1
   

What does everybody think about the soldier , shooting that?

 
 
Idaho
 
  1  
Reply Sat 20 Nov, 2004 09:59 am
Quote:
thinking on his feet he gets his commander and he comes and assesses the situation


You must be joking. Seriously, this is not a stand-alone police action. These men are replaying the same scene over and over and over again. Talk to command every time they have to make a decision? Once they see the insurgent move, there is an instant in which to make a decision - no time to call command. If the "dead" guy has a gun, the marine is killed while he calls command. If the body is booby-trapped, the marine is most likely dead either way, or you bring in more marines and they all die. The only good scenario possible is the terrorists quit hiding in mosques and behind their women and children.
0 Replies
 
willow tl
 
  1  
Reply Sat 20 Nov, 2004 10:01 am
timberlandko wrote:
I agree it "looks bad" Piffka, but what looks even worse is that so many are so quick to leap to the conclusion that it was bad.


In all seriousness Timber, I cannot judge that situation until all the facts are known...what it does is remind me how insane this war in Iraq really is..and it feels like another nail in the coffin...
0 Replies
 
timberlandko
 
  1  
Reply Sat 20 Nov, 2004 10:55 am
Dunno as there can be much argument to the proposition that war is a penultimate insanity.

That in no way negates that war is a reality, a component of the human condition evidently as unavoidable as the gathering into communities.
0 Replies
 
au1929
 
  1  
Reply Sat 20 Nov, 2004 03:58 pm
From the Washington Times


Knaves: The U.S. media, for taking every opportunity to cast our troops in the worst possible light.
Watching the nightly news, you might not have known that U.S. forces achieved a historic victory in Fallujah this week. You might not have known this because all the U.S. media, spearheaded by NBC News, seemed to care about was one Marine shooting an insurgent pretending to be dead. As the Wall Street Journal lamented on Thursday, "Have we lost all sense of moral proportion?"
Is one Marine, wary of "dead" terrorists rigged with bombs, more important than the 40-plus Marines who gave their lives in the battle? Does one Marine, weary of fighting and seeing his buddies cut down by fanatics, trump the torture chambers, starving prisoners and disfigured victims that U.S. forces found throughout the city? It would be laughable if it weren't so tragic.
In just over a week, our guys killed more than 1,200 terrorists, captured 1,000 more and liberated a city in the grip of Islamists for the past eight months. And all the media can do is find their next Abu Ghraib. Memo to big media executives: The election is over and you lost. Now get back to reporting the news.
For their relentless efforts to shame our troops, the U.S. media are the Knaves of the week.
0 Replies
 
Cycloptichorn
 
  1  
Reply Mon 22 Nov, 2004 10:58 am
I've heard a lot of talk about how the 'video didn't show the truth' and such. Listen to the guy taking the video, himself:

http://www.kevinsites.net/

Quote:
To Devil Dogs of the 3.1:

Since the shooting in the Mosque, I've been haunted that I have not been able to tell you directly what I saw or explain the process by which the world came to see it as well. As you know, I'm not some war zone tourist with a camera who doesn't understand that ugly things happen in combat. I've spent most of the last five years covering global conflict. But I have never in my career been a 'gotcha' reporter -- hoping for people to commit wrongdoings so I can catch them at it.

This week I've even been shocked to see myself painted as some kind of anti-war activist. Anyone who has seen my reporting on television or has read the dispatches on this website is fully aware of the lengths I've gone to play it straight down the middle -- not to become a tool of propaganda for the left or the right.

But I find myself a lightning rod for controversy in reporting what I saw occur in front of me, camera rolling.

It's time you to have the facts from me, in my own words, about what I saw -- without imposing on that Marine -- guilt or innocence or anything in between. I want you to read my account and make up your own minds about whether you think what I did was right or wrong. All the other armchair analysts don't mean a damn to me.

Here it goes.

It's Saturday morning and we're still at our strong point from the night before, a clearing between a set of buildings on the southern edge of the city. The advance has been swift, but pockets of resistance still exist. In fact, we're taking sniper fire from both the front and the rear.

Weapons Company uses its 81's (mortars) where they spot muzzle flashes. The tanks do some blasting of their own. By mid-morning, we're told we're moving north again. We'll be back clearing some of the area we passed yesterday. There are also reports that the mosque, where ten insurgents were killed and five wounded on Friday may have been re-occupied overnight.

I decide to leave you guys and pick up with one of the infantry squads as they move house-to-house back toward the mosque. (For their own privacy and protection I will not name or identify in any way, any of those I was traveling with during this incident.)

Many of the structures are empty of people -- but full of weapons. Outside one residence, a member of the squad lobs a frag grenade over the wall. Everyone piles in, including me.

While the Marines go into the house, I follow the flames caused by the grenade into the courtyard. When the smoke clears, I can see through my viewfinder that the fire is burning beside a large pile of anti-aircraft rounds.


I yell to the lieutenant that we need to move. Almost immediately after clearing out of the house, small explosions begin as the rounds cook off in the fire.

At that point, we hear the tanks firing their 240-machine guns into the mosque. There's radio chatter that insurgents inside could be shooting back. The tanks cease-fire and we file through a breach in the outer wall.

We hear gunshots from what seems to be coming from inside the mosque. A Marine from my squad yells, "Are there Marines in here?"

When we arrive at the front entrance, we see that another squad has already entered before us.

The lieutenant asks them, "Are there people inside?"

One of the Marines raises his hand signaling five.

"Did you shoot them," the lieutenant asks?

"Roger that, sir, " the same Marine responds.

"Were they armed?" The Marine just shrugs and we all move inside.


Immediately after going in, I see the same black plastic body bags spread around the mosque. The dead from the day before. But more surprising, I see the same five men that were wounded from Friday as well. It appears that one of them is now dead and three are bleeding to death from new gunshot wounds. The fifth is partially covered by a blanket and is in the same place and condition he was in on Friday, near a column. He has not been shot again. I look closely at both the dead and the wounded. There don't appear to be any weapons anywhere.

"These were the same wounded from yesterday," I say to the lieutenant. He takes a look around and goes outside the mosque with his radio operator to call in the situation to Battalion Forward HQ.

I see an old man in a red kaffiyeh lying against the back wall. Another is face down next to him, his hand on the old man's lap -- as if he were trying to take cover. I squat beside them, inches away and begin to videotape them. Then I notice that the blood coming from the old man's nose is bubbling. A sign he is still breathing. So is the man next to him.

While I continue to tape, a Marine walks up to the other two bodies about fifteen feet away, but also lying against the same back wall.

Then I hear him say this about one of the men:

"He's ******* faking he's dead -- he's faking he's ******* dead."

Through my viewfinder I can see him raise the muzzle of his rifle in the direction of the wounded Iraqi. There are no sudden movements, no reaching or lunging.

However, the Marine could legitimately believe the man poses some kind of danger. Maybe he's going to cover him while another Marine searches for weapons.

Instead, he pulls the trigger. There is a small splatter against the back wall and the man's leg slumps down.

"Well he's dead now," says another Marine in the background.

I am still rolling. I feel the deep pit of my stomach. The Marine then abruptly turns away and strides away, right past the fifth wounded insurgent lying next to a column. He is very much alive and peering from his blanket. He is moving, even trying to talk. But for some reason, it seems he did not pose the same apparent "danger" as the other man -- though he may have been more capable of hiding a weapon or explosive beneath his blanket.

But then two other marines in the room raise their weapons as the man tries to talk.

For a moment, I'm paralyzed still taping with the old man in the foreground. I get up after a beat and tell the Marines again, what I had told the lieutenant -- that this man -- all of these wounded men -- were the same ones from yesterday. That they had been disarmed treated and left here.


At that point the Marine who fired the shot became aware that I was in the room. He came up to me and said, "I didn't know sir-I didn't know." The anger that seemed present just moments before turned to fear and dread.

The wounded man then tries again to talk to me in Arabic.

He says, "Yesterday I was shot... please... yesterday I was shot over there -- and talked to all of you on camera -- I am one of the guys from this whole group. I gave you information. Do you speak Arabic? I want to give you information." (This man has since reportedly been located by the Naval Criminal Investigation Service which is handling the case.)

In the aftermath, the first question that came to mind was why had these wounded men been left in the mosque?

It was answered by staff judge advocate Lieutenant Colonel Bob Miller -- who interviewed the Marines involved following the incident. After being treated for their wounds on Friday by Navy Corpsman (I personally saw their bandages) the insurgents were going to be transported to the rear when time and circumstances allowed.

The area, however, was still hot. And there were American casualties to be moved first.

Also, the squad that entered the mosque on Saturday was different than the one that had led the attack on Friday.

It's reasonable to presume they may not have known that these insurgents had already been engaged and subdued a day earlier.
Yet when this new squad engaged the wounded insurgents on Saturday, perhaps really believing they had been fighting or somehow posed a threat -- those Marines inside knew from their training to check the insurgents for weapons and explosives after disabling them, instead of leaving them where they were and waiting outside the mosque for the squad I was following to arrive.






During the course of these events, there was plenty of mitigating circumstances like the ones just mentioned and which I reported in my story. The Marine who fired the shot had reportedly been shot in the face himself the day before.

I'm also well aware from many years as a war reporter that there have been times, especially in this conflict, when dead and wounded insurgents have been booby-trapped, even supposedly including an incident that happened just a block away from the mosque in which one Marine was killed and five others wounded. Again, a detail that was clearly stated in my television report.

No one, especially someone like me who has lived in a war zone with you, would deny that a solider or Marine could legitimately err on the side of caution under those circumstances. War is about killing your enemy before he kills you.

In the particular circumstance I was reporting, it bothered me that the Marine didn't seem to consider the other insurgents a threat -- the one very obviously moving under the blanket, or even the two next to me that were still breathing.

I can't know what was in the mind of that Marine. He is the only one who does.

But observing all of this as an experienced war reporter who always bore in mind the dark perils of this conflict, even knowing the possibilities of mitigating circumstances -- it appeared to me very plainly that something was not right. According to Lt. Col Bob Miller, the rules of engagement in Falluja required soldiers or Marines to determine hostile intent before using deadly force. I was not watching from a hundred feet away. I was in the same room. Aside from breathing, I did not observe any movement at all.

Making sure you know the basis for my choices after the incident is as important to me as knowing how the incident went down. I did not in any way feel like I had captured some kind of "prize" video. In fact, I was heartsick. Immediately after the mosque incident, I told the unit's commanding officer what had happened. I shared the video with him, and its impact rippled all the way up the chain of command. Marine commanders immediately pledged their cooperation.

We all knew it was a complicated story, and if not handled responsibly, could have the potential to further inflame the volatile region. I offered to hold the tape until they had time to look into incident and begin an investigation -- providing me with information that would fill in some of the blanks.

For those who don't practice journalism as a profession, it may be difficult to understand why we must report stories like this at all -- especially if they seem to be aberrations, and not representative of the behavior or character of an organization as a whole.

The answer is not an easy one.

In war, as in life, there are plenty of opportunities to see the full spectrum of good and evil that people are capable of. As journalists, it is our job is to report both -- though neither may be fully representative of those people on whom we're reporting. For example, acts of selfless heroism are likely to be as unique to a group as the darker deeds. But our coverage of these unique events, combined with the larger perspective - will allow the truth of that situation, in all of its complexities, to begin to emerge. That doesn't make the decision to report events like this one any easier. It has, for me, led to an agonizing struggle -- the proverbial long, dark night of the soul.

I knew NBC would be responsible with the footage. But there were complications. We were part of a video "pool" in Falluja, and that obligated us to share all of our footage with other networks. I had no idea how our other "pool" partners might use the footage. I considered not feeding the tape to the pool -- or even, for a moment, destroying it. But that thought created the same pit in my stomach that witnessing the shooting had. It felt wrong. Hiding this wouldn't make it go away. There were other people in that room. What happened in that mosque would eventually come out. I would be faced with the fact that I had betrayed truth as well as a life supposedly spent in pursuit of it.

When NBC aired the story 48-hours later, we did so in a way that attempted to highlight every possible mitigating issue for that Marine's actions. We wanted viewers to have a very clear understanding of the circumstances surrounding the fighting on that frontline. Many of our colleagues were just as responsible. Other foreign networks made different decisions, and because of that, I have become the conflicted conduit who has brought this to the world.

The Marines have built their proud reputation on fighting for freedoms like the one that allows me to do my job, a job that in some cases may appear to discredit them. But both the leaders and the grunts in the field like you understand that if you lower your standards, if you accept less, than less is what you'll become.

There are people in our own country that would weaken your institution and our nation -by telling you it's okay to betray our guiding principles by not making the tough decisions, by letting difficult circumstances turns us into victims or worseÂ…villains.

I interviewed your Commanding Officer, Lieutenant Colonel Willy Buhl, before the battle for Falluja began. He said something very powerful at the time-something that now seems prophetic. It was this:

"We're the good guys. We are Americans. We are fighting a gentleman's war here -- because we don't behead people, we don't come down to the same level of the people we're combating. That's a very difficult thing for a young 18-year-old Marine who's been trained to locate, close with and destroy the enemy with fire and close combat. That's a very difficult thing for a 42-year-old lieutenant colonel with 23 years experience in the service who was trained to do the same thing once upon a time, and who now has a thousand-plus men to lead, guide, coach, mentor -- and ensure we remain the good guys and keep the moral high ground."

I listened carefully when he said those words. I believed them.

So here, ultimately, is how it all plays out: when the Iraqi man in the mosque posed a threat, he was your enemy; when he was subdued he was your responsibility; when he was killed in front of my eyes and my camera -- the story of his death became my responsibility.

The burdens of war, as you so well know, are unforgiving for all of us.

I pray for your soon and safe return.


I emphasized the part in the middle b/c I've seen a few links slamming this guy as blatanly partisan, and at least he disagrees with that...

Cycloptichorn
0 Replies
 
woiyo
 
  1  
Reply Mon 22 Nov, 2004 12:00 pm
http://www.abc.net.au/news/newsitems/200411/s1248394.htm

While everyone is "bickering" about what to do or not do with this Hero Soldier, it might be best to be aware of what our soldiers have to deal with in these intense times they face.



Excerpt..."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.

The point-blank shooting on November 13 of a wounded Iraqi was caught on tape and beamed around the world.

It raised questions about the degree of military restraint and fanned Arab resentment.

The marine was withdrawn from combat and an investigation launched.

Military sources had said that the rules of engagement were looser during the operation launched in Fallujah, for fear that rebels would be disguised, fake death or wear suicide explosives belts."
0 Replies
 
Cycloptichorn
 
  1  
Reply Mon 22 Nov, 2004 12:02 pm
One can 'fear' those things happening at any time. Why should the rules of engagement be any different now than they are in other wars?

Cycloptichorn
0 Replies
 
JustWonders
 
  1  
Reply Mon 22 Nov, 2004 01:16 pm
Kevin (cheap propaganda artist) Sites should be on his hands and knees thanking whatever God he prays to that he wasn't with THESE Marines. If he had been, he'd be dead.

Quote:
On one particularly grim night, a group of marines from Bravo Company's First Platoon turned a corner in the darkness and headed up an alley. As they did so, they came across men dressed in uniforms worn by the Iraqi National Guard. The uniforms were so perfect that they even carried pieces of red tape and white, the signal agreed upon to assure American soldiers that any Iraqis dressed that way would be friendly; the others could be killed.

The marines, spotting the red and white tape, waved, and the men in Iraqi uniforms opened fire. One American, Corporal Anderson, died instantly. One of the wounded men, Pfc. Andrew Russell, lay in the road, screaming from a nearly severed leg.

A group of marines ran forward into the gunfire to pull their comrades out. But the ambush, and the enemy flares and gunfire that followed, rattled the men of Bravo Company more than any event. In the darkness, the men began to argue. Others stood around in the road. As the platoon's leader, Lt. Andy Eckert, struggled to take charge, the Third Platoon seemed on the brink of panic.

"Everybody was scared," Lieutenant Eckert said afterward. "If the leader can't hold, then the unit can't hold together."

The unit did hold, but only after the intervention of Bravo Company's commanding officer, Capt. Read Omohundro.

Time and again through the week, Captain Omohundro kept his men from folding, if not by his resolute manner then by his calmness under fire. In the first 16 hours of battle, when the combat was continuous and the threat of death ever present, Captain Omohundro never flinched, moving his men through the warrens and back alleys of Falluja with an uncanny sense of space and time, sensing the enemy, sensing the location of his men, even in the darkness, entirely self-possessed.

"Damn it, get moving," Captain Omohundro said, and his men, looking relieved that they had been given direction amid the anarchy, were only too happy to oblige.

A little later, Captain Omohundro, a 34-year-old Texan, allowed that the strain of the battle had weighed on him, but he said that he had long ago trained himself to keep any self-doubt hidden from view.

"It's not like I don't feel it," Captain Omohundro said. "But if I were to show it, the whole thing would come apart."

When the heavy fighting was finally over, a dog began to follow Bravo Company through Falluja's broken streets. First it lay down in the road outside one of the buildings the company had occupied, between troop carriers. Then, as the troops moved on, the mangy dog slinked behind them, first on a series of house searches, then on a foot patrol, always keeping its distance, but never letting the marines out of its sight.

Bravo Company, looking a bit ragged itself as it moved up through Falluja, momentarily fell out of its single-file line.

"Keep a sharp eye," Captain Omohundro told his men. "We ain't done with this war yet."

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/21/international/middleeast/21battle.html?pagewanted=1&ei=5094&en=bc339766506f30ca&hp&ex=1101099600&partner=homepage
0 Replies
 
au1929
 
  1  
Reply Mon 22 Nov, 2004 02:45 pm
Cycloptichorn wrote

Quote:
One can 'fear' those things happening at any time. Why should the rules of engagement be any different now than they are in other wars


Because this is not a conventional war. It is a guerilla action against fanatics who have no respect for the rules of engagement. What do you suppose would have happened if the roles were reversed?
0 Replies
 
Cycloptichorn
 
  1  
Reply Mon 22 Nov, 2004 03:53 pm
Quote:
Because this is not a conventional war. It is a guerilla action against fanatics who have no respect for the rules of engagement. What do you suppose would have happened if the roles were reversed?


The entire point of our 'morally superior' position is that we specifically do NOT do the thing that would be done by the enemy if the roles were reversed.

Without our position of morality, we are little better than thugs enforcing our will on the region. With it, we can keep insisting that we are bringing peace to the region and that we are better than those who oppose us... a critical component of the support we need from Iraqis to win this war against the insurgency.

As soon as the Iraqis see us doing the same things as the insurgents, a lot more people start, well, 'cheering for the home team' as it were....

Cycloptichorn

p.s. The American Revolutionary soldiers drastically broke the rules of civilized warfare of their day, and fit your definition of 'fanatics' in the same way. Don't be so quick to stereotype the reasoning behind the insurgency, for there are many different ones, and we really don't understand any of them.
0 Replies
 
hingehead
 
  1  
Reply Mon 22 Nov, 2004 04:30 pm
JustWonders wrote:
Kevin (cheap propaganda artist) Sites should be on his hands and knees thanking whatever God he prays to that he wasn't with THESE Marines. If he had been, he'd be dead.


I'm not sure I follow your logic - there are Marines who kill journalists?
0 Replies
 
Asherman
 
  1  
Reply Mon 22 Nov, 2004 04:31 pm
Obviously not enough. Laughing Laughing Very Happy Confused Twisted Evil
0 Replies
 
au1929
 
  1  
Reply Mon 22 Nov, 2004 04:50 pm
Cycloptichorn

Sitting behind a computer and rationalizing is pretty easy. Try that in the heat of battle after being shot at and watching your comrades being killed and wounded.
Cyc said
Quote:
Don't be so quick to stereotype the reasoning behind the insurgency, for there are many different ones, and we really don't understand any of them.


Anyone who will hide among and use civilians as shields. Execute and behead hostages and use suicide bombers to kill indiscriminately deserves no quarter. You are correct I do not understand these "people?"
0 Replies
 
revel
 
  1  
Reply Mon 22 Nov, 2004 06:06 pm
Quote:
Cycloptichorn wrote:
I've heard a lot of talk about how the 'video didn't show the truth' and such. Listen to the guy taking the video, himself:


I think in this time of being labeled everything under the sun if you say anything that can cast a negative light on anything to do with the military or bush or the right agenda, Kevin Site showed a lot of courage in reporting the news.
0 Replies
 
JustWonders
 
  1  
Reply Mon 22 Nov, 2004 09:34 pm
Most of us feel more admiration for the courage of the Marine, and a great deal of contempt for Sites, which he richly deserves, because he knew exactly what he was doing. I hope the fame and fortune he's after is worth it to him.

Sites did not show an ounce of courage with his seemingly urgent need to sell his footage to the world before the military could investigate whether any wrongdoing had occurred.

Nor do I believe a word of his so-called "open letter to the Marines" on his website. He's a self-serving low-life who doesn't for a second think that Marine is now "his responsibility", but more likely his "ticket" to the Pulitzer Prize.

Why is it so difficult to see that the enemy we are fighting has none of the humanity you are demanding of the USMC. None.
0 Replies
 
dyslexia
 
  1  
Reply Mon 22 Nov, 2004 09:52 pm
I can't say that
Quote:
Most of us
know much of anything, and don't presume to try. Whatever the Marine did, has been done before and will be done again because that's what war is like and is not likely to change. While it seems comforting to say that "they" are worse, it doesn't make what happened any better. Supposedly "we" are bringing to the 'savages' civilization while at the same time simply demonstrating that 'we" have bigger and better guns. we certainly like to point out that 'they" resort to such barbaric tactics as suicide bombers while 'we' pride ourselves with using only 'smart' weapons. War is friggin' war no matter how you frame it and it always is inhumane, ugly and deadly to all sides involved. We don't need more troops on the ground in Iraq, we need none, we need to stop the killing because we were wrong going in and the longer we stay we just get more wrong and more die. I believe it's time for humanity to grow up.
0 Replies
 
cjhsa
 
  1  
Reply Mon 22 Nov, 2004 09:55 pm
Yes, I agree Dys. The "humanity" that is the middle east needs to grow up, by about 2000 years.
0 Replies
 
dyslexia
 
  1  
Reply Mon 22 Nov, 2004 10:05 pm
ah yes, they will then have the same smart weapons that we have and we can have civilized wars, none will die, picnics after the battles and the ants won't come. It will be swell. But for now it's time to stop the killing and get back to the real issues of why queers getting married will destroy good christian values.
0 Replies
 
JustWonders
 
  1  
Reply Mon 22 Nov, 2004 10:07 pm
Kevin (wannabe Geraldo) Sites probably disagrees with you, Dys. He's no doubt not famous or rich enough yet.

I'm thinking it might be a good idea if we make the reporters check the wounded jihadists.
0 Replies
 
dyslexia
 
  1  
Reply Mon 22 Nov, 2004 10:11 pm
justwonders, I just wonder if you are aware of just how many journalists have died in both Iraq and Afghanistan during the last several years making the big money and getting famous.(I think not)
0 Replies
 
 

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