[Athens]

The Army Criminal Investigation Command said in the 16 cases it has completed so far, it found sufficient evidence to support a range of charges against 21 soliders, including murder, negligent homicide and assault.

http://www.cbc.ca/story/world/nation...es-050325.html


My guess is little will be done to make sure this stuff dosent happen again.

[Millennium]

21 soldiers, out of some 153,000? That's it? 0.01%; one in every 10,000. This seems to be very much in line with the 'few bad apples' theory.

[Weyland-Yutani]

Well done soldiers!! You make me proud.

BTW Millennium would you think it acceptable if we had 0.001% fatal accident rate in civilian aviation?

[SimpleLife]

Originally posted by Weyland-Yutani:
Well done soldiers!! You make me proud.

BTW Millennium would you think it acceptable if we had 0.001% fatal accident rate in civilian aviation?

Bad Apples fall from trees you know...

[Athens]

Originally posted by Millennium:
21 soldiers, out of some 153,000? That's it? 0.01%; one in every 10,000. This seems to be very much in line with the 'few bad apples' theory.

I do agree with you in part, 0.01% in a Army would be acceptable, as the saying goes a few bad apples, BUT a majority of the crimes where committed in with in the same small place with a much smaller amount of soldiers making the % for the unit involved much higher then 0.01. If it was 100 acts spread out through out the entire army it wouldnt be so bad, but when its 15 in one prision or camp, a camp maned by only a couple hundred that seems anyways worse. Perhaps its that the worst soldiers the ones that cant make it out in the field are the ones used to the camps.

[SimeyTheLimey]

Originally posted by Athens:
I do agree with you in part, 0.01% in a Army would be acceptable, as the saying goes a few bad apples, BUT a majority of the crimes where committed in with in the same small place with a much smaller amount of soldiers making the % for the unit involved much higher then 0.01. If it was 100 acts spread out through out the entire army it wouldnt be so bad, but when its 15 in one prision or camp, a camp maned by only a couple hundred that seems anyways worse. Perhaps its that the worst soldiers the ones that cant make it out in the field are the ones used to the camps.

But conversely, that makes the number of these crimes committed in other locations correspondingly lower. Either way, the few bad apples description works, whether it is a handful of individuals out of hundreds of thousands, or one broken platoon out of tens of thousands. It's still an isolated incident, an abberation.

Soldiers are well trained and generally highly professional, but they aren't superhuman. They commit crimes just like civilians do. That's why there are military police units, the criminal investigation command (they are military detectives), military lawyers (both prosecution and defense), and military courts. If a crime committed is a black eye for the organization, then a successful investigation and a prosecution by the same organization is surely a gold star.

The crime rates in the Army are extremely low compared with civilian communities (yes, including Canada). It is lower still when you consider the military demographic is young, and overwhelmingly male (and in this case, young, male, under stress, and armed). Young males are the prime criminal demographic in any population. But that crime rate is not zero, nor could it ever realistically be expected to be zero.

[Athens]

im surprised at how low it is myself actually, based on the yahoos I get at my hotel, that includes US and CDN inlisted men. Some of our worst guests are military folks, noisy, parties, hookers, FIGHTS. And they are always young.

[bubblewrap]

I wouldn't be surprised of these are the same little bastards that destroyed my lawn and ran.


You should see the latest UN soilder scandle.
They're ****ing goats now. I'm not kidding.

[Athens]

Originally posted by bubblewrap:
I wouldn't be surprised of these are the same little bastards that destroyed my lawn and ran.


You should see the latest UN soilder scandle.
They're ****ing goats now. I'm not kidding.

Link to scandle

[bubblewrap]

Linky link linky.

Children were not the only victims - in early 2001, two Jordanians were evacuated home with injured penises after attempting sexual intercourse with goats.

[ebuddy]

I think y'all missed a critical point here; "The Army Criminal Investigation Command" found...

Now, who gets to blow the whistle on your injustices???

So, next time there's a cover-up y'all will know why. It doesn't do any good to publicize findings. Instead of viewing your organization as trying to improve a situation, they'll only point fingers at your organization for finding problems.

[James L]

Originally posted by SimeyTheLimey:
But conversely, that makes the number of these crimes committed in other locations correspondingly lower.

True enough. Not that I am defending these lowlifes, and I hope the book is thrown at anyone who tarnishes the images of an armed forces, but there is a lot of truth to the mob mentality. There is a line in Men in Black that goes something like "a person is smart. People are stupid".

As corny as it is, there is validity too it. The high number of criminal incidents in a concentated area would seem to indicate this. I am not using this as an excuse for their actions, and if they did commit murder than I hope the rope comes out for them.

As to the rest, spread out over the whole number of troops over there, the number is quite low... though I hope they get their own harsh punishment as well.

[SimeyTheLimey]

Originally posted by James L:
True enough. Not that I am defending these lowlifes, and I hope the book is thrown at anyone who tarnishes the images of an armed forces, but there is a lot of truth to the mob mentality. There is a line in Men in Black that goes something like "a person is smart. People are stupid".

As corny as it is, there is validity too it. The high number of criminal incidents in a concentated area would seem to indicate this. I am not using this as an excuse for their actions, and if they did commit murder than I hope the rope comes out for them.

As to the rest, spread out over the whole number of troops over there, the number is quite low... though I hope they get their own harsh punishment as well.

From the official IG report I skimmed a few months ago, it appears that discipline and order simply broke down in this one isolated reserve unit. That's why members of that unit's chain of command -- beginning with a brigadier general no less -- were relieved of command. They didn't commit the crimes, but they did allow discipline to break down to the point where those crimes were committed.

This is pretty much a danger in any armed forces. The reason why the Army has such a low crime rate is partly because the military screens out troublemakers (it's very hard to enlist if you have even a minor criminal record, and they screen continuously for drug use). It is also because the Army has a very low tolerance for even minor infractions of discipline. Small things like being 5 minutes late for work, having a surly attitude with a superior, wearing your clothes sloppily - all will get a soldier in a lot of trouble while his civilian counterpart would probably get away with it.

That all goes under the rubrik of "discipline." Once that discipline breaks down, any unit can swiftly go from being a professional fighting force to a Lord of the Rings style mob and that is very danger given the power and authority even a low ranking soldier (and these were all very low ranking) wields on a battlefield. The fact that it came out in this case in the form of pointless sadism shouldn't be surprising to anyone who has read about the Stanford Prison Experiment. As in that case, this was a somewhat unique circumstance -- a breakdown in discipline among a group who found themselves alone, at night, with a group of helpless victims. It's a terrible combination, but also a rather unique one. It's certainly not one to impute to an entire Army, especially when the Army is what brought the matter to light and ended the abuse.

[Athens]

Originally posted by bubblewrap:
Linky link linky.

Poor Goats did any one pay for there rehabilitation

[Athens]

Originally posted by James L:
True enough. Not that I am defending these lowlifes, and I hope the book is thrown at anyone who tarnishes the images of an armed forces, but there is a lot of truth to the mob mentality. There is a line in Men in Black that goes something like "a person is smart. People are stupid".

As corny as it is, there is validity too it. The high number of criminal incidents in a concentated area would seem to indicate this. I am not using this as an excuse for their actions, and if they did commit murder than I hope the rope comes out for them.

As to the rest, spread out over the whole number of troops over there, the number is quite low... though I hope they get their own harsh punishment as well.

Of course thats true, look at riots, case in point the 94 Stanley Cup Riot in Vancouver, or the 2001? or 2002? Guns & Roses Riot in Vancouver. Normal law obiding people turned into a criminal mob. The case with the Canadian Airborn regiement in Somolia, another example how a group together acted as criminals, when not a single one of them on there own would do something like that. Either way it is a black eye for the US Military just as Somolia was a Black Eye for Canadian Armed Forces.

The people that really need to be held accountable are the leaders, its there men under there command, examples need to be set with them because in the end they are the only ones that can stop these things. Doing nothing or not knowing what there man do makes them just as guilty.

[finboy]

Originally posted by Millennium:
21 soldiers, out of some 153,000? That's it? 0.01%; one in every 10,000. This seems to be very much in line with the 'few bad apples' theory.

That crime rate is lower than anywhere else in the developed world, certainly lower than the top 10 US cities. I wonder if we should adopt the UCMJ for everyone? Maybe get the UN to put together a treaty making the UCMJ the preferred legal system?

[James L]

Originally posted by Athens:
The people that really need to be held accountable are the leaders, its there men under there command, examples need to be set with them because in the end they are the only ones that can stop these things. Doing nothing or not knowing what there man do makes them just as guilty.

I think psychologically it explains things, but in the end everyone should be held accountable.

[SimeyTheLimey]

Originally posted by Athens:
The people that really need to be held accountable are the leaders, its there men under there command, examples need to be set with them because in the end they are the only ones that can stop these things. Doing nothing or not knowing what there man do makes them just as guilty.

I can't speak to the Canadian Airborne example with any great authority because I didn't follow it closely. I don't know what was done individually to hold leaders responsible. I do recall that the Canadian government decided to disband what was probably Canada's finest military regiment because of that incident. It seems to me that the Canadian govenment grossly overreacted for political reasons, and by doing so the Candian government damaged Canada's military effectiveness. That doesn't strike me as any kind of a model.

In the US example, responsible individuals in the chain of command have been held to account. I don't know if civilians can quite understand the slap that being relieved of command represents. It's considerably beyond just ending a career. It's a public humiliation, and one done without any opportunity to answer.

However, that is an administrative matter. The UCMJ is a criminal justice system. In order to be found criminally liable, a person has to have committed a criminal act. Just being the inept commander of a criminal doesn't make a person herself a criminal. What you are arguing for is, in effect, a show trial and a conviction without actual guilt -- and all for basically policital reasons. That is not something a country that follows the rule of law does.

[Millennium]

Originally posted by Weyland-Yutani:
BTW Millennium would you think it acceptable if we had 0.001% fatal accident rate in civilian aviation?

At such rates, one could fly once every day for 27 years and never crash. Certainly this is not as good as the current rate, bit is it unacceptable? Granted, this is not the vaunted six-sigma figure bandied about in quality-control circles these days -even the current civilian airline fatality rates are not that low- but

Somewhere along the line, an officer seems to have gone bad. He seems to have dragged his subordinates over the edge with him. That's a shameful situation, but far from unique. It is how all sorts of negative behavior patterns, from schoolyard bullying to international terrorism, tend to spread: someone in a leadership position corrupts those beneath him.

What would you suggest be done about it? You can never completely eradicate it with certainty, unless you are willing to commit crimes beyond imagining against free will. Human beings are not machines or programs, and while this gives them incredible adaptability, it also makes them much harder to control. We have already seen that the people responsible for these actions -both directly for committing the actions and up the chain of command enough to nail the ones who dragged the others down with them- are being tried, convicted, and sentenced. If the rate of corruption is as low as these investigations suggest, it would seem that something is already being done. Minimizing risks takes a staggering amount of time and effort; for them to be this low already suggests that some sort of measures have been in practice for many years.

I am not trying to minimize or cheapen the horrors of Abu Ghraib. What happened there was a disgrace not just to the USAF, but to humanity in general. At the same time, it is not possible to catch everything, and it is quite easy for an attempted cure to become worse than the disease. When these things happen, it is important to root out those responsible, being them to justice, and make restitution to the victims as best one can. However, consider this: in 2001, the US agencies responsible for recognizing and preventing potential threats only missed a single attack. 9/11 was one hell of a failure, but it was the only black mark on what was literally a 99.95% success rate for the year (even if you count the four planes as separate attacks, the success rate was 99.93%).

[SimeyTheLimey]

Originally posted by Millennium:
Somewhere along the line, an officer seems to have gone bad. He seems to have dragged his subordinates over the edge with him.

To be accurate, the ranking person was a corporal. That's an enlisted rank, grade E4 and it is the lowest rank of non-commissioned officer. Officer ranks begin with Second Lieutenant.

What happened there was a disgrace not just to the USAF,

You mean Army reserves.

[Millennium]

Originally posted by SimeyTheLimey:
To be accurate, the ranking person was a corporal. That's an enlisted rank, grade E4 and it is the lowest rank of non-commissioned officer. Officer ranks begin with Second Lieutenant.

Thank you for the clarification.

You mean Army reserves.

Actually, I meant US Armed Forces (I apologize for the ambiguous abbreviation). Although these people were reservists, their behavior has been projected onto the armed forces in general -not entirely fair, but completely predictable and not incomprehensible- and it is thus a disgrace to all of them.

[Zimphire]

Originally posted by bubblewrap:
Linky link linky.

I knew it.

BTW what you guys aren't realizing, this is nothing new. This isn't even a America only thing. I know some of you would LOVE to paint it out to be though.

We have direct access to the front lines now with the media, so now everyone is seeing what war is really like. Instead of just the soldiers.

Most of you would **** your pants if you saw half the stuff that went on during WWII.

I am just glad there weren't as many whiney bitches back then. We could be speaking German.

[Athens]

Originally posted by SimeyTheLimey:
I can't speak to the Canadian Airborne example with any great authority because I didn't follow it closely. I don't know what was done individually to hold leaders responsible. I do recall that the Canadian government decided to disband what was probably Canada's finest military regiment because of that incident. It seems to me that the Canadian govenment grossly overreacted for political reasons, and by doing so the Candian government damaged Canada's military effectiveness. That doesn't strike me as any kind of a model.

In the US example, responsible individuals in the chain of command have been held to account. I don't know if civilians can quite understand the slap that being relieved of command represents. It's considerably beyond just ending a career. It's a public humiliation, and one done without any opportunity to answer.

However, that is an administrative matter. The UCMJ is a criminal justice system. In order to be found criminally liable, a person has to have committed a criminal act. Just being the inept commander of a criminal doesn't make a person herself a criminal. What you are arguing for is, in effect, a show trial and a conviction without actual guilt -- and all for basically policital reasons. That is not something a country that follows the rule of law does.

You might find this interesting
http://www.commando.org/somalia.php?...troduction.txt

Even has the rules of engagment a few pages in. Something I read in there I never even thought of, the meds they take to prevent dease could also affect a person which otherwise would be normal. Anyways thought I send you think link since you said you didnt know to much about it. I ended up learning more about it. Orders while in somlia where shoot first ask questions later.

[SimeyTheLimey]

Originally posted by Millennium:
Actually, I meant US Armed Forces (I apologize for the ambiguous abbreviation). Although these people were reservists, their behavior has been projected onto the armed forces in general -not entirely fair, but completely predictable and not incomprehensible- and it is thus a disgrace to all of them.

OK. "USAF" is the abbreviation for the United States Air Force. Technically, there is no such term as the "US Armed Forces" which is why I thought you were accusing those soldiers of being zoomies.

[SimeyTheLimey]

Originally posted by Athens:
Orders while in somlia where shoot first ask questions later.

That seems contradicted by the Rules of Engagement posted on your link.

[RAILhead]

I don't see a black eye anywhere -- as said before, 21 people doesn't even make a visible scratch, much less a whole black eye.



Maury

[Athens]

Originally posted by SimeyTheLimey:
That seems contradicted by the Rules of Engagement posted on your link.

Ya but look through his site and read about the verbal orders they got. It was one of the first times they had that authority to shoot first ask later.

[Athens]

Originally posted by RAILhead:
I don't see a black eye anywhere -- as said before, 21 people doesn't even make a visible scratch, much less a whole black eye.



Maury

In a professional well orginized and disaplined orginiaztion such as a military force all it takes is one case in my opinion. Somolia which was 6 men was our black eye, the cases in Iraq is just a new black eye for the US Military and the British too.

[SimeyTheLimey]

Originally posted by Athens:
In a professional well orginized and disaplined orginiaztion such as a military force all it takes is one case in my opinion. Somolia which was 6 men was our black eye, the cases in Iraq is just a new black eye for the US Military and the British too.

For "black eye" I would substitute "opportunistic politicians overreacting to sensationalistic and ignorant press accounts and whipping up public opinion."

To dissolve your armed forces best unit because of an isolated incident involving six low ranking soldiers was totally absurd. It might have satisfied public opinion, but it wasn't a rational way to react.

To smear an entire Army over an isolated incident involving 21 equally low ranking soldiers would be equally absurd. Sometimes an isolated incident is just an isolated incident. It tells you no more than some individuals broke the law and should be (and are being) punished for it.

[RAILhead]

Originally posted by SimeyTheLimey:
For "black eye" I would substitute "opportunistic politicians overreacting to sensationalistic and ignorant press accounts and whipping up public opinion."

To dissolve your armed forces best unit because of an isolated incident involving six low ranking soldiers was totally absurd. It might have satisfied public opinion, but it wasn't a rational way to react.

To smear an entire Army over an isolated incident involving 21 equally low ranking soldiers would be equally absurd. Sometimes an isolated incident is just an isolated incident. It tells you no more than some individuals broke the law and should be (and are being) punished for it.

Simey Wins! w00t w00t!

Maury

[Krusty]

Originally posted by SimeyTheLimey:

To smear an entire Army over an isolated incident involving 21 equally low ranking soldiers would be equally absurd. Sometimes an isolated incident is just an isolated incident.

I agree with your first two paragraphs .. but what are you talking about with this one ? The article clearly states that the 21 soldiers being investigated were culled from 24 separate incidents (only 16 of the 24 have been looked in to so far) spanning 2 years in both Iraq (17 cases) and Afghanistan (7 cases).

To smear an entire Army over *one* incident involving 21 people would be absurd. This is is clearly 24 incidents out of which sufficient grounds for 16 cases of criminal homicide involving 21 soldiers(so far) with 1/3 of the cases still open.

Originally posted by Millennium:
21 soldiers, out of some 153,000? That's it? 0.01%; one in every 10,000. This seems to be very much in line with the 'few bad apples' theory.

Murder rates are typically calculated by the population being murdered ... not the population murdering. 65,000 Iraqis and Afghanis have passed thru US run detention in the last 2 years and 27 appear to have been the victims of criminal homicide (along with 21 by justifiable homicide, 29 by natural causes, 22 from an insurgent attack on the prison ... etc, etc ...108+ have died in custody all in all). That's a murder rate of about 41 per 100,000 ... or about 10x the rate for the US. If you want to calculate based on the number of US troops, you should only count the few thousand engaged in detention because that's where these 27 were all killed ... the bulk of US forces aren't in a position to kill detainees.

Originally posted by finboy:
That crime rate is lower than anywhere else in the developed world, certainly lower than the top 10 US cities.

The rate is 10x the US rate, 20x the rate of the next most violent developed country (Finland) and 40x the rate for most other developed Western European countries. It is 2x the rate of Philadelphia which won the prize for most murders per capita this year.

Over the past year or so, our own military has presented evidence of widespread abuse at Abu Ghraib, at Gitmo, in Afghanistan, and most recently at Camp Bucca near Mosul. This confirms the reports made by the ICRC and Amnesty international, entails virtually every major detention facility we operate, included numerous civilians and "enemy combatants" in addition to actual POWs, and began nearly day one we began detaining people and continues though today. We know that our Secretary of Defense personally extended the rules for how badly we could treat detainees and that our current Attorney General presented the President with legal ammunition to justify more vigorous interrogation methods and ways to sidestep the traditional rules of prisoner treatment as outlined by the Geneva Convention. We have thousand of pages of documentation on the topic being forcibly released under the Freedom of Information Act every few weeks due to a lawsuit filed by the ACLU that is (very grudgingly and slowly) being complied with by court order.

.... Yet we still have the die-hards claiming "isolated incident" with each new revelation. I guess the thought that come up in my mind is ... at what point do you guys start questioning ? When do you even begin to entertain the thought that maybe we're having a systemic problem with abusive conditions (as General Taguba concluded well over a year ago in his report on the conditions at Abu Ghraib) ? Aren't you at least a little curious ... or concerned ... or worried that maybe something has gone wrong somewhere that could be fixed rather than immediately denying, dismissing, or justifying it ? Can anyone articulate what evidentiary threshold has yet to be crossed for you ?

[SimeyTheLimey]

Originally posted by Krusty:
I agree with your first two paragraphs .. but what are you talking about with this one ? The article clearly states that the 21 soldiers being investigated were culled from 24 separate incidents (only 16 of the 24 have been looked in to so far) spanning 2 years in both Iraq (17 cases) and Afghanistan (7 cases).

Even if it is 24 incidents, and even if all 24 result in probable cause at the end of the investigation for an arrest, and even if those cases have sufficient evidence to prosecute, and even if each case results in a conviction, you are still talking about isolated incidents. Stop trying so hard to smear the troops with the crimes of a handful.

[Zimphire]

Originally posted by RAILhead:
I don't see a black eye anywhere -- as said before, 21 people doesn't even make a visible scratch, much less a whole black eye.



Maury

Yeah I think Demon should change the description of this part of the forum to "Do all your drama queening here"

[Millennium]

Originally posted by Krusty:
Murder rates are typically calculated by the population being murdered ... not the population murdering.

Indeed, but when you talk about trying to lower the murder rate it doesn't do much good to focus on the victims. You have to deal with the perpetrators, do you not?

[Zimphire]

Murder.

If you could show some premeditation on the situation, you know a soldier purposely going after a specific person or persons I would agree with you. But that isn't the case.

This is what I am talking about when I say drama queening.

Over-Exaggeration to get a certain response or attention.

I know you probably don't agree, but that just goes a long with the act.

[Millennium]

Originally posted by Zimphire:
Murder.

If you could show some premeditation on the situation, you know a soldier purposely going after a specific person or persons I would agree with you. But that isn't the case.

I can predict the response, actually; they're going to claim that these were racially- or religiously-motivated. My actual guess is that they'll play the religion card. There won't be the slichtest shred of evidence, but they'll claim it to be self-evident.