Army FAIL in Iraq

[AutumnLeaves]

Theres no point pointing fingers, everyone is wrong but if you want to play the blame game, its your distorted islam heretics that started it all.

Hit the nail on the head.

[Brago]

AC130's dont have hellfire as the term for rockets,

UAV's do they even said it.

Code: Select all is enough proof it was a uav

[EvGa]

Apaches are equipped with hellfire missiles. What are you talking about??

They were using the 30mm canon in the OP video.

[BuDo]

why do so many people treat the american soldiers as if they are mass murdering people in afghanistan/iraq. The military situation on the ground there is different beyond probably any of you guys' imaginations unless one of us is a vet that actually was over there. Soldiers are under pressure all the time and making the right decision with only a few seconds given is incredibly difficult. Its easy for people to criticize whatever is going on when they are sitting behind a computer; its not easy for them.

@Budo keep in mind the whole reason why america is over there is because america was attacked by "true" terrorists. And the reason why the civilian count is so high is because of the terrorists tactics of using civilian meat shields and them killing civilians in general. When terrorists wear cloaks and hang around a marketplace there is absolutely no way of knowing if they are a terrorist or not. Have you ever even remotely thought of what it feels like if terrorists start shooting you while they are hiding behind civilians? Do you as a soldier shoot or watch your friends die? Its tough and to dismiss american soldiers as being cruel/evil is just idiotic.

If those soldiers knowingly killed civilians then they should be put on military court. If they didn't know, then its just an unfortunate mistake that happens a lot in war.

Yes this was clearly one of those life and death slit decision situation you are talking about. I could clearly see the pressure that those guys in the helicopter where faced with. Their lives were in immediate danger. All that laughter and jokes about running vehicle over dead bodies does show the pressure. And yes the guys on the ground looked like some of the same people that attacked america...Wow you are a genius. I don't condone any killing but these soldiers should be taken out back and shot

[Reise]

I don't disagree, those could be mistaken for weapons but just as easily as you see plenty of objects that could be mistaken for weapons you're also admitting that lots of things look like weapons, and even in war that has never been cause to suddenly open fire or civilian casualties would be alot higher than they are (and they're already extremely high on the Iraqis side in the war).

Again, the only reason they were treated the way they were is because there was hostility reported in the area. Before the recording, there were gunshots and IIRC an RPG was fired. It may not have been the people that were attacked, but the pilots don't necessarily know that.

The mentality always seems to be to get permission and remove every possible threat, because if they screw up or miss any, it could be your friends dieing the next day.

---
As far as their comments go, what do you expect? Do you think other nations soldiers are any different? What else can they say after they hear that there were kids in the van? They thought those people were insurgents, naturally they will blame them for bringing kids into a situation like that.

Still, if it were me I would have been driving in the opposite direction if I just saw all that happen. Especially if there were kids in my car.

Yes this was clearly one of those life and death slit decision situation you are talking about. I could clearly see the pressure that those guys in the helicopter where faced with. Their lives were in immediate danger. And yes the guys on the ground looked like the some of the same people that attacked america...Wow you are a genius.

Insurgents don't wear military uniforms or carry themselves like they know what they are doing. If you were flying around in a helicopter and you saw suspicious people with equipment that may or may not be weapons, peeking around corners, you would probably attack them first as well.

If it was an RPG, all they would need to do is point it and pull the trigger.

[Jstar1]

I wasn't talking about this particular situation, I was talking about the "do I shoot or not shoot" in general that the americans face in afghanistan/iraq.

As for the video that was posted here, the americans are definitely at fault in hindsight, but you can't blame them for making the mistake in the moment. From the soldiers' point of view they are better safe than sorry. Having a helicopter shot down and losing 2 skilled pilots and millions of dollars worth of equipment is the last thing the soldiers would want. I'm positive that there probably was a previous situation where the people on the ground actually were terrorists and the pilots decided not to shoot and end up getting american soldiers on the ground killed.

You anti-americans see Americans as the baby killers and evil murderers. What about muslim terrorists strapping 16 year olds with bombs and blowing up american soldiers? What about sectarian violence where iraqis blow each other up in broad daylight. There seems to be at least one story of some iraqi/afghan blowing themselves up to kill people every week. Again, if you want to play the blame game, extremist muslims are the ones that started it. But pointing fingers and tit-for-tat moves are the nature of war.

edit: evga is right, it is a manned helicopter. There is no way a UAV (or any plane) that can circle around that slowly at that kind of an angle).

[BuDo]

I don't disagree, those could be mistaken for weapons but just as easily as you see plenty of objects that could be mistaken for weapons you're also admitting that lots of things look like weapons, and even in war that has never been cause to suddenly open fire or civilian casualties would be alot higher than they are (and they're already extremely high on the Iraqis side in the war).

Again, the only reason they were treated the way they were is because there was hostility reported in the area. Before the recording, there were gunshots and IIRC an RPG was fired. It may not have been the people that were attacked, but the pilots don't necessarily know that.

The mentality always seems to be to get permission and remove every possible threat, because if they screw up or miss any, it could be your friends dieing the next day.

---
As far as their comments go, what do you expect? Do you think other nations soldiers are any different? What else can they say after they hear that there were kids in the van? They thought those people were insurgents, naturally they will blame them for bringing kids into a situation like that.

Still, if it were me I would have been driving in the opposite direction if I just saw all that happen. Especially if there were kids in my car.

Yes this was clearly one of those life and death slit decision situation you are talking about. I could clearly see the pressure that those guys in the helicopter where faced with. Their lives were in immediate danger. And yes the guys on the ground looked like the some of the same people that attacked america...Wow you are a genius.

Insurgents don't wear military uniforms or carry themselves like they know what they are doing. If you were flying around in a helicopter and you saw suspicious people with equipment that may or may not be weapons, peeking around corners, you would probably attack them first as well.

If it was an RPG, all they would need to do is point it and pull the trigger.

Hey I remember you..you're that Farking moron from the dog discussion.. ...I guess those men on the ground that weren't yet dead were getting helped by their comrades who were still "pretending" to be civilians....sorry I can't talk to morons ever again.

[TheDrop]

Its very high of you guys sitting at home watching this vid going "FAAACCK AMERICAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA". When you are faced in a real life situation where what you do on that moment depends on your and your friends lives, you cant take risks. Soldiers are human too you know, and make mistakes . What were they supposed to do, land their choppers and risk getting themselves killed?

If I was your enemy I would not be walking the street in plain view knowing you could shoot me from a helicopter...and I would definitely not be grabbing my injured comrades to put in my van minutes after they've been shot and doing so in plain view again. This was plain blood lust killing by american soldiers. I didn't see any threat from the men on the ground. No wonder why american people fear terrorist attacks. Their way of thinking causes them to be attacked by TRUE terrorists.


When you reach a state of mind where killing people is like a video game to you where you can laugh and say things like "Their fault for bringing kids to a war zone" and firing missile into buildings that might have innocent people inside I think you've reach the point of savagery. You're dead on the inside....I don't call this "a way of dealing with war situation" I call this pure evil because those same american soldiers will weep the death of their comrades. This is horrible.

for some reason this shit made me laugh...lols.
Yes BuDo, the soldiers killed the guys below for fun since their jobs were so boring.

[Evil_Venom]

sorry I can't talk to morons ever again.

Hopefully you don't talk to yourself at all because most of the things you said make you seem moronic.

[Reise]

Hey I remember you..you're that Farking moron from the dog discussion.. ...I guess those men on the ground that weren't yet dead were getting helped by their comrades who were still "pretending" to be civilians....sorry I can't talk to morons ever again.

I guess BuDo was on that street in Iraq that day and knows who everyone was with 100% certainty.

Fills my heart with joy when someone remains bitter after running from a discussion.

[William-CL]

The sad thing is, I doubt this is a rare occurrence. Some times it seems like our military is becoming no better than a 3rd world Military.

[BuDo]

I can't believe the utter stupidity an lack of morals of some of you who are trying to defend the actions in the video. We got soldiers laughing and literally cheering and praising what they did without any remorse for that little girl that got shot in the gut. Or anyone else that may be innocent. And I'm the moron?

I'm not an anti-american but you guys seem to think I am and thats why you try to counter my argument and not be subjective here...that makes you guys f*cking morons. I also hate terrorists in case you wanted to know and I hope to god that those soldiers in the chopper will one day get shot down and burned to death because they have lost a big part of their humanity.

[BuDo]

Hey I remember you..you're that Farking moron from the dog discussion.. ...I guess those men on the ground that weren't yet dead were getting helped by their comrades who were still "pretending" to be civilians....sorry I can't talk to morons ever again.

I guess BuDo was on that street in Iraq that day and knows who everyone was with 100% certainty.

Fills my heart with joy when someone remains bitter after running from a discussion.

I guess after they found out that a little girl was in that Van they shot up something didn't make them think that they might do it again when they rocket that building....because they were 100% sure that this time the building had no civilians..

[DarkJackal]

Yea, that seemed pretty messed, little girl was hurt and needed evac, so the guy was like "ah damn, oh well" lol >.>.

They said they had weapons when they were getting out of the car to get the wounded too, he sounded like he was just sayin it so he could shoot lol.


Did anyone else find it kinda messed up when they went to blow up that building 1 dude went in, just as some random person is walking down the sidewalk right next to the building, and cars on the street? lol I don't know where that takes place, but at 1 point some woman was walking down the street with a kid I believe, so obviously theres normal ppl around >.>.


Anyway, iuno what its really like down there, so I can't say to much.

[Jstar1]

I'm not an anti-american but you guys seem to think I am and thats why you try to counter my argument and not be subjective here...that makes you guys f*cking morons. I also hate terrorists in case you wanted to know and I hope to god that those soldiers in the chopper will one day get shot down and burned to death because they have lost a big part of their humanity.

Well that doesn't make you any different from a extremist terrorist or a civilian-killer helicopter pilot.

For those that rage about civilian casualties in iraq/afghanistan, remember that the military heads don't intend to kill civilians and most riflemen on the ground don't intend to either. What happens is that terrorists often hide behind civilians when fighting and often start firefights in the middle of a city in broad daylight. That civilians wouldn't get killed would be surprising to me. I'm pretty sure the majority of civilian deaths caused by american bullets happen from accidental shootings or targeting. Americans don't go around putting lead into every single thing that moves over there. And a big chunk of civilian deaths overall is from iraqi/afghani suicide bombers. They have no one to blame but themselves for those specific deaths.

The helicopter pilots in the video should be put on a military court and put their asses in jail but you can't extend their actions to the rest of the US military.

[Goseki]

If you close your eyes and just listen to the voices. You can tell the guys in the helicopter were trigger happy.

The soldiers chose the right course of action. What's disturbing is not what they did, but how happy and willing they were to do it.

[BuDo]

I'm not an anti-american but you guys seem to think I am and thats why you try to counter my argument and not be subjective here...that makes you guys f*cking morons. I also hate terrorists in case you wanted to know and I hope to god that those soldiers in the chopper will one day get shot down and burned to death because they have lost a big part of their humanity.

Well that doesn't make you any different from a extremist terrorist or a civilian-killer helicopter pilot.

For those that rage about civilian casualties in iraq/afghanistan, remember that the military heads don't intend to kill civilians and most riflemen on the ground don't intend to either. What happens is that terrorists often hide behind civilians when fighting and often start firefights in the middle of a city in broad daylight. That civilians wouldn't get killed would be surprising to me. I'm pretty sure the majority of civilian deaths caused by american bullets happen from accidental shootings or targeting. Americans don't go around putting lead into every single thing that moves over there. And a big chunk of civilian deaths overall is from iraqi/afghani suicide bombers. They have no one to blame but themselves for those specific deaths.

The helicopter pilots in the video should be put on a military court and put their asses in jail but you can't extend their actions to the rest of the US military.

You know what I guess there is no reason to continue to talk with you either. Until you are willing to do exactly what they did then we can have an argument. Until you can kill a child and then fire missiles into a building that might have more civilians then you and I can argue.

You're moronic argument might have hold water if they didn't fire rockets into the building after knowing they've just unknowingly killed a little girl few minutes earlier. They couldn't see who was inside the Van and when they found out what they did it didn't stop them from trying to level a building of which again they couldn't see who was inside.

You're an idiot to think that these soldiers wouldn't shoot civilians when obviously from their last attack they could care less who was inside that building. And for the record I said the "helicopter pilots" I don't blame the entire US army for what happened here.

[Azilius]

And the people raging at the soldiers would rather they get close ups of everyone before engaging...?

If you're stupid enough to walk the streets of a war zone suspiciously and carry shit that can look like weapons, peering around corners with something that looks exactly like an RPG..while an armed helicopter is obviously surveying you..

You're asking for it.

What if the soldiers instead said, "Oh well that could be a camera or they could be carrying toy guns"

Then the helicopter gets RPG'd and they all die. Awesome.

War has collateral damage. It's part of a war and it never, ever changes. While we're at it let's discuss the effects of the nukes used!

[Jstar1]

^If you mean by obama's nuclear weapon policy? He is being a douche with his nukes. Just because we supposedly live in a post world war age doesn't mean we shouldn't have strong weapons primed and ready to go in an emergency. We live in uncertain times..anything could happen. We can reduce the number of warheadsd but restricting our own ability to use our own weapons? I mean come on thats like chaining our hands together right before entering the ring.

@Budo, those american pilots were clearly in the wrong, but like I and others said already..they are better safe than sorry. How can you not understand this concept? I'll say it again: THEY ARE BETTER SAFE THAN SORRY. I'm talking about the very first time when they decided to fire. The pilot was obviously being an idiot later when he wanted to shoot the wounded guy and the van (notice how he's like "come on pull out a gun so it gives me a reason to kill you"). But the very first time the pilot saw a group of guys walking around holding weapon-like things, I'm sure he was on super-alert mode and ready to save his own ass in case they really were terrorists. Theres nothing wrong with that.

[Toshiharu]

War has collateral damage. It's part of a war and it never, ever changes.

Thread was tl;dr, but the last few posts. This is the only thing that catch my attention, because it's true.

[Reise]

I guess after they found out that a little girl was in that Van they shot up something didn't make them think that they might do it again when they rocket that building....because they were 100% sure that this time the building had no civilians..

BuDo, the soldier's job is to get rid of insurgents. If they see people with weapons head into a building that's mostly abandoned, they're going to blow the hell out of it.

Yeah it sucks, but if we side-stepped every incident where an insurgent was hiding out near civilians, we would never get anything done. You know how our troops feel about people there. All they have to do is pick up a weapon and they're a combatant. Unfortunately the insurgency has made the situation that way, you can't trust anybody.

[William-CL]

My brother is moving to Germany when he gets out of the service (marine) because he said "Americans are stupid and pathetic assholes that think they can do whatever they want without any backlash" Which a lot of American's are.. I'm not Anti-American. I'm Anti-Douche bag

There's a big difference between a mistake and laughing about killing an innocent person. if you are one to laugh at the thought of an innocent little girl getting killed, you deserve to be hung with razor wire.

[.AWAKE.]

killing a group of 15+ Terrorists while only JUST wounding the little girl is a pretty good outcome if you ask me

[Fury]

The guy was on the ground crawling, and they assumed he was looking for weapons? What a load of fkn shit! The people got out of the van to help him and they die. I didnt see anything close to a weapon that time...

[Nick Invaders]

At the beginning I can understand them being mistaken as possible insurgents, but after the initial volley it was pretty much all bs.

[asusi]

Stopped wachting at "Let us shoot" Seems like this guy just sits in a apache and just shoots at people he sounds like he has pretty some good time.

I watch how they kill innocent people and i can't do anything about it.


Jstar STFU and GTFO, troll with IQ of shoe doesn't belong in this thread.

[cpinney]

keep it on topic no need to insult each other.

[asusi]

keep it on topic no need to insult each other.

Sorry Cpinney, but this guy is just trolling here. I could not resist it...

Theres no point pointing fingers, everyone is wrong but if you want to play the blame game, its your distorted islam heretics that started it all.

Yo troll, Do you wonder what has made those guy to bomb twin towers? You think those terrorist got nothing to do, just go and bomb some random country? everything is happening for reason. And the fact that you blame whole Islam for actions of small group says enough about your IQ.

[LillDev!l]

I can understand that when you're in a situation where some1 might fire RPG's at you, you could engage.
The people standing around there dont look threatening at all though.
The bad part is that these soldiers really seem to enjoy this, watching a man crawl in the ditch saying 'yeah grab a weapon basterd, give me a reason' just looking for reasons to shoot people and laugh.
As people said before, they are soldiers, they are human, they can make mistakes.
But like any other job, your supposed to act professional, and not like some 16 year old kid playing Call of Duty laughing when killing people like that >.>
Not only are they completely unprofessional by acting like kids, 'ah kid has a wound in her belly, damn it, oh well.', they also dont even make an actual count before they start shooting.
7 or 8 individuals.. and after that they take some more guesses on how many there were.
It could be me, but if it'dd be a threatening situation, where you think the enemy has RPG's i'dd make sure i got my count right- 7 or 8 ? what if nr 9 had an RPG ?

'oh well its their fault for bringing a kid to a battle'
It wasnt a battle, it was slaughter >.>

Anyhow, people like that shoulnt be soldiers T_T

[XemnasXD]

killing a group of 15+ Terrorists while only JUST wounding the little girl is a pretty good outcome if you ask me

now fairly certain you're just trolling...