Read the explanation here before deciding whether to watch the video.
An excerpt:
5th April 2010 10:44 EST WikiLeaks has released a classified US military video depicting the indiscriminate slaying of over a dozen people in the Iraqi suburb of New Baghdad -- including two Reuters news staff.
Reuters has been trying to obtain the video through the Freedom of Information Act, without success since the time of the attack. The video, shot from an Apache helicopter gun-site, clearly shows the unprovoked slaying of a wounded Reuters employee and his rescuers. Two young children involved in the rescue were also seriously wounded...
After demands by Reuters, the incident was investigated and the U.S. military concluded that the actions of the soldiers were in accordance with the law of armed conflict and its own "Rules of Engagement".
About 2000 comments on the Reddit thread already, including these:
Why isn't this on CNN yet?*
Its on the front page of Al Jazeera http://english.aljazeera.net/
Because, they're an actual news organization.
Because Tiger Woods returning to the golf course is more important...
If it's any consolation it's on the front page of Norway's biggest newspaper. Link
Update: The story is now posted at CNN.
Addendum: An excerpt from Glenn Greenwald's column this past week re the U.S. government's response to the existence of Wikileaks:
All of this has made WikiLeaks an increasingly hated target of numerous government and economic elites around the world, including the U.S. Government. As The New York Times put it last week: "To the list of the enemies threatening the security of the United States, the Pentagon has added WikiLeaks.org, a tiny online source of information and documents that governments and corporations around the world would prefer to keep secret." In 2008, the U.S. Army Counterintelligence Center prepared a secret report -- obtained and posted by WikiLeaks -- devoted to this website and detailing, in a section entitled "Is it Free Speech or Illegal Speech?", ways it would seek to destroy the organization. It discusses the possibility that, for some governments, not merely contributing to WikiLeaks, but "even accessing the website itself is a crime," and outlines its proposal for WikiLeaks' destruction...Second addendum: some measured interpretation of the incident.
Third addendum: Some salient comments from "WordyNinja" on a different Reddit thread re the concept that the important aspect about this video is not to place blame on the soldiers, but to be concerned about the suppression of its release and the creation of phony cover stories:
We don't get angry at a cop who shoots a teenager holding a toy gun in a dark alleyway [think Sgt. Al Powell in Die Hard]. We mourn for the child, grieve for the police officer having to be in that a situation, and very rarely assign blame in the wake of such a tragedy. BUT... If that same cop panics and plants crack and a real gun on the body to cover up his mistake, it's almost as if he had shot the kid out of malice.
It's on BBC too, but still no CNN or CBC.
ReplyDeleteIn all honestly this isn't surprising. The reporters were embedded in a group carrying AK-47s and RPGs. In 2007 Iraq this was a major threat to US and Coalition Forces. Also that rescue vehicle had no markings identifying it as such. It is pretty logical to assume it is there to support the insurgents in the video. Also... who the hell brings kids into a combat zone? That is the very definition of criminal negligence.
ReplyDeleteIn short what we see here is not murder. However it is a good examples of the tragedies of war and the risks faced by war reporters.
"The reporters were embedded in a group carrying AK-47s and RPGs."
ReplyDeleteI don't know the full details. Were the reporters "embedded" with insurgents? My impression on seeing the video was that the cameras were misinterpreted as weapons.
I sure hope that the guys on the chopper could see a lot better than I could on this crappy video. I saw only one thing which could have been interpreted as a weapon. I want to know more about the van trying to pick up the wounded. Whose was it? Who was responsible for sending it into the area where the attacking chopper was still on site? Etc., etc..
ReplyDeleteNicholas, I found the answer to my own questions at the CNN report on the video:
ReplyDelete"The U.S. investigation into the attack found that the helicopter gunship's crew mistook the journalists' cameras for weapons while seeking out insurgents who had been firing at American troops in the area."
and this:
The Army's 2007 report on the incident found the crew had "neither reason nor probability to assume that neutral media personnel were embedded with enemy forces,"
At minute 3:38 you can clearly see two men carrying AK47 rifles in their right hands. They are not the two reporters in question. At minute 4:08 you can see the head of mobile RPG rocket launcher poking out from the side of the buiding in the hands of someone..... Still a very unfortunate incident for the reporters involved... Has Reuters identified who their reporters were going to be meeting with at this location? That could shed some more light on the situation....
ReplyDeleteMy interpretation is that no offence was made toward the US chopper, but the chopper crue obviously lied in order to gain permission to shoot on the 2 rescuers and the injured man. They were not as far as I could see collecting weapons, and there was no proof that these two ment were enemy.
ReplyDeleteWith ground troops moving in I see no justification for firing on that rescue vehicle, is this what we expect to happen to out red cross vehicles! No markings I agree, but it was obvious what they were doing.
Their actions disgust me. They were under no threat and had plenty of time to asses the situation. It appears to me this crue were treating this mission as a sport.
There seems to be a lot of stuff unanswered here. Is it not odd that these guys were not firing on the US helicopter? Is it not strange that they were not even conserned with the helicopters presence?
ReplyDeleteWhar was hapening here? Did the US command know what the reporters were doing there? If like they say they thought these guys were shooting at US troops, then did they not think it odd that they themselves were not being fired upon?
This whole scenario is wrong!
Why does this worry me so much? Because given a post TSHTF scenario, it makes me wonder who we can trust to protect us! Would we not only have to protect ourselves against raiders but also government forces who are just looking for an excuse to shoot?
That confuses me too, LeLoup. I don't know how far away the helicopter was, but from the radius of his circle above the building he appears to be hovering right over that block. The "target" MUST know it's there (they're not silent). If they are insurgents (as opposed to civilians armed for self-defense), why would they not either conceal the weapons or head for cover?
ReplyDeleteMy thoughts exactly!
ReplyDeleteI feel that context in very important here. When introduced as Collateral Murder, you are looking for errors or lies that vindicate that position. If it had been titled 'Helicopter response to attack on US ground forces' then many things make sense.
ReplyDeleteThese helicopters were on patrol for men who had attacked a US patrol. This group had rifles and what appeared to be an RPG (had it not said camera in the caption, i would have assumed RPG too) After the initial salvo an unmarked van comes in to take away the only survivor and possibly set a trap for the incoming us ground patrol. looking at the video i didn't see kids in the front seat until after it zoomed in on and pointed out, and even then it was hard to differentiate them as children and not just another man in the front seat. And why would they suspect that children would be there anyway? If i were fighting a war i wouldn't bring my children to a battle zone.
I think what we are seeing is terrible and an example of the horrible nature of warfare, but I don't think its a massacre or a murder.
There is absolutely no excuse possible for firing on that van as they tried to save that poor wounded man. They were not collecting the bodies or weapons. That was a blatant lie. There we no weapons found on the ground in that video and thus anyone who says they see a weapon is lying. These people who treat killing human beings as a game need to be locked up and the key thrown away.
ReplyDeleteAnonymous....
ReplyDeleteunfortunately the prior Anonymous posting was right about there being two AK47 rifles in clear sight at minute 3:38 of the video...... although I'm not sure that one can clearly state that there is a "head of mobile RPG rocket launcher poking out from the side of the buiding".... that could be something else, but it appears too big to be a camera....
Just as disturbing as the video itself are the moronic, hate-filled comments left on that website.
ReplyDeleteFrom what I've read, the reporters were not embedded with the insurgents. They were working for Reuters, but they were an independent team (cameraman and driver) that had been on assignment somewhere else and heard there was conflict in this area, so they came to check it out.
ReplyDeleteThe video is scary. The drastic attempts at justifying the actions are scarier.
ReplyDelete"their fault for bringing THEIR kids to a battle"
ReplyDeleteI guess that helps them sleep at night.
Note to self: never stop and help severely wounded people.
Can someone link me to the article on CNN? It is no longer within view. 'Mom: Crime scene photos add to grief' is the biggest post I can see.
ReplyDeleteOh, wait... "Breaking News: USGS says earthquake that struck northern Sumatra, Indonesia, was magnitude 7.7."
What do you expect from WAR? Scenes like this happen everyday at times, they just don't include an unfortunate story about the large object being a camera held by a Reuters photographer.
ReplyDeleteStop war and armed conflicts earth-wide and all these situations go away.
I dissagree DubyaD, I do not think it was just unforotunate. If the crew of the helicopter could identify AK47s being carried then they could identify cameras. Look at the video, these two guys stand out. Why were these people on the ground not conserned about the helicopters? Did command know that these reporters were going there? None of these guys were within reach of a safety exit, no one bothered, why not? No, something is very wrong here. Coupled with the lies the crew told on tape to gain permission to shoot, I would say something is very wrong here!
ReplyDeleteIf this is merely a big mistake coupled with the de humanisation of US troops, then heads still need to role, because it means that those guys in the chopper do not have half a brain between them!
http://gawker.com/5513068/the-full-version-of-the-wikileaks-video-is-missing-30-minutes-of-footage
ReplyDeleteThe footage shown on here and on most of the other websites, bbc and all other newsites so far, IS MISSING 30 MINUTES OF FOOTAGE. Found the video and you CAN see in detail rpgs and etc. Watch closely as the video shown on tykiwdbi and bbc is edited to show a murder and not show the entire story.
This is a typical news act. Always edit the story to appear the way they want it instead of showing the actual truth.
Ill post a link to the full video later if it is still accessible when I get home.
Great blog btw. Im a daily (hourly) visitor.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=is9sxRfU-ik
ReplyDeleteThis seems to be the correct one I only watched part of it so far, but it seems to be the same one I watched earlier (full length not cropped for news drama and B.S.)
Posted instead of waiting until I got home so I wouldn't forget.
Explosive Monochrome [News Poem, April 8, 2010]
ReplyDeletehttp://toylit.blogspot.com/2010/04/explosive-monochrome-news-poem-april-8.html
“We had a guy shooting... and now he's behind the building.”
“Uh, negative, he was, uh, right in front of the brad. Uh, 'bout there... one o'clock. Haven't seen anything since then.”
“Just fuck it. Once you get on 'em just open 'em up.”
With monochrome eyeballs the whirlybird watches
And likewise we're fixed on the ignorant target;
And both of us think of the black and white movies—
Those cellulose nitrates, those obsolete pictures
Of characters featuring colorless faces,
Of subjects long dead and the lingering stigma
Of monochrome colors in digitized footage:
The murder it plays out like X-Box Three Sixty.
http://toylit.blogspot.com/