U.S. Apache helicopter Gunship vs. some potato farmers
 

G'Day AmpHeads

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It's easy to see that the vehicle on the left is a tractor and that the Apache just blew away some farmers. There is no question that the men were involved in some kind of agricultural activity, most likely ploughing. This is cold blooded murder and this video records a war crime.

Certainly the video makes it clear that the Apache was not engaged in evasive flight indicating that it was under any kind of a threat. The US Government is desperate to explain this away. One individual wrote in to claim that since the video is dark, it must be night and since farmers don't plough their fields at night, they deserved to be killed. However, as the display in the video itself confirms, this is an infrared thermograph, which shows emitted heat (bodies, engines, shrapnel) as white over a dark background. One thing is clear from the body language of the people. They were clearly unconcerned about the helicopter until it opened fire, which means they did not think they were doing anything that the helicopter would see as a threat. I don't think there is anything that illustrates how low the US military has sunk than this video.

From The Geneva Convention 3-1: 1. Persons taking no active part in the hostilities, including members of armed forces who have laid down their arms and those placed hors de combat by sickness, wounds, detention, or any other cause, shall in all circumstances be treated humanely, without any adverse distinction founded on race, colour, religion or faith, sex, birth or wealth, or any other similar criteria -

The very FIRST person gunned down was the person who had been driving the tractor.

Here it is...

"U.S. Apache helicopter Gunship vs. some potato farmers"

Sickening :hang:

Awful!

This is almost as sickening as when that US soiler bombed his own camp during the beginning of the Iraqi movement in spring 2003... :( :hang:

Sickening and awful. It reminds me of the Air Cavalry scene in Apocolaypse Now.

Can you provide any legitimate news sources to back this video up?
I'd be interested to see them.

Um. Yeah. I'd like to see something other than your word that shows these are, (presumably) innocent "potato farmers".

And how were they at all a threat? They were in the middle of a field by a tractor. Hardly obvious members of an army or terrorist organisation. It's not like they were packing RPGs into the truck.

And how do you know it's footage off of an Apache?
All you have is a disjointed audio track and a infrared video track with no indication of anything but some people being shot.

I still want to see a legitimate news source for this,
because until I do, I'm not buying into it.
For all I know its a rip from a video game,
or an animation created to further a propagandist's agenda.

On another note, Google returns absolutely nothing, and Faaris backed his story up with ... absolutely nothing!

Unless something credible in the slightest pops up, I'm going to consider it fake.
[edit] Wow, papadoc - didn't see your post there. :D[/edit]

Murder. pure and simple.

Footage of unarmed men being shot to death by a large caliber machine gun. One of whom is obviously wounded, is then murdered as he lays helpless.

You just watched footage of a war crime.

:rolleyes:

You have no proof, and yet the human assumption:
"If it's outrageous, it MUST be true!"

More like it's very realistic.

found something else regarding the video:
http://portland.indymedia.org/en/2004/01/278605.shtml

I tried to search Google with "apache" and "potato farmer" with each other or in some other order, but I got nothing...

Thanks Dawg4Life2K1. That's all I was asking for.
Although that's a left wing web site, it did give me
a link to a news source for the story:

http://abcnews.go.com/sections/WNT/U..._040109-1.html

It doesn't surprise me that ABC News is the source.

The page didn't load the first time around when I tried to visit it...

Glad some more insight was shed...

Indeed!
I'm open minded.
I want the see or hear both sides of a story, before I rush to judgement,
unlike others here, who only rely on one side for their knowledge.

Hmm. I wonder what the truth is. Justified attack, or killing some farmers? The video doesn't really give enough data.
[edit] but the full length supposedly shows the men dumping weaponry. I kinda wonder what kind of Army would release a video of killing innocent farmers... [/edit]

I love how they edited the video down so you don't see what happens beforehand.:rolleyes: What you don't see is the truck on the right side of the screen pull up and 2 guys get out and one of them is carrying an RPG. Potato farmers my ass.

I'd also have to question wtf potato farmers (if that's what they are)
were doing planting/hoeing/harvesting potatos,
in the middle of the night, in a war zone?

I don't whether they were innocent or not, but the last fella was clearly wounded and they fired on him again.

I watched the video, and I know that Western armies do not shoot at people for no reason. What happened in the moments before that? What is in those trucks?

And your point is...what? Did you want them to land their helicopter and go out there and hug him until he felt better?:rolleyes: Under Geneva rules he was fair game. They played by the rules of engagement, he's dead, now build a bridge and get the fuck over it. :cry:

Coulda swore there is such thing as a POW. Granted none of us can know the true situation for sure but it does look bad at any angle.

Considering the video does not actually give any information on the RoE, the event cannot solely be judged by it.

That's what happens if they're caught or surrender. If they are an immediate theat, which having an RPG in your possesion is, especially while running around trying to hide, then they're likely to be killed and that's what happened to them.

I actually meant about the guy that was gunned down but survived, so they shot him up again. If he was within easy crawling range (bearing in mind that he'd be wounded) of an RPG then yeah, I'd say he's still a threat.

I think you'll find that executing the wounded is illegal.

By the way;

"I watched the video, and I know that Western armies do not shoot at people for no reason. What happened in the moments before that? What is in those trucks?"

Please, Western armies have a long and shameful history or doing just that....along with all other armies.

Like grumpy said, he was an immedieate threat, wounded or not. They did what they had to do, what they were ordered to do. I seriously doubt that Apache helicopter pilots fly around saying to each other, "Hey I'm bored, let's go kill some farmers, just for shits and giggles."

Nope, not at all. If it was there'd be TONS of controversy surrounding this exact tape. Instead it's just a few bleeding-heart, anti-war, whining liberals that are doing this ---->:cry:

The pilot had his orders and he followed them to the letter. War is hell, no doubt about it. People get wounded and killed fighting. You don't achieve peace through pacifism, you achieve it through victory.

Once again, I agree with grumpy...3 times in one week...:igor: I'm getting nervous.

exactly why american soldiers shouldn't be used anywhere but in "hot" combat....

way to trigger happy :rolleyes:

my old history teacher from highschool told us a story from when he was stationed on Cyprus for the UN mission, there were two road blocks in his area, one run my americans, one run my danish and finnish soldiers, americans had an average of 15 - 20 incident's per week, Danes/Finns none.

Think that story was what made me weary of the american army.

:blah: amusing.

as for what happened before, the apache stumbled upon them, saw that they had a "long, cylindrical object", that they deemed to be a weapon, they asked for permission to engage then, er, engaged! this is all covered in the news report.

right, so where's the controversy, they thought it was a weapon, you can't prove it wasn't (not we can't prove it was, but it's a moot point). What farmers tool is long and cylindrical like that. I've lived on farms. I can't think of a fucking thing. It wasn't a fucking rake.

I think it's funny that everybody automattically chalked it up to us hateful, trigger happy Americans before even bothering with a source. God forbid you fucking look around before you leap.
I agree with Grumpy, simply because what he said makes sense.

I'm open minded.
I want the see or hear both sides of a story, before I rush to judgement,..<<<

Unfortunately there is no other side of the story. They were all vaporized by a large caliber chain gun. Farmers, sokdiers or freelance pissed off Iraqi citizens, they are all now decidedly dead. We'll never know and each of us will decide based on our own biases and filters.

i'm not especially complaing about the incident, but i'm not best pleased that "a long cylindrical object" can put you down as a target of opportunity. that scares me, somewhat.

I don't know about you, but I don't walk around warzones with something that looks like an RPG.

That'll cut out anyone actually building anything out of wood in a country then! Or carrying around architect plans in a long cylindrical documents case. Or fixing any guttering and/or plumbing. Or, or, or, or.....

How can these people be so naivee as to believe we wont kill them just because they're innocent! :hang: