Holy ****! (Iraq) Helo shot down, up to 35 aboard, 20+ casualties

[MichaeltheGreat]

So we have a fair tribunal, then a fair mass execution?

[HershOstropoler]

If that is the result of fair trial... I just doubt that most of the prisoners there qualify.

[Kropotkin]

Meanwhile, in the real world and on the topic of this thread; another chopper, a blackhawk this time, has crashed near Tikrit. There's no real information just yet if was due to technical errors or an attack. The reports of the number of deaths was at four but according to the BBC it's now six.

I might as well post the entire article. It, amoungst other things, claims that the violence is spreading northward, towards Mosul. Might imply something for MtG's military plans if this is true. More ground to cover.

Six die in US helicopter crash


Other helicopters flew over the crash site
An American Black Hawk helicopter has been forced down near Saddam Hussein's hometown of Tikrit, killing all six soldiers on board.
The US military is investigating whether the chopper was attacked or suffered mechanical problems.

American troops have secured the scene near the Tigris River in north Iraq.

Last weekend, an American Chinook helicopter was shot down, killing 16 soldiers in the biggest single strike on US forces since they invaded Iraq.


The Black Hawk went down on a riverbank along the Tigris River about a kilometre from the US base in Saddam Hussein's former palace in Tikrit.

Smoke was seen rising from the wreckage as other helicopters hovered above.

"We don't know if it was a mechanical failure or hostile fire," Major Josslyn Aberle told the Associated Press.




Factfile: Black Hawk
Profile: Saddam's home town

All the soldiers killed were from the 101st Airborne Division.

On 25 October a Black Hawk helicopter was shot down near Tikrit, injuring one crew member.

Tikrit lies in the heart of the "Sunni Triangle" - the region around Baghdad seen as most loyal to the ousted regime of Saddam Hussein.

It has been the scene of continued resistance to US-led forces.

In continuing violence elsewhere, a US convoy was ambushed in Mosul early on Friday morning, coming under fire from small arms and rocket-propelled grenades, the US military said.

One soldier died and six others were injured in the clash.

This brings the number of US soldiers killed in action since President George W Bush declared major combat over on 1 May to 140.

In a separate attack, a roadside bomb in the city injured three US soldiers.

Mosul, Iraq's third largest city and close to the semi-autonomous Kurdish areas, was quiet until relatively recently.

Correspondents say the spate of attacks there has prompted concern among US commanders that guerrilla attacks are spreading north from the Sunni Triangle.


Chinook warning

The attack came hours after a memorial service was held for the men killed when their Chinook helicopter was shot down on Sunday.

"Death was in the cause of freedom. They were serving our country and answering our nation's call to fight terrorists," Colonel David Teeples, commanding officer of the men's unit, said.

Army officials said the Chinook's crew apparently had a warning of an approaching missile seconds before it struck, the Associated Press reports.

The crew managed to launch flares designed to draw the heat-seeking missile away but the defensive measure did not work.

Source:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/3249493.stm

[Chemical Ollie]

Edit: Kropotkin beat me by 2 minutes

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/3249493.stm

[Kropotkin]

[MOBIUS]

That is 3 helos in less than two weeks...

[Kropotkin]

Maybe they are to vulnerable after all.

It wasn't that easy for the AI in Gunship 2000....

[Ned]

MtG, you make a very good point about "questioning." But, do "terrorist" prisoners present materially different threat issues than do ordinary soldiers taken in combat? If they do, what we ought to do is seek a change in the laws of war so as to permit "questioning" of such POWs.

[Ned]

HO, I agree with your position.

Unlike MtG some others here, I do not believe that we had the right to simply gun down the AQ as we captured them.

Question: if they are no more than foot soldiers in a terrorist organization that wages war primarily if not exclusively by unlawful means are they themselves quilty of being war criminals?

I am thinking now about about being a "foot soldier" in a gang that exists for committing various sorts of crimes. Is such a "foot soldier" just as much guilty as the bosses?

[Lefty Scaevola]

Originally posted by Ned
Question: if they are no more than foot soldiers in a terrorist organization that in wages war primarily if not exclusively by unlawful means are they themselves quilty of being war criminals?

Yes, that is itself a warcrime, but not among the most serious.

[HershOstropoler]

What Lefty said.

[MichaeltheGreat]

Originally posted by MOBIUS
That is 3 helos in less than two weeks...

Out of several hundred flying every day.

[MichaeltheGreat]

Originally posted by Ned
MtG, you make a very good point about "questioning." But, do "terrorist" prisoners present materially different threat issues than do ordinary soldiers taken in combat? If they do, what we ought to do is seek a change in the laws of war so as to permit "questioning" of such POWs.

Since they don't answer to any national command authority, but instead to an organization which calls on them to continue fighting, and since they've sworn oaths to jihad against the US, yadda yadda blah blah, they're a bit differently motivated than say, your average soldier.

And why should we open up a can of worms trying to change a 50 year old international treaty, when these people's conduct places them outside that treaty anyway?

[Cruddy]

Just my tupennyworth on this subject;- I'm AMAZED there were any survivors at all from a downed Chinook.

[Ned]

Originally posted by MichaeltheGreat


Since they don't answer to any national command authority, but instead to an organization which calls on them to continue fighting, and since they've sworn oaths to jihad against the US, yadda yadda blah blah, they're a bit differently motivated than say, your average soldier.

And why should we open up a can of worms trying to change a 50 year old international treaty, when these people's conduct places them outside that treaty anyway?

Because United States has been among the leaders campaigning for the rule of law historically?

I think we are doing the right thing in Guantánamo. But it doesn't look right and it continues to draw unfavorable attention.