Wikileaks about to drop "the bombshell"

[MKSheppard]

it was posted earlier in thread:

http://cryptome.org/reuters-kill.zip

[Vympel]

How is the photo the photographer took evidence in favour of thinking these guys were insurgents? Are these the most dumbfuck insurgents ever, milling around out in the open in literal line of sight of a US HMMWV?

[Vympel]

Link

Extract:-

The part of the video I had trouble with is the dialogue between the Apache pilots, which almost sounds like a caricature it’s so callous. I spent a lot of time around troops in Baghdad in 2005-06 and never heard anything even akin to that. Soldiers wanted to do soldier stuff and kill the enemy, but there was a basic level of respect for human life and the power of the weapons they carried. Trust me, there was a lot of gallows humor and grim photo collections of piles of dead from the civil war, but there wasn’t the absurd blood lust that’s so apparent in the pilot’s conversation.

Perhaps it was because the ground troops saw the grisly aftermath of death and the second order effects on families up close and personal that they had a different outlook than the pilots that buzzed the city in glass enclosed cockpits. Or perhaps they spent so much time in the homes of the Iraqi people that they saw them as fellow human beings.

Read more: CENTCOM Releases Report on Apache Gun Camera Video From Iraq | Defense Tech

[The Spartan]

How is the photo the photographer took evidence in favour of thinking these guys were insurgents? Are these the most dumbfuck insurgents ever, milling around out in the open in literal line of sight of a US HMMWV?

I'm pretty sure that wasn't taken by the ones who had been milling about. It was from the other picture of someone leaning around a corner (with the telescopic lens that's been mistaken as a rocket launcher). Unless one of them moved and he was one of them.

[Master of Ossus]

Honest question: would a flak jacket even protect someone from the rounds a gunship is firing?

No way. It might stop AK rounds or shrapnel, but cannon fire from Apaches would tear through the person wearing it and both panels like it was a paper target at a gun range. However, the Reuters jackets are bright blue, and are clearly marked "PRESS" on both sides, and they're also issued with distinctive blue helmets, which might have aided in identification.

[Flagg]

I know how our government works, numbnuts. The President gets elected based on his stated policies, then he goes about appointing people who are then confirmed by the senate. So yes, it is very much a democracy. Maybe not on the ground, but policy dictates ROE.

Flagg - you're either a moron or you're deliberately trolling - which is it?

Neither.

[Elfdart]

Remember, we're blasting children in vans over there, so we won't have to shoot children in vans over here.

[Dominus Atheos]

Hey fucking nice.

*snip*

RPGs recovered off the dead bodies; and live RPG rounds underneath them that gotta be blown by EOD.

Sounds like a bunch of stringers for Reuters embedded with some bad guys, and got shot to shit for their efforts.

PROTIP: When covering a military conflict, do not associate with people carrying RPGs.

Did you not hear about that story that was on the front page of the New York Times yesterday?

Afghan Investigators Say U.S. Troops Tried to Cover Up Evidence in Botched Raid

And that's hardly an abberation:

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan, Sept. 8 -- The U.S. Central Command will send a senior team, headed by a general and including a legal affairs officer, to reinvestigate a U.S. air attack last month that U.N. and Afghan officials say killed 90 civilians, amid mounting public outrage in Afghanistan and evidence that conflicts with the military's initial version of events.

I know this may come as a surprise to as big a military nut as you, but just because the military said it doesn't make it true.

[Alyrium Denryle]

Something to keep in mind is that insurgents carry cameras with them in order to film their attacks. The Apache crewmembers might have come to that conclusion, if they saw/had been able to recognise cameras.

Ok, we're talking about the US Military here, arguably the most technologically advanced and best equiped military there is.

Yes. And we went into the Iraq war with a tactical doctrine that is not suitable for urban warfare. As a result of that, there is a systemic problem with equipment optimization.

Could you elaborate?

Just a cold war era tactical doctrine (or at least the remnants of it). I know for a fact (frigidmagi) that they were training marines how to fight soviets until at least 1998 (probably for lack of a better tactical model...) and most of our weapons systems are cold war era.

[The Duchess of Zeon]

Nobody disagrees that the coverup was wrong; it's just that the decisions made by the Apache crew were forgiveable mistakes. The decision to avoid making civil reparations to the families and instead cover up the action, however, is quite unethical and condemnable.

[CJvR]

Just a stupid question, but, in what way was this covered up?

[bobalot]

Just a stupid question, but, in what way was this covered up?

The same reason Abu Grahib was covered up. The military will say it would undermine their standing in the region or make life even more dangerous for their soldiers.

I personally find this line of reasoning a whole load of bullshit. The locals knew about Abu Grahib long before we did (They had nothing concrete, but they knew). The locals would have known what really happened here and word would have spread.

I suspect it's about trying to keep support up for this retarded war at home.

[Julhelm]

He asked how it was covered up.

[bobalot]

He asked how it was covered up.

My bad.

[Haruko]

Just a stupid question, but, in what way was this covered up?

Seems to mostly have to do with the military stonewalling on Reuters' two-year effort to get that video released using the Freedom of Information Act, and military officials making statements about the incident inconsistent with what the video reveals.

[Flagg]

Remember, we're blasting children in vans over there, so we won't have to shoot children in vans over here*.

*Unless they're black or Mexican

Fixed that for you.

[[R_H]]

Just a cold war era tactical doctrine (or at least the remnants of it). I know for a fact (frigidmagi) that they were training marines how to fight soviets until at least 1998 (probably for lack of a better tactical model...) and most of our weapons systems are cold war era.

Firstly, thank you for elaborating. How is the "cold war era tactical doctrine" invalidated by this and similar events? Training what branch of the Marine Corps to fight the Soviets, the infantry?

Edit: The document is viewable on Scribd.

[Aaron]

Every trade. We were doing it as well, simply out of inertia because when the cold war ended there wasn't a clear threat.

The doctrine was basically that of overwhelming firepower, extensive use of CAS and artillery. It doesn't translate well to the occupation phase of things because it just pisses off the populace. So the Americans wonder why the Iraqi's/Afghans aren't happy about having a democracy now, when it's more like their pissed because you blew up grandma.

[Edi]

About the only extraordinary thing about this Apache attack is the publicity. Shit like this is a daily occurrence there, but this particular case got high visibility because of the two Reuters journalists and for that reason alone.

No surprise why the locals are generally pissed off at the US and its allies, as Kendall points out.

[MKSheppard]

The cameras are classified in the report as "EOS" cameras; and those have metal frames. So I wonder if they still worked and took photos despite being brought under a hail of 30mm HEDP fire.

EDIT: Hell yes, they worked! The Collateral murder site has a photo taken after the attack by one of the soldiers with the camera.

Canon EOS Series...so rugged they survive apache gunships!

[Simon_Jester]

Every trade. We were doing it as well, simply out of inertia because when the cold war ended there wasn't a clear threat.

The doctrine was basically that of overwhelming firepower, extensive use of CAS and artillery. It doesn't translate well to the occupation phase of things because it just pisses off the populace. So the Americans wonder why the Iraqi's/Afghans aren't happy about having a democracy now, when it's more like their pissed because you blew up grandma.

It's a good doctrine for fighting field battles (not just against the Soviets).

As I understand it, it didn't become quite so obvious that the Wars of the Future were going to involve a lot of long-term occupation in guerilla-infested territory and very little in the way of field battles until after 9/11.

[Aaron]

Every trade. We were doing it as well, simply out of inertia because when the cold war ended there wasn't a clear threat.

The doctrine was basically that of overwhelming firepower, extensive use of CAS and artillery. It doesn't translate well to the occupation phase of things because it just pisses off the populace. So the Americans wonder why the Iraqi's/Afghans aren't happy about having a democracy now, when it's more like their pissed because you blew up grandma.

It's a good doctrine for fighting field battles (not just against the Soviets).

As I understand it, it didn't become quite so obvious that the Wars of the Future were going to involve a lot of long-term occupation in guerilla-infested territory and very little in the way of field battles until after 9/11.

I think I said that?

But yes, the doctrine is sound, in the shooting phase. It doesn't translate well to occupation and the nation building that should follow. That said there are plenty of armies that had experience in insurgencies or operations other then war (the UK, Commonwealth, various Euro armies) whose brains could have been picked for options.

[Einzige]

I see absolutely nothing wrong in calling for the heads of the Apache pilots, no matter how innocent they were of the situation. I have no doubt that debate over this issue has and will continue to descend into the hyperbolic, as is typical of sensationalist issues; but in this instance it seems quite justified to me. A mistake was made, and the more severe the outpouring against it, the more likely it is that it will not be repeated in the future.

[Decue]

The entire 39 minutes 39 minutes of unedited footage from wikileaks is on youtube now.


Two highlights:

A camera or a loaded RPG-7?


A AK or yet another "camera"?

Later (at 19:24) they find an RPG-round under one the the bodies and at 31:16 they find an AK.

I think it's good that Wikileaks release this unedited video, it gives them some credibility (well, not that much now when the damage is done) back after the first edited video.

[MKSheppard]

Yep that's a RPG-7.

Keep in mind that the quality of this video is going to be slightly higher in first person in the gunner's seat, due to the immediacy. I don't know what they use currently to record the gun cam footage on AH-64s.