Guilty of murder

Frank the tank

A marine "murders" a taliban fighter and faces life inside.

General Douglas Haig sent 100's of thousands of British soldiers to a needless death. Don't recall him facing a court martial.

The former made two mistakes, 1 filming it, 2 allowing the recording to be found.

upperoilcan

The minute they started looking for him that camera should have been turned off.

Utter madness to keep it rolling let alone putting the footage on a computer.

Sirius631

upperoilcan wrote:

The minute they started looking for him that camera should have been turned off.

Utter madness to keep it rolling let alone putting the footage on a computer.

Both of you, go out and buy some morals, they are going cheap apparently. The madness isn't the videoing of the incident; it's the incident itself.

They say that the camera was switched off and on again. I hope that was due to one of the witnesses feeling guilty about what he sensed was about to happen and merely feigned turning the camera off, so that the footage could be retrieved.

upperoilcan

Sirius631 wrote:

Both of you, go out and buy some morals, they are going cheap apparently. The madness isn't the videoing of the incident; it's the incident itself.

They say that the camera was switched off and on again. I hope that was due to one of the witnesses feeling guilty about what he sensed was about to happen and merely feigned turning the camera off, so that the footage could be retrieved.

Morals eh ?

According to reports the Apache gunship had already seriously wounded him,The moral thing to do would have been to leave him there.

The Taliban will get no sympathy here.

daviesee

Ask yourself how you would react if you had been through what he has.
Ask yourself how things would have played out if the roles were reversed.

This is not an excuse but armchair morals are too easy.

Mikey23

Far too easy... Which is why I will keep my trap shut on this one

rolf_f

daviesee wrote:

Ask yourself how you would react if you had been through what he has.
Ask yourself how things would have played out if the roles were reversed.

This is not an excuse but armchair morals are too easy.

This is true. But of course, the facts are that the marine did murder (no justification for quote marks here) the taliban fighter and therefore gets life. It is the correct outcome even if you can find sympathy for the marine. Anything else would have far worse and wider consequences.

Rob Somerset

I have never been in combat situation and I don't know the full facts of the case, so really I shouldn't be commenting. But I have met people who have been on the frontline and it clearly had a devastating effect, mentally, on some of them. This is a very difficult case, morals can be seriously affected after you have seen some or your mates blown apart by an IED. Putting the audio/video in to the public domain seems to be a ridiculous and dangerous thing to do and serves no purpose.

afx237vi

daviesee wrote:

Ask yourself how you would react if you had been through what he has.
Ask yourself how things would have played out if the roles were reversed.

This is not an excuse but armchair morals are too easy.

Which is why the rule of law exists, to hold ourselves accountable to the morals by which we would want to be judged. He broke the law, and judging by the extracts of the video shown on the news, he knew it.

mamba80

The geneva convention is there for a reason.
After all if u alow this shooting, why not the shooting of uninjured taliban or multiple killings?
Why not their families or whole villages?
This after all is what the serbian army did in bosnia against muslim "terrorists"

GiantMike

The Geneva Conventions are the foundation of the British military's approach to armed conflict. As soon an the enemy is no longer a threat (s)he must be treated the same as one would treat our own troops. Under the Law of Armed Conflict, the minimum force necessary to achieve the military aims should be used and it should be proportional to the threat (you wouldn't lob in a nuke to kill a terrorist, for example).

All British military forces know these rules and the requirement to apply them at all times.

Sirius631

Which is the more powerful weapon for the coalition's cause: a dead Taliban or one whose life has been spared and saved by someone he considered the enemy?

daviesee

All the above posts are true.
They are the standard to which out troops should aim.
And they do good to ease our conscience of having the moral high ground.

Do the Taliban care?

Oh, and as for proportional, villages etc, ask the Yanks. They have plenty of experience. Start with jailing George Bush.

GiantMike

daviesee wrote:

Oh, and as for proportional, villages etc, ask the Yanks. They have plenty of experience.

I think you would be very surprised how much planning goes into minimising civilian collateral damage when planning operations, and how often the lawyers are consulted over what is and isn't a legitimate target. A village should never be considered a legitimate target and wouldn't really add much to the war effort as it would provide propaganda opportunities.

As for the Taliban, there isn't such thing as 'The Taliban'. There are lots of different factions broadly aligned to different causes. Some are criminal, some are ideological, many are both.

daviesee

GiantMike wrote:

I think you would be very surprised how much planning goes into minimising civilian collateral damage when planning operations, and how often the lawyers are consulted over what is and isn't a legitimate target. A village should never be considered a legitimate target and wouldn't really add much to the war effort as it would provide propaganda opportunities.

I wouldnt be surprised at all.
The results speak for themselves though.
If it is not planned, then the Yanks need more target practice.

arran77

daviesee wrote:

GiantMike wrote:

I think you would be very surprised how much planning goes into minimising civilian collateral damage when planning operations, and how often the lawyers are consulted over what is and isn't a legitimate target. A village should never be considered a legitimate target and wouldn't really add much to the war effort as it would provide propaganda opportunities.

I wouldnt be surprised at all.
The results speak for themselves though.
If it is not planned, then the Yanks need more target practice.

The yanks just like blowing the shite out of things and checking after

mamba80

daviesee wrote:

All the above posts are true.
They are the standard to which out troops should aim.
And they do good to ease our conscience of having the moral high ground.

Do the Taliban care?

The GC isnt a set of guidelines that troops should try an follow, they are international law, and the UK are signatures.

What the Americans or anyone else does is neither here nor there.

do i think this guy should be jailed for life ? NO way - i would rather he be treated like the soldier in NI who was jailed (for a similar sort of thing) but allowed to carry on his service after his sentence was served.

Frank the tank

Sirius631 wrote:

upperoilcan wrote:

The minute they started looking for him that camera should have been turned off.

Utter madness to keep it rolling let alone putting the footage on a computer.

Both of you, go out and buy some morals, they are going cheap apparently. The madness isn't the videoing of the incident; it's the incident itself.

They say that the camera was switched off and on again. I hope that was due to one of the witnesses feeling guilty about what he sensed was about to happen and merely feigned turning the camera off, so that the footage could be retrieved.

I have morals fella. The thing is if I'm being 100% honest I don't know how I would react in a situation like that.

I don't know the circumstances that lead to the insurgent/fighter getting wounded initially. But I won't moralise from the safety of my home.

If someone had been trying to kill me all day and I'd seen colleagues getting killed/maimed and I found myself in the position marine "A" did, being totally honest I can't say what I would do. I would find it very difficult to kill someone who is no longer a threat to me in cold blood, it goes against my morals but as I said,being 100% honest I don't know if I would be able to control a desire for retribution, beit right or wrong.

finchy

I suppose the question is whether or not he was suffering from some sort of PTSD. Has he seen his mates getting blown up? Has he even been in battle before? Maybe he's just a violent thug and always has been. We don't know these things but hopefully the judge will be aware of the whole situation before sentencing.

Bookwyse

As an ex squaddie with tours or active duty under his belt, I can bet that this isnt the first or last time something like this has happened. The biggest mistake was recording the bloody thing. Having seen some good guys get killed by various methods always makes you think differently.

Do I feel sorry for the bloke they shot, hell NO, if he was seriously injured it was probably the best thing, IF I was seriously injured I would have expected my collegues or ENEMY to do the same. Do I feel sorry for the way it was recorded YES, there is no excuse for recording it.

A lot of things happen in the heqat of the moment, some good some bad, I just hope the sentancing officers take everything into account and sentance accpordingly.

rick_chasey

It's pretty simple. He knows he's committing murder - he even references he just broke the law that governs what is and isn't murder in war.

There is good reason why the Geneva convention exists and it's only right that those soldiers who don't obey them are seen to be punished - especially in the new type of asymmetrical warfare where working with locals is paramount.

Frank the tank

The part of my OP which has been totally overlooked was my reference to general Haig.

Marine A was found guilty of murdering one of his enemy. For my money Haig in effect murdered tens of, if not hundreds of thousands of British soldiers and never faced a court martial.

pliptrot

Frank the tank wrote:

The part of my OP which has been totally overlooked was my reference to general Haig.

Marine A was found guilty of murdering one of his enemy. For my money Haig in effect murdered tens of, if not hundreds of thousands of British soldiers and never faced a court martial.

Quite. But Haig was one of the powerful; Marine A is not. The whole idea of laws which govern the act of sending a large number of well equipped people to another country to effect extreme violence on that country is absurd. As to minimising collateral damage, is their any such thing in a guerilla war?

rolf_f

johnfinch wrote:

I suppose the question is whether or not he was suffering from some sort of PTSD. Has he seen his mates getting blown up? Has he even been in battle before? Maybe he's just a violent thug and always has been. We don't know these things but hopefully the judge will be aware of the whole situation before sentencing.

Yeah, what's is needed is some sort of, I don't know, trial or something where the defendant and witnesses could be questioned to find out if he actually was suffering from some sort of trauma and then maybe we'd know what was right to do with him ........

Frank the tank wrote:

The part of my OP which has been totally overlooked was my reference to general Haig.

Marine A was found guilty of murdering one of his enemy. For my money Haig in effect murdered tens of, if not hundreds of thousands of British soldiers and never faced a court martial.

What has Haig got to do with this? Would Marine A be more guilty if, in your words, Haig hadn't murdered thousands of British soldiers? How can events that happened nearly 100 years ago be relevant in this case?

ballysmate

Frank the tank wrote:

The part of my OP which has been totally overlooked was my reference to general Haig.

Marine A was found guilty of murdering one of his enemy. For my money Haig in effect murdered tens of, if not hundreds of thousands of British soldiers and never faced a court martial.

Frank, I agree that the WW1 was a dreadful catastrophe for this country and mankind in general. I am not a military strategist and I know it is fashionable to castigate the generals, Haig in particular, but I ask, a serious question of you. What would you have had Haig do? How would you have prosecuted the war?


Edited for spelling. :oops:

Frank the tank

Ballysmate wrote:

Frank the tank wrote:

The part of my OP which has been totally overlooked was my reference to general Haig.

Marine A was found guilty of murdering one of his enemy. For my money Haig in effect murdered tens of, if not hundreds of thousands of British soldiers and never faced a court martial.

Frank, I agree that the WW1 was a dreadful catastrophe for this country and mankind in general. I am not a military strategist and I know it is fashionable to castigate the generals, Haig in particular, but I ask, a serious question of you. What would you have had Haig do? How would you have prosecuted the war?


Edited for spelling. :oops:

I honestly don't know, but I'm sure that I would have endevoured to come up with a better way than just sending men "over the top" when the exercise had proven totally fruitless. The troops were considered as cannon fodder whose lives were totally expendible and as long as we killed on a one for one basis we would prevail due to weight of numbers.

ballysmate

Frank the tank wrote:

Ballysmate wrote:

Frank the tank wrote:

The part of my OP which has been totally overlooked was my reference to general Haig.

Marine A was found guilty of murdering one of his enemy. For my money Haig in effect murdered tens of, if not hundreds of thousands of British soldiers and never faced a court martial.

Frank, I agree that the WW1 was a dreadful catastrophe for this country and mankind in general. I am not a military strategist and I know it is fashionable to castigate the generals, Haig in particular, but I ask, a serious question of you. What would you have had Haig do? How would you have prosecuted the war?


Edited for spelling. :oops:

I honestly don't know, but I'm sure that I would have endevoured to come up with a better way than just sending men "over the top" when the exercise had proven totally fruitless. The troops were considered as cannon fodder whose lives were totally expendible and as long as we killed on a one for one basis we would prevail due to weight of numbers.

I don't know either Frank. Greater strategists than we, have had 100 years to come up with a plan, but still can offer no idea.

finchy

Rolf F wrote:

johnfinch wrote:

I suppose the question is whether or not he was suffering from some sort of PTSD. Has he seen his mates getting blown up? Has he even been in battle before? Maybe he's just a violent thug and always has been. We don't know these things but hopefully the judge will be aware of the whole situation before sentencing.

Yeah, what's is needed is some sort of, I don't know, trial or something where the defendant and witnesses could be questioned to find out if he actually was suffering from some sort of trauma and then maybe we'd know what was right to do with him ........

That's my point - we here in Cake Stop aren't really aware of the whole situation, whereas the judge should be.

verylonglegs

Ballysmate wrote:

Frank the tank wrote:

Ballysmate wrote:

Frank the tank wrote:

The part of my OP which has been totally overlooked was my reference to general Haig.

Marine A was found guilty of murdering one of his enemy. For my money Haig in effect murdered tens of, if not hundreds of thousands of British soldiers and never faced a court martial.

Frank, I agree that the WW1 was a dreadful catastrophe for this country and mankind in general. I am not a military strategist and I know it is fashionable to castigate the generals, Haig in particular, but I ask, a serious question of you. What would you have had Haig do? How would you have prosecuted the war?


Edited for spelling. :oops:

I honestly don't know, but I'm sure that I would have endevoured to come up with a better way than just sending men "over the top" when the exercise had proven totally fruitless. The troops were considered as cannon fodder whose lives were totally expendible and as long as we killed on a one for one basis we would prevail due to weight of numbers.

I don't know either Frank. Greater strategists than we, have had 100 years to come up with a plan, but still can offer no idea.

Haig didn't have tactical air support, satellite photographs, attack helicopters or armoured brigades. Doesn't mean to say I don't think he was a cold hearted murderous swine but equally you have to consider very carefully the context in which he made his rather unpalatable decisions. I can't see any merit in trying to compare very different conflicts, both in terms of enemy and technology.

ballysmate

As regards the marine, no other verdict, other than guilty, could be returned. I would be amazed if similar incidents, atrocities if you like, have not been happening in most theatres of conflict. Nowadays, people seem to feel the need to record and share every moment of their lives.
On a lighter note, an ex colleague who was responsible for interrogating hard drives and phones, once told me that it would appear that every soldier, on receipt of a new phone, takes a picture of his c0ck.

pliptrot

Ballysmate wrote:

How would you have prosecuted the war?

I certainly would not have executed soldiers in my own army for refusing to go "over the top" to certain death. I would have kept people in the trenches when machine guns were focused on them...in fact I would have expected nothing that I would not have done myself. Therein lies the problem.....Haig and the others in charge neither considered the casualty rate nor could identify with those on the front line. They genuinely believed the war could be won through attrition.