Private Manning sentenced to 35 years in prison

[Korto]

Ghetto edit:
However, if in a completely different circumstance like, I don't know, surrendering to an aircraft, a "reasonable person" would know that surrender is not an option in some set circumstance, then "tough titties" indeed.

(Edited so it doesn't look like I think pretending to accept surrender in order to murder prisoners is acceptable.)

[Metahive]

Why are people so eager to concoct scenarios where's it's OK to kill helpless troops and civilians? Can anyone tell me? Because I find this incredibly disturbing.

[K. A. Pital]

So you guys think that if you save the lives of your soldiers, this means executing prisoners and killing civilians is possible? Nice. In this case I have an idea for you: complete and utter genocide removes a threat for good. If you don't need people of a given territory but only something in there, the best solution that wil save countless soldiers is to kill all civilians that could potentially become soldiers, POWs or insurgents. Atomic bombing can help.

[Korto]

Metahive
Would YOU kill the fat man?


Stas, that would seem to be an over-reaction. I mean, just speaking for myself.

[Metahive]

Korto, I refer you back to the point I made about hypotheticals being cheap. It's also immensely inappropriate to indulge in purely philosophical musings when the massacring of civilians and surrendered troops is already an ugly reality. It's easy to do so when the people aren't dying on your doorstep.

[salm]

So you guys think that if you save the lives of your soldiers, this means executing prisoners and killing civilians is possible? Nice. In this case I have an idea for you: complete and utter genocide removes a threat for good. If you don't need people of a given territory but only something in there, the best solution that wil save countless soldiers is to kill all civilians that could potentially become soldiers, POWs or insurgents. Atomic bombing can help.

It seams that neutron bombing would be more adequat as you can keep the infrastructure.

[eyl]

Why are people so eager to concoct scenarios where's it's OK to kill helpless troops and civilians? Can anyone tell me? Because I find this incredibly disturbing.

Speaking for myself - because you made an absolute statement that killing civilians is never permissible. I just want to determine whether you actually considered the less clear-cut cases.

So when soldiers fuck up it should be civilians who pay the price? Sorry, unacceptable. When you become a soldier you have accepted that death is an occupational hazard. Civilians have not. It will be hard for you to convince me otherwise.

The ideal case is a war where civilians are unaffected. That's has never, to my knowledge, ever happened, and won't until we replace war with some kind of arena contest.

Let's not. Hypotheticals are cheap and, as I said above, can lead to soldiers massacring children because some hypothetical scenario painted them as potential threats.

If the scenario is plausible, then you're going to have to account for that case.

And the hypotheticals I gave aren't all that out there. In particular, in the case of the Lamed Hei (the 35) while we don't know for a fact if the shepherd existed, it's something that could plausibly have happened. In which case the decision to spare his life lead directly to the death of 35 soldiers and indirectly to more deaths due to lack of supplies.

Make an argument or not, don't just throw stuff out there.

You're assertion is that the killing of civilians is invariably a war crime. I'm pointing out that international law - which defines a war crime - disagrees.

Legal definitions and moral definitions don't always go hand in hand.

So your definition of a war crime is "Stuff I don't approve of"?

So you guys think that if you save the lives of your soldiers, this means executing prisoners and killing civilians is possible? Nice. In this case I have an idea for you: complete and utter genocide removes a threat for good. If you don't need people of a given territory but only something in there, the best solution that wil save countless soldiers is to kill all civilians that could potentially become soldiers, POWs or insurgents. Atomic bombing can help.

Isn't that like saying that since we could prevent crime by locking everyone up, and we're not willing to do that, we shouldn't fight crime at all? Or are you going to make an actual argument why killing civilians is always forbidden (which again, is not actually the case under international law).

[Kamakazie Sith]

This is the same crew that callously killed children and people attempting to rescue said children.

If we're talking about the same video with the journalists being killed I can see someone sitting in the passenger seat which I know, due to the report to be a child, but I'm not sure how the gunner is suppose to know given the quality.

The Conventions make no such distinction either. If, at the time you want to shoot at them, they are not engaged in hostilities, you cannot shoot them. At minimum, if they lay down their arms, they are inviolate. It does not matter if you can take them prisoner. If they pick up their weapons again, they are fair game, but until then not so much.

I understand what the law says. I'm curious about how it is used in practice in battlefield conditions like Iraq with an insurgency.

You can make the argument that on an actual battlefield, this might be silly, or may not apply, because for example the helicopter gun ship might fly over and the guys pick weapons up and start shooting at your infantry five minutes later. However, this is urban warfare. If nothing else, it is a vital protection for civilians and aid workers, who need some way of showing they are not combatants. If they cannot put their hands up, raise a white flag--something--to show they are not hostile and have it count for something, then your rules of engagement constitute a war crime.

What you said is perfectly reasonable. If they do such a thing then they're fair game.

Combat zone vs not-combat zone should not affect properties of optics.

Poorly worded on my part. Of course a combat zone would have nothing to do with the quality of your optics. What I meant by that is in a combat zone things can be much more easily mistaken for as weapons and I wonder if you have tried to distinguish weapons for objects that could resemble them.

And? Would you like to know how it determined whether those targets were hostile? The camera it uses is a monochrome TV camera from 1970s. They are finally upgrading to color...

I'm aware of the video equipment aboard the Apache. So, it seems you're implying the technology is inferior which appears to be the case since that picture you posted seems to be of much better quality.

My Nikon L610 (a decent point and shoot) can take images at 80 meters which, when scaled to what it would be at 800 meters, gives you this:

I will see about confirming my image scaling on an 800 meter distant object, but it is kinda hilly around here.

Please do. I'm interested in the result.

The entire country is a combat zone. It is not as if the population "enters" said warzone. They live there. The combat zone enters their homes--often literally, resulting in various american service branches raging out and executing entire families.

The fact that the army's imaging systems cannot discriminate between an RPG, a 2x4, or a camera tripod at 800 meters--while relying on said same imaging systems for friend/foe designations at 800 meters--is my entire point. Laying aside the fact that these motherfuckers knowingly shot children and people trying to render medical aid in abrogation of not just the geneva conventions but any sort of conscience whatsoever, this is the US Army in the 21st century.

So, is the report of the recovery of a RPG and two AK-47s by the responding ground team bullshit?

The proper response should have been "We cannot tell at this range what they are carrying, this area is swarming with civilians going about their business. We need to get eyes on" rather than chomping at the bit to engage.

First of all. It isn't that they weren't sure. They believed they were carrying weapons and if the recovery of the weapons from the ground team is an accurate report then they were correct. You also have to take into consideration the actions of the reporters which included aiming in the direction of the ground troops that the Apache's were providing support for. Basically, the camera crew was trying to get pictures of coalition forces. You can see this happen on the video and the gunner is clearly heard saying "He's getting ready to fire". Was that all an act so they could murder people and eventually children?

That is why not being able to tell what people are carrying is not an excuse. And it should not be an issue in the first place, because the US Army, with its vast amount of money, should be able to afford periodic optical upgrades to their targeting systems. Because at this point, they are better off using a good set of binoculars, or strapping a remote controlled Nikon D3200 with a with a 400 mm telephoto lens to their guns, and looking at the image feed on a god damn jailbroken Ipad.

As has already been covered "not being able to tell" is not the reason.

I agree. If the US military truly has inferior video equipment to what you can buy as a civilian then you are absolutely right and in which case I hold the United States government responsible for lowest bidder bullshit.

[Kamakazie Sith]

You people are all missing one point: It is completely unreasonable to assume that people are insurgents in Iraq just because they were funny clothes and are armed. EVERYBODY there is armed. There is no difference between a peaceful group of people celebrating or just meeting up (who put their weapons in the air as a sign that they are happy) or a group of insurgents who have not started shooting yet.

In those circumstances it is completely unreasonable to just think of every Person as a military insurgent just because he carries a weapon.

That would be an excellent point if it weren't for the fact that Iraq was an occupied country and subject to the laws of the occupying power. In 2003 around June or July all heavy weapons and automatic weapons were banned. A permit was required to carry small arms.

[LaCroix]

LaCroix, if instead the insurgents, realising their ambush is a bust, pack their gear and leave to try again another time, was this a good result as far as the helicopter is concerned.

It was called in to stop an attack. If the attackers flee and thus stop atacking, it's mission accomplished, as well.

Still, shooting somebody who has surrendered - and to stop that shitty excuse - they surrendered to the pilot of the craft, not the craft (even if he might sit far away behind a video screen) - is illegal. The US has a long history of condemning others for doing exactly that, even though it has been just as convenient for the other forces, then, as it is now for US forces.

The problem is that the current US ROE are completely illegal in terms of the convention - if a pilot cannot discern whether an object carried by someone is a weapon (in a urban warzone, of all things!), and cannot get better intel, then there is only one way of dealing with it - NOT ENGAGING!
If he does engage with the visuals we have been presented here, and it turns out to be a civilian, the pilot has to bear the book being thrown at him, hard & fast.

[Kamakazie Sith]

So you guys think that if you save the lives of your soldiers, this means executing prisoners and killing civilians is possible? Nice. In this case I have an idea for you: complete and utter genocide removes a threat for good. If you don't need people of a given territory but only something in there, the best solution that wil save countless soldiers is to kill all civilians that could potentially become soldiers, POWs or insurgents. Atomic bombing can help.

I think your straw man put on a cape and costume with an "S" in the middle and flew away. Well done.

We're not talking about the destruction of an entire city and/or tens of thousands of lives indiscriminately ended. We're talking about using deadly force against a group of combatants that lay down their arms when confronted by an aircraft but capture is not possible. Unless you think it is likely that they will march to the nearest enemy outpost and surrender.

[K. A. Pital]

For fuck's sake even eyl's scenario where letting them go actually causes an immediate loss of life is a greater problem.

Your "capture is not possible" is bullshit, is a load of fucking stinking pigshit. Anyone who falls into someone's power is by definition a fucking surrendering person, capiche?

So you don't machinegun people who lay down arms. Period. You don't do that, unless you want to be called a pig-fucking murderous piece of brown slime flowing out from Cheney's crack.

I hope I was clear enough.

[Kamakazie Sith]

LaCroix, if instead the insurgents, realising their ambush is a bust, pack their gear and leave to try again another time, was this a good result as far as the helicopter is concerned.

It was called in to stop an attack. If the attackers flee and thus stop atacking, it's mission accomplished, as well.

Still, shooting somebody who has surrendered - and to stop that shitty excuse - they surrendered to the pilot of the craft, not the craft (even if he might sit far away behind a video screen) - is illegal. The US has a long history of condemning others for doing exactly that, even though it has been just as convenient for the other forces, then, as it is now for US forces.

Can you provide some examples of the US condemning others for doing exactly that?

The problem is that the current US ROE are completely illegal in terms of the convention - if a pilot cannot discern whether an object carried by someone is a weapon (in a urban warzone, of all things!), and cannot get better intel, then there is only one way of dealing with it - NOT ENGAGING!
If he does engage with the visuals we have been presented here, and it turns out to be a civilian, the pilot has to bear the book being thrown at him, hard & fast.

I believe that is the ROE. The pilots of the Crazyhorse group weren't killing everything and anything in their path as wikileaks apparently wants you to believe. When ground forces were actually receiving fire from insurgents they were cleared to engage but spotted children and other non-combatants in the area and held off engaging.

[Kamakazie Sith]

For fuck's sake even eyl's scenario where letting them go actually causes an immediate loss of life is a greater problem.

Your "capture is not possible" is bullshit, is a load of fucking stinking pigshit. Anyone who falls into someone's power is by definition a fucking surrendering person, capiche?

I love your passion. It's moving.

They haven't fallen into someones power though. That's the point that you seem to be ignoring. In order to exercise power over someone you must be able to control them. You aren't controlling them when you aren't able to take them into physical custody and they have weapons literally at their feet.

So you don't machinegun people who lay down arms. Period. You don't do that, unless you want to be called a pig-fucking murderous piece of brown slime flowing out from Cheney's crack.

I hope I was clear enough.

Your position is clear. It is not convincing. Still, I really do love your passion. I want to see more. Seriously, I want to see you rage about this discussion. Get really fucking angry and then I will laugh at you.

[Thanas]

Thanas, did the Germans accept the surrender (even if only long enough to get them into their power)? If they did, then they murdered prisoners.

I think machinegunning them immediately after they raise their hands is not any different than disarming them, forcing them to dig some graves and then machinegunning them.

You set too much emphasis on "accepting the surrender". My point is, soldiers are required to accept surrenders. If they cannot do so, then they have to let the guys go after they have been disarmed. Otherwise, machinegunning civilians and POW will become the norm, because it saves the occupying power manpower, resources, time and reduces risks.

Heck, the institution of parole is pretty much the heaviest indicator that the guys who wrote the conventions were not in favor of people getting shot if the occupying power cannot detain them.

They haven't fallen into someones power though. That's the point that you seem to be ignoring. In order to exercise power over someone you must be able to control them. You aren't controlling them when you aren't able to take them into physical custody and they have weapons literally at their feet.

If you can shoot someone, you have power over them. Simple as that.

As for your example, they could easily have radioed infantry to come and get them and keep them under check by the occasional flyby. It is not as if people on foot can outrun a helicopter. Given the troop deployment in Iraq I very much doubt it would have been impossible for a few US troops to come and get them.

Can you provide some examples of the US condemning others for doing exactly that?

Malmedy massacre trial. Same principle. It wasn't impossible to take the guys into POW camps, it was merely impractical and exposed the SS to risk.

[K. A. Pital]

In order to exercise power over someone you must be able to control them.

Thanas already clarified this, but I can add something. These people did not lay down arms of their free will. They would not pick up and bear arms if their will and intent were not to fight an opposing force. When they are at barrel point and they lay down the weapons, they have submitted to another power, they are forced to do it.

At this very moment they are powerless (if they were fighting to the death, it is in their power to at least try to kill you). They are completely at the mercy of the other side.

And at this very moment specifically you say they should be shot to death since there's no way to stop them from resuming hostilities later.

Are you fully understanding this?

[eyl]

That would be an excellent point if it weren't for the fact that Iraq was an occupied country and subject to the laws of the occupying power. In 2003 around June or July all heavy weapons and automatic weapons were banned. A permit was required to carry small arms.

That in itself is not sufficient to identify someone as a combatant - laws are rarely 100% complied with, and unless the penalty for this law is summary execution...

If you can shoot someone, you have power over them. Simple as that.

That can't be a sufficient condition, otherwise anyone in range of someone else's weapon on a battlefield is in the latter's power.

[Thanas]

I was talking about the specific situation in this thread.

[Simon_Jester]

The act is declaring a city "open". The French did so in WW2 with Paris for example, to save it from wartime damage. The Germans accepted under the condition that the French had to take their frontline back several miles as well as remove all military from the city. I don't know if that would have saved Nagasaki or any japanese city.

Two issues-

1) Declarations of "open city" are tricky things, which really need to be arranged ahead of time through diplomatic side-channels. Declaring yourself an open city twenty minutes before a major enemy offensive begins is at best gambling with your safety.

2) Whether or not the concept of "open city" is viable depends on the kind of conflict.

It's hard to imagine declaring open cities in a nuclear war, because as a general rule the enemy is seeking to destroy, not capture, key military infrastructure. Even if you declare a city demilitarized, with the relevant infrastructure and facilities having been shut down... in nuclear war, the enemy has no way to verify your claims. So they are unlikely to be in any position to accept your declaration.

On the other hand, in a war fought by advancing or retreating ground forces, declaring a city open is relatively easy, as with Paris.

A strategic bombing campaign is more like a nuclear war, in that you simply cannot verify or enforce anyone's surrender, which does pose a serious problem for the attacker that should at least be addressed.

Even if the capturing force is a ground force, it doesn't guarantee that they are capable of taking prisoners in various edge cases. For example, the capturing force may be starving even without the addtional mouths to feed.

You disarm them and send them back across lines. Thankfully, we have modern logistic trains now, and that is not an issue for modern militaries.

Forces from a modern military can still end up surrounded (Dien Bien Phu), and their supplies can still be interdicted. Also, the rules of war are supposed to also apply to poorer countries whose militaries are often not so well supplied.

Question, is convenience an acceptable excuse for warcrimes? Should soldiers be allowed to kill civilians because letting them live would make things harder for them? I don't know what you think, but my answer is a resounding NO!

Does this remain true when "make things harder for them" is replaced with "get them killed?" I mean, seriously, you're using a huge euphemism here. Inconvenience and death are not the same things.

So what if a civilians spots your covert ops team? Here's a thought, abort the mission and send troopers who don't suck next time.

Does this remain true, if aborting the mission results in hundreds of people being killed?

Simon, what people will learn from being shot up by helicopters when attempting to surrender is, you cannot surrender to aircraft. You want to surrender, find some infantry. Being shot up by a machine that you can't defend yourself from isn't very nice, but you decided to take that risk when you decided to fight in the first place.

It appears to also be a risk taken by deciding to be born in the place someone else decided to fight.

I mean, as a noncombatant I can 'surrender' to any armed man by putting my hands in the air, to indicate that I am not a threat to him and am not a target on his hit list. A ship can hoist a white flag, or shout on the radio that it is a noncombatant, or something. How do I indicate noncombatant status to aircraft? If that can't be done, then aircraft are no more suitable for urban guerilla operations than random artillery bombardment of the city would be.
__________________

That said...

Korto, I refer you back to the point I made about hypotheticals being cheap. It's also immensely inappropriate to indulge in purely philosophical musings when the massacring of civilians and surrendered troops is already an ugly reality. It's easy to do so when the people aren't dying on your doorstep.

Metahive, it's silly to refuse to answer hypothetical questions and then expect anyone to believe you have general principles. If you can't answer a hypothetical, you don't have principles, you have strong personal dislikes.

We're stuck in a philosophical argument about how the laws of war work in a new case. A a case where surrender, a concept which dates back to ancient times, has to come to terms with 20th century weapons that did not exist in those times.

If all you can do in that situation is stick your fingers in your ears and shout louder about how evil the opposition is, you really aren't contributing anything to the conversation. You're just repeating your personal dislikes.

Granted, your dislikes may be very justified, but they don't represent a coherent position others can be asked to take seriously.

[Serafina]

Of course accepting surrender is dangerous, taking captives costs resources and taking a moment to verify your target might cost lives.
Neither of this is new, todays wars aren't completely different from any before. A civilized nation choses to accept those risks for the sake of making war less brutal and more humane - just like such a nation choses to treat its prisoners humanely, and its police force doesnt have a shoot-to-kill policy despite increased cost and risk.

[Simon_Jester]

Well, my argument is that if you can't surrender to helicopter gunships, you should not use helicopter gunships to patrol cities. Sure, they're great in open country for plinking tanks and blowing up trench lines that are obviously armed and dangerous. Or maybe blasting strongpoints which are dug in and well fortified and, again, obviously armed and dangerous.

But given that the gunship can't "accept the surrender" of a bunch of random civilians and not shoot them, on the grounds that they are actually not the enemy, they don't belong in areas where civilians and enemy guerillas mingle.

There are situations where, yes, an armed force effectively cannot take prisoners. If this happens once in a long while, or under unusual conditions like a commando raid deep into hostile territory, it doesn't mean the nation behind that army is barbaric in and of itself.

But it's grotesque for a military to go out of its way to create such situations by having helicopter gunships patrolling cities and blasting things that look vaguely hostile. Or drones buzzing around in the total absence of a real armed force to surrender to.

[RogueIce]

Second, i fail to see how there's anything to be done now. She's been sentenced already, and as far as i am aware theres no chance for appeal.

This is incorrect. Because the sentence is of confinement for more than a year (35) and a punitive discharge (dishonorable) it'll automatically go before the Army Court of Criminal Appeals.

EDIT: There's also the Court of Appeals for the Armed Forces, which is kind of like the military's Supreme Court, but that hearing is up to the Court in whether to grant petition. Still, the automatic appeal will apply.

[Serafina]

That's good to know.
Still, i see nothing wrong with her coming out now.

[Korto]

Well, my argument is that if you can't surrender to helicopter gunships, you should not use helicopter gunships to patrol cities. Sure, they're great in open country for plinking tanks and blowing up trench lines that are obviously armed and dangerous. Or maybe blasting strongpoints which are dug in and well fortified and, again, obviously armed and dangerous.

You know, Simon, I completely fucking agree with you. Helicopter gunships shouldn't be used to patrol cities. They can't communicate properly, they can't take people into custody, they are probably less able to discriminate between civilians and combatants, and their weaponry is too heavy to use in built-up areas. All they can do is kill. It should be armoured ground vehicles and infantry, perhaps with a helicopter or two ready to scramble in case of real attack, but otherwise not to be used in cities.

I would go even further. I would like Q to step in, and make all fighting with swords, axes, and other hand weapons, so you've actually got to look in the face of the person you're killing. I dread the ongoing trend of far-off video-game death, all nicely sanitised on a screen. But that's not likely to happen.

[Simon_Jester]

Well, Korto, I don't think it's unrealistic for an occupying army to say "use of gunship patrols in urban areas is too expensive, bloody, and deeply counterproductive to our mission of bringing an end to the insurgency."

I do think a reversion to swords and spears is unrealistic.