RE: War Crimes
April 6, 2010 at 10:55 am
(This post was last modified: April 6, 2010 at 10:57 am by tavarish.)
I've discussed this on a few other forums already.
I've come up with a few observations:
1. The video is pretty disturbing
2. The gunners did not know they were firing on possible civilians and children, they thought they were in immediate danger.
3. Military personnel are trained to distance themselves from the enemy, who by the way, does not follow rules of engagement.
4. The cameramen were in the company of armed insurgents, although the mood was "calm". Not only civilians in the cluster.
5. The attack on the van was overkill, but it's not the army's job to take chances in a wartime scenario. It is literally life or death. Unfortunately, there were mistakes made.
The only real issue I see is that Army officials did not disclose the information and lied about what had happened by pleading ignorance to the subject, when the video proved otherwise.
The cameramen were in the wrong place and the wrong time, and although advanced technology could've avoided this, we can't rely on theoretical solutions to a problem that happened 3 years ago. Hindsight is always 20/20.
At no point did the military personnel think they were firing on civilians or children. This is a horrible turn of events, but something all too real in the confines of a wartime scenario.
Difficult, but not impossible, and there were armed insurgents on the ground.
I've come up with a few observations:
1. The video is pretty disturbing
2. The gunners did not know they were firing on possible civilians and children, they thought they were in immediate danger.
3. Military personnel are trained to distance themselves from the enemy, who by the way, does not follow rules of engagement.
4. The cameramen were in the company of armed insurgents, although the mood was "calm". Not only civilians in the cluster.
5. The attack on the van was overkill, but it's not the army's job to take chances in a wartime scenario. It is literally life or death. Unfortunately, there were mistakes made.
The only real issue I see is that Army officials did not disclose the information and lied about what had happened by pleading ignorance to the subject, when the video proved otherwise.
The cameramen were in the wrong place and the wrong time, and although advanced technology could've avoided this, we can't rely on theoretical solutions to a problem that happened 3 years ago. Hindsight is always 20/20.
At no point did the military personnel think they were firing on civilians or children. This is a horrible turn of events, but something all too real in the confines of a wartime scenario.
(April 6, 2010 at 10:54 am)Tiberius Wrote: It wasn't in hover. The video clearly shows it going around in a circle. Add to that the difficulty in firing an RPG accurately from that far away (given wind, gravity, etc) and I still say it is worth doing a bloody check to make sure they aren't going to kill innocent people.
Difficult, but not impossible, and there were armed insurgents on the ground.
