I don't know the tactical situation, but it looks like they were providing aerial cover for a convoy of some sort, since that's who they keep chatting with. This was quite possibly an ambush in it's very early stages. While disturbing (welcome to war) I don't think that the actions of the crew where unbecoming at that point.

I did however have an issue with the destruction of the van. There were no weapons visible, it was clear that they were collecting bodies for transport/medical attention. Any perceived or real threat to the convoy was at that time neutralized, and there was no need to fire.

Doing so clearly violated the Geneva conventions and the US Army's ROE. Both apache crews should be charged with murder, and the authorizing officer should be charged with some lesser charge for not confirming the intended target.

However, I'm uncomfortable with the way Wikileaks has couched the release of this video (the editing, the title, and the url used to promote it). It's agitprop, and in the long term I think it undermines the ability of leaked documents like this to enter the public discourse and (possibly) effect change.

My advice to Wikileaks if they want my continued support is to stick to what you're good at: enabling whistleblowers to anonymously release documents that may serve the public interest. But let Michael Moore handle the filmmaking.

I definitely saw cameras with telephoto lenses in the video, but I also saw a weapon as well.

I'm glad the video was released, but it should have been released raw and without all of the markup and commentary.

http://www.reddit.com/r/WTF/comments/bmooi/wikileaks_video_j...

And who gave them permission? (Really ignorant here, sorry....) Did the person who granted them permission to fire have another source of information about the situation, or was the decision based entirely on the crew's description of the situation? Did it have something to do with them saying the van was "picking up weapons?"

They actually ask twice for permission to fire on the van. The first time with some detail about the target and the second without.

Did the person who granted them permission to fire have another source of information about the situation, or was the decision based entirely on the crew's description of the situation?

The latter. Although being that authority to fire is in the hands of the ground commander, he should have asked what the heck they were firing on. From the sounds of it, I think he was tied up with other things at the time he gave said permission, which doesn't absolve him from his role.

It's not clear that no one is shooting, though. It's only clear that the available and very limited perspective did not capture such activity.

02:15 No hold on. Lets come around. Behind buildings right now from our point of view. ... Okay, we're gonna come around.

02:19 Hotel Two-Six; have eyes on individual with RPG. Getting ready to fire. We won't...

02:23 Yeah, we had a guy shoot---and now he's behind the building.

02:26 God damn it.

02:28 Uh, negative, he was, uh, right in front of the Brad Uh, 'bout, there, one o'clock.

02:34 Haven't seen anything since then.

Every war there's big civilian massacres and other major moral abridgments no matter what the combatants' PR department spews out. We should be realistic about that.

It's not an excuse for those that committed or knew about this, but it shouldn't be unexpected.

Proof of murder, huh? I'd point out some things worth thinking about, but it sounds like you've completely made your mind up already. Would it be worth spending a few minutes trying to look at why it happened, and all the elements of the situation, and the thinking patterns of people involved - or would that just be "political bullshit"?

It's easy to apply black and white thinking to a battlefield after the fact, but it seems to miss a lot of the nuance of the situation - the helicopter had been radioed in by ground troops who were under small arms fire. The fight might or might not have still been going. It's not clear where the van came from, and what the positions of the engaged ground forces were relative to the van. Who knows if that style of van had been used recently for combat purposes by the insurgency. This was at the height of the surge - was there a curfew or some ban on vehicles in the area?

I don't know. I'd ask and think about things like that, but is that just "political bullshit"? Battlefields seem to rarely give way to black and white morality. It seems like after something like this comes out, you could get more answers by thinking and asking smart questions than you would by rushing to moral judgment.

fire in the hole.

In my opinion, we should only ever declare total war, and we should not allow ourselves the opinion that some wars are less gruesome than others. If we aren't willing to carpet bomb a school, we should not be willing to destroy the family that depends on it.

And yes, the video is horrific.

This is the whole point of rules of engagement. Making war a lesser--or "more obscure", if that is your semantic preference--violation of humanity is the goal, the whole idea, the very point of these rules. We live in a time where we can easily afford not to have total war--not that it was ever a good idea in the first place.

You think as long as we're killing people, it's OK to carpet bomb schools? As long as you're doing bad, might as well not be selective about it? Might as well go for the big enchilada? Maximize body count, like a video game? You're an idiot of the first class. Not just because of the foolishness of the idea, nor because of the lazy faux-intellectual rationalization therefor, but because of how easily you justify the obliteration of lives and nations when such a thing is not even close to necessary. Thank God that America abandoned your mindset after Vietnam; too bad they didn't abandon it earlier.

It's not about justifying carpet bombing, it's about not fighting when you don't have to.

Vietnam was a horrible idea, not because we didn't have precision munitions and rules of engagement, but because we didn't belong there in the first place.

War used to be a big fucking deal. Now, George Bush gets on the television and says "don't worry, we won't hurt any kids, we're using JDAMs." And it's bullshit, we end up killing tons of civilians because people think that ROE and precision munitions will actually make war zones safe. News flash: they aren't, and they never will be. If people realized that, then we wouldn't be in Iraq right now, which is the right thing.

Anyway, you are logically incorrect to the first degree: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/False_dilemma . Some wars are less gruesome than others. By multiple orders of magnitude. You are wrong.

And the very notion that total war is even permissible angers and disgusts me.

Also, while you're at it, you might as well educate yourself as to what "ad hominem" means: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ad_hominem

Have a nice life.

PS. You called me "an idiot of the first class." I have no idea what the first class is, and I'm sort of curious what an "idiot of the second class" might be, but that is irrelevant. You infer that my intelligence is lacking, and that that implies my argument is weak. That manner of argument is known as ad hominem. You should read your own Wikipedia article.

I really agree with you here. In my opinion, total war is how war should be waged. If we're in, we're in for the long haul and we take it serious. Plus, it forces our citizens to constantly acknowledge and renew their commitment every day, which means no shaky 'oh I'm not sure' wars.

(This is not me saying conquest is moral or justifiable, merely pointing out that people have been willing (your word) to wage total war for the sake of conquest)

Typically "good" in this context is equated with "moral", so I'm a little confused with your statement. Could you please elaborate?

It seems like you're unable to decide between utilitarianism and some notion of "fair"ness (reason perhaps?) as your central moral philosophy. Note that utilitarians generally define fair as "greatest good of the greatest number".

You're right though, my views are often very utilitarian. Although, while 'fair' on the large scale applies to 'greatest good for greatest number', I would very rarely condemn someone for acting out of self-preservation, even if it was not 'fair' on the large scale. Generally speaking I hold our own right to defend ourselves, and those we love, above 'fair'. Generally speaking.

For me this video it's just a tool for journalists to play with, and the media to make some money with. Nothing more.

Has the army retired from war? No. The administration could be punished only once it finishes its goal.

Choosing between the candidate who supported the invasion of Iraq and Afghanistan and the candidate who only supported the invasion of Afghanistan.

> The administration could be punished only once it finishes its goal.

I'm not so sure that's true. According to the Hague and Geneva Conventions medical personal are off limits, but are supposed to be identified as such. If the people who jumped out of the van had medical personnel markings, they wouldn't have been attacked.

Instead they were presumed to be members of the same un-uniformed militia which is common in Iraq (as I understand it).

That's not political BS, that's just how war works. War is terrible and should be reserved for the defense of our nation, not these pseudo war escapades across the world that we have now.

It also specifically provides protections for civilians who are trying to assist wounded soldiers, so it's immaterial whether or not they were official responders or not.

Either way this is a war crime and needs to be prosecuted as such. Those who conspired to suppress it should also be charged as co-conspirators.

I'm not saying that justifies the shootings, just pointing out that the conventions need a refresh.

Outdated or not, that's the law.

The destruction of the Van was clearly murder. If I had done that, a Marine Corps Colonel would have had his boot so far up my ass after seeing that video, that there would not be much left of me to execute.

You know what the correct response is from a CO in a situation where a van arrives to pick up bodies? Hint: It's never 'Roger. Engage.'

Your guys told you that a van arrived to pick up bodies, and they ask for permission to engage. Correct response: 'Do they have any weapons?' or 'Negative.'

Now sometimes there is so much trust between a CO and a particular guy, that clarifying information will not be asked for. This is rare, but it may have been the case here. Which still calls that CO's ability to judge character into question.

Bottom line. In the Marine Corps, there would have DEFINITELY been consequences for this action. (the destruction of the van).

Also, I noticed that the individual who said they 'had no idea how the children were hurt' was a Major. Now I know there is no way a Marine Corps Officer would tell a lie like that. They would just not say anything. You lose a lot of respect for Army Officers after seeing something like that.

He was doing something else and these guys were a piss off that he trusted to actually be responsible. They weren't, and because of that his failure is highlighted as well.

http://www.reddit.com/r/WTF/comments/bmooi/wikileaks_video_j...

It seems plausible to me that these guys are seeing this situation all the time: they fire on a group of people, some are left wounded, and vans show up to collect weapons, but also grab wounded/bodies to try and look legit from the sky. Being used to tactics like these, I can understand how anxious they were to get clearance to fire on the van; who knows if they are going to fire on the helicopter or speed off. It wasn't clearly marked as a medical vehicle, and it sounds like everyone over there knows that you will be fired on if you do something like this.

Also, the original group of Iraqis didn't notice the chopper at all, even though it was circling for a while. They surely would have had a potshot at it had they seen it, as they were supposedly all armed with AKs and RPGs. It's probably quite a distance from the target, with the camera zoomed in creating the illusion its a lot closer than it would appear. Notice the amount of time it takes for the rounds to strike the target. That's why I reckon the van pulled up, he thought the street was empty.

All I was saying before was that gunners like this are used to facing insurgent tactics. When they see vans like this, they aren't looking to give them the benefit of the doubt. They have been trained that, if they do, they may be putting their lives and the mission at risk. This guy is probably scared out of his mind. He has a huge responsibility, and screwing up - as we've seen today - has enormous consequences.

To me, the laughing and joking isn't making light of slaughtering the enemy, it's nervous laughs and desperate attempts to bring everyone out of it. We're human, we don't deal with this shit well. The comments here are good proof of that.

None of this excuses slaughtering innocent unarmed civilians, it's just my attempt at bringing some perspective.

Not that it makes the situation any more right, but it does make things a lot less clear cut...

Out of curiosity suppose you're the soldier in that situation and your CO says to engage. Do you refuse to do so? That itself has to violate military protocol right? Do you say "but they're unarmed, are you sure?" then follow whatever instructions you're given?

From what I've read/heard of Marines, the people in the field are expected to make more of their own decisions than in other branches of the military. There's less micromanagement I suppose would be a good way of summing it up, and as a result this would have been less likely to have happened in the first place in that branch. Is that true?

I'm not saying you're wrong, I'm just saying if both of us had to go to Iraq, I'd probably come home alive (having killed a lot of people, probably some innocent people in the confusion) and you'd come home in a box because you assumed everyone was nice and wanted to buy you a beer...until they shot you.

In other words, in a war, my life means more to me than a civilian's who has a 50/50 chance of being a combatant. Again, this is why we shouldn't be there.

It seems that you're entirely too willing to throw out morals for expediency. If you really believed that the killing is bad, you ought to not enlist, or if you're conscripted, get conscientious objector status to avoid being in a place where you'd need to kill. And the same goes for anyone else who has moral qualms about what's going on there.

If you go there willingly, knowing what's going on, you can't use the exigencies of the situation as an excuse, as they're perfectly foreseeable.

>If you really believed that the killing is bad, you ought to not enlist

I really do believe that. I even donated thousands of dollars to a POTUS candidate that would have gotten us out of Iraq as soon as he took office. Sadly, 98.5% of Americans still wanted this war, since they voted for Obama or McCain.

>It seems that you're entirely too willing to throw out morals for expediency

If the expediency should mean the difference between my life or death, than yes. I'm just being honest here. In war, I'd kill anyone who I thought was a danger to me, but then I wouldn't go to war unless it was for self defense.

>If you go there willingly, knowing what's going on, you can't use the exigencies of the situation as an excuse, as they're perfectly foreseeable.

That's a good point, but why apply it to just the soldier, why not our Presidents? Wasn't it entirely foreseeable that innocent people would die by going into or staying in Iraq. Isn't it entirely foreseeable that the money we send the government is going to pay for all this to happen?

The reason I defend these heli pilots is 1) because the situation they were in was far more complicated than most people here will admit, 2) they probably didn't sign up to kill innocent people, just like I didn't pay my taxes to pay for the bullets.

Blatantly wrong. You are throwing away the rest of your point with this garbage.

You must think I'm wrong in some other way...please explain. Getting out of Iraq wasn't part of either candidate's platform. So, how was I blatantly wrong?

At the same time, your life in a gunship as the operator of a 30mm cannon is also rather more secure than that of of wounded individual reduced to crawling on the ground, or of unwounded people who choose to assist the wounded individual rather than first trying to secure the area (eg taking a shot at the helicopter). Of course it is difficult to weigh such subjective factors in an objectively dangerous situation but that is part of the training for a professional rather than conscripted military force, IMO.

Did not vote on your comment - don't agree with your perspective but it seems like a sincere effort to further rather than stifle debate.

War is an active engagement between military forces, not randomly killing civillians in a country you are trying to help.

You must assume Y. You can't just start shooting on the balance of probabilities. It might be forgivable if there was some imminent danger to... somebody. But I'm not seeing that.

From the pilots eyes, he just got the drop on a bunch of bomb laying insurgents trying to help their friends. Of course if it worked out that way, we wouldn't be having this discussion and it would have been perfectly fine.

>War is an active engagement between military forces

If only that were true beyond some ideal. You realize that the alies dropped incendiary bombs on German cities in WWII that killed women and children at a pace of thousands per bombing run. Not to mention what we did to Japan, or what Japan did to China or Korea, or what the North did to the South (slash and burn) in the war of northern aggression.

Not to say that this is acceptable, but Hitler started the bombing of civilians. Apparently, one of the bombing runs on England at night got too close to the city (London?) and killed a bunch of civilians. Instead of admitting that it was a mistake, Hitler pushed out propaganda saying that this was the intention from the start. After that both sides bombed each other's civilian populations.

However, the point being made was that Allied forces weren't exactly blameless in their conduct in the war, despite the amount of attention given to German war crimes in Nuremberg etc. The bombing of Dresden was referred to as 'terror bombing', in that very little tactical military advantage was gained by conducting the bombing, but civilian casualties were horrendous. Apparently so much incendiary bombs were dropped that the intensity of the flames created sudden 'draughts' of air that were powerful enough to suck someone off their feet into the flames.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bombing_of_Dresden_in_World_War...

Also, a side of the war the Golden Generation would rather sweep under the carpet:

http://www.amazon.com/Taken-Force-American-Europe-during/dp/...

But the definition of "reasonable" can be different things to different people, especially under these circumstances. What is reasonable to presume from behind our monitors means nothing. When you're in the middle of a firefight, your definition of reasonable can be a little more flexible.

One problem that we have here is a lack of context. Perhaps these solders were just in a fight the day before with a very similar van. Perhaps instead of presumed medical personnel it was more enemy fighters. If they didn't have clear markings, then it could be very hard to make quick decisions. This is the type of stuff that you just aren't going to be able to tell from a single video.

That is the "missing" context for you...

I believe that this video sets a very powerful context. Don't be ignorant!