Unlawful Killing

[Geezer]

Fucking hell they are talking about prosecuting the soldiers who killed Terry Loyd.

Is it going to come to it that if a soldier kills the enemy he will be arrested for murder?

Its all total and utter bollocks

[AllRuth]

Is it going to come to it that if a soldier kills the enemy he will be arrested for murder?

Its all total and utter bollocks

I agree completely.

[smoothballs]

whos terry lloyd?

[Inbedwithfaith]

whos terry lloyd?

He was a journalist who was killed in iraq by friendly fire.

[smoothballs]

ah ok thanks for that

[pleasureville]

I think any killing by friendly fire is unlawfull killing.. if you cannot aim and hit the right people you shouldnt be in the army or holding a gun.
Come on.. these guys are meant to be trained.. all the iraq war was over money and lots of lives with children and families were taken because of .. bla bla bla friendly fire.. No it was fireing at the wrong people..
Yes its murder... The soldiers were trigger happy!

[-HF]

I think any killing by friendly fire is unlawfull killing.. if you cannot aim and hit the right people you shouldnt be in the army or holding a gun.
Come on.. these guys are meant to be trained.. all the iraq war was over money and lots of lives with children and families were taken because of .. bla bla bla friendly fire.. No it was fireing at the wrong people..
Yes its murder... The soldiers were trigger happy!

you have been in the army and in the field?

[pleasureville]

I have trained as a body guard by sas22 so have a little knowledge of the difference between sas and paratroopers going in trigger happy.. yes.

[-HF]

I have trained as a body guard by sas22 so have a little knowledge of the difference between sas and paratroopers going in trigger happy.. yes.

a simple no would have sufficed.

[pleasureville]

Lol.. fair enough.
Its just horrible that our country and its guys get placed in shit surroundings in a time of revolution and the new era. this is 07 with abilities to fire weapons into an arsehole from a mile away and then people still get killed that are obviously brave enough to do a job like news reporting!

[strictlybroadband]

Fucking hell they are talking about prosecuting the soldiers who killed Terry Loyd.

Is it going to come to it that if a soldier kills the enemy he will be arrested for murder?

WTF you talking about? Terry Lloyd was an ITN journalist, not "the enemy", and it came out in his inquest that his was (probably) deliberately targeted by US troops. That's murder wherever it happens. The context for this is that US troops have deliberately attacked journalists repeatedly in Iraq and Afghanistan since the war started. Are journalists "the enemy"?

You don't seem to understand that even war has laws.

[-HF]

You don't seem to understand that even war has laws.

speaking of which, when was the war declared?

[strictlybroadband]

speaking of which, when was the war declared?

I suspect that's a trick question... but I'll say March 2003. Or if Iraq is part of the so-called "war on terror", than maybe September 2001?

[-HF]

not a trick question at all. to the best of my knowledge neither Afghanistan nor Iraq were served a declaration of war. that makes both invasions an act of agression, but not a war, if played by the rules. which then would make the Law of Armed Conflict you mentioned irrelevant for this case, as there is no war going on, officially.

it appears rather perverted to have a full blown campaign against 2 nations based on nothing but the fact one has a better equipment and then turn around crying wolf if one of your own kind gets hurt. what makes the case one victim of friendly fire more bad than the cases thousands of victims of the campaigns?

[strictlybroadband]

it appears rather perverted to have a full blown campaign against 2 nations based on nothing but the fact one has a better equipment and then turn around crying wolf if one of your own kind gets hurt. what makes the case one victim of friendly fire more bad than the cases thousands of victims of the campaigns?

But Terry Lloyd isn't "one of their own kind". There are savages who declare war and journalists who try to shine a light on what's happening. US troops and British journalists are NOT ON THE SAME SIDE.

Bush and bin Laden are on the same side. Bush and Terry Lloyd aren't.

[fredicus]

That's the US army for you, if it moves shoot it.

[Bernice]

this is 07 with abilities to fire weapons into an arsehole from a mile away

Not technically true with small arms ( and small arms includes rifles ). The US army carried out a HUGE study about 10 years ago to look at incresing kill probability out to a measly 400 yards - the current kill proabability for most field armies is 100 yards.

Kill probablility is the liklihood of hitting ( and ideally disabling ) a moving target.

After extensive tests and all kinds of wonder weapons including the Steyr AR which fires plastic flechetes ( like a bundle of small plastic cross bow bolts ), the lates ( at that time ) H&K rifle which fires a burst of 5 rounds from a recoilless, cartirdge free system and the M16-A4 which fired 'Olin' duplex rounds ( two balls in a single shot ) the army finally decided that even with all the wonder technology and super duper laser sighting the kill probablity was still only 100 yards.

This myth of being able to shoot guns out of peoples hands from 6 miles away is just that - a myth. In a former life I was a very competent shooter and worked in sales to the military and later as an analyst for a company selling to the military. Thats how come the know how of firearms - I was selling consultancy and evaluation.

In small arms warfare you have 50,000 rounds being fired to produce a single dead body so 'smart weapons' dont exist in small arms and ANY warzone is always a VERY high risk area for combatants and anyone unlucky enough to be caught in it.

I have seen what modern small arms do both to stuff like cars and to human bodies and once a firefight starts people dont tend to stand upand take carefully measured shots as if they are down on the range at Bisley.

Thats point 1.

Point 2 is simple - in a shooting fight with troops under fire then casualties will result. While any deaths are regretted the fact is, and most war journalists are very well aware of this, if you wander into warzones theres a decent chance of getting hit by one side or the other.

I dont know the facts of this case and whether the journalist was targetted, certainly US troops have a poor record of blue on blue incidents, mostly caused by poor training and an overreliance on technlogy rather that old fashioned methods like 'position on battlefield'.

But I would at least try and dispel the myth of every trooper being trained to televisions style SAS and armed with flawless weapons which can shoot fleas off steeples at 10,000 yards.

[strictlybroadband]

I dont know the facts of this case

Correct. Lloyd's inquest decided that the killing was deliberate, so the rest of your post is irrelevant. It's about deliberate murder, not accidental killing.

This is one of many examples of US troops DELIBERATELY killing journalists.

Note the word "deliberate".

[Geezer]

WTF you talking about? Terry Lloyd was an ITN journalist, not "the enemy", and it came out in his inquest that his was (probably) deliberately targeted by US troops. That's murder wherever it happens. The context for this is that US troops have deliberately attacked journalists repeatedly in Iraq and Afghanistan since the war started. Are journalists "the enemy"?

You don't seem to understand that even war has laws.

You might want to try and read and comprehend before commenting.

Please show me where I said Terry Loyd was the enemy?

"Probably"? I hope your never do Jury duty.

[Geezer]

I dont know the facts of this case and whether the journalist was targetted, certainly US troops have a poor record of blue on blue incidents, mostly caused by poor training and an overreliance on technlogy rather that old fashioned methods like 'position on battlefield'.

Maybe its just a case of there being cameras and journalists at every battle or attack. I'm sure people have been killed by so called "friendly" in all wars but now it seems if someone dies in battle there is a fucking inquest and footage shot from every angle, still keeps people in jobs I suppose.

[strictlybroadband]

You might want to try and read and comprehend before commenting.

Please show me where I said Terry Loyd was the enemy?

"Probably"? I hope your never do Jury duty.

You seem to think that slaughtering a journalist is the same as killing an enemy combatant.

I said "probably" because until this goes to court, nobody can say for sure.

You need to back to the news reports about the inquest - you seem to have missed it.

[Geezer]

You seem to think that slaughtering a journalist is the same as killing an enemy combatant.


Please show me where I said this?

[strictlybroadband]

Please show me where I said this?

"Fucking hell they are talking about prosecuting the soldiers who killed Terry Loyd.

Is it going to come to it that if a soldier kills the enemy he will be arrested for murder?"

[Geezer]

"Fucking hell they are talking about prosecuting the soldiers who killed Terry Loyd.

Is it going to come to it that if a soldier kills the enemy he will be arrested for murder?"


So you know how to copy and paste :dance:

No tell me where I said Terry Loyd was the enemy or where I say killing a journalist is the same as killing an enemy combatant?

If you really can't see it I will post slowly just for you so you might be more able to comprehend. I'll give you a clue, there is a new paragraph.

[strictlybroadband]

No tell me where I said Terry Loyd was the enemy or where I say killing a journalist is the same as killing an enemy combatant?

Listen carefully, I shall say this only once.

In your first sentence, you expressed shock that a US soldier might be prosecuted for the unlawful killing of Terry Lloyd.

In your second, you then go on to draw the comparison with killing of an enemy combatant.

In other words you're implying that (2) because it would be wrong to prosecute a soldier for doing his job, (1) it is also wrong to prosecute a soldier for unlawful killing (which BTW was the verdict of the inquest that you clearly missed).

I'm assuming that you meant both sentences to appear in the same post and didn't accidentally paste together two random thoughts. Although perhaps I shouldn't be making such assumptions.

[Geezer]

Listen carefully, I shall say this only once.

In your first sentence, you expressed shock that a US soldier might be prosecuted for the unlawful killing of Terry Lloyd.

In your second, you then go on to draw the comparison with killing of an enemy combatant.

In other words you're implying that (2) because it would be wrong to prosecute a soldier for doing his job, (1) it is also wrong to prosecute a soldier for unlawful killing (which BTW was the verdict of the inquest that you clearly missed).

I'm assuming that you meant both sentences to appear in the same post and didn't accidentally paste together two random thoughts. Although perhaps I shouldn't be making such assumptions.

OK once more for the hard of comprehension:

I stated that there are talking about prosecuting soldiers for accidently killing someone in a "war" zone. I finished that with a full stop. This means I have finished on that part.
I then started a new line (two actually) so I am now talking about a different thing. I then sarcastically asked if it will come to a stage where a soldier could be prosecuted for killing the enemy.

At no point did I say that Terry Lotd was the enemy, as you implied.

I agree with you on one thing though...you shouldn't make assumptions

[strictlybroadband]

I agree with you on one thing though...you shouldn't make assumptions

Next time you post 2 unrelated sentences, why not put them in 2 different threads to avoid confusion?

[rogue]

That's the US army for you, if it moves shoot it.


When i worked with old people, one of the old men told me that US friendly fire is nothing new, in the second world war the Americans were just as bad at shooting allies as they are now. He told me that if you had Germans in fron of you and Americans behind you - you never knew who's bullets would kill you first.

It appears to me that its all down to the American training, "Hey! War is just like the movies ... Lets rush in, guns a-blazing!"

[strictlybroadband]

Here's why US troops need to be prosecuted for attacking journlists...

USA Today, 2005: "U.S. troops allegedly killed an Iraqi television director Tuesday when he drove near a U.S. convoy, colleagues and a hospital official said. The U.S. military said it had no reports of the incident.

Ahmed Wael Bakri, a program director for al-Sharqiya television, was the third Iraqi journalist allegedly killed in similar incidents in the past week."

Forumblog.org: "During one of the discussions about the number of journalists killed in the Iraq War, Eason Jordan asserted that he knew of 12 journalists who had not only been killed by US troops in Iraq, but they had in fact been targeted."

Guardian 2003: "Journalists who were with a Reuters news cameraman shot dead by US troops while filming outside a Baghdad prison yesterday accused the soldiers of behaving in a "crazy" and negligent fashion.

They claimed the Americans had spotted the Reuters crew outside the jail half an hour before Mazen Dana was killed and must have realised he was not a guerrilla carrying a rocket-propelled grenade launcher."


Missouri.edu: "IFJ general secretary Aidan White said: "The number of unexplained media killings by US military personnel is intolerable. Media organisations and journalists’ families face a wall of silence and an unfeeling bureaucracy that refuses to give clear and credible answers to questions.""

BBC: "An ITN journalist was unlawfully killed by American soldiers in southern Iraq, an inquest has found.

The troops shot 50-year-old Terry Lloyd in the head while he was in a makeshift ambulance, having already been hurt in crossfire, the coroner said."

Wsws.org: "On June 24, Yasser Salihee, an Iraqi special correspondent for the news agency Knight Ridder, was killed by a single bullet to the head as he approached a checkpoint that had been thrown up near his home in western Baghdad by US and Iraqi troops. It is believed that the shot was fired by an American sniper. According to eyewitnesses, no warning shots were fired."

Partial list of journalists killed by US troops in Iraq: http://www.kirkbytimes.co.uk/antiwaritems/journalists_killed_iraq.html


CBS: "In February, Italian reporter Giuliana Sgrena was taken hostage in Iraq. But after 28 days, she was rescued by an Italian intelligence agent, Nicola Calipari.

Sgrena and Calipari thought they’d escaped to safety, when an American patrol opened fire on their car. Sgrena was wounded; Calipari, an Italian national hero, was killed."

Washington Post: " Eason Jordan resigned last night as CNN's chief news executive in an effort to quell a burgeoning controversy over his remarks about U.S. soldiers killing journalists in Iraq.

Even as he said he had misspoken at an international conference in suggesting that coalition troops had "targeted" a dozen journalists and insisted he never believed that, Jordan was being pounded hourly by bloggers, liberals as well as conservatives, who provided the rocket fuel for a story that otherwise might have fizzled."

Countercurrent.org: "Yesterday, news emerged that an Iraqi journalist was killed by US troops in Ramadi. The journalist's body was riddled with bullets - some 20 of them.

I held my tongue, I had suspicions. It's a pattern, you see. Iraqi journalists getting picked off one by one."

WorldNetDaily: "Echoing a claim that led to CNN executive Eason Jordan's resignation, the president of the 35,000-member Newspaper Guild asserted U.S. troops deliberately are killing journalists in Iraq.

Linda Foley, speaking Friday in St. Louis, said the American attacks are focused particularly on Arab journalists, according to a tape aired by Sinclair Broadcasting's "The Point," a commentary segment by Mark Hyman."

[-HF]

But Terry Lloyd isn't "one of their own kind". There are savages who declare war and journalists who try to shine a light on what's happening. US troops and British journalists are NOT ON THE SAME SIDE.

Bush and bin Laden are on the same side. Bush and Terry Lloyd aren't.

obviously 'one of their own kind' as in not a citizen of the attacked places.

if anyone is holding a soldier responsible for killing anyone during those camapigns, they have to hold them responsible for every single harm done or none at all. the life of a journalist cannot be valued more than someone having to suffer through their country being invaded because some wankers decided to have a go.

explaining the prosecution of the journalist's death with war laws doesn't work, as there was no war declared, so all killings in the course of the campaigns are unlawful.

[strictlybroadband]

obviously 'one of their own kind' as in not a citizen of the attacked places.

if anyone is holding a soldier responsible for killing anyone during those camapigns, they have to hold them responsible for every single harm done or none at all. the life of a journalist cannot be valued more than someone having to suffer through their country being invaded because some wankers decided to have a go.

explaining the prosecution of the journalist's death with war laws doesn't work, as there was no war declared, so all killings in the course of the campaigns are unlawful.

True. I'd support prosecuting every case where there's evidence. US and UK troops in Iraq are war criminals - the Nuremberg trials established that "just following orders" is not a defence.

[-HF]

Not technically true with small arms ( and small arms includes rifles ). The US army carried out a HUGE study about 10 years ago to look at incresing kill probability out to a measly 400 yards - the current kill proabability for most field armies is 100 yards.

always amusing when people with no army experience share opinions on such topics. :)

my oldest rifle is from 1898, it's designed to fire at targets up to 2 miles away.
i have no problem hitting a target the size of a torso at 300m - 328 yards for you. when i was taking part in competitions, i used to place hits within a patch double the size of a palm of a hand at this distance. and i only came top 5 usually, so there are way better competitors.

people have this funny idea, most likely from watching movies which discard basically all laws of physics, that all you need to do is aim and fire. this isn't how it works. as with any technological item the biggest issue is the human handling it.