him, asked for permission, waited for it to to be granted and deliberately blew him away. IMO, it doesn't get any more cold-bloodedly malicious.

Unfortunately, that sort of thing has to take into account the totality of the situation, which is beyond the scope of the video itself. Sometimes it's a non-combatant who comes along to pick up insurgents, sometimes it's another insurgent. That becomes a judgement call based on the area at the time. There would be very little doubt if the same thing happened in Fallujah 2004 one way, neither would there be much doubt the other way if that were Basra 2009.

The guy was doing his job as a reporter for a reputable international news agency. He was not an armed participant in the conflict. I can accept that in his case there may have been an honest mistake, but you seem to be claiming he was on the insurgents' side and actually deserved what he got. Pretty harsh.

It Wasn't Me has pretty much nailed it. It's an occupational hazard of going around with an insurgent group for the story that you will be killed along with them. You know the risks, you take your chances.

NTM

Local-womanizer

http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2010/jun/11/wikileaks-founder-assange-pentagon-manning

More on this whole affair,and Wikileaks in general.

gizmo555

Manic Moran wrote: »

Unfortunately, that sort of thing has to take into account the totality of the situation, which is beyond the scope of the video itself. Sometimes it's a non-combatant who comes along to pick up insurgents, sometimes it's another insurgent.

Sorry, don't buy that. The guy was clearly unarmed.

Manic Moran wrote: »

That becomes a judgement call based on the area at the time.

The kind of judgement expressed in the helicopter crew reporting to their controller that the driver was "possibly picking up . . . weapons" when he manifestly wasn't?

One of the Paras who gave evidence to the Saville Inquiry said "I had the distinct impression that this was a case of some soldiers realising this was an opportunity to fire their weapon and they didn't want to miss the chance." One gets a similar impression from the helicopter crew in this video, pleading with their controller to be allowed fire, exaggerating and telling outright lies to convince him.

Local-womanizer wrote: »

http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2010/jun/11/wikileaks-founder-assange-pentagon-manning

More on this whole affair,and Wikileaks in general.

If the claim that Manning has also leaked 260,000 pages of diplomatic cables is true, this has the potential to become another Pentagon Papers, with similar implications for US public support for overseas military action.

It wasn't me!

gizmo555 wrote: »

Sorry, don't buy that. The guy was clearly unarmed.

Not all combatants are armed. One can be a legitimate target without carrying a weapon.

BrianD

It wasn't me! wrote: »

Not all combatants are armed. One can be a legitimate target without carrying a weapon.

So th pretty much puts a target on anybodies head. I don't think I've read so much hogwash ina long time.

Manic Moran - with all due respect the video fails to show anything but civilians that the US military making an error of judgement and the situation escalating out of control. They got it wrong and and used disproportionate force.

In regard to other postings about small arms being present. Surely, the US military would have copped at this stage that not only are the civilian population armed to protect themselves (this is one of the situations that the NRA and the Tea Party would argue why you would need to own a gun) and there are stacks of mercenaries, I mean contractors, under arms as well. From my understanding, it's quite common for a range of people to be escorted by gun toting civilansn Iraq.

Local-womanizer

BrianD wrote: »

So th pretty much puts a target on anybodies head. I don't think I've read so much hogwash ina long time.

It does and it doesnt. Spotters are legitimate target if they are directing fire onto you. After all you dont need a weapon to hurt some-one.

gizmo555

Local-womanizer wrote: »

It does and it doesnt. Spotters are legitimate target if they are directing fire onto you. After all you dont need a weapon to hurt some-one.

If we could draw back from generalities and hypotheticals to the facts of this particular case, the driver of the car who was killed for coming to the aid of the wounded photographer was not an artillery spotter, nor a known insurgent leader, nor anything else which justified the attack on him and his family.

For the umpteenth time, he was spontaneously (and it should be said courageously) rendering aid to someone he found wounded on the side of the road. The Geneva Conventions expressly protect the right of civilians to do this without being attacked or punished for it. He was unarmed and posed no threat to anyone. He was not collecting weapons. The helicopter crew who killed him had ample time to observe all this before firing on him.

iceage

This has been done to death it really has, and far be it from me to say who was right and who was wrong in this. But "press" putting themselves on the frontline to get the scoop happens time and time again. Wasn't too long ago I remember seeing European Journo's getting smacked in Kosovo and the like..on camera for all the world to see. They know the risks involved and whether they "shoot" with one side of the conflict OR the other in any of these places, no lets call a spade a spade here, Warzones because thats what it is a War..they run the risk of being killed. Unfortunate but its a stonecold fact.

The guy in the black Bongo van drove into a firefight its a plain and simple case of being in the wrong place at the wrong time I'm sorry to say it buts its a fact. WTF was he doing out and about with kids in a van during running battles between troops and insurgents in that area at all defys all logic and reason. The consequeces of his actions are brutal, deadly and all the more tragic because there was kids involved but as I said earlier WTF was he thinking of? Would you or I drive into that with kids on board? Would I fcuk, I'd be high tailing it all the way in the opposite direction.

Manic Moran

The Geneva Conventions expressly protect the right of civilians to do this without being attacked or punished for it

They also say that combatants, even wounded, leaving the battlefield may be engaged unless within a marked vehicle. Hence there's a balance to be struck.

See my earlier statement

That becomes a judgement call based on the area at the time

Contrast with, say, Brian's statement

the US military making an error of judgement

Note that

The kind of judgement expressed in the helicopter crew reporting to their controller that the driver was "possibly picking up . . . weapons"

is not required, all that is required is that the combatants have been identified. That the weapons statment turned out to be wrong (and I'll submit that trying to look at an 8" screen in a helicopter tends to not be particularly easy to discriminate fine details) does not in itself render the engagement 'bad.'

The judgement call is 'what are the chances that that's a passer-by vs the chances that it's someone connected to the insurgents?' which is beyond the scope of the video.

NTM

gizmo555

Manic Moran wrote: »

Note that

The kind of judgement expressed in the helicopter crew reporting to their controller that the driver was "possibly picking up . . . weapons"

is not required, all that is required is that the combatants have been identified. That the weapons statment turned out to be wrong (and I'll submit that trying to look at an 8" screen in a helicopter tends to not be particularly easy to discriminate fine details) does not in itself render the engagement 'bad.'

I'm sorry, this is cobblers. If you view the video again, you will see the helicopter crew made this comment before the car even stopped, so in fact at the time it was made it was entirely impossible the driver was picking up weapons. They flat out lied.

When they fired on him, he had both hands under the armpits of the wounded photographer while dragging him to the car, and this was also entirely clear.

I find it mind boggling that on the day the Saville inquiry report is published, posters here are tying themselves in knots to justify this murder. Don't we learn anything - not least the long term danger these guys put their comrades in? How many recruits to the insurgents did this incident create?

Anyway iceage is right on one point, it has been done to death, so as we attempted to before Manic, I suggest we again agree to differ.

BrianD

Manic Moran wrote: »

They also say that combatants, even wounded, leaving the battlefield may be engaged unless within a marked vehicle. Hence there's a balance to be struck


See my earlier statement


Contrast with, say, Brian's statement


Note that is not required, all that is required is that the combatants have been identified. That the weapons statment turned out to be wrong (and I'll submit that trying to look at an 8" screen in a helicopter tends to not be particularly easy to discriminate fine details) does not in itself render the engagement 'bad.'

The judgement call is 'what are the chances that that's a passer-by vs the chances that it's someone connected to the insurgents?' which is beyond the scope of the video.

NTM

Manic, I think you need a reality check. This happened in the middle of a city that is teeming with civilians. The chances of the insurgents rocking up in an ambulance with a red crescent on the roof are slim to none. The chances of any decent civilian giving assistance extremely high.

The video clearly demonstrates a trigger happy, incompetent military incapable of operating within this environment. It is quite obvious that the US military psyche - probably as a result of the Vietnam campaign - is low casualites at any cost. Dead civilans in a foreign country are easy to dismiss over flag draped coffins arriving on American soil. One can understand the pressures that these soldiers are under hence the errors of judgements made and the heavy firepower.

If the US military are relying on 8' screens in a airborne and moving aircraft (or remotely) then clearly they are ill equipped operate in this urban and largely civilian environment.

Perhaps in 40 years ime the equivalent of the Saville enquiry will sort out this one.

Manic Moran

Manic, I think you need a reality check. This happened in the middle of a city that is teeming with civilians. The chances of the insurgents rocking up in an ambulance with a red crescent on the roof are slim to none. The chances of any decent civilian giving assistance extremely high.

If the video were taken during the fighting in Fallujah in 2004, would you be so quick to come to the same conclusion? That was in the middle of a city...

NTM

BrianD

We are 6 years later. The US role should be a "keeping the peace" role. At the same time had this happened in Falluja it would be the same. Shooting civilians and children is the same where ever it happens.

Local-womanizer

BrianD wrote: »

We are 6 years later. The US role should be a "keeping the peace" role. At the same time had this happened in Falluja it would be the same. Shooting civilians and children is the same where ever it happens.

Peace-keeping role? Sure there is no peace there to start with.....

gizmo555

Manic Moran wrote: »

If the video were taken during the fighting in Fallujah in 2004 . . .

More hypotheticals. It wasn't - it was taken in Baghdad in July 2007, six months after the US troop surge began. The surge was supposed to involve a change in counterinsurgency strategy:

Counterinsurgency Strategy

Counterinsurgency strategy in Iraq changed significantly under the command of General Petraeus since the 2007 troop surge began. The newer approach attempts to win the hearts and minds of the Iraqi people through building relationships, preventing civilian casualties and compromising with and even hiring some former enemies.

Instead of seeing every Iraqi as a potential enemy, the current COIN strategy focuses on building relationships and getting cooperation from the Iraqis against Al Qaeda and minimizing the number of enemies for U.S. forces. The beliefe is, that maintaining a long term presence of troops in a community improves security and allows for relationships and trust to develop between the locals and the U.S. military. Civilian casualties are minimized by carefully measured use of force. This means less bombing and overwhelming fire power, and more soldiers using restraint and even sometimes taking more risk in the process.

Not much sign of this kind of thinking in this incident . . .

Manic Moran

More hypotheticals. It wasn't

I know it wasn't, but it is an example of where judgement comes into it. That's why I also expressed Basra 2009 as a counter-example where the judgement would almost definitely fall under 'this is likely a local non-combatant'.

We have in this case a notoriously rowdy part of the city, in which there have been fights going on all day. It's not the chaos of Fallujah, but neither is it the tranquility of Basra. It falls somewhere in the middle, you can expect the 'weight of decision' to fall somewhere in the middle as well.

NTM