[Closed] Sergeant Blackman?

White Europeans breaks international law killing foreign nationals - often in their own countries. Many calling for leniency or exception from law.

Brown Middle Eastern men break international law often in own country. Many say it's justice and defend the ending of their lives...

What makes you say that?

Have you had much contact with anyone suffering from PTSD?

he was suffering from a mental condition called adjustment disorder that substantially impaired his ability to make rational judgments.

You either agree or disagree. Your opinion on the facts as you see them, unless you've actually served on the ground somewhere like that, is factually irrelevant.

Not a dig at anyone in particular, and this isn't a 'you weren't there man' situation. But honestly, how can you say what you'd do if you've never ever had exposure to that kind of life?

[quote=moose ]Your opinion on the facts as you see them, unless you're actually [s]served on the ground somewhere like that, is factually[/s] [b]a qualified judge[/b] is irrelevant.
FTFY

Very droll. My point still stands, a judge has addressed the issue, there is no doubt he killed an enemy combatant outside of the rules. The mitigation put forward a judge has felt is sufficient to correct the earlier verdict. I don't disagree with the legal decision, however some of you with your holier than though opinions are rather, well, ****ing stupid.

so essentially anyone who does not agree with the decision is a **** idiot

I am well persuaded now as judges, and military ones in particular, are indeed infallible as , probably, are you 😉

unless you've actually served on the ground somewhere like that, is factually irrelevant.

Not at all. I agree with the judge, he broke the rules, bang to rights. PTSD doesn't excuse you from your actions.

I also completely understand why he did it, it's very easy for someone sat at home, never having been in that situation, to go OTT with the condemnation, I prefer a more sedate level.

I guess some people on here like to run up their colours and take the moral high, high, high ground. Such is the internet. But they as well as some of Sgt B's more ardent supporters I find just as distasteful.

Horrible things happen in war, the line between right and wrong is constantly moving depending on the situation. Although what he did was a deliberate act, it's not hard to see where he is coming from.

My view- lifelong pacifist that I am - seems on balance about right. Not let off, not made an example of.

From what I have read the entire outfit he was in was at best very "gung ho" and he would have been affected by that to the point his moral standards would not be those of a civilian nor even perhaps a soldier in a less "gung ho" outfit

Having seen a little of how killing people under orders affects men I can accept his judgement was clouded and that an unlawful killing is right but murder? Not sure enough to want to see him spend a long time in prison.

What good would imprisoning him for a long time do? Deterrence? Retribution? Rehabilitation? These are the three main aims of prison and its hard to see how any of these are enhanced by a long stretch in this case

[i]edited after Junkyards correction[/i]

PTSD doesn't excuse you from your actions.

One can sympathise with what he did and understand why he felt like that but it was still a murder IMHO rather than a manslaughter though the judges, this time round, disagreed.

You missed out rehabilitation and its not that hard to see how punishment [ or deterrence for that matter] was better served with a longer sentence.

Junkyard, really? Murder? How do you murder someone you've been sent to kill?

And that's the part that confuses me. He shot a man, who a mere few moments earlier had been legally sanctioned to kill. Hence why an appeal judge has decided to overturn the original conviction.

If his judgement is clouded because of the stress he was under and the attitudes of those around him normalised such behaviour then is he "of sound mind"?

Correct Junkyard - I meant rehabilitation. retribution and punishment are really the same thing.

Ninja edit time

tjagain - Member
If his judgement is clouded because of the stress he was under and the attitudes of those around him normalised such behaviour then is he "of sound mind"?

Very much no. And I would argue that none of us really are when we're there.

How do you murder someone you've been sent to kill?

And that's the part that confuses me. He shot a man, who a mere few moments earlier had been legally sanctioned to kill. Hence why an appeal judge has decided to overturn the original conviction.

Again what he did was wrong though many of us can sympathise with the scenario that led to this decision It was still a poor one done in "the fog of war".

Please set me right if it's inappropriate to speculate, but how [i]did[/i] the vid ever see the light of day?

If its been paraded round as a trophy video, then the lad who took it and shared it bears an equal responsibility for what happened in the courtroom, in my opinion. (I take the viewpoint of "isn't the first, won't be the last....war is always f'd up)

If on the other hand the poor lad who witnessed the event came home traumatised and burdened by what he had seen his colleague do, then i can empathise more with the fact that the film saw the light of day.

If any of the posters have a military background and experience of hostile environments and/or front line action, your views and experiences have some relevance.
As for the rest - including me - our views are just words; no context, no understanding, no experience.
FWIW today's judgement is right but overdue - in my view.
I usually ignore posts from Chewkw but this time he's 100% accurate in saying war is, effectively, kill or be killed.
War is always a f***ing mess.

Please set me right if it's inappropriate to speculate, but how did the vid ever see the light of day?

Had there been no cameras, I'm sure I would have switched off an enemy combatant with a humane headshot. That's what soldiers do?
To talk on camera about mortal coils and contravening THE rule of war is plain stupid.

He's served some time and will never be in the military again. Time to move on I think.

I do feel though that there are undertones of "hmmm was he a terrorist or mentally ill."

In the context, there is a valid argument that the enemy here would not qualify as a lawful combatant (he certainly wasn't a soldier) and perhaps could be classified as a mercenary or even a spy. The GC rules here aren't cut and dried, and, whilst Sgt Blackman certainly didn't follow the ROE (if you agree with the ROE in the first place is another topic entirely), him not adhering with the Geneva convention is a very different thing. Hard thing to make rules about, is war.

"during an unrelated investigation"

For those who have not experienced operations; it is the most stressful thing you can imagine. In the case of Sgt Blackman, he was leading men into daily patrols where people were doing their damnedest to kill them.

To be fair, I'd ****ing genuinely love to know how the shrink came to the conclusion of adjustment disorder when in comparison with PTSD "the stressor does not have to be severe or outside the “normal” human experience." - war is outside of the normal human experience for most people.

Moose sounds about right.

How do you murder someone you've been sent to kill?

Although this seems wrong on a few levels, it's not all about search and destroy is it? It's about the long term game and garnering support for your actions, I mean even on a simpler level.... in shootier more straightforward wars the idea isn't always to kill - it can be to injure/maim so that people are locked up dealing with their injured. In protracted wars, a take no quarters approach also means that your own soldiers can suffer more by having to face an enemy that is discouraged from surrendering and will fight until the bitter end - see the American island hopping campaign to see what fighting people like that is like.

If some of you were in charge post 9/11 - Afghanistan would have just been carpet nuked and we'd have won right?

Frankconway - frankly thats nonsense.

I have a little insight from treating ex soldiers for example and am widely read on the subject - as well as being a lifelong pacifist.

If only those who served on the front line can judge a soldiers actions then he cannot be tried for anything ever.

He made a choice, a bad choice.

A complete and utter mess and moral minefield. There is no right answer in this, but purely in my opinion: did the fighter continue to pose a threat? I doubt it. So did he break the law? Undoubtedly. Irrespective of the law, was it morally excusable to kill the fighter? Absolutely not. Should he have tried to help him? Yes within the bounds of what was reasonable. So what should the punishment be? Absolutely no idea.

Just to give a bit of food for thought to those who put forward the 'kill or be killed' total annihilation vision of war: look up the definitions of total vs limited war. Also, consider the somewhat cliched definition that war is an extension of politics by other means and that it exists on a massive sliding scale from humanitarian aid to a fight to the death, sometimes at the same time (see the 3 block war).

Sometimes maintaining the moral high ground and doing the "right" thing is as much about protecting your own mental welfare and those around you as it is anything else. I've seen more soldiers traumatised by what they could have done but didn't, than by seeing worse sights over which they had no control. Sgt Blackman had the choice to kill someone who no longer posed a direct threat at that moment or help him, but he chose to kill. I stress, I'm not an infanteer and have, fortunately, never had to make that choice but I would like to think my gut would choose to help.

The problem with the Geneva conventions is they were never created with asymmetric, unconventional warfare in mind. It was gentlemanly warfare where both parties bought into them. Still doesn't justify it, but it puts you on some shaky ground.

You're right of course and I agree with a lot of what you're saying moose.

This rather nicely highlights how hard it is to conduct these kind of counter insurgency wars though. Sure, the rules weren't invented for counter-insurgency war - but even in the 60's - what was the effect of ignoring these rules on public support for Vietnam by getting the Mai Lai Massacre published in Time magazine? Was this conducive to achieving the goals of the Vietnam war?

Noooooooooo.

Had there been no cameras, I'm sure I would have switched off an enemy combatant with a humane headshot. That's what soldiers do?

Please, please, please tell me you don't actually believe that...?

Look, there's no doubt he stepped, nay, leapt way outside of the rules. He's been judged for it, I'm not going to condemn the man. He is a good man, who made a bad choice and will now have to live with it.

By all accounts he took one for the team as the senior officer

Some SAS lad wrote a book describing the same thing, couldn't call in a team to evaculate so its kill him or leave him to die.

I don't think his 'shuffle off mortal coil' line did him any favours, and why the hell did they video it...

But it was a classic example of us looking to be whiter than white, when in reality I doubt the british army is anything such (and i'm not judging them by saying that, i think they do a great job).

Things happen in a war zone, i'm glad he'll soon be free.

@tj: i acknowledge our difference of opinion. You have your view - I have mine.You may have some limited experience of treating/dealing with military casualties but that does not give your view any more weight than mine

In times of conflict I will back Andy Blackman - his attitude and behaviour - every time.

I'm off to bed - knowing I have never had my finger on the trigger.

As for Andy Blackman - I hope he sleeps well tonight and is allowed to live his life in peace; fat f*cking chance of that.

Off to the politics thread now for a few minutes; el trumpo continues to fuel the fire.

Frank - My point being that if your doctrine is accepted then not even a civilian court could judge them

But yes - I have never been in that position and whether you think we were right to be in that war or not he put his life on the line and that must be respected

@tj:I all I can say - reiterate - is that war is a f***ing mess.
No right and only degrees of being wrong.

I got close to joining the Royal Ordnance Corps- but didn't. If any of my 3 adult children talked about joining the forces I would do everything possible to dissuade them - I coudn't stop them.
If that means another parents' child dying in service - yes, i would accept that because my family would be intact.

Selfish? Yes.

I hope the Blackman case causes most of us to examine our motivations and possible responses.
None of us knows why he signed up or what he expected.
We can all play 'what if'; if he didn't pull the trigger what could have happened - or what may have been avoided?

We can all play 'what if'; if he didn't pull the trigger what could have happened - or what may have been avoided?

You could use that argument to justify all sorts of massacres, incidents and towering monuments to human empathy.

I think the point is that he fairly clearly broke the rules, but the punishment should take the context into account and the judiciary should act with some sympathy in this case - as a few others have pointed out. Clearly, letting these things happen and/or be leaked is also a discipline issue that needs to be addressed, if he'd been totally let off - what message would that send?

I coudn't stop them.
If that means another parents' child dying in service - yes, i would accept that because my family would be intact.

This ****s me off, it's always (or often) working class kids sent to die - because middle class kids have options. Then the same parents wax lyrical with a bunch of platitudes and donate to HFH. This is where conscription is great, we all get an equal opportunity to die from internal bleeding caused by overpressure - we're all in this big society together aren't we guys?

because middle class kids have options.

Go to the chapel of any public school and see the extensive lists of the fallen, plenty of middle class kids die as well even today.

An independent judge has made a decision and that in my view should be where the matter should be left.

Of course Mefty, something just irks me about the attitude that it's okay to accept other peoples kids dying. If the conservatives were true to their "big society" principles.... and the middle and upper classes actually, we'd think harder and longer about sending people to die - because people from all strata of society would have a vested interest (their children) in the debate.

It's perfectly natural to want to keep your children from harm. If my son wanted to join the forces, I certainly wouldn't encourage it; but at the same time I wouldn't discourage it, I'd help him to come to a decision of his own like my dad with me.

Tom, your 'working class are always (often) sent to die' comment is bollocks. No one gets sent to die; we get sent to do a job which is inherently risky with the real possibility of getting hurt or worse, and that applies to officers as much as soldiers.

Secondly, I can assure you that on the whole Army selection is class blind: I've trained over 200 recruits at phase 1 and had recruits with everything ranging from the minimum education standards required all the way up to a PHD Astrophysicist. Similarly, on my commissioning course, I trained with ex-soldiers, university graduates, guy's straight from school having just scraped their a levels, and guys who fancied a change of job from stacking shelves.

As for the joining because of not having options, if that were true then recruitment would be pretty steady. In fact, since Afghanistan has ceased, recruitment has gone off a cliff. Why? Because people have options and at the moment, the Army isn't an attractive offer so they've gone elsewhere. Those who do join because they can't be arsed or don't have the imagination to find another job rarely make it through training and if they do, leave as soon as they can.

I have nothing but respect and admiration for those who serve regardless of their individual motives. I'm grateful they do a necessary job that I'd rather my loved ones didn't. The additional drama was a bad idea but I expect the underlying action was totally appropriate in the circumstances.
On a lighter but relevant note, Colonel Nathan Jessop encapsulated some aspects of how I feel about a conversation like this, selective quoting:[i]
Son, we live in a world that has walls, and those walls have to be guarded by men with guns. Who's gonna do it? You? You? I have a greater responsibility than you can possibly fathom....You have the luxury of not knowing what I know...that my existence, while grotesque and incomprehensible to you, saves lives.
You don't want the truth because deep down in places you don't talk about at parties, you want me on that wall -- you need me on that wall.
We use words like "honor," "code," "loyalty." We use these words as the backbone of a life spent defending something. You use them as a punch line.
I have neither the time nor the inclination to explain myself to a man who rises and sleeps under the blanket of the very freedom that I provide and then questions the manner in which I provide it.
I would rather that you just said "thank you" and went on your way. Otherwise, I suggest you pick up a weapon and stand the post. Either way, I don't give a DAMN what you think![/i]

I wonder if any terrorists will now be offering up PTSD as an axcuse for why they carried out a shooting or a bombing??

Some posters on here don't seem to know what Blackman actually did. They found the wounded taliban fighter in a field with his weapon, at that point they could have considered him a threat and shot him dead as an armed enemy fighter. But they didn't, they dragged him out of the field at which point he was now an unarmed prisoner of war to a place where they couldn't be seen by either the helicopter or an overhead observation balloon and executed him.

That's my understanding too Natrix.

My issue isn't that he killed the wounded insurgent - I'm pretty sure I'd have done the same thing. My problem is that this decision didn't appear to bother him at the time.

From the transcript:

marines are roughly dragging the injured insurgent across a field and aiming abuse and laughter at him.

ordering his colleagues to get the man out of sight of a British observation balloon.

"Shuffle off this mortal coil, you ****,"

Wouldn't want to be in his shoes in a million years, but I can see how they originally found it a thin line between manslaughter and murder. Daily Mail campaign to get him released didn't help his public perception, as it cemented in my mind that it probably was murder.

Transcript:

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2013/oct/25/royal-marines-court-martial-video-transcript

Lol at the thread, the only thing wrong about Blackman's situation was some plank filming it.
He humanely killed a mortally injured enemy instead of tying up a Medivac chopper, good call.

I work as a paramedic, just to give some of the more holier than thou, detached from reality posters on this thread an idea of what goes on in front line services:

Do you think the medics sent to treat the terrorist in London the other day put the same amount of effort into resusitating him as they would on a typical cardiac arrest call to a private residence where the 'patient' hasn't just killed several people?
You're very naive if you think police, medics, army etc don't tailor their efforts according to the situation or the arsehole they're treating.

That's human nature and unless you've been there, well....

You're very naive if you think police, medics, army etc don't tailor their efforts according to the situation or the arsehole they're treating.

Not naive. I just expect a level of objectivity and professionalism. If you can't do that - do another job, there are people who can and other roles for people who can't.

That's human nature and unless you've been there, well

Perhaps one of the dumbest arguments ever. The ''You've not been in the situation so you can't empathise or judge" position, totally ignores people's ability to empathise and concieve of different perspectives. Now that is dangerously naive.

He should never have gone to trial so his release isn't really justice.

Seems to me that one thing that's not getting enough discussion/thought is what put him in that position. I don't just mean us being in a shooting war in afghanistan (though, yeah, when you send people off to war you take responsibility for all that comes with it), I mean the command/supervision/duty of care side of it. It's all been raised as mitigation- which is right imo- but doesn't seem to have been considered as much from the "how do we fix this" side. Maybe that's all going on behind the scenes and just doesn't make a juicy headline?

But we put people in shitty situations, and it seems to have been accepted that the support and supervision and protection that ought to have been there, wasn't. That's how these things happen, and you know fine well that it's not the only time it's happened.

And it's how people come home more messed up than they have to, even if something like this doesn't happen. A mate of mine was left in the field til he snapped, too, he just snapped in a different way.

He humanely killed a mortally injured enemy

Dragging him across a field wasn't all that humane though was it?

He could have quite legitimately shot him straight away when they found him, but he chose not to.

Deviant - you might want to get that post removed. If I was your employer I'd be very concerned at seeing that on a public forum. Whether it's true or not.

And it misses the point that a live terrorist provides much more useful information than a dead one.