More Wikileaks.Follow

My post about 'the blogger' referred to a panel - you know, a group of people. Erudite, well-informed people.

Reports about deaths in Iraq, that have no reason to be concealed were withheld. They deemed that we have a right to know, no security was compromised by the release of these facts, and we will have a better understanding of the truth of what's happening in Iraq.

Your problem?

So, you're denying that there were death toll tickers on the news channels before this leak? Are you denying news people reporting ambushes and large US death tolls in missions on T.V. prior to this leak? Are you denying that people used these high death tolls to argue against the Surge and continuation of the war? So, I guess the 2004 election year never happened either huh?

Dude, you can't hide behind the fact that people have been notified of deaths in the war. Once again, there is no need for John Smith to know that a goat was killed, someone's house was accidentally destroyed or that Iraqis are destroying each other. The mass population do not care about those things, only the people who are against the war so they can project negativity. The average person cares about US deaths and success, which they were given. Quit making stuff up.

How is compromising classified information, not compromising security? Are you saying having unauthorized access to CPOF is not a compromise to security?

Ok, well pm me your bank account information, I'm not going to take any money, I just want to look at it, because I want to know how much money you have. I mean, it's not a compromise or a security threat to have access to your account if I'm only going to browse through your information. While you're at it, give me your SSN and any relevant information. I just want to know it.



Which makes you against WAR period.... so you can't claim that this war is a war-crime if you believe all war is a crime. That doesn't make any sense. So, you're just supporting the fact that you have absolutely nothing on this war other than the fact that it is a war. So, there is no justification for the compromise of classification information, because this was never about "war crimes", but your dislike of war in general.

PROTIP: Most people don't like war.

Edited, Oct 30th 2010 2:25am by Almalieque

Edited, Oct 30th 2010 5:01am by Almalieque

Sure. We all get that. And if the arguments used were just like that, I'd haven no issue with it. But what we're seeing is an attempt to suggest that this war and the behavior of the US government is somehow special or unusual in this regard.

The arguments being used by the antiwar folks aren't just "we're anti war, so we oppose all war, and we think you should to!". It's "In this war, horrible illegal things were done. So you need to oppose this war because of those things". That's more than a little bit dishonest IMO, and this wikileaks thing is just another component of that dishonesty. It's an attempt to make things which happen in war, and which we all understand and accept happen in war appear to be something different or worse than normal. And that's where the argument fails IMO.


You can't make a rational reasonable argument, so you go ahead with implication, innuendo, suggestion, and implication instead. Way to go, I suppose!

gbaji - being wrong can be more concise you know.

Your response literally had nothing to do with the incident that I cited. Unsubstantiated conjecture on your part about a completely separate incident does not disprove my example, which actually happened.

You're right, there's nothing there about IG. Which is exactly what I find particularly damning. There's ample evidence for them to conduct an investigation, so why didn't they? That's why I doubt them. If they were doing their due diligence, the events which took place in that video should have been investigated, and the findings made public (or at least to Reuters, which was seeking the info through the Freedom of Information Act).



A lot more than two civilians died when they took down the building, not that the number is what matters. Of course civilian deaths happen in war. But I would hope that the military would make every practical effort to avoid them. That simply did not occur in those videos. It's clear from the audio that the gunner had an itchy trigger finger, and that they used little to no discretion in regard to their targets.

What an awful person you are, to trivialize the senseless deaths of innocents. Learn some fucking empathy.

Edited, Oct 29th 2010 11:32pm by Eske

Edited, Oct 30th 2010 12:19am by Eske

Let me get this straight: You say that the IG will not investigate something unless the military brings it to them to investigate?

I think you just punched a hole square through the middle of your argument. If what you say is true, then there is a huge reason to be skeptical of the system right there: if the IG needs to have the incident reported to them by the very people who stand at risk from the reports, then the system is flawed. There is a conflict of interest; the military would have no incentive to report incidents to them. They would, as happened in these particular incidents, complete their own personal investigation and consider any matter closed.

That would be ridiculous, and I would be right to be skeptical.

If you're wrong, and they don't need to have the incident reported to them, then as I said, the fact that they chose not to investigate this incident is just as damning, in my opinion. Again, I would be justified in my skepticism.

And lastly, if the IG cannot investigate an issue unless any other party reports it to them, then they're simply an inept entity, and I would be right to be skeptical of their effectiveness.



Don't conflate my points with those of others in the thread. I haven't said that I support the release of sensitive information to the public. I prefer to err on the side of having military information public, yes, as long as it does not directly compromise missions and troops. But I don't think that this method, where the military operates with impunity, and we are forced to rely on leaks to be made aware of issues, is effective. So no, I don't like the leaks. Some may be justified in their release, some may not be. But I'm more concerned with the fact that this is the way we're doing things.

I think that I would prefer to have multiple third parties that are given oversight and auditing over military operations. Perhaps that's the role the IG is supposed to fill, but I am seeing a general ineffectiveness on their part. That's my point: if the Collateral Murder videos were not investigated, then why should I trust such a system, as you do? It clearly needs to be reevaluated.

I don't trust the military to police itself, for the same reason that you would never trust anyone to police themselves. It's a conflict of interest; they have no incentive to prosecute many crimes, nor reason to publicize negative information. If the IG isn't up to the task, then we need to implement a system that is.

All of that is to say that when you rest your argument on the IG, as you have been doing, I don't see it holding any water. I haven't read this leak, so I'm not going to comment on it one way or the other. But I don't have the faith in this IG that you do. I see no reason for it, and it strikes me as willful naiveté.




Edited, Oct 30th 2010 1:26pm by Eske

Why, because the military concluded so? Please don't make me go on that conflict of interest diatribe again.

http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/newsdesk/2010/04/the-wikileaks-video-and-the-rules-of-engagement.html

There is ample evidence there to at the very least necessitate further investigation. I'm not necessarily arguing that draconian charges need to be handed down. I feel that the wrongdoings were more the result of systemic problems with the RoE and training of the soldiers in question than they were about any individual. But if the IG is fulfilling the role that you say it does, then it should have performed an investigation and made its findings public. It did neither.

So no, I still don't trust this system one bit.

Edited, Oct 30th 2010 4:44pm by Eske

Wow.

Theree;s trying too hard

Then ther's Alma.

LMFAO

You're just making stuff up to argue. I watched the first few minutes and I'm asking you to tell me at what time are you specifically talking about?

Part of our problem is that we are arguing two different concepts.

You are (or at least were ) arguing on a very specific event. I don't think what the Reuters are asking is bad in anyway, as any organization who cares about their employees would do the same. My original claim is that there is a proper reporting protocol and wikileaks isn't one of them. You seem to be more level-headed then the other posters and realize that.

Our engagement slightly shifted the argument as you claim that an organization that you've never heard of is crooked while completely ignoring the evidence shown on this thread saying otherwise. Your only argument is because they didn't investigate in something which was already investigated on (according to your own quote)and deemed legal, then they are crooked. That makes absolutely no sense. You later give a link showing Soldiers positively identifying the enemy with weapons, asking permission to fire and then checking for surrounding civilians, then firing.

What else can they do? How do you define that as a war crime?

I know no one organization is pure and will always have corrupt people, as people are corrupt, but what I get from you is that you just don't trust the military or the government at all. You think the majority of the military personnel are just over there acting trigger happy and the government is concealing it. I've asked very specific questions that no one has answered, what benefit does an organization like IG gets from covering up a story that is deemed legal? Why would a person send up a summary telling on himself? Why would a person knowingly commit war crimes while being recorded and NOT destroy the tape during a cover up? How much more information do you want to know besides the US death polls and success which have always been reported?

The fact that you think that the Iraq war was a success, and that you can compare what happens in war with what happens in a dental chair, tells me two things.



1. That your moral compass is completely, utterly, irreperably broken.

2. And that you've never actually been close to any sort of armed conflict to see the effects of it on the people involved IRL. Or that you need to change your dentist.

Iraq a success? Thats a pretty delusional assesment even for you.

No it fUcking doesn't.

I supported the war, and it was obviously prosecuted in a disastrous way. From a stupid call on the disbanding of the Iraq army to the mass-recruitment of fundamentalists through the atrocities in fallujah, the whole thing was a cluster-fUck from the day we took Baghdad.

My 'expectations' were that we'd take control and support the locals to rebuild their infrastructure (physical, social and political). Instead we treated them like *****, handed the reconstruction budget to corrupt mega-corporations who syphoned off the dough and half-built shambolic construction work, alienated Saddam's former enemies and recruited half of Iran and Syria into Al-Q'aeda In Iraq.

Wikileaks is (unhelpfully for the apologists like you) clarifying the extent of this failure by exposing information that was only kept hidden to protect the incompetent.

1. If the objective was to foment a mass-radicalisation of previously moderate muslims in Iraq, Iran, Syria etc., it was a wowsie. Otherwise, it caused far greater problems in the Middle East, and in the West than it solved. Q.E.D. A failure - not my subjective view old chum - facts.

2. Have you read the reports from Wikileaks? Much of the recent content adds names, ages and circumstances to hundreds of previously nameless 'non-combatants'.

Dunno about you, but it's easier to turn a blind eye to the deaths of "4 non combatants" than it is to ignore the deaths of Hannan, a 26 year old checkout girl and her children Iftiqar (age 6), Hannan (age 4) and Zualfiqar (2).

I know there's collateral damage in war, but didn't we 'win' the war a few years back. Innocent women and children are dying at the hands of our soldiers, often as a result of indiscipline, poor training and ***** intelligence.

At best, incompetence; at worst, war crimes. Thanks to knobheads like you, much of this knowledge is buried with the victims by unthinking, pigShit-ignorant little fUcks like you.

Now fUck off and suck some junior officer's cOck like they pay you to.