There is a video going around (I'll not link to it) apparently made by British mercenaries in Iraq. It's shot out of the back of a moving truck/SUV which is driving down the fast lane of a dust-coloured concrete dual carriageway. There is quite a lot of civlian traffic in the inside lanes. Sometimes other cars are visible in the fast lane behind; whenever this happens a gun fires from the right of the camera position. You see the muzzle sometimes, and sometimes ejected cartridges jerk across the screen.
There's one sequence where a white Mercedes comes fast round a bend, so he couldn't possible have seen the mercenaries riding ahead, and the firing goes on until the Mercedes lurches abruptly to the right and crashes into the rear quarter of a car in the slower lane. Both vehicles stop. The doors of the car that was crashed into open. Two men get out and run across the remaining traffic for the verge. For some reason. I had expected to see them rush back to help the wounded or dead people in the car that had hit them after being machinegunned by the British mercenaries. I don't know why this struck me as more terrible than the murders themselves but it did.
Even worse was something you couldn't see at all: the whole video sequences -- and there were three or four scenes, obviously carefully edited -- had been given a soundtrack, of Elvis singing "Mystery Train." And I suppose there is more chance that the perpetrators will be done for copyright infringement than for war crimes.
I haven't seen the footage of which you speak, but I have to ask - How exactly can we armchair soliders know wether or not the white mercedes knew the mercernaries were about? Perhaps they were giving chase? Or perhaps they were warned by radio, and were joining in a chase? That seems fairly reasonable. Or perhaps they were just driving like dickheads (speeding around or whatnot) and drove into an ongoing chase unwittingly. An unfortunate accident, but hardly a war crime. Perhaps it was cold blooded thrill-killing... Perhaps not... WTF do we know?
Posted by: Sophistifunk on December 9, 2005 12:51 AMEver think perhaps they are driving in a military vehicle? I would think what they are actually doing is in self defense. Picture this... your in a land full of terrorists wanting to kill you. These people send cars after miltary vehicles to DETONATE the military vehicle. To which the military responds with STAY BACK SO MANY YARDS OR WE WILL SHOOT. The shots we saw were warning shots. I am sure if they WANTED to kill someone, they would have. In each sliced segment, you see people get out of the cars, though I do not remember the mercedes one.
I would NEVER get out of a miltary vehicle due to an accident that happened behind you, even if you did sort of create the accident. Think survival, and I am sure you would do SAME thing. You'd be a fool otherwise....
Posted by: Fiktionous1 on December 10, 2005 02:06 AMThe evidence for it being a thrill killing is primarily the soundtrack; but if you haven't seen it.
Fiktonous1 -- they're not warning shots when the car hit by them crashes inot another and stays motionless. Perhaps it help you to concentrate on the fact that these are British mercenaries. If they were threatened by Jewish, or Irish terrorists, would you be quite so certain that they were only firing warning shots? Imagine if it were Mel Gibson in that car, or Mel Gibson's sister. This might help you to see how the videos look to the outside world.
Posted by: acb on December 10, 2005 10:51 AM