Video posted of Apache strike which killed Reuters employees

[Viktor Sebastian]

I saw this video last night, heart breaking to see.
http://wikileaks.org/

The July 2007 footage shows a number of men on a Baghdad street including two who were later identified as Reuters news employees Namir Noor-Eldeen and Saeed Chmagh.
The Apache pilots tell controllers they have spotted "five to six individuals with AK-47s" and ask for permission to "engage."
At least two individuals in the video do appear to be carrying weapons but the pilots appear to mistake a camera carried by one of the Reuters employees as a rocket-propelled grenade launcher or RPG.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20100405/ts_alt_afp/usitmediamilitaryinternetreuterswikileaks

Don’t take zoom lenses into a war zone.

 

[Luna]

http://www.rangefinderforum.com/forums/showthread.php?t=88287

 

[edodo]

Yeah those soldiers should be judge for this intolerable but obviously common practice in the US army (not that other armies are better though). This story being covered up by the martial law is telling us there may be many more. This war needs to end.

 

[Instantclassic]

A video camera masquerading as AK-47. Not a joke for the dead and their loved ones.

 

[varjag]

They were however appearing in pack alongside with genuine, armed militants. If you are in a middle of battlefield, and spot some armed people on lowres video feed, and other people carry something on a strap over they shoulder, you tend to assume it's a weapon as well.

The two journalists again proved that war journalism is necessary but dangerous, possibly fatal enterprise.

 

[robklurfield]

disturbing beyond words.

 

[mfunnell]

They were however appearing in pack alongside with genuine, armed militants.

I saw the video too, and all I could conclude was that they were with "genuinely armed" people. With weapons slung, BTW. The video told me nothing about their politics. They may have been "genuinely armed moderates". Or "genuinely armed just-regular-folks" who thought being armed in a tough neighbourhood was a reasonable thing to be. Not that that should be allowed. I'm sure the NRA would agree that any armed civillian is a legitimate target.

...Mike

 

[gilpen123]

Verify, verify, verify before you engage. They are not in a shootout with those people this is just senseless. They were even joking around and laughing those SOBs.......

 

[viridari]

I read somewhere else that the journalists were traveling with armed security. I think that part of the incident was a truly unfortunate case of mistaken identity combined with Rules Of Engagement that did not require positive identification of combatants before engagement.

The really disturbing part for me was when a van pulled up and a couple of guys who were clearly unarmed tried removing the injured survivors from the scene, presumably to get them to a hospital. The gunship begged for permission to engage and then shot at the injured and the unarmed men that got out of the van (plus the two small children that were inside the van that could not be seen from above). This, in my opinion, is a war crime and should be treated as such.

Furthermore, General Patreaus saw this video and declined to fulfill the FOIA requests filed by Reuters. Top military brass & Pentagon officials, perhaps even members of the White House administration, saw this video and decided it should not be made public. All of them are complicit in this war crime involving engagement of injured & non-combatants trying to remove casualties from the scene of an engagement.