[TheeBadOne]

BAGHDAD, Iraq, Aug. 18 — The U.S. military acknowledged Monday that U.S. troops had accidentally killed a television journalist after soldiers mistook his video camera for a rocket-propelled grenade launcher.

IN THE journalist’s death, the U.S. military said that troops had “engaged” Reuters cameraman Mazen Dana, thinking that his camera was an RPG launcher.
“This is clearly another tragic incident, it is extremely regrettable,” said Central Command spokesman Sgt. Maj. Lewis Matson.
Dana’s driver, however, thought the cameraman, 43, had been deliberately shot outside the U.S.-run jail. Journalists had gathered there after the U.S. Army announced that a mortar attack on Saturday evening had killed at least six Iraqi prisoners and wounded scores.
“There were many journalists around. They knew we were journalists,” said Munzer Abbas. “This was not an accident.”
Stephan Breitner of France 2 television echoed that view. “We were all there, for at least half an hour. They knew we were journalists. After they shot Mazen, they aimed their guns at us. I don’t think it was accident. They are very tense. They are crazy.”......

http://www.msnbc.com/news/951994.asp?0cv=CB10
------------------------------------------
Ouch! Should the US soldiers responsible for killing the reporter face any type of charges? Manslaughter? (just getting a jump on the media, I say most likely no overt foul involved)

[JimP]

Having shot many cameramen myself in training - be careful of what you start here. Its hard to distinguish friend from foe and when the dude jumps out and points a big hollow lens at you - you tend to shoot. Cameramen need to be careful where they jump and at whom they point that thing. Sad story all around.

[HBK]

It's sad, but that's part of war. I don't buy the "they shot him on purpose" crap.

[bogie]

One thing we were ALWAYS very paranoid about was aiming cameras at people... You do it right, looks like you're about to launch something nasty at them.

[TheeBadOne]

HBK"It's sad, but that's part of war."
While I don't disagree with you there will be some (just waiting for the media) who will say it wasn't war. The war is over and while there may be some hostiles around it's rebuilding/occupation, not war. (I'll watch the news tonight, I'm sure someone will be on saying a like thing......)

[greyhound]

As soon as I heard this this morning (on NPR no less), I was waiting for Reuters/BBC/other leftist press to go nuts with "the US did it on purpose."
I expected them to play up the "he was shot for being a Muslim" angle though (apparently the cameraman was Palestinian, according to NPR).

Sigh.

[Iain]

greyhound-

there is always bias there when you are looking for it or expect it.

[Double Naught Spy]

Reporters provide a fine service in what they do and I am grateful they do it, but you have to be an idiot to willingly go to a place where a war or post war gun battles are an ongoing process. No doubt that Friend or Foe identification is very important in warfare. No doubt that in the heat of battle, Friend or Foe identification gets blurred real quickly.

This is a sad fact of any battle/conflict situation where the big boys play with guns.

"They knew we were journalists..." Sure enough. And American soldiers continue to be killed by people they knew to be ______ (car load of women, pro American civilians, etc.).

I saw the picture of the killed camera man. If that is an example of what he was wearing when killed, it is a shame, but I would fault the cameraman. He has body armor, helmet, and what could easily be seen as an optically sighted weapon.

From the article, Stephan Breitner of France 2 television echoed that view. “We were all there, for at least half an hour. They knew we were journalists. After they shot Mazen, they aimed their guns at us. I don’t think it was accident. They are very tense. They are crazy.”

Let's see, people keep killing American soldiers every day and Breitner of France thinks that being very tense is somehow not proper.

It is sad. I hope Rueters spends as much money and time helping the family of their reporter as they do on their investigation.

If you want to up your chances to survive such a conflict, the best defense is to NOT BE THERE!

[DigitalWarrior]

I hope that the shooter is OK. He is propably feeling remorse for his (justifiable) actions. Any man who places himself in harms way, whether to report or to fight must understand that they could die.

May peace come to the photographers family.

[greyhound]

there is always bias there when you are looking for it or expect it.


St, Johns-

Actually quite the opposite. I always look at these things optomistically, hoping that the reporting will be straightforward and without an agenda. i am constantly disappointed, however.

For what its worth, I see a lot of the same thing from the other side of the political fence, i.e Fox News Channel.

I have to admit, as I am not British I only get small doses of BBC and Reuters, so you are probably more qualified as to their overall tone.

[seeker_two]

...apparently the cameraman was Palestinian, according to NPR...


[biting tongue] Trying...hard...not...to...draw...conclusions...here...[/biting tongue] :scrutiny:

[Iain]

Greyhound-

Way too late at night to get into the BBC argument again. Was just pointing out that people often approach a news report with a prejudice about the perceived prejudice of the organisation reporting - this often leads them to misjudge and plain get things wrong.

Fair enough that you approach it the other way. The BBC are reporting this incident this way: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/3160429.stm.

Seems fairly evenly balanced to me - the picture very definitely shows how when on edge you could make that same mistake. The quotes are from other sources such as Reporters sans frontieres. This will be a follow up story - I have been chopping wood all day so missed the way the news was broken.

My sympathies to all concerned - hope the soldier concerned can chalk it to what seems so far like a genuine mistake, a tragic one, but a mistake nonetheless.


edit

Just watched the news report linked to on that page - am sure it will make uncomfortable viewing for some. I suspend my own judgement.

[C.R.Sam]

Looks like the camaraman went in harm's way.
And was harmed.

Sam

[bountyhunter]

When you look at it, the big shoulder-carry cameras do kind of look like an RPG launcher or a LAWS rocket launcher. If I was stuck in that shooting gallery with a target painted on my back, I'd be pretty quick on the trigger as well.

[Kimber45]

I can see where a camera like the one carried can look like a sholder launched weapon. With the clothing being worn I can also see confusion. It is a decision that has to be made quickly if you want to live in a combat zone (I'm sorry if they say major combat is over, but this is combat, and combat that can be more intense that in big unit operations). Having been in the intelligence business for many years I think (based on knowledge of the facts of the operation) that 99% of the media are unwilling to tell the truth if it does not advance their agenda. I feal sorry more for the man that fired the shot and what he now must endure from the armchair combat "experts" than I do for the newsman. I may take alot of flame for this, but the newsman that thinks he is always in the right for doing his "job" but fails to consider the situtation is a fool, and that is what happens to fools whom do not stop to think about what is going on.

My condolences to his family, any life lost is a shame. But if you where there, and you saw what looked like an RPG about to be launched at you, would you not shoot to protect yourself and your comrads.

Semper Fi

[Gmac]

"W" may have declared the war over but people are still dying,ergo the fornicating war is NOT over and soldiers are going to react accordingly when someone points a possible weapon at them. It,s about as smart as going into a crouch and pointing a cellphone (or whatever) at a cop at night in a high-crime neighborhood-----do-do is gonna occur.

[Teufelhunden]

I have little to no sympathy for reporters and their staff that willfully remain where any sane man would do his best to leave.

Perhaps this is a product of a general "You can't do that to me!" attitude I've noticed in the past few years. Everyone thinks they have the right to go anywhere and know anything, and fail to apply a little common sense when they look at the place they demand to go.

-Teuf

[BigG]

This may sound harsh, but, given the tenor of the usual one-sided portrayal these lttle tin gods continually spew forth, even if the shot were intentional I would applaud it. If you can't stand the heat, stay out of the kitchen, press! :scrutiny:

[Intune]

Hmmm, bias is subjective I suppose. Here is the last para from the BBC report on this shooting: "In April, Reuters cameraman Taras Protsyuk, a Ukrainian based in Warsaw, died when a US tank fired a shell at the Palestine Hotel, the base for many foreign media in Baghdad."

True statement. However, can anyone in the class state the circumstances that led to the directed fire upon this establishment?

I also just LUV this "unbiased" statement from the BBC "bubble headed bleach-blonde from the evening news" during the video clip: "... From Americans who shoot first and ask questions, if at all, only later."

This is not Brit bashing, ALL the news providers play the masses like fine instruments...
:barf:

[TarpleyG]

The war is over and while there may be some hostiles around it's rebuilding/occupation, not war
TheeBadOne,

I don't recall anyone saying the war is over, just an end to major combat operations.

GT

[hops]

Having pointed a camara with a 300mm telephoto lens at a East German, Berlin wall, guard tower, and having a machine gun in said tower pointed at me in return, in my misspent youth -

'Never point a camara with a long lens at someone with a gun, without making certain that they know what you really are. '

The East German guard did look us over with his very powerful binoculars to make sure that I and my friend (who was quite spooked by the event) were just simple tourists taking a picture. (and no I can't find the photograph, it's been 20 years now and I seem to have lost a few over time; damm..)

[LawDog]

My condolences for the family of the dead photographer.

One of these days I shall compare the responses to this bit of mistaken threat ID, with the responses to the TFL Amadou Diallo mistaken threat ID threads.

I think the comparison should prove to be enlightening.

LawDog

[TheeBadOne]

I think the comparison should prove to be enlightening. Indeed

[Cosmoline]

LEO's are officers of the court, NOT soldiers. Some might THINK they are soldiers. Indeed, it's just this sort of "we're at war on ____ (drugs, guns, booze, whatever)" thinking on the part of police that might lead a bunch of anti-gun plainclothes cops to empty their highcaps into a guy trying to give them his wallet.

When citizens start firing RPG's at squad cars and detonating explosves under them on a daily basis, THEN you might have an argument.

[TheeBadOne]

Cosmoline, go walk some of those hell hole beats....bet it feels a lot like combat. :scrutiny:

[w4rma]

The Pentagon has threatened to fire on the satellite uplink positions of independent journalists in Iraq, according to veteran BBC war correspondent, Kate Adie (http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/correspondents/newsid_2625000/2625875.stm). In an interview with Irish radio, Ms. Adie said that questioned about the consequences of such potentially fatal actions, a senior Pentagon officer had said: "Who cares.. ..They've been warned."
…
Another guest on the show, war author Phillip Knightley, reported that the Pentagon has also threatened they: "may find it necessary to bomb areas in which war correspondents are attempting to report from the Iraqi side."
…
http://www.gulufuture.com/news/kate_adie030310.htm

…
The move followed a day in which three journalists were killed by US fire in separate attacks in Baghdad, leading to accusations that US forces were targeting the news media.

Reuters cameraman Taras Protsyuk, 35, was killed when an American tank fired a shell directly at the Reuters suite on the 15th floor at the Palestine hotel, where many journalists are staying.

Jose Couso, 37, a cameraman for the Spanish television channel Tele 5, was wounded in the same attack and died later in hospital. Samia Nakhoul, the Gulf bureau chief of Reuters, was also injured, along with a British technician, Paul Pasquale, and an Iraqi photographer, Faleh Kheiber.

Earlier, al-Jazeera cameraman Tarek Ayyoub, a 35-year-old Palestinian who lived in Jordan, was killed when two bombs dropped during a US air raid hit the satellite station's office in the Iraqi capital.

American forces also opened fire on the offices of Abu Dhabi television, whose identity is spelled out in large blue letters on the roof.

All the journalists were killed and injured in daylight at locations known to the Pentagon as media sites. The tank shell that hit the Palestine hotel slammed into the 18-storey building at noon, shaking the tower and spewing rubble and dirt into hotel rooms at least six floors below.
…
http://www.guardian.co.uk/international/story/0,3604,932800,00.html

I was actually between the tank and the hotel, when the round was fired. I was trying to get back from a story, an assignment I'd been on, what I'd put myself on. And the shell with an extraordinary noise swooshed over my head and hit the hotel...bang! Tremendous concussion. White Smoke. And when I got there, two of my colleagues, one from Reuters and one from Spanish Television, both of whom were to die within a few hours, the first one within half an hour, were being brought out in blood-soaked bed-sheeting. And a Lebanese colleague, a woman, Samia, with a piece of metal in her brain. She recovered. She had brain surgery. She's married to the London Financial Times correspondent here in Beirut. She survived. The initial reaction was very interesting because the BBC went on air saying it was an Iraqi rocket-propelled grenade. Someone wanted to frighten the press. Then it emerged, thanks be to God for the attempt to get the truth, that TV3, a French channel, had recorded the tanks' movements and I actually rushed to their Bureau and they showed me the videotape and you saw the American tanks for five minutes beforehand, in complete silence - there was nothing happening - going onto the bridge, moving its turret, and then firing at the hotel. The camera shakes and pieces of plaster and paint fall in front of the camera. Clearly, it's the same shot. Four or five minutes in which nothing is happening. Now I was in between the tank and the hotel and there was complete silence. And when initially the Americans said they knew nothing about it, when it became clear the French had a film, before the Americans realized how long the film was running for prior to the attack, they said that the tank was under persistent sniper and RPG (rocket-propelled grenade) fire which is not true. I would have heard it because I was close to the tank and the hotel and it would have been picked up on the soundtrack, which it wasn't. This statement was made by General Buford Blount, the same 3rd Infantry Division commander who boasted that he'd be using depleted uranium munitions during the war in an interview with Le Monde in March, a month ago. And he then said that there had been sniper fire and after the round was fired by the American tank, the sniper fire had ceased. In other words, the clear implication was that the gunfire had come from the Reuters office, which was a most mendacious, vicious lie by General Blount. General Blount lied in order to cover up the death of journalists. It was interesting that when indeed the Americans actually arrived in central Baghdad within a day, no journalists were raising these issues with the Americans who'd just arrived. They should have done...I did actually. And in fact two days later, I was on the Jumeirah bridge, and climbed onto the second tank and asked the tank commander whether he fired at the journalists and he said "I don't know anything about that, sir. I'm new here." Which he may well have been. How do I know if he was there before or not? But that tank round was fired deliberately at the hotel and General Blount's counterfeit - the commander of the 3rd Infantry Division - was a lie. A total lie. And it was a grotesque lie against my colleagues. Samia Mahul had a piece of metal in her brain, A young woman who's most bravely reported the Lebanese civil war. And against the Ukrainian cameraman for Reuters and against the Spanish cameraman in the room upstairs. It was a most disgusting lie. And as a journalist, I have to say that. And General Blount has not apologized for it. So far he has gotten away with his lie. I'm sorry to say.
http://www.webactive.com/pacifica/demnow/dn20030422.html

The White House is vowing a strong retaliatory response after the BBC aired live video of President Bush getting his hair coiffed in the Oval Office as he squirmed in his chair and practiced on the teleprompter minutes before Wednesday night's speech announcing the launch of military operations against Saddam Hussein.
…
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A1027-2003Mar20.html

[Cosmoline]

Cosmoline, go walk some of those hell hole beats....bet it feels a lot like combat."

In combat, there is an enemy you must be prepared to kill instantly. On sight, even. Are you saying LEO's walk around with the same mindset? See an armed person--shoot to kill? I find that disturbing, though it would explain the situation in some of those hell hole beats you're talking about.

[TheeBadOne]

In combat, there is an enemy you must be prepared to kill instantly. On sight, even. Are you saying LEO's walk around with the same mindset? See an armed person--shoot to kill? I find that disturbing, though it would explain the situation in some of those hell hole beats you're talking about.
There is more than one type of combat zone. Viet Nam, Afgan, Iraq, Balkins, Somolia, Bosnia, (any peace keeping mission), L.I.C. (Low Intensity Conflict). Combat doesn't go on 100% of the time, but it is very real and always very close, ready to break out at you in a moments notice.

[Cosmoline]

Whether you're talking about low intensity or high intensity combat, there should be no comparison between patrolling an occupied foreign territory and policing an American neighborhood--even a bad neighborhood.

The LEO's are there to enforce laws, not to engage in combat with anyone. Just like many other professions, they may encounter dangers going about their work and they should certainly have a right to be armed and to defend themselves. But I reject this "cops vs. XXXX" mindset implied by the assertion that "it's a war out there." A war on whom? Who are they trying to conquer? Who are they trying to kill off? It's a very dangerous analogy, though I don't deny many LEO's have apparently taken it to heart--esp. in neighborhoods where they don't live, populated by people who don't look or talk like they do.

[TheeBadOne]

A war on whom? Who are they trying to conquer? Who are they trying to kill off? It's a very dangerous analogy
I think you have it backwards. You as a citizen can walk down a certain street on your merry way. Joe Cop walks down that same street and gets shot just because he's a cop, not because he's Joe. That's what I'm talking about. Flip your statement over, look at it that way.

[Cosmoline]

I know that cops are getting targeted and killed by well armed Taliban troops operating in concert in Afghanistan. I know of no similar situation in the US, certainly none that would warrant the police going to war against the people they're supposedly protecting. If the LEO's in a neighborhood view every as a potential cop killer, I'd say there are some major problems with policing.

Thus, I would view a police officer shooting a cameraman in a bad part of NYC VERY differently than a US soldier in Iraq shooting a cameraman in a bad part of Iraq.

[TheeBadOne]

In many large cities there are areas that cops are told they cannot go into alone. Some have policies to that effect. Why do you think that is? Because they are a target just for the uniform they wear.

[Quartus]

or a LAWS rocket launcher


<sigh> It's a LAW, not a LAWS. Light Antitank Weapon.

Don't get your weapons education from Dirty Harry.

--------------------------------

Because they are a target just for the uniform they wear.

Agreed, TheeBadOne, but there is a huge difference between an actual war zone (like Afganistan or Iraq) and the streets of America. Like it or not, REAL DANGER LEVEL OR NOT, the cops do not have the right to respond in the same manner as do military troops in a hostile country.

[TheeBadOne]

REAL DANGER LEVEL OR NOT, the cops do not have the right to respond in the same manner as do military troops in a hostile country. I never said they did.

[Quartus]

Good! I suspect we're in substantial agreement. Sometimes these things get get too heated for clear communicatiion.

[telomerase]

>Joe Cop walks down that same street and gets shot just because he's a cop, not because he's Joe.

Statistically, Joe Cop is a lot safer than Abu convenience-store clerk. Police need to be a little realistic; their jobs aren't nearly as dangerous as the guy's doing house-to-house searches in Iraq. (Although I think the convenience-store guys are getting pretty close, in Dallas...)