Washington — A gritty war video circulating on the Internet that shows U.S. troops firing repeatedly on a group of men — some of whom were unarmed — walking down a Baghdad street is authentic, a senior U.S. military official confirmed Monday.
The official said the video posted at Wikileaks.org was of a July 12, 2007, firefight involving Army helicopters in the New Baghdad District of eastern Baghdad.
Among those believed to have been killed in that attack was Reuters photographer Namir Noor-Eldeen, 22, and his driver Saeed Chmagh, 40. Two children also were wounded.
The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak publicly about the video, said the military could not confirm the identities of the Reuters employees in the film.
Comments
just_another_bozo_on_this_bus 3 years, 1 month ago
This is pretty sick stuff. These people were clearly not armed (unless you can call a video camera a weapon) and what's worse is that it also clearly demonstrates that indiscriminate firing upon unarmed civilians has been the norm in Iraq, and now almost certainly in Afghanistan as well.
http://www.democracynow.org/2010/4/6/massacre_caught_on_tape_us_military
Jeteras 3 years, 1 month ago
Before you balk at how this goes down maybe you should go on a patrol in Iraq where ANYONE young or old could be out to kill you. Be glad and pray everyday that you are here at home safe and dont deal with these things. you know this is a sad deal,, there is noone to blame here. Rules of engagement ,, you walk around in a hostile red zone with equipment that resembles RPG's and AK's what are you thinking? Maybe a lack of communication. The area would have to be a hot zone for that Apache to be on ready to engage at any time... These people either knew that or they were in an area that they were warned to not enter.
and NO it is not the norm!! jesus I wish you could for once think about what you just said.
vertigo 3 years, 1 month ago
Obviously not enough information in this video. Looks to me like the guy under the crosshairs at 2:31 has an RPG, or at least something that looks like an RPG. The guy at 2:42 looks like he might be sticking an RPG around the corner, and at 3:15, might be another guy with an AK. Was this after curfew? What does the video look like from the second chopper? Did the second chopper take fire? With two guys per chopper, a little hard to voice recce which one says "we had a guy shooting". Again, there's just not enough info in this video.
Obviously whoever edited the video and made the subtitles does not have the first clue about anything military related. "Stay firm"? I can barely type that without laughing. Maybe the actual radio call was "that's affirm" and was actually pronounced "t's afirm"? (anyone dealing mil comm knows how not everything transmits properly - words get cut off and it's usually the first word spoken)
snap_pop_no_crackle 3 years, 1 month ago
Before you get too weepy over the bad guys getting smoked, check out http://mypetjawa.mu.nu/archives/201889.php
vertigo 3 years, 1 month ago
Transcribed from a friend of mine who was in the unit during this timeframe:
Having seen the video (the full video) I know that the ground unit that was conducting the cordon and search had been taking fire all day. Additionally when the crew PID the individuals one can clearly see that at least 3 of the individuals do indeed have weapons, not including the reporter. You can only tell that the reporter is holding a camera only because we have hind sight. To judge these men from the comfort of a lazy boy is both ignorant and unjust. Did the crew use language that was unprofessional? Maybe, but how is this any different than a detective who makes jokes about a murder scene to cope with what they are seeing? Killing people and getting shoot are not natural events and at times can be hard for the human brain to process so we disconnect ourselves to deal with it. Its not that these men are monsters or murderers, they are simply normal people put in abnormal situations.
As for the reporter- he chose to hang out with people who shoot at American soldiers. They go in knowing full well what can happen when you hang around a group of guys who are armed and shoot at U.S. soldiers.
As all of us who have been there know too often the enemy uses cameras to document their attacks for propaganda purposes. How would anyone suggest that an aircrew discern a real world reporter for a combatant documenting his handy work?
This video has clearly been portrayed in a light that brings discredit to the U.S. Military. If you watch the video on wikileaks.org at 3:42 you can clearly see a military age male with an RPG and another MAM to his right with an AK-47 and at 6:49 one can see an AK-47 lying among the bodies. Once again look the event in the context of what the crews see and not in hind sight. I feel that we would find very few in our profession that would not take the same actions these men did.
just_another_bozo_on_this_bus 3 years, 1 month ago
"This video has clearly been portrayed in a light that brings discredit to the U.S. Military."
No, it brings discredit to those who abuse the U.S. military. Military force is a blunt instrument to be used as an absolute last resort, for reasons of true self-defense. It's not appropriate to use it simply because neocon political theory states that a president needs to be a "war president" in order to move their agenda, foreign and domestic, forward.
just_another_bozo_on_this_bus 3 years, 1 month ago
http://www.salon.com/news/opinion/glenn_greenwald/2010/04/06/iraq/index.html
excerpt--
"The WikiLeaks video is not an indictment of the individual soldiers involved -- at least not primarily. Of course those who aren't accustomed to such sentiments are shocked by the callous and sadistic satisfaction those soldiers seem to take in slaughtering those whom they perceive as The Enemy (even when unarmed and crawling on the ground with mortal wounds), but this is what they're taught and trained and told to do. If you take even well-intentioned, young soldiers and stick them in the middle of a dangerous war zone for years and train them to think and act this way, this will inevitably be the result. The video is an indicment of the U.S. government and the war policies it pursues.
All of this is usually kept from us. Unlike those in the Muslim world, who are shown these realities quite frequently by their free press, we don't usually see what is done by us. We stay blissfully insulated from it, so that in those rare instances when we're graphically exposed to it, we can tell ourselves that it's all very unusual and rare. That's how we collectively dismissed the Abu Ghraib photos, and it's why the Obama administration took such extraordinary steps to suppress all the rest of the torture photos: because further disclosure would have revealed that behavior to be standard and common, not at all unusual or extraordinary."
sflagg 3 years, 1 month ago
This was a tough video to watch. But it is important to see this so we are not blind to what is happening over in Iraq.
75x55 3 years, 1 month ago
"Reporters".....
Really? Or were they 'stringers' that fed propaganda to the media from the 'local perspective'?
A fine example for teens everywhere - you will be associated with the people you hang out with, and it does have consequences.
just_another_bozo_on_this_bus 3 years, 1 month ago
So according to 75, the definition of a terrorist is someone who's had their head blown off by a US helicopter gunship from 1000 yards away.
75x55 3 years, 1 month ago
Are you always so childish and irrational, bozo?
You know, I once met one of the original 'Bozo' the Clowns. Interesting guy - he had been a ball turret gunner on a B-17.
just_another_bozo_on_this_bus 3 years, 1 month ago
This comment was removed by the site staff for violation of the usage agreement.
75x55 3 years, 1 month ago
Exactly!
Ricky_Vaughn 3 years, 1 month ago
I refuse to support troops that commit acts such as these.
Agnostick 3 years, 1 month ago
Kinda funny how this video doesn't look anything like an episode of "Sesame Street." Not that I was expecting it to look like an episode of "Sesame Street"...
Chilling? Yes. Horrific? Yes.
I believe this is also the exception, rather than the rule.
Part of my support of our armed forces involves me accepting that our military men and women are fallible human beings... who sometimes make mistakes in the heat of battle.
My only wish is that rather than hide this and cover it up like Abu Ghraib, the Pentagon should acknowledge the mistake, try to make some sort of reparation to the victims/survivors... and keep on keepin' on.
And fer cryin' out loud... if these are reporters, journalists "on duty"... WTF are they doin' drivin' around with children in a frackin' war zone?!?!?
just_another_bozo_on_this_bus 3 years, 1 month ago
Jeez, I was posed a loaded question, and merely responded with one of the most commonly used examples of loaded questions, "Have you stopped beating your wife." But I guess that went right over someone's head.
http://www.fallacyfiles.org/loadques.html
Exposition:
A "loaded question", like a loaded gun, is a dangerous thing. A loaded question is a question with a false or questionable presupposition, and it is "loaded" with that presumption. The question "Have you stopped beating your wife?" presupposes that you have beaten your wife prior to its asking, as well as that you have a wife. If you are unmarried, or have never beaten your wife, then the question is loaded.
Since this example is a yes/no question, there are only the following two direct answers:
"Yes, I have stopped beating my wife", which entails "I was beating my wife." "No, I haven't stopped beating my wife", which entails "I am still beating my wife." Thus, either direct answer entails that you have beaten your wife, which is, therefore, a presupposition of the question. So, a loaded question is one which you cannot answer directly without implying a falsehood or a statement that you deny. For this reason, the proper response to such a question is not to answer it directly, but to either refuse to answer or to reject the question.
Some systems of parliamentary debate provide for "dividing the question", that is, splitting a complex question up into two or more simple questions. Such a move can be used to split the example as follows:
"Have you ever beaten your wife?" "If so, are you still doing so?" In this way, 1 can be answered directly by "no", and then the conditional question 2 does not arise.
just_another_bozo_on_this_bus 3 years, 1 month ago
"Part of my support of our armed forces involves me accepting that our military men and women are fallible human beings... who sometimes make mistakes in the heat of battle."
Of course, this is the one predictable aspects of warfare-- it is pure chaos and violence. But in this tape, it was pretty evident that the soldiers doing the firing weren't particularly concerned with whether or not they were making mistakes, and I think that is precisely how they have been trained to act.
just_another_bozo_on_this_bus 3 years, 1 month ago
"And fer cryin' out loud... if these are reporters, journalists "on duty"... WTF are they doin' drivin' around with children in a frackin' war zone?!?!?"
The journalist was the injured guy they were trying to help. Why were they trying to help him? Because he was injured. Why were they there with their kids? Because they live there.
vertigo 3 years, 1 month ago
Agnostick (anonymous) says…
Part of my support of our armed forces involves me accepting that our military men and women are fallible human beings... who sometimes make mistakes in the heat of battle.
Please explain the mistake made by our armed forces in this video?
At least 3 military aged men, armed, in an area where U.S. forces had been receiving small arms fire.
If a journalist decides he wants to hangout with RPG-toting insurgents (and these were experienced journos), then that is a risk that is theirs to take.
The Bongo truck was trying to not only pick up the wounded, it was also trying to remove the weapons as well. This situation happens a lot in Iraq where we blast the insurgents, and then the insurgents have a getaway vehicle to evac out the remaining guys/guns to fight again another day. The Army ground unit was on the way, and would have treated the wounded. The insurgents typically try to remove their wounded to avoid having them get captured for intel.
Sad that there were children harmed (they lived btw). But as you pointed WTF are you doing bringing children there? Also realize that the gunship crew are pretty task saturated. They can't keep their eyes on everything happening in their environment.
Bozo- you're speculating on things you have no clue about. The bongo truck wasn't some local deciding to come out and lend a hand. It was an insurgent evac vehicle.
This incident was investigated thoroughly and the crew were cleared. As gruesome as it is to watch this was a legit shoot within the ROE. Keep in mind the investigators have at their disposal more evidence than you or I. They have eyewitness statements, the video from the #2 gunship in their formation, Personal ID from the ground units that had taken fire from these insurgents, etc.
snap_pop_no_crackle 3 years, 1 month ago
Poor bozootie, he'll never get his Order of Lenin at this rate.
just_another_bozo_on_this_bus 3 years, 1 month ago
" As gruesome as it is to watch this was a legit shoot within the ROE."
I don't doubt that one bit. When you have ROE that say the first option is to shoot, and the only other option is to shoot with an even more destructive weapon, you end up with lots of dead Iraqis.
I'm not necessarily faulting the soldiers for this. That's what they're trained to do, and once you start the wanton destruction of a country, you find yourself getting shot at a lot, and your survival depends on being not too picky about shooting back. That's exactly why Bush, Cheney and the whole neocon war criminals should be on trial in the Hague.
scott3460 3 years, 1 month ago
Lie to go to war, lie about what happens there. When will we stop the lying?
Mixolydian 3 years, 1 month ago
vertigo (Jesse Crittenden)
You speak the truth. Thanks for sharing.
75x55 3 years, 1 month ago
Next someone will be whining that we aren't "fighting fair".... Frankly, anyone wandering around at night in a warzone with weapons, or assisting the same, might as well be wearing a giant target that says 'shoot me'.
As for the maroons carping about the "tone" of the pilots/gunners conversations, well what can be said about that? War is hell, and anyone who takes affront with it's obscenity and attempts to sanitize it is insane.
bearded_gnome 3 years, 1 month ago
thanks Jesse! unfortunately Boozo already had its mind made up before this video was released. and its mind is severely stilted.
poor Boozo doesn't appreciate the freedom he/she/it has to carp, that that right was defended by warfighters of many generations.
war is not a tea and crumpets parlor game for gawd's sake!
and I love how Boozo thinks he/she/it has all kinds of expertise to analyze the video. then cites www.democrazynow.com like that's a valid source!
we see idjiots like Boozo calling for bush/cheney/rummy/rove to be jailed, executed, tried as war criminals. and they wonder why we speak so angrily about them shredding the constitution, giving massive coruption that causes your healthcare quality to depend on what state of the union is your place of residence!
btw, Boozo, here you've made at least three of your stupidest comments ever, right up there with your epic failure on the definition of what is profit.
vertigo 3 years, 1 month ago
If anyone is interested you can view the report of the investigation here:
http://www2.centcom.mil/sites/foia/rr/CENTCOM%20Regulation%20CCR%2025210/Death%20of%20Reuters%20Journalists/6--2nd%20Brigade%20Combat%20Team%2015-6%20Investigation.pdf
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