| Orca_Azure said: Seems like I have to side with MrBubbles on this one. Those reporters knew full well they were walking around with a group of armed men during a time of heated war. Sorry, but at a time when people are committing suicide bombings and driving explosive trucks into buildings, the army has to er on the side of caution. When you have suicide killers every other day in the news and you see a large bunch of men in an active city with guns, what are you supposed to think? Would you rather they go up to the crowd and say "hey, you guys. ya'll wouldn't happen to be terrorists right?" You may all be quick to jump against them, but they took the proper precautions. They asked for permission and they did not shoot the unarmed crawling man. They also took several circles around to make sure those men were armed. When the van comes out of nowhere, you have to wonder what their intentions may be. Again, at a time of war you can't be naive and assume that everyone is just trying to live a normal life. Had the reporters been with military guards rather than people wielding guns and t-shirts, they might not have been mistaken for targets. As for the kids; who brings their children to an active war zone? The war is nothing new. Exiting the country or at least keeping the children indoors would have been better. Flame me if you must, but in a war where you have people conducting all kinds of guerrilla warfare, there are bound to be some unintended casualties. Perhaps this is cheap of me to add, but maybe it will show you where i derive my stance from. I've been an army brat for well over 20 years. My father served in Iraq for nearly 3 years. Once while on guard at a market place, he and his group were fired upon by plain clothed civilian terrorists. The scars on his body show that you can't go about trusting people on the streets; the ones who openly carry deadly weapons with a large group of people aren't exactly the least suspicious men in the world |
Firstly, they didn't have guns, they saw a guy with a camera and thought it was a gun. How on Earth does a fully trained soldier of the US army mistake a camera for an AK-47 or an RPG? They're completely different dimensions. So it's OK now to shoot people carrying cameras if you ask for permission from command first?
Secondly, none of them actually had guns, they were all civilians. So actually they shot all targets did not have weapons. So it's OK to shoot 8 unarmed men but it's OK c'os when he was on the ground and injured they didn't shoot him?
Thirdly, I thought the intent of the van was pretty clear when they didn't see any weapons and tried to carry the injured guy into the vehicle. It's possible they were just some guys on the road, saw someone injured and decided to help. They got killed and their kids orphaned for trying to help someone, and killed the guy who they'd mistakenly shot in the first place.
Lastly, if you're an army brat and think this is OK, then this suggests to me a fundamental flaw in the combat procedure of the military. This was one of the most botched operations I've seen since the air strike on British troops by US fighter jets.
