The military did not reveal how the Reuters staff were killed, and stated that they did not know how the children were injured.
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"."
NY Times article from 2007.
Longer video with more civilians shot.
You have probably all seen this by now, but fuck, they are too shoot-happy, report 6 armed men while it's 2 possibly armed and shoot civilians trying to help the wounded. This is only a news story because journalists are involved.
It is quite terrible and sickening. Also their commentary during their actions.
ReplyDeleteThis group could have easily been engaged by or at least confirmed by ground troops.
I think the ROE should state that these helicopter guys may only fire if their target has been confirmed by ground troops (like special ops) or if their targets are really obvious. But if they shoot on grey grainy footage alone, it should be viewed by a second crew before giving permission.
I'm sure occurrences like this were happening all the time in 2007 when the 'Surge' was and before. Any group walking the street holding something might have been fired upon.
I really respect WikiLeaks but I think naming their site collateralmurder.com doesn't really do their neutrality justice. IMO they should just make the information public and let the press and people judge it.
Also they need donations because most of their site is offline due to lack of funding.