I tend to think of that incident as a war crime. The most obvious clue is that the perpetrators are the military, and the victims civilians. It is the use of deadly force by a military unit against noncombatants, most of which are unarmed.
The civilians are _mostly_ unarmed; a couple or so are toting AK-47s, and the pilot said one was carrying an RPG. However, considering the situation in Iraq at the time, the persons with the AK-47s could have simply been the equivalent of bodyguards. And the RPG sighting was far from certain; the pilot saw someone peeking around the corner, and he seemed to be carrying something longish.
From a physical point of view, even if all of the civilians were carrying AK-47, these short-range, inaccurate weapon in the hands of non-trained personnel were absolutely of no threat to the Apache and/ or to the crew. The helicopter was out of range of the AK-47s (based on the time lag between the helicopter's cannon firing, and the rounds arriving), and it is built to withstand 23mm cannon rounds. Even at point blank range, an AK-47 bullet would have the effect of peas bouncing off of an armored Humvee.
From a psychological point of view, though I am not a psychologist or psychiatrist, it seems the pilot & co-pilot were just finding excuses to fire the helicopter's cannon. As the wounded man was crawling, one said repeatedly for the wounded man to just grab a gun. The intent clearly being if his hand falls on a weapon, then technically he was armed and presented a clear and present danger, and thus can be "taken out." This despite the facts that the man was near death and in no condition to fire, and that the AK-47 presented no danger whatsoever to the heavily armored attack helicopter flying out of range of small arms fire.
Indeed, hearing the radio talk it seemed as if the Americans' goal was to shoot someone, anyone. The excuse they used was the AK-47s and the shadow of a glimpse of what they said to be RPG. When the Van came, we heard some more search for excuses so that they can pull the trigger.
When the Americans heard that a child had been wounded, they cursed, as if that would result in bad publicity for their actions. Then they further justified it by saying it was the Iraqi's fault for bringing a child to a firefight.
However, there was a child in the background apparent in some angles of the video. Alternatively, there might have been a child in the van that stopped to help the wounded man.
The Americans then exclaimed proudly at how their round went perfectly through the center of the van's windshield.
This was like shooting fish in a barrel, with the exception that the "fishes" were live human being. The civilians presented absolutely no danger whatsoever to the helicopter. The Americans seemed to know that on some level of awareness, and thus their attempts to justify their action.
It was, at least to me, clearly an act of war crimes.
From surfing sites such as CommonDreams.org, I get the impression that when conservatives dislike their party, they hijack it. On the other hand, when liberals dislike their party, they turn away from it, voting for third parties.
After some years, the situation is that the party of Eisenhower has become the party of Gingrich. While liberals are out in the wild, subsisting on grass soup, saying things like "the lesser of two evils is still evil." Meanwhile, the party of Gingrich is busy calling the shots, channeling public funds to their own pockets with no one to stop the.
I tend to think of that incident as a war crime. The most obvious clue is that the perpetrators are the military, and the victims civilians. It is the use of deadly force by a military unit against noncombatants, most of which are unarmed.
The civilians are _mostly_ unarmed; a couple or so are toting AK-47s, and the pilot said one was carrying an RPG. However, considering the situation in Iraq at the time, the persons with the AK-47s could have simply been the equivalent of bodyguards. And the RPG sighting was far from certain; the pilot saw someone peeking around the corner, and he seemed to be carrying something longish.
From a physical point of view, even if all of the civilians were carrying AK-47, these short-range, inaccurate weapon in the hands of non-trained personnel were absolutely of no threat to the Apache and/ or to the crew. The helicopter was out of range of the AK-47s (based on the time lag between the helicopter's cannon firing, and the rounds arriving), and it is built to withstand 23mm cannon rounds. Even at point blank range, an AK-47 bullet would have the effect of peas bouncing off of an armored Humvee.
From a psychological point of view, though I am not a psychologist or psychiatrist, it seems the pilot & co-pilot were just finding excuses to fire the helicopter's cannon. As the wounded man was crawling, one said repeatedly for the wounded man to just grab a gun. The intent clearly being if his hand falls on a weapon, then technically he was armed and presented a clear and present danger, and thus can be "taken out." This despite the facts that the man was near death and in no condition to fire, and that the AK-47 presented no danger whatsoever to the heavily armored attack helicopter flying out of range of small arms fire.
Indeed, hearing the radio talk it seemed as if the Americans' goal was to shoot someone, anyone. The excuse they used was the AK-47s and the shadow of a glimpse of what they said to be RPG. When the Van came, we heard some more search for excuses so that they can pull the trigger.
When the Americans heard that a child had been wounded, they cursed, as if that would result in bad publicity for their actions. Then they further justified it by saying it was the Iraqi's fault for bringing a child to a firefight.
However, there was a child in the background apparent in some angles of the video. Alternatively, there might have been a child in the van that stopped to help the wounded man.
The Americans then exclaimed proudly at how their round went perfectly through the center of the van's windshield.
This was like shooting fish in a barrel, with the exception that the "fishes" were live human being. The civilians presented absolutely no danger whatsoever to the helicopter. The Americans seemed to know that on some level of awareness, and thus their attempts to justify their action.
It was, at least to me, clearly an act of war crimes.
Well then couldn't the CIA just quietly removed him from power, and not go through a war with many people killed?
From surfing sites such as CommonDreams.org, I get the impression that when conservatives dislike their party, they hijack it. On the other hand, when liberals dislike their party, they turn away from it, voting for third parties.
After some years, the situation is that the party of Eisenhower has become the party of Gingrich. While liberals are out in the wild, subsisting on grass soup, saying things like "the lesser of two evils is still evil." Meanwhile, the party of Gingrich is busy calling the shots, channeling public funds to their own pockets with no one to stop the.
For some odd reason, while reading the article, the phrase "Fox News" popped into my head
The 9-11 hijackers are to Muslims what Timothy McVeigh was to Christianity.