well, uh... THIS is just FUCKIN' dark

[incontrovertible]

You know, I'm not anti-military by any stretch, and I understand that war is war and so forth. I'm as coarsened by my media upbringing as anyone, and Jane's Addiction was right that nothing's really shocking anymore, but... uh... DAMN, man. There's dark, there's really dark, and then there's THIS.

In all honesty, you probably shouldn't watch this.

http://s87913275.onlinehome.us/Helicopter_Kills_1.mpg

[DS1]

1. Hey, check out this really sick thing you shouldn't see

I see you've perfected modern advertising.

[incontrovertible]

3. no, I mean

someone showed me, and the quease factor was high enough, and opposition to the Iraq war strong enough on DU, I figured it warranted publication.

[DS1]

4. It's your last line that I find perplexing

[Catch22Dem]

5. I don't get it

What's got you upset? incontrovertible wasn't misleading or anything. I fail to see the breach of protocol here.

[incontrovertible]

7. stolen

from the intro to South Park: "Due to its content, it should not be viewed by anyone." I like the ironic total self-disclaimer. I think it's valid, too - the people who shouldn't see it (and there are, no doubt, many) could and should take the statement literally.

[DK666]

2. Well

IF you had the whole clip you could see what was going on. The men were hiding weapons in the field. True it was a breach of the ROE. But you should tell the whole story.

[incontrovertible]

6. you're right

sorry about that - didn't mean to take it out of context, that's just the video that I found first. Upon seeing the full video, yeah, the infantrymen went and hid a bazooka in the field, and of course, they were manning what looked like an artillery piece.

The thing I found interesting is that here's this sort of video-gamish footage that, when you watch, doesn't look or FEEL anything LIKE a video game. Interesting that these sorts of gun camera clips don't make the news. Maybe if they did, they'd serve as a war deterrent more than anything else - both for American pro-war voters who self-censor their minds, and for any beligerent adversaries. Not gonna get much chance for a trench fight when we've got helicopters that do this sort of thing from within pitch darkness.

[pretzel4gore]

16. it still murder

they weren't armed and posed no danger to chopper crew....
especially the injured guy.... it's too obvious.

[LastKnight]

8. well thats disturbing...

if they showed that kinda thing on CNN i imagine there wouldnt be as many people nearly as gung-ho about the war... i mean sure they were hiding weapons in the field... but thats still possibly somone's brother, somones son, possibly somones husband or father. crist were all human. a life is a life. (im assuming that they were men, just because its what i thought i saw)

-LK

[WannaJumpMyScooter]

9. No, the whole fucking world should watch this

and realize that those are human beings getting ripped to shit with big bullets.
Enemies, yes.
But this is what the US needs to see to build animosity towards this war.

[alwynsw]

10. I'll probably butcher the quote, but here goes nothing

Wasn't it Robert E. Lee who said, "It is good that war is so terrible, else we would grow too fond of it."?

Hell, it could have been Sherman, you know, Mr. Peabody's boy. I stink with names.

[WannaJumpMyScooter]

12. Yep, that's old Bobby Lee for ya

a very strange and complex man

[incontrovertible]

15. pretty much

I think the media has deliberately designed to keep the reality of war out of the public mind - not out of conspiracy, but out of condescension. They think the public doesn't need to see what war really looks like - the smart ones can imagine it, while the dumb ones don't think about it at all.

Like I said, I don't have any issue with our military operating on a kill-or-be-killed basis. That's war.

I do, however, wish more people actually had the stomach to seek this sort of material out, or to not boycott sponsors if the mainstream evening news deigns to show it to them.

The reason being, this sort of illustrates a point that everybody knows but few people think about: The United States is an unrivaled military power. When we go to war, we rain HELLfire down on the enemy. They don't stand a CHANCE. That being the case, we should be SO reluctant to wield the military. People should mourn throughout any war, not just for the losses our side incurs, but also in due dread of the merciless death machine that we've loosed.

That doesn't mean the Taliban didn't deserve what they got. They did, in spades. It just means that we dealt a HEAVY hand in giving it to them. I know, dead is dead, but really, really dead without even having ever known you were being engaged... phew.

[Beaker]

11. it wasn't loading for me, but I think i saw it on TV a week or two ago...

is that the one where the Apache crew chews some guys up in a field with the helicopter's 30mm electric gatling guns??

that was gruesome.

[incontrovertible]

13. yep

doesn't just chew them up. There's nothing left except for some splatter that holds some residual infrared for a few seconds. One poor son-of-a-bitch takes about 30 anti-tank rounds while cowering underneath a truck, then they hit him again as he death-crawls away from the wreckage.

[alwynsw]

14. The guy under the larger truck deserves a Darwin Award.

When you're outgunned - STAY HIDDEN.

[pretzel4gore]

17. he was 8 years old

fukit...