Here is a troop to support…
“We made 500 bucks before she hung herself… she was unhappy.”
Since the whole Support the Troops loyalty oath assumes some cardboard cutout as “the troops,” let’s have a look at what the Boy-War culture really produces. I can assure readers, who may find this shocking, that this is a very typical attitude in combat arms units.
Please ensure that this video get the absolute maximum distribution, including to your local Congress-critter.
Tatiana:
Although this is typical during wars – women are always the first to suffer and rape is an inevitable aspect of an occupied country, this doesn’t make me less desirous to take a shotgun and blow his brains out (I doubt anything else will help him). A true offspring of the country that considers itself the top of the world.
12 July 2007, 8:44 amThe Buffalo In Da' Midst:
I’ll get it up on my site sometime today.
This one is also telling:
[F*uck Iraq/Child Abuse 0:18 seconds]
You can hear one of them say “That’s Soooooo Wrong!”
He’s so right, and I’ll bet he wonders why the parents are shooting at him.
12 July 2007, 11:33 amkevin:
Disgusting. I want to vomit my tuna fish sandwich.
14 July 2007, 3:35 pmKeep in mind he is recalling something that is a couple years old.
LWM:
I wish I had a link for you but I don’t. Dr. Philip Zimbardo was on CSPAN recently, (Booknotes I think).
He was talking about his new book. The Lucifer Effect.
http://www.prospect.org/cs/articles?articleId=12717
I almost fell off my chair when he said this. He actually thinks we may find out Pat Tillman was intentionally murdered, fragged. You could try to contact Zimbardo or track down the video of the CSPAN segment. Bush’s recent claim of executive privilege RE the Tillman case, and Stan’s piece at TruthDig:
http://www.truthdig.com/dig/item/200601003_white_supremacism_sexism_militarism/
Plus that video, make me wonder if Zimbardo may be on to something. I’m not given to conspiracism but neither is Zimbardo. His book and Stan’s article make some interesting points about bad apples and bad barrels. I can’t see a Pat Tillman being too popular with white supremacists but maybe Zimbardo is off base here. It just wondered if Stan had heard this.
STAN: The big news is that Rumsfeld will invoke executive privilege to avoid testifying about when he learned about the fratricide. On the conspiracy, I respect Dr. Zimbardo immensely, and the Stanford Experiment remains extremely relevant; but I have reviewed thousands of pages of testimony on the incident, and know the family quite well. Infantry platoons don’t commit political assassinations, and Pat’s killing was not planned by anyone. This is my absolute and categorical opinion. I have written a series about Pat’s death for the now-defunct From the Wilderness Publications, called “The Tillman Files,” and my basic prosecutorial hypotheses remain unchanged. I have since learned many more details and had names corrected from previously redacted documents; but long-story-short, no conspiracy. More than that I can’t say now, because I have signed a confidentiality aggreement that limits my discussion of this case.
14 July 2007, 7:16 pmRequired:
Is there anyway to authenticate the video? Has the soldier been identified?
15 July 2007, 12:36 amRequired:
I wonder if this changes anyone’s perception of the soldier effigy burning video we discussed a little while ago.
15 July 2007, 8:42 amRequired:
Has this made the US news? Stan, I remember you mentioning something about how images of abuse towards female inmates were omitted in the Abu Ghraib scandal. What further evidence of this type of behavior is there?
[moderator intervention: ummmm -- the rape rate in the US is 2nd only to that in S Africa -- the porn biz in the US generates more cash flow than the "legit" entertainment biz -- the US internet is saturated with images of rape and torture of women -- colloquial speech in the US normalises and naturalises prostitution of women -- on both left and right, US men routinely use metaphors of rape and prostitution to express agression, enmity, and contempt -- under the circs, wouldn't it be rather surprising if there were no incidents of "this type of behaviour", since "this type of behaviour" is routine throughout the culture these men come from?]
Apparently some of these types of video have been faked in the past so it would be interesting to get some confirmation.
http://www.infowars.com/articles/ps/abu_ghraib_us_army_investigating_new_torture_allegations.htm
Actually, looking at it, it does seem like it could be fake. I understand that this type of conversation is run of the mill in the military, but the way his face is caste in shadow makes me suspicious.
Seems like to do such a thing on purpose shows to much premeditation and if it occurred accidentally the camera operator would have moved to a better position.
I’ve read some transcripts where the video ends slightly after the “no fucking cameras†bit where one of the men of camera says “yeah, you got that.†This might be a covert way of reminding “all the boys,†don’t get caught on tape like this.
Moderators feel free to merge all my posts into one.
16 July 2007, 8:19 amRandy Morris:
It certainly doesn’t change my opinion on burning effigies of soldiers—that still seems like a pointless and counterproductive waste; it does, however, make me feel like burning the people in the video.
On the other hand, I’m conflicted in my feeling that even that hollow shell of a human being interviewed might be redeemed someday. Sometimes the most naturally compassionate individuals end up being the ones who succumb to the pain and cruelty just to survive the constant barrage of horror. Not an excuse, certainly, but a factor to consider.
STAN ADDS: Mine either. If we are to burn effigies about celebrating rape aond domination, then we can’t lay that at the door of soldiers. We would have to burn effigies of… well, men. No one is siggesting that this one man represents all soldiers, or all men. But the war is a hothouse that grows this kind of sociopathy. The nursery is masculinity.
16 July 2007, 12:20 pmRequired:
“moderator intervention” I didn’t mean to imply that I thought that there was no evidence to suggest that rapes had occured in Abu Ghriab. If there happening on college campuses at the rate they are, than there defintely happening in occupiers prisons.
However, something about this video, the way it was posted annonysmously on YouTube, the way you can’t tell who the soldier is, makes me think that it’s another hoax. If it could be varified I’d spread it, but seems potentially damaging to spread it around and say “look, this is what the war does” only to have it revealed as a hoax in time. Particularly when there are other videos of known veterans detailing similar things.
16 July 2007, 9:08 pmMichael:
I want to post the video myself but I don’t feel comfortable doing so until it can be confirmed that it’s legit.
STAN: These are real concerns, and I empathize. The reason I went ahead with it is because if this is a hoax, there should be Oscar nominations. The verisimilitude of everything from attitude to body language to the je ne sais quoi of my own intuition (no, I’m not Michael Chertoff) are ringing Reality Bells. This was my culture for many many years. I’ve never seen even the best films capture it; and the documentaries always introduce a camera that distorts the authenticity of troop mannerism. This “type” is not the majority, but a type respected by the majority… because there is a sense among young men that he has climbed over the perimeter fence of masculine psychology… a challenge to the rest. We took ears as souveneirs in Vietnam. Some of us — in transit on R&R or leave — sold them to the air conditioned Air Force guys at Phu Cat for big bucks, who could then take them home and show them off as “their own.” Get your head around that. I’ve said it before: Perfect masculinity is sociopathic.
16 July 2007, 9:58 pmAdam:
While I have my suspicions regarding the authenticity of the video itself, I find the content to be jarring in a sense that it makes me reflect on the conversations I heard from other prisoners while incarcerated. The pride, disassociation, confidence, arrogance, certainty, ignorance, intimidation, masculinity, etc. all are well ‘acted’ (if that is the deal here) and are reminiscent of many a conversation I listened to up the river. In my case, I heard these tales (sometimes /tall/ tales) related in the same eager breathlessness as the shadow in this video. I could relate them here, even in detail, to perhaps try and connect the similarities, but it makes me sort of sick to think about writing those things here among people I have so much regard for. These discussions among men are nothing new. Really, if this kind of talk is new you should hang out with the right soldiers or ex-soldiers when they come home from a fight and party. I went to a few of these in high school and can honestly say I felt the bizarre parallel when I was sent to prison later. I remember thinking how appropriate and funny the term ‘war stories’ was at the time. People told ‘war stories’ behind the walls all the time. It passed time. It gave credit to the legitimate criminality of those who perhaps felt powerless. These stories were ways to artificially bond with the other men currently surrounding them.
17 July 2007, 1:13 amWould this guys story change at all if he told it ten times over a period of a year? Would the facts alter or become more sinister or his terminology change at all to suit the audience? It did in prison. Embellishment was certainly commonplace. There was, I imagine, some truth to just about all the stories.
Even now, as I talk to people and listen to people and urge people to speak up, I sometimes get the feeling that some of them are ‘testing the water’ so to speak. They throw out a lure, like a sexist or racist comment and throw a side glance my way, wondering if I’ll bite.
“Blah blah…towel-head, you know what I mean?”
No, I don’t.
I think my point is that this is an example of a form of – dare I say – typical male behavior. I’ve heard the same fucking tone of voice from my brother (a veteran police officer) when he tells of his abuse against the citizens he should be serving. There’s pride to be found somewhere in these horrors because this is what boys are supposed to do: Beat the crap out of everyone and everything around them that doesn’t conform to their standards, whatever those may be. Simplified, try going to the toy store nearest you. For the boys: Monsters and guns. For the girls: Kitchen play sets and baby dolls. Something this trivial to most people has, in part, done society in.
Whew. If my bullshit trying to relate everything to the system of incarceration gets tired please just tell me to stop.
It’s odd to me that the harder I look at see society the more I see it as a macrocosm to prisons microcosm. How does that shit happen?!? Since when did ‘Our Boys’ become so closely linked by the idea of male dominance that they are a mirror of the so-called refuse of our society? Which came first, I wonder.
I’m all messed up in the head by this video, regardless.
Required:
“The reason I went ahead with it is because if this is a hoax, there should be Oscar nominations.”
Yeah, if it is fake it’s very well done.
17 July 2007, 10:13 amAudrey:
When I hear people talk about gendered violence by US troops in Iraq, it’s almost always as a supporting argument related to ending the occupation there, rather than ending gendered violence as part of our culture here.
The president of Eastern Michigan University was fired yesterday for covering up the details surrounding the death of a student, with the help of several other top administrators who have now submitted resignations. The pattern is eerily reminiscent of how the Tillman family was treated. The parents – and public – were told by the university that she died of asphyxiation with no sign of foul play. Ten weeks later, the man who killed the woman was arrested, and that was the first the parents heard that she’d been found raped and murdered in her dorm room, despite the officials knowing it all along. The man arrested was a fellow student.
From the Detroit Free Press: Howard Bunsis, professor of accounting and president of the school’s faculty union, said the firing is necessary so the university can move on. “It’s never easy to see someone lose their job, but we need to move forward.â€
Bunsis said the college’s reputation has been hurt by what has become a national story. He said the university’s primary mission needs to be “focusing on what happens in the classroom between students and faculty.â€
This quote doesn’t address the rape, the murder, or how the university notified the family, which are the real crimes. It’s written from the perspective that the reputation of the organization is more important than either truth or the needs of the people affected by the crime. The university, a nonhuman entity, is the victim.
The president apparently needed to be fired so the university can “move forward†– whatever that means; not because he took part in an unethical conspiracy to cover up a crime – and, as it turns out, to consistently disregard reporting requirements for other crimes on campus. Bunsis reminds us that confronting a culture of violence against women is a distraction from the real (more important) mission of the university.
Adam writes: If my bullshit trying to relate everything to the system of incarceration gets tired …
What gets tiring for me is people who show a stunning inability to make these connections.
Those in administration, whether in the military, in prisons, or in universities and corporations, understand individual rapes as a reflection of their own organizational culture – if they didn’t, they wouldn’t work so hard to cover them up. People are able to make the leap from individual case to a systemic culture on a medium scale, but if we ask them to recognize it as something that is systemic in our culture at large, and to accept some responsibility for that in the same way we expect organizations to accept responsibility for their culture, it sometimes feels like that part of their brain function is missing.
17 July 2007, 10:20 amDeAnander:
@Audrey, right on the gold as always.
I particularly like [not] the way that some librul men, when women talk about rape, immediately pipe up and say “but men get raped too, what about prison rape?” as if the people raping men in prison were not men. as if it wasn’t the same rape culture operating exactly the same, by the same rules — except that in prison there’s no underclass of expendable women, so they turn the beta and gamma males into expendable women.
I guess it’s kinda like troops hit by “friendly fire” from their own team, and thinking that is somehow special and different from (more tragic, more unfair than) the fire they’re raining — as a team — on the civilians. but it’s the same war. that’s how it’s done: destroying human bodies with projectiles and explosives.
and patriarchy is enforced by male dominance and rape, and the theft of sexual pleasure by using another person’s body as a toy or accessory — kleptosexuality — is the official sexuality of patriarchy. that’s how it’s done: destroying human dignity, transgressing physical boundaries and obliterating bodily integrity using the penis (or other objects) as a weapon. oddly enough, the actual physical gender of the rapee is not as important as the relationship of dominance. remember that men who rape other men in prison — “pitchers” — emphatically do not think of themselves as “gay”. “gay” means female.
the prostitution of an enemy woman in wartime is a win-win-win scenario in patriarchal economics: humiliate the enemy man by stealing and abusing “his” woman; demonstrate your own masculinity unambiguously to other dangerous males (you wouldn’t want to be mistaken for a catcher, not when you’re surrounded by pitchers); demonstrate your “racial superiority” if you’re Anglo and the victim is brown; and make some money at the same time. what’s not to like?
only the haunting sense that one has done something very, very wrong, that can never be undone… but that haunting sense can always be silenced by blaming the victim, committing more and worse crimes against women to blunt the senses and stun the conscience, consuming enough drugs or alcohol to numb the heart. after all, feeling a haunting sense of compassion and guilt is girly stuff, and the punishment for being girly is being raped by the non-girly. you’re either with us, or you’re under us.
17 July 2007, 3:45 pmJon:
I remember hearing things like this from older brothers who had returned from Vietnam. I’m not sure if this video is real or not. The reason being that these confessions were usually met with shocked silence. After the moment of silence, someone would offer, “Well, I guess you had to be there,” as an out for the family member/friend/classmate. As vulgar as today’s porn raised youth can be, I still think most of them would have to pause after hearing about the rape and suicide of an innocent 15 year old. Otherwise, the garage, the alcohol, the dim lighting and the affectless flat tone of the returning vet was creepily familiar.
Recently spoke with my nephew, a young Army sergeant. He is terrified of going to Iraq. He’s not worried about being wounded or killed. He said that he was afraid of peer pressure. He is worried that he might go along and end up doing something that would “destroy his soul.”
19 July 2007, 4:12 pmLinda c:
None of my daughters friends have returned “the same”.
This video is very – in line – with what she is told. It is now time for her best friend to be shipped out. We talk everyday about how they will “deal with him” when he returns – if he returns. One of the sad things is that I can’t really help her because “war”, as we know it, basically skipped my generation. I know, now, some of what Stan and our brothers experienced and how it had a profound affect on who they are today. This leaves me wondering what this generation will have to endure before they can “make amends”.
Our “fearless leaders”, will make it all OK, after all they are “all knowing” – Gods.
20 July 2007, 9:00 amgoritsas:
@Stan,
I wonder if all the soldiers in that platoon were actually soldiers. Coming from you, unless your insider knowledge is incontrovertible, your position seems almost naïve. Sorry.
One thought, by the by. I hate all this insider crap. If it wasn’t coming from you, I’d have to say bullshit. It seems to me just another day in empire when the facts cannot be openly stated and openly discussed. Why is that, I wonder? Secrecy seems to begat endless secrecy; the “Secrecy Recursion Jive†seems to be a self-justifying principle. The more it’s used the more it gets used. When, Dear God, will we accept only the facts so we can discuss only the truth? When will we demand the facts as is our right in a world that belongs not just to “them†but to us as well. When?
I wish you’d been able to be forthcoming. I wish, in truth, those to whom you agreed non-disclosure had not asked it of you. I’m sure in the eyes of all concerned their motives are pure and their intentions honourable. For those of us on the “outside,†it seems just another secret on just another day we’re not privy to because we’re not to be trusted by those doling out the invitations to the private screenings.
STAN RESPONDS: I wonder if all the soldiers in that platoon were actually soldiers. No, the Black Ops folks always hire 20-year-olds (one member of the shooter vehicle was 19!), and put them in deep cover — which they study between playing video games and sharing high school lies.
The task organization of the platoon that placed that particular vehicle, with those particular troops, in this situation… with Pat exactly where he was… was decided on an ad hoc basis, less than an hour before it happened, after an all day delay, caused by a busted vehicle. The decision was made by a 1st Lieutenant (was he in on it), and forced on him after an argument by members of the TOC in Khoust (were they all in on it?), and altered at the last minuted by an Afghan jinga truck driver (was he in on it?) who’d been randomly hired in Magarah to tow the broken vehicle on that very day, after consultation between the PLT chain of command (were they all in on it?). Pat’s position was decided by Pat, after being released from an earlier position by an acting squad leader (was he in onit, and did he control Pat’s mind in Pat’s selection of exactly that place in the boonies of Paktia Province?), who was himself sent forward in response to gunfire in a canyon. Did the Black Ops people put the ruts in the road that trashed the hummer that caused the delay that stalled the Blacksheep Platooon in Magarah for more than six hours, where they were sussed out by three part-time guerrillas (were they in on it?) who played their role by staging an ineffectual ambush along a last-minute route determined by the inability of the jinga truck that was towing the busted vehicle to climb through the originally planned (less thanone hour before) wadi?
I love how conspiracy-affines refer to others as “naive,” when they themselves cannot describe the difference between coreelation and causation, and they attach themselves to stories that are only possible in the minds of scriptwriters. Real Black Ops are straightforward affairs, with planning designed to minimize complexity and reduce the number of independent actors and “moving parts”… but that makes a shitty script. But if this is what you want to believe, then we’ll leave you to the Illuminati. In the real world, power has to mobilize such awesome resources on its own behalf precisely because it cannot exercise the kind of control you suggest. No one can.
Is that forthcoming enough?
22 July 2007, 6:02 amgoritsas:
That’s without doubt the most detailed description I’ve ever read about the events leading up to Tillman’s death, and yet all delivered with such brevity.
I love how conspiracy-affines refer to others as “naive,†when they themselves cannot describe the difference between correlation and causation
Go on then, enlighten me. Where in the discussion of Tillman’s death is there cause and effect at work? I’m entirely sure your excellent timeline summary doesn’t indicate cause and effect whatsoever. At best, it seems to be a chaotic (in the mathematical sense, not the colloquial sense) or a stochastic process, and any small perturbation along the timeline could have caused an outcome that didn’t include Tillman’s death. So, while I can differentiate between causation and correlation (even if forced to do the statistical maths with pencil and paper), I really don’t see what you’re on about as far as us “conspiracy-affines†and our apparent inability to clearly differentiate cause and correlation. And, let’s be honest, that was a rather shallow allusion to us types being incapable of dealing with “reality†as opposed to living in “fantasy.â€
Tillman’s enlistment and subsequent death seem rather too pat. Sure, maybe it was just an accident. Sure, it’s not unusual for soldiers to die when they’re being shot at. All that as may be, the manner and timing of his death was sublime. Recruiting not going well. War not going to plan. Cue the All-American Hero (deceased) stage left and, at least for a while, those orchestrating the war now have an ideal “Hearts and Minds†public relations campaign, for immediate release. Those of us watching and listening remember Powell at the UN, we remember Blair in parliament, we remember “Mission Accomplished.†We remember Bremmer and several billions in cash missing, gone walk-about. We remember Haliburton and Blackwater. We remember Rumsfeld and 3 trillion unaccounted for. We remember Wilson and Plame, and Libby and Cheney and Judith Miller. We remember “Shock and Awe.†We remember Watergate and Kent State. We remember Whitewater and Mena. Hell, we remember the Ford Pinto, and asbestos, and cigarettes with jumped up nicotine. So when we see a guy like Tillman die and then we witness the tawdry, cynical charade his death becomes as its manipulated and milked for as much value as it can bring to the establishment, well we balk. Our gag reflex kicks in. We feel nauseous. Why? Because we simply find the whole story so damned implausible. Even if it is true. Why? Because a guy like Tillman just doesn’t die for no damned good reason. A guy like Tillman just doesn’t take a bullet like any other soldier and die. Even if that is the truth. A guy like Tillman doesn’t still believe in the myth of service to country, especially now it’s under the rule of such evil incarnate. A guy like Tillman just doesn’t die unless he’s being used by that evil. Otherwise, a guy like Tillman becomes just another statistic. A guy like Tillman becomes just another casualty. Never to stride into another stadium. Never to sign another autograph. And the waste becomes too damned big for us to stomach. Too damned big to swallow. Somebody, somebody, has to be responsible. He had to have been used by that evil for its own ends. If he wasn’t used by that evil, then we’re all guilty of his death because we’ve all allowed him to go. We could have stopped him. We could have stopped the war.
So, no, I don’t ascribe to your pathetic “conspiracy-affines†sideswipe. Given all I’ve seen and heard and read over the years I’ve been here, to trust the account given by a government or a corporation, as mediated and modified and manipulated by the press, to think the truth was he just died and that’s it, would be infantile. Maybe if I’d been privy to your “non-disclosure†information I too would have developed the same timeline as yours. But as long as revelations of wire tapping unfold, as long as executive orders further concentrating executive power continue to be signed, as long as liars and flunkies sentences are commuted by presidents who have no legal power to commute sentences, then you know what? The first thing I’m going to wonder is, which of those evil shits we’ve allowed to take over has done it this time. If you think that’s “conspiracy-affines†thinking, then hey, may I’m one of those “conspiracy-affines†after all.
22 July 2007, 10:56 amThe Buffalo In Da' Midst:
Here’s something that relates to the psychology of war, from Adbusters:
The Death Mask of War
From Adbusters #72, Jun-Jul 2007
All troops, when they occupy and battle insurgent forces, as in Iraq, or Gaza or Vietnam, are placed in “atrocity producing situations.†In this environment, surrounded by a hostile population, simple acts such as going to a store to buy a can of Coke means you can be killed. This constant fear and stress pushes troops to view everyone around them as the enemy. This hostility is compounded when the enemy, as in Iraq, is elusive, shadowy and hard to find. The rage soldiers feel after a roadside bomb explodes, killing or maiming their comrades, is one that is easily directed over time to innocent civilians who are seen to support the insurgents. It is a short psychological leap, but a massive moral leap. It is a leap from killing – the shooting of someone who has the capacity to do you harm – to murder – the deadly assault against someone who cannot harm you. The war in Iraq is now primarily about murder. There is very little killing.
After four years of war, American Marines and soldiers have become socialized to atrocity. The American killing project is not described in these terms to a distant public. The politicians still speak in the abstract terms of glory, honor, and heroism, in the necessity of improving the world, in lofty phrases of political and spiritual renewal. Those who kill large numbers of people always claim it as a virtue. The campaign to rid the world of terror is expressed with this rhetoric, as if once all terrorists are destroyed evil itself will vanish. The reality behind the myth, however, is very different. The reality and the ideal clash when soldiers and Marines return home, alienating these combat veterans from the world around them, a world that still dines out on the myth of war and the virtues of the nation.
[In Full]
23 July 2007, 7:09 pmLinda c:
Thank you.
It is one of the hardest things I’ve wrapped my mind around, in a long time.
I am going to make sure my daughter reads this, when she has time to really concentrate on what is being said. Maybe, it will help her understand what she and her friends will be dealing with when all of their “loved ones” come home.
25 July 2007, 1:55 pmRequired:
If you think that’s “conspiracy-affines†thinking, then hey, may I’m one of those “conspiracy-affines†after all.
Congratulations, admitting it is the first step.
26 July 2007, 6:36 pmgoritsas:
@Stan,
AP: New Details on Tillman’s Death
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/07/26/AR2007072602025.html
How does this article square with what you know?
Also, what purpose is this article serving and who would benefit?
Tillman’s death seems to have a life of its own. What is going on and why does this particular story appear now and to what end? Thanks for any insight in advance.
28 July 2007, 10:31 amrebecca:
Stan,
Just wondering if this new information from the AP:
http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/T/TILLMAN_FRIENDLY_FIRE?SITE=MABED&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT
AP Exclusive: New Documents Shed Light on Ex-NFL Player and Army Ranger Pat Tillman’s Death
MARTHA MENDOZA
AP News
Jul 27, 2007 01:49 EDT
SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — Army medical examiners were suspicious about the close proximity of the three bullet holes in Pat Tillman’s forehead and tried without success to get authorities to investigate whether the former NFL player’s death amounted to a crime, according to documents obtained by The Associated Press.
“The medical evidence did not match up with the, with the scenario as described,” a doctor who examined Tillman’s body after he was killed on the battlefield in Afghanistan in 2004 told investigators.
The doctors – whose names were blacked out – said that the bullet holes were so close together that it appeared the Army Ranger was cut down by an M-16 fired from a mere 10 yards or so away.
is part of what you already know.
I’m not at all interested in promoting any “conspiracy theories”, I’m just wondering if this new information moves Tillman’s cause of death due to “friendly fire” closer to a possibility of a deliberate fragging.
STAN: Not unless it occurred in front of at least eight people, all who had great respect for him, and who conspired to cover this up together. Two of the top gunshot specialists in forensic pathology in the nation agree with me that this was likely a squad automatic weapon (same caliber as an M-4). The army dummied up the distances, then drew them down to 85 meters to support a “fog of war” thesis (as opposed to the actual serial violations of the ROE that did occur… more likely at around 40 meters. The three shots that killed Pat were actually two tight, and one flyer, all head shots and each instantly fatal on its own account. Now think in slow motion. Let me begin with the terminal ballistics one never sees in films and on tv. Destruction of the connectionn between the brain stem and the rest of the body caused a body to fall… straight down. No, people do not fly through the air like the stunt-people in Hollywood. Straight down. This happens instantly. The new theory proposed by some so-called expert, says that this tight shot-group (less than 4 inches) could only have been fired by someone shooting on semi-automatic (one shot at a time, even if in rapid succession). A fully-automatic weapon, like the Squad Automatic Weapon (SAW) that is presumed (by me and two of the top forensics experts in the country) to be the lethal weapon, according to this theory, cannot fire this shot group because automatic weapons can not be controlled for this tight a shot-group. This premise is the basis of the presumed distance (10 meters) and mode of fire (semi-auto)/weapon (M-4) in the ne AP-propogated theory. Two problems: (1) the theory about auto fire is wrong, and (2) Pat was shot in the face three times, while facing downhill, and standing on a steep incline dropping to his front. (2) first. For this to have been an M-4 fiing on semi, the shooter would have had to fire, reaquire, fire, reaquire, and fire again, before Pat fell to the ground (straight down, on a steep forward inclining piece of terrain, with a large stone in front of him to prevent him tumbling down the hill). Even a very good rapid-fire shooter could not have place all three shots together quickly enough to fire the second and third shots before Pat fell away from the sight alignment. The only 5.56 mm weapon that could have placed those shots that quickly in the same place was the SAW… cyclic rate of auto-fire: 850 rounds per minute (14 rounds per second, ergo, three rounds in 2/10 of a second). Physics and pysiology matter; now add on the statistical probability that a bunch of enlisted people wopuld willingly participate as accessories after the fact in a cold-blooded murder (that just happened to coincide with an unplanned (but ineffectual) ambush)… and we begin to appreciate how unlikely this scenario is. Now for number (1). I’ll happily go to the range with anyone who cares to set it up today (which can be arranged with anyone who has been trained with the SAW), and demosntrate that these tight groups very well can be fired from a Saw, when they are part of a con tinuous firing cycle that allows the gunner to first walk the fire onto a target, then tighten down on the weapon as he orients on the impact signature (The rock in front of Pat was covered with bullet strikes.). There are family members who will not easily dismiss this because they are not experts on these things, and because the government has lied and covered up again and again and again on this case. I don’t fault them; and in fact I have great affection for them. The depth of their sense of betrayal would make anyone think the worst, and want someone to prove otherwise. More than this, I am not willing to say because I am still under a confidentiality agreement. Let me say this, though. If this case becomes about a conspiracy to murder, the focus is taken off the likely suspects for the real cover-up and crime, and the ones who all these sacrifices of Geneals have been designed to protect… Donald Rumsfeld, Lawrence DeRita, and probably George W. Bush. They are all loving this right now.
28 July 2007, 10:44 amrebecca:
Thank you very much for your response. I have been observing with great dismay how quickly so many of my fellow online lefty/progressives have jumped on the murder conspiracy theory bandwagon since this AP story came out, and have been endeavoring to marshall some effective counter-arguments in an attempt to damp down the hysteria. So far to little effect, unfortunately.
Is there any chance that you might devote a future post here to this very subject? It would be a great resource for linking to in order to counter the wild-eyed “conspiracy-affines”. (LOVE that term!)
One other question, if I may — do you know if the drone footage question was ever resolved? http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/wireStory?id=3071449
Thanks again — I’m so glad I found your site.
28 July 2007, 3:12 pmMartha Koester:
This is certainly a straightforward and plausible explanation. I don’t understand why the coverup though. It makes no sense–seems that the people involved could have easily come up with an report similar to what you just laid out.
Why were his diary and uniform burned? This certainly can’t be standard practice.
1 August 2007, 1:50 amannie:
Not unless it occurred in front of at least eight people ….. and who conspired to cover this up together.
actually, it would only take one person to decide to cover this up, and order the others to keep silent. or, it could have been others not present who conspired to cover it up and ordered all witnesses to keep silent. it would not require any conspiracy by those present at his death. soldiers follow orders and conspiracies of their superiors.
now add on the statistical probability that a bunch of enlisted people wopuld willingly participate as accessories after the fact in a cold-blooded murder …. and we begin to appreciate how unlikely this scenario is.
now add on the statistical probability that a bunch of enlisted people wopuld willingly participate in burning of possessions and uniform of a fellow soldier (all who had great respect for him) who was killed accidentally and we begin to appreciate how unique the scenario may have been.
the situation was extraordinary, so was the response. under extraordinary circumstances statistical probabilities get scewed.
2 August 2007, 12:44 pmStan:
I have secured permission from those with whom I signed a confidentiality agreement to write something on this. it should be available before Monday. And soldiers do not always follow illegal orders. People may not be aware of it; but I spent more than two decades on active duty with the US Army, including a hitch with the self-same company in 2nd Ranger Battalion as Pat Tillman (albeit when Pat was just a baby). I know just a little bit about military life and military culture. What I write will explain the cover-up. What I have written explains quite a bit of it.
2 August 2007, 8:02 pm