BBC WORLD NEWS TODAY 20/01/11 US Troops In Sangin

[Camilo19832001]

Nice one!!!! I love it that they fucked that spotter!!!

[TheLittleAC0RN]

@chillibeans22 That last statement would be so much more impressive were it not for the fact that it's usually the US fucking with other countries which motivates them to fuck you back. Try staying at home for a change, not interfering in other people's shit & then see how many people want to blow you up...

[TheLittleAC0RN]

@chillibeans22 Politics is pretty much everywhere. It's why you're in Afghanistan & it'll be why you leave. You're not protecting anybody. If anything, you are making the world a more dangerous place. Your actions are creating terrorists. They hate you for a reason. Not because of their religion or any bullshit propaganda you've been fed. But because the West keeps INTERFERING in their affairs & dropping bombs on their heads. Not to mention Western support for Israel. Try learning some history.

[TheLittleAC0RN]

@chillibeans22 Whatever you tell yourself, the truth remains you are fighting a pointless war. Not for any moral or noble cause but simply because politicians cannot admit they were wrong. You are saving face, & risking your lives for gutless politicians. Not one of whom would send their own sons to fight. They are willing to fight to the last drop of other people's blood...

[TheLittleAC0RN]

@chillibeans22 As for the bombs kids are stepping on, the bombs are intended for you. Your presence there is the PROBLEM. You are making life more difficult for the locals by making their home a war zone. & killing them in the crossfire. You're not helping them, you're simply making matters worse. Any achievements you do make will be short lived. The Taliban aren't going anywhere. Meanwhile, irresponsible US actions are radicalizing the population &generating even more support for the Taliban.

[TheLittleAC0RN]

@chillibeans22 Oh so I imagine all the dead civilians, women & children, are figments of my imagination. Just because you may not be personally responsible does not mean it's not happening. It's happening every day. Both civilians AND US & UK soldiers are losing their lives everyday for NOTHING. You cannot win & you cannot stay there forever. The war is pointless, a waste of time, human life & tax payer's money. Accept reality & leave...

[TheLittleAC0RN]

@chillibeans22 He's not been through any shit for ME. How about you show some respect for the hundreds of thousands of Iraqi, Afghan and Pakistani civilians who have died as a consequence of US air strikes & drone attacks. You don't even give a shit, do you? Patriotism & ego are more important to you than human rights. Drone attacks are cowardly. Modern warfare is for pansies, let's face it.

[baskins0331]

But thank you paul woods and Ronnie wright

[baskins0331]

If you were there in our shoes you would understand the threat of spotters the video doesn't show what we saw and the area we were in was one of the worst we had to patrol in if you have any questions feel free to ask

[baskins0331]

I just want to know how you can justify sitting on your ass talking shit about what we did over there im in the video im the machine gunner next to the sniper the shot was at 820 meters so its a little hard to take a precision shot with a rifle that shoots a 7.62 cartridge at that range we followed our rules of engagement with the shot spotting on a mari e patrol is a hostile act and has hostile intent and we had positive identification on the target so we engaged him

[TheLittleAC0RN]

@baskins0331 Perhaps you can explain why the locals want you to stop shooting them? & killing their cows. Do cows commit hostile acts and harbour hostile intent? Seems killing unarmed men is par for the course with US troops these days. Judge, jury & executioner. Justice... the American way...

[myka4hg]

@pvtsorrel How exactly are you fighting for my freedom? Perhaps you can explain that to me. Is the Taliban planning to invade the US or the UK? Was Saddam Hussein planning to invade us? Oh yeah, of course, with his weapons of mass destruction. Did you ever find those? Stop parroting propaganda like a mindless drone. The war is unwinnable. Is it ego or pure denial which prevents you from admitting that?

[kaitie14]

It shouldn't matter if you like what they do or not. My boyfriend is with the 3/5 Marines and he is seen in this video. Any military force is doing things to protect peoples right to complain on websites like this. Agree with it or not, they are doing something that you or I didn't have the courage to do. They volunteer knowing they could die. The closest we will ever come to what they do is cross the street. They deserve much more than you or I do for what they are doing to protect everyone.

[myka4hg]

@kaitie14 But they're NOT protecting us. That is just the propaganda politicians use to justify their ill considered decisions and mistakes. Your boyfriend is RISKING HIS LIFE so politicians can save face and not have to admit their decisions were wrong. All the wars in Iraq & Afghanistan have achieved is to increase hatred towards the West. You can't behave recklessly & irresponsibly in warfare and then act all surprised when terrorist acts around the World increase. Actions have consequences.

[asktac09]

How do I explain accidents? Human error comes to mind, but you have no idea what happens in your head in direct combat. How do civilians get killed? I have seen Taliban with kids tied to them on ropes, and we chose not to engage. Sometimes you don't have the choice. But we are the cowards right? I like your "pack up and leave" mentality, that should work. Actually, since you're from the UK, you guys already did that, so what stock do you have in this argument?God bless you 3/5

[TheLittleAC0RN]

@asktac09 Accidents. There seem to be a lot of those. If US soldiers aren't killing British soldiers in "friendly fire" incidents then they are killing Scottish Aid Worker (Linda Norgrove) who they were suppose to be rescuing! Gung ho & trigger happy. The US has vastly superior firepower, use drones (which yes, I consider cowardly) and seem to kill as indiscriminately as any terrorist. Yet STILL cannot defeat the Taliban. The war is pointless and soldiers are dying everyday for NOTHING.

[RT378]

AC0RN, where are you getting this from? I think you are talking out of your ass, bud. Put your money where your mouth is and pony up some proof of your accusations. The unbiased kind, that is...

[TheLittleAC0RN]

@RT378 Did you even WATCH the news footage? That's where I'm getting it from. An UNARMED man is walking along a road and shot and KILLED on the sole grounds of talking into a radio and "trying to look inconspicuous." He was unarmed and posed no significant threat. Yet was killed. Was this really necessary? Is "shoot first & ask questions afterwards" really US policy? No wonder they have been fighting this war for so long. I'm amazed the locals aren't queuing up to join the Taliban.

[RobbieWright]

@TheLittleAC0RN This is a very primitive part of the world, if some on is talking into a radio, he can only be one thing, a spotter.

[TheLittleAC0RN]

@RobbieWright Thanks for your comments, Robbie. However, whether the man was a spotter or not is actually irrelevant. He was unarmed. "One shot, one kill" mentality is that of the video-game generation. A disabling shot would have sufficed, allowing the man to be questioned afterwards. Why are the locals complaining that their relatives are being shot dead? Were they ALL Taliban? Was the cow a Taliban sympathizer? Troops are seemingly getting bored and shooting at anything that moves.

[RobbieWright]

I don't understand why if he was a spotter or not is irrelevant, if he was a spotter he was the enemy and therefor a legitimate target, if he was talking into a radio, he was a spotter, the British had a , "must see a weapon first rule" but that could be part of the reason they didn't make any headway in 4 years.

[RobbieWright]

He needed to be taken down, not disabled, it was a 700 meter shot so with the IED threat, it would of taken at least half an hour to get to him, it that time he would of called for back up, set up booby traps or even booby trapped him self.

[TheLittleAC0RN]

@RobbieWright It's hard to imagine how he could have set up booby traps if he was injured. Once disabled, he could then be questioned afterwards. If he was a spotter, he could provide valuable intel. If he was a local farmer, he could be patched up and sent on his way. If snipers are skilled enough to kill with one shot, they should be skilled enough to perform a satisfactory (non-lethal) disabling shot. But that's not the policy is it? US policy simply doesn't care about collateral damage.

[RobbieWright]

The relatives were shot in a different time, when the fighting was much more full on, they could of been hit in cross fire, they could of been shot by the Taliban or more likely, they could of been Taliban. but the idea of Marines being bored and shooting at anything that moves, it's just not the case.

[TheLittleAC0RN]

@RobbieWright That's like the Israelis saying the 1300 people they killed in Gaza were all Hamas. The reality is US forces are killing civilians, then making poor excuses to justify it. Look at the recent air strikes in Afghanistan, "an unknown number of insurgents were killed." If they don't KNOW how many they killed, how exactly do they know they were even insurgents? Children aren't insurgents. Air strikes R indiscriminate. & acts of terrorism, no different to those carried out by Taliban.

[RobbieWright]

@TheLittleAC0RNI would be very easy for him to booby trap himself, all he would have to do is pull the pin on a grande and lie on it. I don't think it is fair to to compare the U.S troops in Afghanistan to the IDF who do target civilians, there might be the odd rogue marine who might take a pot shot at a cow or something but the idea of the marines terrorizing the civilians and shooting anything that movers is simply not happening.

[TheLittleAC0RN]

@RobbieWright Robbie whatever happened to providing impartial news reporting? You're embedded ! You've completely lost your objectivity. Your report clearly shows a sniper kill a man on nothing more than a hunch. Civilian casualties in Afghanistan are completely unacceptable &  they're not some figment of imagination... They are being killed & modern warfare techniques are to blame... murder from a far. Drones are the embodiment of this policy.

[RobbieWright]

@TheLittleAC0RN Sure being embedded isn't ideal but in this case it a case of an embed or nothing, we can't get embedded with the Taliban and we can't go wondering around the country side by our self's but at no point did any marine tell us we couldn't shoot something or have a say in what we asked the Afghans.

[RobbieWright]

@TheLittleAC0RN Civilian deaths are a fact of war, always have been and always will be but at least with today's technology, civilian casualty are far lower then the days of carpet bombing. As you can see by the longer edit video I sent, this guy was taken down on much more then a hunch. He has a radio, he was using it and he was observing them. You have to remember this is a country where only the military or Taliban would have 2 way radios.

[myka4hg]

@RobbieWright Robbie, I totally respect your opinion & the work that you do but you are depending on US soldiers to keep you safe & alive. Of course you are going to take their word for it that whatever they tell you is the truth. But we both know, in war the truth has a habit of being manipulated into something more palatable. If the civilian deaths in Iraq, Afghanistan & Pakistan caused by unmanned drones were British or Americans do you really think they would be quite as readily tolerated?

[RobbieWright]

@myka4hg Sure they would be less accommodating if a mistake were made, that will be the same for any military, company or person, that is to be expected but I have been on embeds before and shot stuff they would rather the outside world did not see, they have expressed there opinion but not stopped us, there are rules we need to follow as embedded journalists but these has to do with current operations and identifying the dead, stuff you would expect any-how.

[TheLittleAC0RN]

@RobbieWright With all due respect, Robbie, U R an embedded journalist, which tends to compromise your impartiality. Was a radio actually found on the unarmed man? & even if it was, carrying a radio should not carry a death sentence. Don't spotters carry guns? US progress is debatable. They may chase the Taliban away for a while but they'll soon return. Meanwhile, locals are being radicalized as a result of their relatives being killed by the very people who are supposed to be protecting them.

[asktac09]

@TheLittleAC0RN - No accountability? EVERY SINGLE action they take today they have to deal with the consequences and reactions tomorrow, and the rest of their deployment. Trust me, every decision is carefully weighed. If you want to harp on cows, go ahead, ignore the fact that these Marines have brought safety and security to an area that was torturing and killing locals since the beginning of the war. You have no idea the realities of the ground because that doesn't fit your agenda.

[TheLittleAC0RN]

If every decision is carefully weighed, perhaps you can explain why so many Afghan civilians are being killed? As for bringing safety and security, all troops have achieved is to change who the locals are being killed by. It seems troops have an equal regard for human rights & the value of human life as the Taliban. Offers of compensation to the locals for their losses sum up the US strategy and mentality. If you really want to help the Afghan people, LISTEN to them. Stop killing them & LEAVE.

[asktac09]

LittleACORN, I assume by your description you think these Marines did something wrong. That means you have no experience in the AO, so your opinion and input mean less to me (or the Marines there, their families, etc) than the web space it took you to write that. You have never had a spotter lead to a 4 sided ambush on you, never been rocketed, shelled, or mortared because the enemy is that coordinated. Don't offer your take on things, because you haven't earned it.

[TheLittleAC0RN]

@asktac09, thank you for your comments. However, the fact remains US troops in Sangin seem to have no accountability whatsoever. They are killing unarmed people on little more than a hunch. They are even shooting cows. Do you really expect them to "win hearts & minds" with this kind of arrogant & reckless behaviour? They are not making the situation better... they are simply making it worse. The war is pointless, cannot be won & is a waste of time, money & human life. This is the reality.