By Eric Pettifor
An important story over at WikiLeaks concerns what appears to be the slaughter of innocent civilians by American forces, including two Reuters news staff, in Iraq . I should warn you that the video is very disturbing, taken as it is from the Apache helicopter doing the firing.
I’ll leave it to a political blogger to consider the big picture of what this says about the US military and their operations in Iraq, and restrict myself to a couple of technology related issues. The first, of course, must be to thank WikiLeaks for the courage they display in bringing us information that powerful entities like the US military don’t want us to have. They accept donations via paypal and some other options.
Secondly, I was struck by just how critical the role of accurate information is in this sort of situation. Elements of the US military do not always conduct themselves professionally, but nonetheless, command and control is professionally structured. Soldiers can’t simply fly around firing at whoever they like depending on how trigger-happy they’re feeling on any particular day. Before they can engage a target, they must request and get permission to do so.
But here’s the rub. The fellow removed from the heat of the action, who arguably should have a cooler head and better judgment, depends absolutely on the report of the people who will be doing the engaging for his decision on whether or not to engage. If you watch the video, you may be a bit stunned when you hear the gunner reporting that he sees people with RPGs and AK47s, because that simply isn’t apparent from the video.
I’m not an expert in military systems, but in light of this incident I would hope that someone in some military R & D lab somewhere is working on a system whereby the one who makes the decision could actually see the camera video in real time. That might have made a difference, if he could have said, “I don’t see a threat here, boys, simmer down and move on.”
Or maybe not. Even based on the verbal info he was getting, the guy granting the permission to engage should probably be court-martialed for approving the attack on unarmed civilians coming to the aid of a man wounded in the initial attack. No amount of technology can compensate for the criminally poor judgment of an officer.
Again, the video is very disturbing, but if you want to see for yourself, you can view it here. Here’s an MSNBC clip with some analysis, but same warning, as they show the video in an inset while they talk over it.
Eric Pettifor says
Thanks, Clashmore Mike, for you comments. They’ve motivated me to create a tech post on spotting AK47s and RPGs ( https://backofthebook.ca/2010/04/15/ak47-and-rpg-spotting-101/2452/ ). I think I may even have spotted an RPG in what feels like a really dark version of Where’s Waldo.
While a live video feed from the copter to the controller wouldn’t guarantee good judgment calls, I still think the controller should have that as an additional source of information, especially when verbal report can be so fatally flawed.
“It’s a war and the only way to avoid these incidents is to avoid war altogether.”
I’m certainly not going to argue with you about the desirability of avoiding war altogether, but until we get there, I do think more could be done to avoid these types of incidents. A live video feed, for example, might even encourage more careful verbal reporting, for example. Also covering stuff up and not holding people accountable does nothing to discourage this sort thing.
Clashmore Mike says
The helicopters were called in specifically to offer support to troops on the ground who had come under fire in that area approximately an hour earlier. It wasn’t happenstance that the crew engaged an armed party without said party presenting a direct threat.
The long barreled weapon you see is indeed an RPG. The AK-47 is a short-barreled weapon. The Apache crew mis-identified the camera slings as shoulder hung weapons, and then correctly identified weapons in an area where ground troops had been attacked.
In so far as a live video feed, I’m not sure how effective that would be. The “Predator” unmanned aircraft is as real-time as it gets, with less risk as there isn’t a pilot directly in harms way…and yet it seems to me that at least once a month I’m reading about an errant Predator attack that resulted in either unarmed civilian deaths, or friendly fire deaths.
It’s a war and the only way to avoid these incidents is to avoid war altogether.
Eric Pettifor says
Thanks, Dave, though it wasn’t really my objective to scare Alex off. I would like an answer.
Your point about a threatening posture with guns is well taken. As I understand it, it isn’t an offense to carry a gun in Baghdad.
And thanks Maloy49 for pointing out that there are guns visible if you look closely after the time point you mention. I see two guys with what appear to be long barreled weapons pointed at the ground. I don’t see any RPG and the guy reporting to control doesn’t mention it at that point either. He says “Have five to six indivduals with AK47s.” Even though there only appear to be two weapons, that statement could be taken as true, as in five to six individuals collectively possessed of an unspecified number of AK47s (assuming that the long barreled weapons are AKs), though if I was depending on a verbal report, I would interpret that as five to six individuals each possessed of an AK47. This also makes my point. There’s nothing like seeing for oneself rather than depending on verbal report, and the one approving attacks should if at all possible have a real time video feed.
Maloy49 says
I won’t call it dishonesty, but you are very much mistaken with this line:
“…you may be a bit stunned when you hear the gunner reporting that he sees people with RPGs and AK47s, because that simply isn’t apparent from the video.”
From the short version, the Apache crew initially mistakes the journalists shoulder-strapped cameras for weapons between 3:10 and 3:20. However, they correctly identify men carrying an RPG and an AK-47 between 3:40 and 3:45.
I would agree that opening up on that van seems to go beyond what was immediately necessary.
Also, should you chose to track my ID, I am a civilian who happens to live in the D.C. area.
Dave says
Nice to see, put him in his place and scared him off. Go figure.
Keep up the Great work!!
The funny thing is i never seen on the video anyone shooting at them and the MSNBC Panel discussion says it all. (expecaily about the van picking up the wonded.)
and yes i know i am a poor speller but i made my point 🙂
Eric Pettifor says
Your attack on my character as dishonest and being a liar reminded me of the US military’s strategy of discrediting journalists whose reporting they dislike. Curious with regard to whether this might be happening to me, as paranoid and unlikely as that sounds, I decided to look up the ip addresses you posted from.
You’ve posted from two ip addresses, 216.221.71.170 and 131.137.245.198 . The first appears to belong to an Ontario cable company. The second is indeed a military ip, though not American. It is associated with the Canadian Department of National Defense. I can post detailed lookup information if you wish to challenge it, though anyone who knows what they’re doing can find it from the ip addresses the same way I did.
I can understand the American military going into damage control mode and broadly employing their ‘discredit the journalist’ strategy, but I don’t understand why the Canadian military would be involved. Or are you an employee of the DND independently posting your own thoughts?
If you are a military hacker, I would ask you please not to try to break into the server to cover your tracks. I have an off-site backup of everything, so the exercise would be futile.
Eric Pettifor says
WikiLeaks has also provided a transcript of the video at http://collateralmurder.com/en/transcript.html . There is absolutely nothing about a “vehicle full of armed combatants”. Even filled with blood lust as they seem to be the best they can manage with regard to presenting a threat is a lame “looks like possibly uh picking up bodies and weapons”. Here is a an excerpt:
07:07 Yeah Bushmaster, we have a van that’s approaching and picking up the bodies.
07:14 Where’s that van at?
07:15 Right down there by the bodies.
07:16 Okay, yeah.
07:18 Bushmaster; Crazyhorse. We have individuals going to the scene, looks like possibly uh picking up bodies and weapons.
07:25 Let me engage.
07:28 Can I shoot?
07:31 Roger. Break. Uh Crazyhorse One-Eight request permission to uh engage.
07:36 Picking up the wounded?
07:38 Yeah, we’re trying to get permission to engage.
07:41 Come on, let us shoot!
07:44 Bushmaster; Crazyhorse One-Eight.
07:49 They’re taking him.
07:51 Bushmaster; Crazyhorse One-Eight.
07:56 This is Bushmaster Seven, go ahead.
07:59 Roger. We have a black SUV-uh Bongo truck [van] picking up the bodies. Request permission to engage.
08:02 Fuck.
08:06 This is Bushmaster Seven, roger. This is Bushmaster Seven, roger. Engage.
Alex says
Well either you’re lying about having watched the video, or you’re intentionally misrepresenting what it shows. Either way, you’re being dishonest. Permission was granted to engage a vehicle full of armed combatants which was involved in the removal of bodies and weapons. You can’t go from that to “shoot the unarmed civilians” unless you’re trying to rewrite the events in order to lay the blame on the controller.
Eric Pettifor says
Yes, Alex, I did watch the video. But for conciseness and reduced risk of nausea, you might prefer to refer to the timeline at http://collateralmurder.com/en/timeline.html . Here’s an excerpt:
06:25:26 Helicopters notice a mini-van arriving, attempting to help Saeed.
06:25:58 Crazyhorse: “Roger. Break. Uh Crazyhorse One-Eight request permission to uh engage.”
06:26:29 Bushmaster gives permission to engage. Proceed to open fire on the mini-van.
Alex says
“Even based on the verbal info he was getting, the guy granting the permission to engage should probably be court-martialed for approving the attack on unarmed civilians coming to the aid of a man wounded in the initial attack”
The problem is, that’s not what he was approving. Did you actually watch the video?