Since then, McCord has been receiving threats to him and his family on a regular basis. [18] Both helicopters strafe a group of ten men with 30 mm rounds once they became visible again. [115], While the Air Weapons Team was providing support at the first engagement area they were informed by ground troops that they were receiving small arms fire from the south/southwest. The men become obscured behind a building as the Apache moves around the group. The editors asked to see the remaining footage so Reuters could check whether it had been edited or manipulated. [19], The team observed several individuals from this group, some possibly wounded, run into a large multistory building. Just over a year ago, WikiLeaks released footage from a gunsight camera of an Apache helicopter engaged in an attack that killed two journalists and eight ci. [61] Speaking to Reuters on condition of anonymity, a U.S. Defense official confirmed the authenticity of the leaked audio and video. In the video, you can clearly see that they did have weapons to the trained eye. Wired's Kim Zetter reached McCord at his home in Kansas. [18][25][31] The Apache crew requested permission to engage, stating it "looks like [the men] possibly, picking up bodies and weapons" from the scene,[33] and repeated their request to shoot,[7][34][35][36][37] before they received permission to begin firing on the van and its occupants. I was up on a rooftop at that time. However, I don't feel that the attack on the [rescue] van was necessary. Reuters responded, "It is absolutely untrue that this story was spiked. Ethan McCord who says he scooped up the children and at least one of his comrades say the incident revealed the bankrupt brutality of the war. Seven men (including Noor-Eldeen) were killed during this first strike; Saeed Chmagh, who was injured, later died in a hospital. They were destroyed. A Pentagon spokesman said the video did not contradict the official finding that the helicopters' crew acted within the rules of engagement and said that the inquiry backed the assessment that the group of men were carrying a rocket-propelled grenade (RPG). [32], U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates criticized WikiLeaks for releasing the video without providing any context. Solemnly and Sincerely, Josh Stieber, former specialist, U.S. Army Ethan McCord, former specialist, U.S. Army. In the first example maybe it's collateral exaggeration or incompetence when they strafe the initial gathering, this is recklessness bordering on murder, but you couldn't say for sure that was murder. [20] According to a military review, soldiers in that company "had been under sporadic small arms and rocket propelled grenade fire since" the operationdescribed as "clearing their sector and looking for weapons caches"began. [59] Reuters requested a copy of the full video under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) on the same day. But you guys did have a firefight a couple of blocks away. It was more of a child who was frightened out of her mind. James W. McCord Jr., a security expert who led a band of burglars into the shambles of the Watergate scandal and was the first to expose the White House crimes and cover-ups that precipitated the . I think it is good that they're putting this stuff out there. [8] The video, which WikiLeaks titled Collateral Murder, showed the crew firing on a group of men and killing several of them, then laughing at some of the casualties, all of whom were civilians, including two Reuters journalists. Plus: Microsoft fixes several zero-day bugs, Google patches Chrome and Android, Mozilla rids Firefox of a full-screen vulnerability, and more. Fox News reported in 2010 that the rules of engagement in Iraq had not been changed since the incident occurred. (quote begins at 5:15)", "Soldiers in 'Collateral Murder' video apologise", "Meet The New Public Face Of WikiLeaks: Kristinn Hrafnsson Forbes", "2 Iraqi Journalists Killed as U.S. [65][66] Our secretary of defense may say the U.S. won't lose its reputation over this, but we stand and say that our reputation's importance pales in comparison to our common humanity. Wired.com: Do you support Wikileaks in releasing this video? [86], Ethan McCord, the soldier seen in the video carrying the injured boy, recalled in an interview on The Marc Steiner Show that on arrival at the scene, "The first thing I did was run up to the van". They request permission to fire a missile at the building, describing it as "abandoned" or "under construction". He responded, "I hadn't heard of WikiLeaks before yesterday. Wired.com: How much sniper fire were you getting? Knowing that I was part of the system that took their father away from them and made them lose their house it's heartbreaking. [38] The children, a girl and boy, suffered injuries. Soldier on 2007 Apache Attack: What I Saw, Ethan McCord had just returned from dropping his children at school earlier this month, when he turned on the TV news to see grainy black-and-white video footage of a soldier running from a bombed-out van with a child in his arms. "[88] McCord also recalled being ordered to "kill every motherfucker on the street" in the event of an attack on their convoy. "[90], James Spione made a short documentary film about the airstrikes called Incident in New Baghdad, featuring a first-person account from Ethan McCord. WikiLeaks stated that the footage shows the "murder of Iraqi civilians and two Reuters journalists". Among the group were two Iraqi war correspondents working for Reuters, Saeed Chmagh and Namir Noor-Eldeen. I was diagnosed with chronic, severe PTSD. The Apache crew then alerted the ground troops that they believed that they could see an injured child moving around inside the destroyed van. [2][22] Pentagon officials told the Reuters news agency that U.S. military lawyers were reviewing the video and could reopen an investigation into the incident,[67] but a spokesperson later said that there were no plans to reopen the investigation. I'm guilty of it, too, myself. She was crying. [62] At a February 2013 pretrial hearing, Manning stated that Finkel "was quoting, I feel in verbatim, the audio communications of the aerial weapons team crew". [18][19] The crew estimates the group is twenty men. On April 5, 2010, the attacks received worldwide coverage and controversy following the release of 39 minutes of gunsight footage by the Internet whistleblower website WikiLeaks. When this video first came out, there was a lot of outrage by the soldiers, just because it depicted us as being callous, cruel, heartless people, and we're not that way. When a congressman tried to jail him for his actions that day he . The soldier, Ethan McCord, has since been discharged from the military and has been an outspoken voice against the Iraq War. [84], Finkel had reported the day in his book The Good Soldiers,[62] including conversations which closely matched the subsequently leaked video footage. We believe this constitutes a fair use of any such copyrighted material as provided for in 17 U.S.C 107. They were stating that these people had no weapons whatsoever, that they were just carrying cameras. The ground troops that secured the site of the first two strikes then receive small arms fire from nearby buildings. According to Tom Raju, a reporter at CNN, "the soldiers of Bravo Company, 216 Infantry had been under fire all morning from rocket-propelled grenades and small arms on the first day of Operation Ilaaj in Baghdad". How to Make Sure Youre Not Accidentally Sharing Your Location, Security News This Week: Sensitive US Military Emails Exposed. [29], A crew member requests authorization to engage after seeing five or six of the men moving in the direction of U.S. What was shown in the Wikileaks video only begins to depict the suffering we have created. . We took her in there and we're checking to see if there were any other wounds. We have asked our fellow veterans and service-members, as well as civilians both in the United States and abroad, to sign in support of this letter, and to offer their names as a testimony to our common humanity, to distance ourselves from the destructive policies of our nation's leaders, and to extend our hands to you. Using short sentences, similar punctuation, or using the same words frequently as well as using Grammarly can boost your content as AI written. [58], On July 25, 2007, during an off-the-record briefing in Baghdad by the U.S. military, two Reuters editors were shown "less than three minutes of video from the Apaches gun camera, up to the exact moment it opened fire the first time." McCord was captured in a video shot from one helicopter as he ran frantically to a military vehicle with Sajad in his arms seeking medical care. After getting permission to fire, the Apache crew fired on the van. This is why we called it Collateral Murder. [117], In June 2011 the Federation of German Scientists (VDW) awarded the "Whistleblower Award" to the person who made the video Collateral Murder public via WikiLeaks. [64] The footage was released during an April 5 press conference at the US National Press Club, and subsequently on a designated website titled Collateral Murder. The footage was portrayed as classified,[7] but the individual who leaked it, U.S. Army soldier Chelsea Manning,[a] testified in 2013 that the video was not classified. When the helicopter pilots discover that they have killed a number of Iraqi civilians and wounded two children, one of them is heard to say: "Well, its their fault for bringing their kids into a battle".[41]. There were some people taking pot shots, sniper shots, at us on the rooftop. McCord: My platoon sergeant knew that I was having a hard time with it and that same night he came into the room and he told me, hey, just so you know, both of the children survived, so you can suck it up now. You joke about the situations and what's happened to push away your true feelings of the matter. [21], The Air Weapons Team (AWT) of two Apache AH-64s from the 1st Cavalry Division had been requested by the 2nd Battalion, 16th Infantry Regiment (216), 4th Brigade Combat Team, 1st Infantry Division under the command of Lieutenant Colonel Ralph Kauzlarich, before July 12 to support Operation Ilaaj. "[60], Early in 2010, the Internet whistleblower site WikiLeaks made a public request for assistance in decrypting a video it described as "US bomb strikes on civilians", specifically requesting access to supercomputer time. [23] Among the group are two journalists working for Reuters, Namir Noor-Eldeen and Saeed Chmagh. It's very clear that that is the approach, to try and find any mechanism to excuse the behavior, and that is what ended up happening. I'm going to help that person. McCord: It was random sporadic spurts. In July 2007, McCord, a 33-year-old Army specialist, was engaged in a firefight with insurgents in an Iraqi suburb when his platoon, part of Bravo Company, 2-16 Infantry, got orders to investigate a nearby street. They asked for an explanation of the confiscation of the journalists' two cameras, access to the on-board footage and voice communications from the helicopters involved, and access to the reports of the units involved in the incident, particularly logs of weapons taken from the scene. They also found 10-year-old Sajad Mutashar and his five-year-old sister Doaha covered in blood in a van. The owner told him that three families were living in the building and seven residents had died, including his wife and daughter. Daniel Ellsberg, a former United States military analyst who was known for having leaked the Pentagon Papers to the media, said of the airstrike: It would be interesting to have someone speculate or tell us exactly what context would lead to justifying the killing that we see on the screen. McCord: I wasn't around that building when it happened. There is no bringing back all that was lost. [39][40] Just as the van was destroyed, U.S. ground troops made their final turn and arrived on the road with the van. I was also told that there would be repercussions if I was to go to mental health. [94], WikiLeaks said they were unable to confirm whether or not Manning was the source of the video, stating "we never collect personal information on our sources", but saying that "if [Manning is the] whistleblower then, without doubt, [s]he's a national hero"[95] and "we have taken steps to arrange for [her] protection and legal defence". [63] The site stated on its Twitter account on January 8, 2010, that it had a copy of gunsight footage of the incidents. It was nominated as a Documentary Short Subject for the 84th Academy Awards. When I saw their faces, I was relieved, but I was just heartbroken. There's no easy way to kill somebody. [81], Publicity of the incident ballooned following the release of the footage. The military said that the van was "fair game under Army rules" , because it had no visible markings to suggest it was an ambulance or a protected vehicle. [But] I was actually starting to get kind of better. It's painful to see, especially when you learn after the fact what was going on. You don't just take somebody's life and then go on about your business for the rest of the day. Ethan McCord, who was one of the first soldiers on the scene in the 2007 attack, told Wired.com that he saw several weapons at the scene, including a rocket propelled grenade launcher. Ethan McCord, a 33-year-old Army specialist, was engaged in a firefight with insurgents in an Iraqi suburb in July 2007, when his platoon, part of Bravo Company, 2-16 Infantry, got orders to. Towards the end of the show, the star actor became an active member of the Screen Actors Guild and after he left "Adam-12." Instead, the Apaches decided to completely obliterate everybody in the van. But this particular eventthis is clearly murder. Was it reasonable for the Apache soldiers to think that maybe the people they attacked were part of that insurgent firefight? [Then] we were just told to move to this [other] location. BACKGROUND ON JOSH STIEBER: Branch of service: United States Army (USA) Unit: 1st ID Rank: Spc. [60] The Pentagon eventually blocked the FOIA request[25] despite several follow-up requests by Reuters. That insurgent firefight for the Apache moves around the group were two Iraqi war correspondents for. 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