I don't think the video tells the whole story. I don't know what to make of it yet, because of precisely that. However, I am extremely leery of the agenda of the persons who leaked this video. I think that whoever leaked it should be slammed hard.
As Joe-Citizen-Taxpayer, I'm all for having aggressive Soldiers that have to reined in. I'll take those kinds of Soldiers over ones that have to be pushed forward any day of the week.
Do I want guys going around taking out zip-codes? No, of course not. I'm not a COINista, but I get the "accidental guerrilla" thing. I'm also a human being. I don't eat babies. Same goes for the Army. This was investigated previously. Could there have been problems with that investigation? Yes, there could have been, but we don't yet know that there were. Covering up a violation of the Law of War carries heavy price and conspiracies require multiple members. I tend not to expect them.
As an example of the difference between investigating versus speculating, after TWA Flight 800 went down over the Atlantic, I remember a press conference at which James Kalstrom of the FBI was speaking and he said something along the lines of "We're not the Federal Bureau of Speculation, we're the Federal Bureau of Investigation." I think he was being asked to guess by members of the press when he said that. It stuck in my head as a really good point. I think it can be applied to lots of other things, stories like this among them.
Similarly, there just isn't a complete enough picture of this situation available to make a reliable assessment of what happened and why it happened.
However, I know for damn sure that this video isn't supposed to be making the rounds on the Internet. THAT also needs to be investigated.
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