This isn't exactly new, but I thought I'd share this with you guys.

Warning: disturbing live footage of people being killed.
http://wikileaks.org/

This got me wondering: what attracts strong, kind-hearted people to a world of brutal violence?

Feel free to attack the US government, philosophize about the endless struggle of good and evil in the human soul and anything in between.

http://streetlamps.perdomocore.com/index.php?showtopic=16735&hl=military&st=0
Null posts get lame responses.

Oh ya. I've seen this before...



These are comments from where negrodamus linked. Let me say something: this is war. War isn't pretty. We spend a lot of time training our men and women to not have their emotions and feelings get in the way of their duty to country and to their brothers in arms. I cannot fault them for opening fire. War isn't black and white, and people die. The reporters went over there knowing they were at risk of getting killed, and they were foolhardy if they thought that the risk was only the other guys.

I salute our troops. They protect us. Do not judge them for how they cope. They are protecting me and my rights, and they are protecting their brothers in arms. If it takes some off-color humor or remarks to deal with the horrors of wars, I am willing to look the other direction.

But you know, you all should have expected this response from me.

I also suggest you read through Negrodamus' link.

I mostly agree with Kame, but I don't really see how they are protecting you OR your rights. They're just there because they're paid to do it or they like fighting for the U.S.

Think you answered your own question

Shorter version, with a discussion between the WikiLeaks co-founder and an intelligence lt.colonel.

Yea, the initial video was blocked due to copyright.

About their motivation:

In my opinion, you have to be half-blind to think that those people had AK47s - they did not. And confusing a camera with an RPG? Common. In the original video, you can hear the helicopter crew say "look, he has an RPG" when one of the reporters leans to a wall with his camera. Armed insurgents don't act that way; standing in one big pack in the middle of the street. I'm no military expert, but it is common sense not to stand in large groups.

Even if the pilots did honestly think those people were armed, here's more:

First rule of engagement, as quoted by the lt.colonel in the interview:
"You may engage persons who commit hostile acts or show hostile intent by minimum force if necessary."
Which was not the case here: even if those were weapons (which was not true), no hostile intent was shown.

After they shot the initial group of people, you can see them shooting a man who fell on the groud and clearly unarmed man that is running away. The latter is in violation of rule 1, while the former is in violation of rule 2:
"Do not target or strike anyone who has surrendered or out of combat due to sickness or wounds."

Then, they shoot a van of people who were trying to help the survivors. None of those people had any weapons, let alone hostile intent. One of the helicopter crew said: "Common buddy, just pick up a weapon...", showing how badly they want to shoot those people.

All this gives me the impression that the helicopter crew were two evil, trigger-happy scumbags. What about you?

The US government wants you to see Iraq as a big threat and fear its culture. I say the terrible education system and social problems in the US are bigger threats: you're more likely to be stabbed by a drug-addict than being killed in a terrorist attack. If Iraq invaded US, then I would see an attack on Iraq reasonable. You say that it's acceptable to kill innocent people just so you have a 0.0000001% smaller chance of being killed in a terrorist attack?

Kame.. are you really missing my implication that whatever they're doing in the middle east doesn't affect our rights?

JaFF, I'm against the war and all, but I really think that acting unscrupulously while in it is excusable. So I'll just stay out of that part of this conversation.

But their enlistment/commission does. I find it hard to believe that all of our troops signed up for the pure reason of going overseas. You don't choose to go there, you get assigned.

Actually I wanted to join the ANG so that I could do all the sweet search and rescue things, and protect home borders. But we see that this is not what ANG does so much...anymore. That's another topic.

[deleted]

Post has been edited 1 time(s), last time on Jul 5 2018, 4:03 am by DavidJCobb.

I do not fully support this war. You can say that its a war and people die but I do not think there should be a war in the first place.
There is also the number of civilians that have died not just these reporters.

@David: Fly in, see this, at the very least follow the rules of engagement. Because without rules of engagement, there's nothing stopping people like that. Realize that the troops on the ground wanted to join the military, hence knew the risks they were taking; while the civilian population of the country you've invaded did not choose to go to war.

They could've made a couple of warning shots.

Kind of a difficult situation where you're in a warzone where civilians and insurgents look alike. It was a terrible mistake to make and one which I would argue aerial units make far more often than ground units - all they have to do is press a button, they don't see the effects of their shooting up close so they're a lot more trigger happy.

The question is did the heli crew make an honest mistake or were they acting out of frustration? A common theme of urban counterinsurgency is regular troops causing civilian casualties due to confusing them with the enemy or because they let their anger at fighting an unseen enemy get the better of them and they open up on questionable targets. It happened with the British in Ireland and India; the French in Algeria; the US in Vietnam... it's just one of the perils of asymmetric warfare and it always has repercussions for the occupying country.

The thing is, although the servicemen involved should be disciplined within the army system for their behaviour, the politicians are ultimately to blame for sending them to war. They weren't sent to Iraq to defend American values, but to satisfy what the government at the time viewed as the national interest by waging an aggressive war against a regime which had no links to Al-Qaeda.

Yeah, they're not protecting our freedoms.

Anyways... Guerrilla war is messy. You don't know who the enemy is. These soldiers were scared. They don't want them, or their friends, to get killed. It's regrettable, but completely understandable. They're trying to protect their country.

There were no links between Iraq and Al-Qaeda. Ba'athism's salient features are secularism and socialism (and in the case of Saddam, authoritarianism), making the government actively hostile to Al-Qaeda. Now that the US has toppled the regime, Al-Qaeda and Iranian insurgents are flourishing in the country. The US dropped the ball big time with Iraq and the soldiers there have not been protecting our freedoms but in fact inadvertently undermining them. The fact that Iraq has massive oil reserves and Saddam was considered an unreliable ruler may have something to do with why the invasion occurred.

You guys are all missing the reason why we're still there. Iran has us scared shitless, and Al-Qaeda needs a target to attack so that civilians are less likely to be attacked. If they're busy fighting us off overseas, they're most likely going to try to stop us from finding their hideouts. With Jerusalem, Iraq, and Kuwait, we have three countries who are more than willing to help keep an eye on Iraq, in case of any nuclear hankey-pankey.

The original reason was probably to secure oil, no doubt, but now that we have a government we're happy with, we don't want the crap that happened to South Vietnam to happen to Iraq. We want a government friendly enough with us to provide reliable oil, keep a watch on Iran, and to have both of those, we need to keep the insurgents out.

Also, I'm getting a major case of Déjà vu. Who basically replaced a government they didn't like with Al-Qaeda in the first place?

I wholeheartedly agree with this. Until you've actually fought in a war, I think it's totally unfair to cast judgments on some of the decisions the soldiers make that, in hindsight, may not have been the best ones. I think that if I was a soldier in a war, I would be set on staying alive, everything else would take a back seat.

There have been numerous other independent agencies that have decided that it was an RPG, and they found the AK 47s for sure.

I'm not sure I follow you.

I think he's talking about the CIA (and hence, the US) funding the Mujahadeen against the Soviets.

Basically, yes. We funded a revolution in a foreign country, and now we fight against it because AT THE TIME we thought it prudent to support radical groups.

Granted, what we're doing now isn't funding radical groups, it's supporting a democratic government, but who's to say that the "terrorists" won't pull a N. Vietnam on our dumb butts?