That’s correct. Not to sound like a jackass, but-- while there are reports of some of our soldiers doing stupid shit, there have been a “few” more instances of iraqis firing RPGs at our soldiers.
So, if I had to give one of the parties the benefit of the doubt, I would certainly choose our soldiers.
LilShieste
Fly away. I certainly wouldn’t want him to kill three people because they might have gone on to kill American troops. Posession of a weapon (especially in a violent, lawless country) should not be enough evidence of intent to kill to allow the use of deadly force.
The guys in the chopper were not in any danger. Like jarbaby said, just scatrering them was probably enough. It was fucking chickenshit to chase a wounded guy under a truck and kill him when he couldn’t hurt them.
Anyway, the point is that it doesn’t help an already terrible US image to have video of a US Apache helicopter using Iraqis for target practice (and that’s how it will be perceived, all chickenshit justifications aside).
For me, one of the big differences between ‘us’ and ‘them’ is that we allow a free press to show the bad side of the military. I’m sure that former Iraqi government tortured it’s citizens. There are probably video tapes of these sessions. But those never aired on TV or the net and the people doing those things never thought they would have to answer for what they did.
So for me, I have no problem with French television showing the tape.
Except that it’s old and has been gone over a million times already.
Nobody fired an RPG at the Apache. Conjuring up fantasies about what someone on the ground might do in some unforseeable future is not a justification to take human life. The Apache was in no imminent danger. Nothing was even pointed at it. They could have easily flown away.
BTW, the trope that anyone with what might be a weapon is fair game to kill because they might use it on US troops someday cuts both ways. Iraqi resistance fighters can make the exact same argument for killing American soldiers. If they have guns, they’re a threat so it’s acceptable to snipe them or mine them or mortar them.
You can’t have it both ways. We can’t say that THEY have to follow one set of rules but WE get to follow another one.
Pictures like this will only get more US soldiers (and civilians) killed. At some point we have to actually prove that we’re better than the terrorists instead of just saying it.
Enough for what??? Enough to let them get away so they can set up their mortar (or whatever it was) a few nights later and drop explosives on our people? Three men operating under the cover of darkness setting up a “tube” outside of a military base is no misunderstanding.
I’d also like to point out that the helicopter is not up in the air in an effort to protect the helicopter it is up in the air to protect the base which was exactly the thing being threatened by these men.
From the link.
Now keep in mind this is being done in the dead of the night ins ome field not far from a base. Not the smartest thing to go out harvesting the crop at that time.
I would consider this suspicious, wouldn’t you?
I’m sure they’ve seen plenty of people ditching weapons, or setting up positions, that’s what they’re trained to do. He seems pretty confident this is the case.
They checked with their superior, how reckless of them.
The pilots waited, observed, and then minutes later took action on what they, and their higher ups viewed as a suspicious situation.
What were they supposed to do, land the chopper and go sneak up in the bushes to be quadruple super duper extra sure? Honestly, if this is what happens every engagement, it’s thorough enough for me. I don’t see any indication of them going in with guns blazing.
If You don’t want to get wasted, perhaps one shouldn’t sneak around in fields near bases, in the middle of the night when a fucking war is going on.
I can see room for error here, but you’ll have to point out what they should have done differently, because I don’t see this as some huge mistake.
“Sir, request permission to relieve Diogenes from sentry duty, Sir.”
Now, I’m not a warhawk, and I detest the idea that our troops are in the line of fire in Iraq. However, I also understand that our troops are engaged in a war. Requiring our troops to wait until they or other troops are under direct fire is not only stupid, but will cost innumerable more lives. Requiring our troops to give an armed enemy soldier the “benefit of the doubt” is very nice in theory, until you consider the cost in human life. Requiring helicopter pilots to disengage unless they’re being fired upon directly is also very nice, neat and tidy. And will result in more dead soldiers.
This is yet another reason why I am opposed to this war. In war, very bad things happen. Innocents die. Iraqi soldiers will be killed while unloading weapons for future use. Soldiers on both sides will not have the benefit of 20/20 hindsight, they will not presume somebody innocent, and they won’t have to show beyond a reasonable doubt that that Iraqi soldier on the nightvision was going to attack American troops. War is horrible. War is tragic. War is dirty, painful, and uncertain. War is hell. War should never be entered into blindly, without thought of the costs in human life on both sides.
And this war should never have happened. But it did. And I, for one, am not going to condemn American troops when they present a reasonable justification for what I saw on the videotape.
Agreed. As far as I’m concerned, if they are attacking our military vehicles, personnel, bases, etc, that is fair game. They attack us, we attack them, that’s war, that is what soldiers do. This is in contrast to terrorists, who target civilians, not soldiers.
I’ll add that the only problem I have with this was shooting the wounded guy. I have no idea what the protocol is. What if a guy plays dead?, what if they leave him, and crawls over and sets up the mortar, etc etc.
I don’t know about finishing him off being the best way to resolve the situation. Maybe send in ground guys? But then sending in ground guys to confirm that every dude you shot is doing what I mentioned above is quite laborious.
War is hell, indeed.
In all those beautifully coded quotes World Eater, there is not one sentence that says “AND THEN THEY FIRED AN RPG AT THE HELICOPTER”
If there was, I’d retract everything I said.
From the looks of the article, now simply walking around in a field looking suspicious gets you the death penalty. Good work.
And please explain to me how the injured man crawling under a truck to survive was a direct danger to the copter and the base.
So you have some definitive proof that these three guys were soldiers? Because I couldn’t tell from the video.
And World Eater, our posts were simulposted, so I didn’t see you question the murder of the wounded guy. Question retracted.
They could have landed their heli and check out what the so called “object” was.
I know, for you landing a helicopter to check out what exactly you have observed is not worth the effort in comparison with 3 towelhead’s lives.
Completely understandable and not only because the proof of the High Standards of the US Army is once again delivered these days.
Salaam. A
Not just any field, jar, one next to our base and at night. They weren’t out there farmin’.
And “proof they were soldiers”? That’s just it, these chickenshits hide among the populace. It’s there refusal to wear a uniform that helps make everyone a suspect.
but you are saying it was right to kill them just on a supposition? Please!
If it was a field near a base, call the base and tell them to go out and have a look around. Don’t blow them to smithereens because you assume those ‘crazy ragheads’ are at it again.
Ever thought about this:
If there was no US army base in Iraq, there would not be one US soldiers in danger in Iraq.
Ther would also be no need for Iraqis to try to chase the US invaders from their own land. If they wear a “uniform” or not has nothing to do with it.
I do not wish you personally any harm of course, but welcome to reality.
Salaam. A
Thank you, jarbabyj, for sitting this conflict out. God forbid you enlisted, rose to a rank of authority, and ordered your soldiers who witnessed suspicious activities outside of your base to hold their fire until it could be proven beyond a shadow of a doubt that they had malicious intent. I’m not a veteran or anything, but I would imagine that 3 Iraqis with a mortar cannon can get a lot of killing done while your orders to your soldiers to “scatter them” are carried out.
Definitive proof? Nope, it could have been just a terrible mistake with these three gentlemen meeting up in the middle of the night outside of an army base to innocently dispose of a large cardboard tube.
While I’m being a bit snarky with my response, it’s only to say that I think it is highly unlikely that these 3 men were just there at random. As far as I’m concerned, if you are an enemy combatant, taking actions to further the killing of my people, you are risking your life.
Nope, it’s not worth getting the helicopter blown out of the sky when the decision has already been made based on these guy’s actions that they’re combatants.
If there’s no US soldiers in Iraq, then Saddam’s still there, Uday’s still raping and Qusay is going to run Iraq just like his murderous old man did for the next 35 or 40 years.
What makes you think you’ve got any sense of reality.