DescentBB

Video is now out of a marine snuffing out a wounded Iraqi insurgent. I'm wondering if this is going to get the same attention that the prison scandel did. So the question is do any of you think this incident will have the legs that the prison bru haha did. Keep in mind though, that the election cycle is over and it seems lately that the press and the liberal left has been trying to show their support for our troops.

Putting someone out of their misery and the systemmatic torture of prisoners isn't really the same thing. The former can, at least in some circumstances, be viewed as a sympathetic action.

I haven't seen this new video, no heard anything about it, though.

Vander wrote:The former can, at least in some circumstances, be viewed as a sympathetic action.

Tell that to my Uncle Jack


Personally I don't think there should be as many news crews running around with the soldiers. This is going to result in slower reaction times.

Vander wrote:Putting someone out of their misery and the systemmatic torture of prisoners isn't really the same thing. The former can, at least in some circumstances, be viewed as a sympathetic action.

A sargent related this to me when I was going thru ITR at Camp Pendleton:

He and his squad were in a paddy area of vietnam when a NVA machine gunner opened up on them, forcing them to take cover behind the paddy dikes. The guy next to the sargent caught a round in the head blowing part of his skull away. The wounded marine was still alive and remained so during most of the afternoon the squad was pinned ( the NVA gunner was very good as no one could move). The sargent said after a few hours of the heat, bugs and flies were congregating on the exposed brain and the pain was making the wounded marine beg the sargent to shoot him. The sargent said he really wanted to comply but knew he would be charged with murder so he did nothing. By dark though the wounded troop died. So one has to be real careful of mercy killings...especially with a newsie along.

Wood, I realise you just want to point to liberals and cry hypocrisy. It's a fun game to play along with, really, but I don't think you can claim hypocrisy if liberals make a fuss about prison torture, and don't about whatever happened here. Your provided context of anti/pro-soldier flip-floppery on the left, and the left's supposed oneness with the press is also amusing. Tired and repetitive, but still amusing.

This wasn't a mercy killing. This was a man that the soldier in question believed to be "faking death" for nefarious reasons.

The report I heard talks about bodies being rigged as Improvised Explosive Devices and terrorists or insurgents faking wounds or death to lure Marines in closer with the intent to ambush them.

These stories may be true, and they may have put some of our guys into a paranoid state about the enemy. Nevertheless, based on the report I heard, it looks like our guy committed a murder here. Whether he did so under mitigating circumstances, we will have to find out. Did he watch a buddy get hurt or killed by a ruse? Did he hear stories? Was he unstable? Was this an isolated action or something that has been taking place over and over, and if so, why?

It's a bona fide scandal, and I expect to be hearing more about it. In fact, I expect the world press to focus exclusively on this one example of American wrongdoing, and say absolutely nothing about the hostage slaughterhouses, the COUNTLESS violations of the laws of war by the terrorists -- starting with fighting without uniforms, to stockpiling weapons in schools, hospitals and mosques, to fighting from these places, blatantly violating the sanctity of their own holy places, to executing hostages and locals, and on and on and on. There's a huge double standard in play, but that's just the way it is, since most of this world seems to have arrived at a position of hating America so much, they'll ignore the crimes of mass murderers like Saddam or Zarqawi in favor of harping on any flaw, real or imagined, that they find in the behavior of Americans. That's enough to make me sick, but it's NOT an excuse for our men to violate the rules and commit crimes.

The fact that we're not hiding this or trying to cover it up speaks for itself, but yes, we should expect this to become Abu Ghraib Part Two.


- Sirian

Vander wrote:Wood, I realise you just want to point to liberals and cry hypocrisy. It's a fun game to play along with, really, but I don't think you can claim hypocrisy if liberals make a fuss about prison torture, and don't about whatever happened here. Your provided context of anti/pro-soldier flip-floppery on the left, and the left's supposed oneness with the press is also amusing. Tired and repetitive, but still amusing.

Ummm...I didn't think I was crying hypocrisy here. I was just curious what was going to happen here.

Sirian I agree with your take on the situation. A caveat to add is that earlier I heard there might have been a weapon by the Iraqi and who knows if the Iraqi twitched in the wrong way. Also supposedly the marine shooter was wounded earlier, so state of mind may certainly play in this scenario.

"Ummm...I didn't think I was crying hypocrisy here."

Ok, you were insinuating hypocrisy.

Thats better

Sirian wrote: Nevertheless, based on the report I heard, it looks like our guy committed a murder here.

- Sirian

I understand you're basing your opinion on the report you heard, but I think your opinion is extremely premature. Context defines the morality (or legality) of the act here.

Let's wait for some context.

BD

Not to be overly cold.... but....

If you put a man in the midst of enemy fire, etc.
I will only speak for myself...

- I would like to think I would always lean toward being sure I was doing the righ thing.
- I would also like to think I would not be killed.

- I would likely shoot first and ask questions later. In a area with enemy fire, ununiformed 'soilders' - you have no way to know.

Frankly unless a guy is on his knees, with his hands raised - he is a threat. Even then, a fair number of these guys have shown a willingness to become human bombs....

Bottom line, I would never think of myself as vicious, in fact I would think of myself as empathetic. HOWEVER - you put me in a mess like that with a gun... I have one fucken mission - to make it home alive !!

I think they ought to ask the guys that were with him "Was he out of line?" if they say no then case closed.
I read he was shot in the face the day before so his paranoia level may have been just a bit elevated. Hell if you had been shot in the face at work yesterday how would your job performance be today?

I said that we should wait until a full investigation is conducted. Of course, you realize, those not already partial to the USA will cry "coverup" and think the investigation is bogus if our man who did this deed is cleared. Nevertheless, we should ignore that and obtain the facts, then rule fairly.

My point about the report is that so far, it does not look good. Some talk of mitigating circumstances, but they have a major slice of the action on film, right up to the point at which the soldier pulls the trigger. The gunshot can be heard on audio. The question is what the film doesn't capture, and whether the facts available on the film tell the whole story accurately. (Clearly, the part they do record is accurate and true.)

Our man, under our law, is deemed innocent unless proven guilty, but setting the law aside for a moment and considering the situation, this is a serious incident. My reason for posting was to add what facts I knew about to our thread here, but not to exceed them. What I heard is only part of the story, but it was more than anyone else in the thread had heard up to that time.


- Sirian

Here is a new twist to this thread. If you were the cameraman, would you have taking the footage and run over to al Reuters and submitted so this could be splashed around the world or would you have turned it over to the military? Either way your actions will be a double edged sword. By going public you prejudice the marine shooter from a possible fair trial by putting pressure on higher ups to hang him out to dry. Additionally al Brazeera will manipulate the footage against the U.S. actions in Iraq.
By submitting to the military the possibilty of cover up is enhanced.
As an aside the cameraman on previous interviews was questioning our actions in Falluja and perhaps is an indication why he choose the first option.

After watching the footage a view times and focusing on the upper left part of the screen where the wounded Iraqi is shot, I see him lying supine with his left side toward the camera. What can't be seen is the right side. So the questions right now would be:

1) Was there a weapon on the Iraqi's right side
2) Was the Iraqi's hands (Can't clearly see either hand in the footage)open or closed. If closed there may have been a detonator switch hidden. A head shot would be the only way to prevent the Iraqi from triggering a IED.

In either case the marine would be justified in shooting.
So until more is known my sympathies are with the marine.

What concerns me is the kids going into hand to hand combat are going to have to have an eye on the the wounded guy in the corner with the compression mine under his arse, and another eye on the embedded reporter filming his pulitzer. This'll lead to more allied body bags.

Maybe it'll lead to cameramen in body bags.

For once, I have to agree with chip.

The only bad thing about cameras in the heat of battle is they show the scenes to people back here in our safety zone and they judge the soldier like we would judge a policeman making an arrest.
If the soldier panics and shoots someone, or even if he loses his cool, gets mad and shoots anything that moves during a house to house type situation then he shouldn't be judged by the same standards we would judge a civilian policeman.
We are the ones responsible for the ugly crap that happens when we send the kids into such a situation.
If the army says let him go then that's good enough for me. If the world finds fault then let them find it in me, I sent him there to kill people and break things.

I've been following this story closely. So far, I've had the opportunity to watch the tape half a dozen times. Three things have become clear to me:

1) The marine in question was responding to what he perceived to be a threat.

2) The marine in question was not acting out of hatred or malice.

3) Although this marine has not given his side of the story yet, I feel confident in judging him innocent of any criminal wrongdoing here. I would go as far as to say that, in fact, he was doing his duty.


Here are some facts that I have observed or learned about:

* There was another survivor among this batch of insurgents. This other survivor was wounded, but he did not offer a ruse as to being dead, and he was captured and taken prisoner and cared for.

* On the tape in question, if you listen to the voice of the marine involved, he is clearly warning the rest of the squad of danger.

* You can see him raise his rifle to cover the target a couple of seconds before he fires. He is not standing there casually, unafraid, dishing out drumhead justice. He's SCARED.

* We're not talking about secured prisoners, where the marine would KNOW that these enemies are unarmed and harmless. This was a squad entering a mosque after a firefight, to disarm or eradicate survivors, to capture those who surrender and to kill those who do not.

* This particular marine got shot in the face on the previous day.

* This squad lost a man on the previous day, a soldier who was KILLED by a booby trap when he turned over an enemy body.


In light of these facts, to expect the soldier to reach down and turn over the enemy man to ensure that he was unarmed would be ridiculous. That's a good way to get yourself killed in Fallujah. This was a "shoot first, ask questions later" situation, and our man did his duty.

Did he judge wrongly? Perhaps. Perhaps the wounded enemy man was unarmed. BUT THERE WAS NO WAY TO KNOW, and the marine perceived him as a threat. The fact that this occurred while taking prisoners, and that this enemy has specifically shown disdain for the laws of war in terms of booby-trapping bodies, using ruses of surrender, fighting from mosques, hospitals and schools, and otherwise actively EXPLOITING our respect for the laws of warfare to pick off some of our guys, means that in a hair trigger situation, where the lives of our men are on the line, if the man honestly perceived what he believed to be a threat, he's totally in the clear.


This is not Abu Ghraib 2, although what I said earlier about world media portraying it that way will certainly happen. Those who WANT to see us as evil will cite this as evidence. An awful lot of people in this world have shown an alarming ability to selectively choose their facts, and this will be more of the same. They won't care about the dangers our men are facing. They won't care about the facts of this particular situation. All they will do is focus on two facts: the slain man was unarmed, and our man killed him. To consider only those two facts and ignore all the others would be a miscarriage of justice, but our political adversaries won't care. They will use this against us anyway. In fact, some of the Arab media are already doing just that.


- Sirian

I have to agree with those who want to cut some slack for the soldier who did the shooting. He may have made a mistake but he was in a situation of extreme duress. Decisions don't come easy at times like that.
Even Abu Garaib shouldn't be over played. A bunch of bad apples don't spoil a couple of hundred thousand brave men and women doing their best to serve their country.
When John Q. Public sees what really happens on the battlefield there is always a reaction against the brutality. Probably a good thing really.

Here's the world of manipulation as portrayed by al Bra-zeera, the pap of information to the arab world:

Arab news has no compunction against showing the total, unblocked footage of the marine shooting the "defenceless" arab (as of this date I have not heard if the dead arab is Iraqi, Syrian, Iranian or Saudi). Bra-zeera has had no problem of any western captive being beheaded in all its technicolor glory. Yet video was submitted to this skin flute news organisation showing Margaret Hassan being shot and they refused to show Hassans execution as it was "Too Graphic".
Could the real reason be showing Hassans murder would put the marine shooter in the proper contex? Or mayhap, does the murder of a women cut across the grain of the fabric of Islamic life. While the stoning to death of a adultress woman may be acceptable, the murder of a defenseless woman who's only crime was working for a care organisation that was trying to aid the plight of poor Iraqi's might incite the average arab to look at what is happening in Iraq as being not a fulsome situation.
If any doubt that al Bra-zeera is nothing more than a a propaganda tool for terrorism, the lack of coverage of the Hassan killing should expell any questions.

Another reason why video Cameras/media shouldn't be allowed in the middle of a war.
No evidence, no controversy.

B-

So where was the cameraman on this:

"The US military says marines in Fallujah have shot and killed an insurgent who engaged them as he was faking being dead, a week after footage of a marine killing an apparently unarmed and wounded Iraqi caused a stir in the region.

"Marines from the 1st Marine Division shot and killed an insurgent who while faking dead opened fire on the marines who were conducting a security and clearing patrol through the streets," a military statement said."

Hopefully this incident will be used as defense for the other marines action.

We didn't have cameras in the revolutionary war. We won.

We didn't have cameras in the Civil War. We won.

We didn't have cameras in WWI. We won.

We didn't have cameras in much, if any, of WWII. We won.

We had cameras in Vietnam. We lost.

We had cameras in the Korean war. We lost.

Anyone seeing a pattern?

We've had cameras in Afghanistan (though not now, the peace and relative happiness in Afghanistan doesn't make a good story) and Iraq. Necessary support for the war is hard to come by. The only reason we've won is that our president struck decisively and quickly, before popular support could wane from seeing the dead bodies on TV.

War is hell. Let's face it. The more of it that is piped into American homes, the more revulsion the American people feel towards war. But face it--either the dead bodies will be the dead bodies of those who want to kill us, or they will be the dead bodies of us. Either way, there WILL be dead bodies.

You don't try and sweet-talk a terrorist who is holding a gun to your head and the idea that killing you will gain him a reward in heaven.

When you're on the ground over there, you don't roll over a guy playing dead when you know there's a good chance he's not actually dead and is just playing a trick on you to kill you.

You make sure the guy on the ground is really dead. You make sure he's not going to kill you. You make sure he won't kill any of your comrades.

You kill him.

Stryker said something I agree with!

Stryker wrote:Face it--either the dead bodies will be the dead bodies of those who want to kill us, or they will be the dead bodies of us. Either way, there WILL be dead bodies.

You don't try and sweet-talk a terrorist who is holding a gun to your head and the idea that killing you will gain him a reward in heaven.

When you're on the ground over there, you don't roll over a guy playing dead when you know there's a good chance he's not actually dead and is just playing a trick on you to kill you.

You make sure the guy on the ground is really dead. You make sure he's not going to kill you. You make sure he won't kill any of your comrades.

You kill him.

Stryker wrote:We didn't have cameras in much, if any, of WWII. We won.

We had cameras in Vietnam. We lost.

We had cameras in the Korean war. We lost.

Anyone seeing a pattern?

Just a few little nit-picky corrections here. There were many reporters and photographers in WWII; in fact, there were even photographers in WWI. However, unlike today, anything that portrayed any of the harsh realities of war was prevented from reaching the public view. I'm sure many Korean veterans would join me in stating emphatically that we did not "lose" the Korean War. While we did not conquer North Korea, we protected South Korea from invasion and ended the war at a stalemate that continues to this day. To that end, Vietnam was less of a "loss" than a blunder. We were trying to fight an all-out war without fighting an all-out war, if you'll follow me.

Otherwise, good post.

Sorry TG, I haven't really studied the Vietnam/Korean wars in depth. In essence, however, we were forced to pull out of both areas by bad media coverage, promoting a peace movement that demanded that our troops be brought home. The effect was quite similar in both cases, though there was much less of an excuse for the Vietnam war than the others.

To be even a little more nit-picky, N.Korea was losing the war up until the Chi-coms got involved. At that point we didn't have enough bullets to kill all the fanatic tinamen square butchers.

There were even photographers during the Civil War. It's also hard to make the case that a Civil war can be "won." I mean, had the south won we still would have claimed that it was "won."

To add my $0.02

This wont be Abu Garaib 2. The average american sees an enourmous difference between soldiers who are in no danger, using prisoners as play things. And a soldier who is on the front line, perhaps making a bad call at taking a life.

The average American can put themselves in the shoes of the latter, not the former.

The two just can't be compared.

Gooberman wrote:There were even photographers during the Civil War. It's also hard to make the case that a Civil war can be "won." I mean, had the south won we still would have claimed that it was "won."

You don't honestly believe that do you?

Which part? And Yes.

First part: http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/cwphtml/cwtake.html

Second Part: It's a civil war. So yes, who ever won history will proclaim as the winner. If it's the U.S. vs the U.S. then either way History will proclaim the U.S. as having won. Even had the division occured, most of teh country would claim the Civil war as a victory.

It's like playing tic-tac-toe with yourself. No matter if the X's or the O's win, you still say you won afterwards.

Gooberman wrote:So yes, who ever won history will proclaim as the winner. If it's the U.S. vs the U.S. then either way History will proclaim the U.S. as having won.

Do you not know that the Civil War was between those who wanted to split off and form a second, separate nation, and those who wanted to keep our Union united?

Goob wrote:It's like playing tic-tac-toe with yourself. No matter if the X's or the O's win, you still say you won afterwards.

This is clearly in error. Only if the South's goal had been to unite the nation under its rule would your remark hold true. Their goal instead was to break off and form a second country.

If the Confederacy had succeeding in winning its independence, it would be clear that the United States of America had lost the war.


- Sirian

whoops, Sirian beat me to it

Sirian wrote:Do you not know that the Civil War was between those who wanted to split off and form a second, separate nation, and those who wanted to keep our Union united?

Gooberman wrote:Even had the division occured, most of the country would claim the Civil war as a victory.

Ok here's a little added info from the Fox news site:

"Itâ??s entirely plausible that the man on the floor was indeed dead, and it would be very difficult, given conditions on the battlefield, for prosecuting authorities to demonstrate otherwise. Press accounts have said that the Marine command at Fallujah was made aware of the incident four full days after it happened. The man shown on the video being shot is just one of many insurgents killed in the action (what happened to the body after the shooting has not been reported). This points to some of the practical difficulties in prosecuting combat-related crimes."

So we have a case that the marine in fact only shot a corpse that they thought "might" be alive. If the Iraqi was indeed already el corpii delectus...then indeed no crime was committed. Now what follows show how the marine was really doing the correct thing:

"Close observers of the Fallujah video will note that the instant the Marine shoots the first covered man on the floor, the covered body directly behind him raises its arms and energetically surrenders. Itâ??s plausible that the Marine in Fallujah shot a wounded man who did not actually pose a threat. But it is far more likely that he saved the lives of his fellow Marines, and cameraman Kevin Sites as well."

So now the truth starts to emerge. A dead man is shot and a dead man springs to life. So does anyone here want to take offense at what happened?
As usual the reality will not be presented by the arab press and the farce of the evil U.S. combat soldier will continue to be foisted on a unsuspecting populace.

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,139554,00.html