UKH

Lots of people spaffing about the excellence of the British Army (best in the world) in recent threads about Ukraine and Russian war crimes etc.

Turns out the SAS may have been a little trigger happy at times...

https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-62083196

I'm guessing you don't like our army?

Just imagine being one of the guys they took back inside the buildings to 'search'... you be shitting yourself!

I don't question the troopers on the ground. It raises a lot of questions about oversight and reporting, which is the role of the officers.

Either... the officers were turning a blind eye to misconduct. Or... these were actually target acquisition missions that were being recorded as searches, in which case they did a terrible job of keeping it off the record. Either way they failed.

just like the Russians on the ground who kill civilians?  Or Ordinary Germans who guarded camps?

personally I want to know just why this story surfaced when it did.   What is the agenda of the time of issuing it?

No, not like the Russians because that appears to be widespread punishment metered out by standard troops, whereas there are actually very few SAS and they only get sent to targeted locations for specific tasks. Not saying that makes everything magically OK, but I do think it's very much an entirely apples vs oranges comparison you are making

Edit: I think the story has been a long time coming and is off the back of other misconduct investigation that the BBC has been doing and they got it reading court evidence from something else, I agree though that the timing of why is this publicised now? should always be questioned, especially when this story has been quietly going on for a long time begs the why *now* question

Usually a trigger happy ambulance chasing solicitor with a dubious record.......

I was quite sad to read about it, I had the impression that our troops were pretty decent chaps.

A case of British exceptional-ism maybe? It's a common affliction, especially amongst the older more gammony generation...

Some of them are. Some of them aren't

Quite so. I'm sure some members of the armed forces will be absolutely horrified by these reports. However, given the potential and actual infiltration of the armed forces by far-right extremists, it should come as no surprise that such acts could be committed, particularly in the heat of battle under stressful conditions few of us who have not served could imagine. 

Timing of the story is a trivial concern compared to whether it is true or not.

Part of the reason we might take pride in or support our armed forces is that murder is punished rather than policy like Russia or Syria.

we all know that unlawful killings happen in war, or we ought to.  We should also realise that many of those killings go unpunished.   This may or may not be such a case.  I certainly think that the armies, as an alliance, who invaded Iraq, did not always minimise civilian deaths, particularly the US for whom evidence only had to be "credible" for families and wedding parties to be obliterated time after time.  Apart from the terrible morality of this it isn't effective either as it simply multiplies and strengthens the enemy.

However bad that is, the idea of public manipulation by timing releases of news is definitely NOT a  trivial concern by any standards.

I expect any adult knows that.

It is trivial compared to truth.

Do you think it's coming out today because it's a great day to bury bad news? It's not even in top 10 of BBC news most read stories (1725, 13/7/22).

Most read
1
Covid blamed for van on M4 with missing tyres
2
Jeremy Vine tells trial of 'avalanche of hatred'
3
DJ Tim Westwood accused of sex with a 14-year-old
4
Euro falls below dollar for first time in 20 years
5
New rail strike to take place on 27 July
6
Families angry over leaked school shooting video
7
Extreme weather warning extended to Tuesday
8
Sunak wins first round of Tory leadership vote
9
Energy firms told to review soaring direct debits
10
Liverpool fans blamed unfairly for Uefa final chaos

Most watched
1
VIDEO'I wanted to fight. The army told me to sing'
2
VIDEOWatch Johnson and Starmer's PMQs exchange in full
3
VIDEO'Shut up or get out' - Speaker orders two MPs to leave
4
VIDEO'You don't hear of Muslim girls skateboarding'
5
VIDEO'Flying my parrot is a reason to go out'

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news

Most read & most watched added at 1743 on 13/7/22
 

It seems that a pattern of detainees being sent back into buildings then being shot for reaching for concealed weapons or grenades was being recorded which was abnormally high. Failures for involving the RMP to investigate this has raised questions about the conduct of both junior and senior officers in turning a "blind" eye when they should have brought in the RMP at the outset.. The BBC's investigations have highlighted what is appearing to be cover ups.

I'm fairly sure it was in the BBC top 10 yesterday.

You're right.

https://web.archive.org/web/20220712163156/https://www.bbc.co.uk/news

I'm no cheerleader for the British Army. But it is possible to be proud of our armed forces for generally upholding certain principles, and also to be outraged when those principles are abandoned in such an egregious way.

The reality is war is $hit, 99% of those who will be outraged will never ever hear it, never see it, or be involved it. Sometimes as the rough saying goes good people do bad things while others sleep safe and sound. Like the bleating about being too warm to work in the uk just now, try being in uniform, body armour, helmet, fully kitted out and it clears 40c by mid morning, 12hrs later I wonder how rational most peoples decision making is then.

These were units tasked to target bomb makers in the most hostile areas hence why sf and not which ever regiment was doing their 6months on telic or herrick, if you're deep in enemy territory, at night, you have limited time, space in vehicles (if you have any and aren't on foot), then you suddenly have more prisoners or injured enemy, the units have the tough choice of calling in helicopter support to a high risk area, trying to man handle the extra bomb makers out with them or letting them go, what do people think may have happened during intense confrontations. Quite often the bomb makers are known already, through their building style or dna removed from discovered devices (detonated or intact). Whilst it's not a good look overall, i lose no sleep with one less bomb maker out there. Imagine if they let one go and a week later a device killed some your colleagues, that's a lot on a conscience, plenty return with serious ptsd as it is. 

No one said it was like going out for ice cream. I'm not sure that excuses summary execution of already safely detained suspects does it?

My wide point, as outlined in my OP is that people should be careful about rose tinted assumptions about 'our' armed forces. Anyone who has encountered squaddies on a night out should know that much. It's all just propoganda.

Since another poster has been a lot more blunt I'll stop pussyfooting about, when I mentioned "target acquisition" I was suggesting they were under orders to remove the people not arrest them or detain them safely. If you don't like the orders question the officers, but give the men a break.

Edit: and I stand by my comments that the officers did a bad job not covering it up more plausibly 

What was it you said about assumptions? 

...will find they behave like any other 18-30 yr old? 

I'll just count your view point as naive and exit the debate . 

All blurred lines in a time of war. Not condoning the behaviour in any way shape or form but outfits like the SAS are slightly more outside of the box than regular soldiers. Not sure I want to know most of what they are ordered to do.

Just makes me think of the covid parties at downing Street. Carefully leaked information to draw attention from something else.

It suddenly became inserted as the the NO 1 News item on the BBC Radio 4 Flagship Today Programme News Bulletins yesterday, from nowhere.  Before the Tory Leadership.

you have to remember that those troops were in there as occupiers after an unlawful invasion.

In those circumstances the prime mission must be not to cause more harm to the civil population and it does not sit well for unconventional forces to give themselves the right to mete out death on the spot.  Miscarriages of justice occur in civil cases with all the time they take up so the soldier on the spot can't assume he's got the right man woman or youngster.  I'm not anti armed forces but it was on public record that civilian lives including children were being lost to European military action (bombing) before Iraq was even invaded, merely on "credible" intelligence.  It was regularly reported on "From our own correspondent" in the days before the BBC became a government lackey.

If you go in as an invader and then subsequently an occupier the welfare of the civil population is paramount and a bound duty.  Summary execution is not permitted - in a war of choice it is no get out from that.

not a question of orders not being "liked", more being quite clearly illegal under international law to which UK military and civil law is subordinate, if those were the orders.

Obeying orders is, as I'm sure you know, not any defence at all, since 1945, a move forward in the laws of armed conflict that Britain, in particular, was at the forefront of making.

A small unit dropped into a pitch black village in the middle of Helmand at the height of an armed insurgency. I think we have very different ideas about the meaning of “safely”.

Perhaps people should also be careful about naive assumptions regarding extreme situations completely beyond any normal frame of reference. 

You could have just said “normal lads on a night out” because that’s exactly what the vast majority of them are.

Because it was a Panorama investigation and that was going to be on TV in the evening. Big investigative pieces linked to news TV are normally trailed through the day on radio news. Do you think people were going to not notice it because of the Tories? Or people wouldn't notice the Tories because of the SAS?

No it wasn't. The original invasion of Afghanistan was accepted as self defence under the UN charter, as ISAF had a UN mandate.

The issue here isn't whether special forces should be allowed to have lax rules of engagement, or be allowed to cause some collateral damage, in order to get the job done. The issue is allegations that one particular SAS squadron was going beyond 'getting the job done' by killing people neither by accident nor because they thought they were a threat. 

Special forces are given quite a lot of autonomy in terms of the tactics they use to achieve strategic objectives. If the current allegations are true, then in the present case that autonomy was abused by (presumably a small number of) individuals with no moral compass.

I think it’s a lot worse than that. Allegations of SF forces perpetrating summary executions in Afghanistan now involve multiple units from the US, the U.K., Australia and the former Afghan National army.

Such widespread abuse rarely occurs without tacit approval at governmental level but hey, shit rolls down hill and it’ll be the people at the sticky end who’ll be dealing with the consequences, one way or another, for the rest of their lives.

I'd like to see a bit more evidence regarding 'summary executions' than the BBC report.

Absolutely, they let me join, which says a lot about about the calibre of the average member of the armed forces..

However there's also the spurious allegations from the likes of Leigh Day and Phil Shiner that cast doubt on the veracity of some allegations against British troops. Yes, we have our fair share of t**ts, but we'll have to go some to match the Russians when it comes to war crimes.

Maybe, but there is also quite a lot of cultural cross-pollination between special forces units from different countries, more so than in the regular army, as they often train together or deploy in small task forces together. So a possibility is that killing for killing's sake has developed as an extremist culture, in a fringe. But I'm not sure how widespread this really is, at least in the UK - this particular case became evident partly because one SAS squadron so contrasted in approach with the others. 

It's not clear whether a few warped individuals find their way into special forces with the intent to kill with impunity, or whether this can arise in some otherwise normal individuals during extremely intense tours with lots of operational autonomy. But clearly the military needs to be better at identifying and rooting these individuals out.

The work of SF may be out of the experience of almost everyone, but - from what I have read - there were people in SF headquarters in the UK, who had been there and done it, looking at the reports going "come on guys... this isn't right" [to paraphrase].

If true, it sounds like a particular unit developed a very unhealthy culture and no one in the leadership chain had the courage to stop it.

Personally, I believe the reporting is very likely true and it is all very sad to hear

I wouldn't blur Afghanistan and Iraq together, to the naive they are both hot countries in the same part of the world, neither of which is true, they differed in almost every aspect: reasoning, motives, goal, population etc.. Iraq was clearly an error and Bush & Blair should shoulder huge responsibility for.

Afghanistan was a hot bed, long before 9/11 and Bush was president, most middle east and persian countries had black flag groups most flying the shahada, they just varied in name, motive or goal. Xmas markets were being targeted in Europe, especially in the run up to the millennium (obvious reason if you're a big islam fan), the western police, military and intelligence organisations actions went largely unnoticed by the population, just like the work to prevent bombings of places like shopping centres, office blocks etc did before the good friday agreement. State sanctioned people taking high risks whilst average joe ponder if they should cut the grass tomorrow or wash the car. 

It was working, innocent lives were being saved, but the terrorist groups learnt, they became better organised, led, funded and changed their mo: 9/11 changed everything. If anything pre 9/11 the terrorists were less keen on dying themselves, they weren't radicalising the naive among them to die for their cause, they did lots of surveillance etc.. to minimise personal risk, but if you are willing to die, then the game changes, a bit like ww2 kamikaze pilots. So the move to target terror groups at source was made. 

Whilst you may think the army's actions in a far offland on what you call innocent populations had no impact on you, you're wrong, these 'targets' weren't local farmers, but identified terrorists, with profiles, dna, photos, known killers, known accomplices etc... not random innocents, yes it would be ideal to capture them all, parade and sentence them in court, but sometimes the murky world that keeps most of us safe just doesn’t work like that. These aren't conventional wars where two sides wear different colours, meet in a field and agree to fight at sun up. 

I'm not justifying it, but it's hard to criticise the mind set of people who will every day of their time in Afghanistan be on their toes being shot at, they'll come home do a few months on uk stand by and other operations, then go back to Iraq or Afghanistan, repeat for a decade. There are thousands of soldiers in the uk who've seen and done things most can't imagine, it's all forgotten to most of the population, just like vietnam or ww1, but much of Afghanistan and Iraq was just as grim in all respects. 

Do you find it hard to criticise the action of Russian soldiers when they shoot prisoners?

That was not something I considered.  I thought it more relevant that it concerned allegations against the armed forces when 3 participants in the leadeership on 12th, when it suddenly became the prime story,  had served in the armed forces. 

I was just listening to one of the Panorama producers being interviewed on Tuesday's Newscast - she was saying that this story had been her prime focus for the last 4 years. The BBC team were the first Westerners to go to the villages in Helmand where the killings took place and interview eyewitnesses, because the military police investigators had been blocked from doing so by higher ups. I may well try to watch the whole episode now as it sounds like a rather impressive piece of journalism was done.

Chalk and cheese, your comment resembles that of one made for a quick like with no actual thought behind it.

Putins illegal invasion, land grab, murdering innocent civilians in broad daylight, even on camera.

Afghanistan, a valiant effort, or misguided attempted to capture or stop people who were prepared to fly passenger aircraft into tower blocks. I don't see any parallels in the two examples. 

I'm going to exit the debate a second time, there's a lot happened and happening all the time even just in the uk most will never know of, but it's done to protect the uk population, the same with the motives of many overseas missions. It's pointless trying to debate it, because by it's very nature it is shrouded in secrecy. Despite the thoughts of many, evil radicalised people can't be reasoned with over a brew, Putin if anything has shown this. 

But there are clearly plenty of other service people who have done similar but didn't develop a mindset where, allegedly, they could kill people taken into custody and not expect for this to be particularly questioned. The majority of US servicemen in Vietnam didn't commit atrocities, which is why Mai Lai stands out. 

That crimes happen in war, isn't really surprising - the SAS cases seem to have happened at about the same time as "Marine A" (A Blackman) killed the injured Taliban soldier that Blackman was convicted of murder (later manslaughter) for. I don't think these accusations are particularly surprising for anyone who has read about the Australian SAS scandal over the last year. In the US, their SOFs have seen similar scandals - the whole Eddie Gallagher mess with Trump and Fox News intervening to protect him, for example

By 2010/11 al Qaeda in Afghanistan had been essentially destroyed. Regardless of what we think of their ideas and ways of governing, the Taliban was Afghans fighting against the Afghan government who they disagreed with, and with the foreign forces that were occupying their country and supporting the government they were against. NATO were essentially supporting one side in a civil war.

You level of comprehension of international affairs and the reality of Western capitalist imperialism is absolutely base. Are you ex-forces by any chance? If so how much shite were you spoon fed?

That's the thing, this will be brushed aside as 'a few bad apples' by most people hearing the story (see this thread), that's from the man on the street who wants to believe 'we're better' right through to those who'll be tasked with pursuing a few scapegoat prosecutions which will never reach beyond those who actually pulled the triggers.

jk

Sadly the world has many nasty people, it's not because I've been fed shite, things happen, be it nerve agent in Salisbury, Manchester concert bombings, 9/11, 7/7, Madrid and on and on. You can argue it's because of our western ideology, but I see it as preferable to the ideology now in Afghanistan, Iran etc..  these people who fund, plan and commit such acts aren't really bothered by the threaten of an appearance in Hague in court. 

"i lose no sleep with one less bomb maker out there" - make your mind up, do you live in a fantasy world of perfect intelligence or something murkier?

My opinion on these allegations isn’t black and white. We don’t know enough and we probably never will. War is horrible, it’s a state in which normal moral codes become hugely distorted. 
 

I don’t think anyone not present can judge events that took place 3500 miles away, 12 years in the past.

My opinion on these allegations isn’t black and white. We don’t know enough and we probably never will. War is horrible, it’s a state in which normal moral codes become hugely distorted. 

I don’t think anyone not present can judge events that took place 3500 miles away, 12 years in the past.

Someone has to otherwise anything goes.

jk

How do you feel about Russian soldiers executing civilians due to concern about their mobile phones being used to give away troops' locations?

Seems like a remarkably similar scenario on some levels. Those troops 'think' they are fighting a just war just like I am sure the SAS in Afghanistan did (at least at the start).

The hypocrisy on this thread is sickening.

I presume that's exactly why some senior officers seem to have kept the military police investigators away from the places where these events happened so that they couldn't interview eyewitnesses. 

It's completely disgusting and the war is hell or it's been too long argument isn't good enough. And those that say that these killings prevent violence or look to minimize this as collateral are mistaken, every sister, dad, cousin etc that's murdered radicalises and hardens many more. Everyone was wringing their hands at Afghanistan a year ago, (seemingly without wondering why?) and I'm not even gonna get started on the clusterf*ck in NI. The British government need to be vigilant, transparent and robust with any investigation but that probably isn't a vote winner and completely goes against the current incumbents core values. 

* Russian troops (non special forces) systematically executing large numbers of random non combatants as collective punishment. That's not the job of soldiers and is a crime and morally unacceptable

* SAS locating and targeted missions to kill a small number of specific high value targets (combatants) such as bomb makers and top officials and their guards. That is one of the jobs of certain special forces units, it is de-facto accepted as part of war and termed "target acquisition". What should they do with bomb makers... send flowers?

Why are you still forcing a comparison with Russian troops in these 2 entirely different scenarios. I'd welcome an informed debate about the ethics and legality of target acquisition and I'm happy to acknowledge the legitimacy of opinions on both sides of that debate. It's a difficult issue.

But you are still systematically ignoring key facts to force an invalid comparison of 2 incomparable situations and is a logical fallacy. Happy for you to argue against the SAS's actions (assuming any of us here actually know the real facts??) but at least please argue from non fallacy.

i think shooting a civilian on the basis that they possess a mobile phone is an entirely different scenario to shooting a bomb maker or taliban leader during an intelligence lead kill or capture mission.

Obviously completely dissimilar 

Must be nice living in a state of complete moral certainty. Unfortunately such a state rarely survives real life exposure to situations where moral certainty doesn’t exist.

Depressingly, I’m sure you’re right.

I fundamentally disagreed with the long term occupation of Afghanistan. We went in with little understanding of the people, the situation or even what we wished to accomplish. 
 

With that as the starting point, a clusterf*ck was a forgone conclusion.

If you can't judge when not present then you must accept that you can't judge the SAS positively either.

Alternatively you can apply judgement to distinguish between British and Russian forces despite not being present.

It's easy to live in a safe country a d preach the moral high ground. One of the main reasons we can do that is because people in the shadows do things that go against our moral compass. 

The real irony is if those people didn't do those things we wouldn't be able to criticise based o morality because we would be too busy fighting to survive.

The end of the movie a few good men sums it up "You can't handle the truth"

Yes there needs to be rules and the military should be investigated if they step outside of the rules but they should be investigated by people who have been there keeping us all safe and not by a bunch of arm chair warriors on a climbing forum. 

I do accept that. Nuance doesn’t come across well on these forums.

To an extent, but footage of an elderly security guard being repeatedly shot in the back as he walks away is pretty straightforward.

I think you're speaking from a position of enormous privilege here, even in the UK the British government has long since covered up murders of its own citizens (e.g. see most recently the NI troubles legacy and reconciliation bill). 

You can't be serious? Organisations investigating themselves only leads to cover ups because more often than not the root cause is systemic failures higher up. 

Sounds like the next time there is a terrorist swinging a machete in London, a suicide vest wearing or ak47 carrying nutter at a concert we just need a few chaps and chapesses from ukc to go chat to those friendly IS or Al Qaeda blokes, maybe a nice cup of tea together, governments have been wasting millions on special forces for years. 

You can use that to justify anything. Is it OK for MI6 to torture people as they might have some useful information? Should we send MI6 officers to other countries with nerve agents to kill people who have betrayed this country?

And the scandal here is as much that military police were prevented from investigating by senior people, as it is the alleged killings by SAS members in the first place.

It seems like you are deliberately misunderstanding the point being made here.

It is unequivocal that Western special forces, when well trained and resourced, with good intelligence and making good decisions, have been able to absolutely obliterate Islamist terror networks on their own turf. But special forces killing unarmed civilians, just to make up numbers, has nothing to do with that goal.

when does an IS or Al Qaeda bomb maker cease being a civilian and become a known terrorist?

You seem to have the understanding that everyone executed was a 'bomb maker'. Care you clarify how you arrived at that conclusion?

But they were killing unarmed people they weren't sure were bomb makers, because of the "grave problems with the intelligence behind the selection process", and because "there was a pressure to up the game, which basically meant passing out judgements on these people quickly".

Sure, you can claim that this was just the heat of war, but there are good examples in other theatres where the tempo of operations has been more appropriately matched to the availability of intelligence, so the massive screw-ups we see here (which aid the enemy overall) are avoided.

What is your problem with SAS chaps seeing the consequences of their actions?

You are painting them as some kind of pathetic snowflakes. Is this what woke culture has led to in the armed forces? The SAS are now unable to handle the results of their behaviour and want some kind of cosy safe space, protected from the micro-aggression of being criticized for illegally killing people?

At the end of the day, if you don't want to do the time, don't do the crime. Own your actions.

I hope for your sake you're deliberately playing daft.

jk

I should save your square eyes for something more interesting. Dad's Army perhaps. I found the journalism overdone, and the rhetoric leading. The evidence, such as it was, was tenuous. If there was a smoking gun, it wasn't presented very well

nah shoot them until you run out and then reload and try again.

The slightly more problematic scenario is after taking that machete wielding terrorist back to their house to search it having them produce a grenade and so you have to shoot them.

Possibly explainable but when you also take that ak wielding nutter back to their house to search it and they produce a genade as well so you have to shoot them it gets definitely gets tricky

When its "the eighth time this has happened" you might have to start asking why they hadnt phoned the cops for some advice on how to secure prisoners.

Quite possibly because the first eight times the unit involved the Afghan National police in the securing of prisoners, their incarceration lasted just about long enough for a suitably large wad of dollars to change hands.

Indeed, something for some here to consider every prisoner in Afghanistan be it al qeada, rebel, terrorist, murderer, or normal criminal was freed or escaped when the taliban took over as part of the bungled usa withdrawal. They are out there somewhere, an intelligence services tracking challenge of some magnitude.

This is almost certainly your best thread ever!

But, is it a serious discussion, or are you just playing progressive buzzword bingo? Or are you some kind of 'woke-bot', sent by the Chinese to undermine society?

"...the reality of Western capitalist imperialism..."

"...how much shite were you spoon fed?"

"A case of British exceptional-ism maybe?" 

"...a common affliction, especially amongst the older more gammony generation..."

"It's all just propoganda."

"The hypocrisy on this thread is sickening."

Absolute classics!

Also (further comment from someone who actually knows what he's talking about):

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-11015513/HARRY-MCCALLION-Im-cert...

I've just watched the Panorama episode and the evidence, although anonymised, was to me far more than tenuous (and I am referring here to the UK aspects, not the already exposed / investigated Aussie one):

- Verbal confirmation from those actually on the SF missions at the time

- Verbatim extracts of mission reports

- emails etc from within SF HQ detailing concerns of staff there

- An (anonymised) officer from SF HQ actually speaking to camera.

With every bone in my body I wish this wasn't true, but I find it difficult to believe that isn't

I'm not saying it's not true. Just commenting on the presentation. It was heavily leading, with its constant reference to SAS 'death squads'. The evidence was anecdotal and circumstantial, and the presentation was overdone and repetitive for journalistic emphasis. Sorry, just my opinion. I was unconvinced. Such is the court of public opinion.

You are a character from Viz and I claim my €5.

I certainly agree that the style was repetitive and irritating, and the hyperbolic references to "SAS Death Squads" and the like intensely irritating.  I think I just discount those as so much reporting is like that these days. 

But at its heart the investigation still had a number of witnesses from the normally closed SF world, with official documents in support, stating that these activities happened, and were considered at the time to be wrong by their peers. 

I’ve followed this thread with interest.

I think what is needed is a proper, and independent investigation which has full access to all documents and witnesses.  The report should be made fully available, as far as possible.  A closed report going to those with appropriate clearance.

Without a thorough and open investigation, the allegations will continue to have a corrosive effect on British forces and our trust in them as they strive to keep us safe.  It also makes it difficult for us to criticise others who have lower standards and take them to task.

Yes. Well I go the other way. As soon as I sense that I am being led to a conclusion, I begin to doubt the veracity of whole report.

One thing that isn't in doubt, I'm not a soldier, but if I were, and I were part of an occupying force where I am readily identifiable by my uniform but my foe were anonymous, indistinguishable and treacherous, then my trigger finger would be set to 'self preservation' by default.

I just assumed you would set Mrs Num Num on them. 

Yes, but there is a wide gulf between 'self-preservation' and taking spare weapons along on an operation, to be planted next to bodies in case you end up raiding some random family's house and feeling like you still ought to kill somebody.

They were targeting random family homes? A new allegation not mentioned in the original report?

Having just watched the documentary after reading this thread I really did feel like Panorama was leading us to a certain conclusion, which I'm not convinced was evidenced in the programme.

The first 5 minutes were films of Aussie SF conducting operations, with Aussie commentators talking about what Aussie soldiers had done. The rest of the programme was an invitation to accept that British forces had done the same based on snippets from emails, testimony from witnesses that were purportedly there, wide ranging assumptions made by unqualified commentators and a comment that "Brits and yanks were doing far worse than [the aussies]".

The selection of film clips were played without any detailed context, for example, the video of the soldier pushing the motorbike over a cliff, inviting the audience to view it as a spiteful petty act without explaining that insurgent forces used motorbikes as one of their main modes of transport. Interestingly there is no footage of UK forces which given the prevelance of GoPros at the time (see Marine A) strikes me as unusual, particularly where there are purportedly whistle-blowers who were with the unit at the time.

It's also interesting that the whistle-blowers are completely unidentifiable. There is no way to properly assess the claims of people who were "there" and remember that there are a lot of people claiming SF links who don't have them, there is a reason people joke about how strong the balcony at the Iranian embassy must have been.

There is also a lot of talk about the rules of engagement that the forces were operating under. Whilst it is true that the majority of the forces in Afghan operated under "Card Alpha", which requires a risk to life to use deadly force, we don't know what the SF were operating under. And nor would we, the rules of engagement profile is (rightly) highly secret. So to make a judgement on the levels of force used without knowing what the legal position is would be inappropriate. We may be able to infer from the reports that the dead posed a risk that there was a requirement to only act in self defence, but that isn't explained in the documentary.

There is a lot more that didn't make sense but the final thing I would like to point out is the use of language. When the SF report their actions the documentary refers to them as "Claims" whilst taking the comments of the obviously independent witnesses as fact.

TLDR - maybe it happened as alleged, maybe it didn't. But the documentary leads you to a conclusion without properly evidencing the claims.

Oh, and if you believe for a second that the Taliban allowed them to speak to whoever they wanted and there was no kind of interference from them, I have a bridge to sell you.

The allegations are that they were targetting raids on locations without knowing whether they housed combatants or civilians, and then during the raids killing people regardless of whether they posed a threat.

Based on comments by an Aussie signaller... Not to be funny but I don't think we should base our assessment of a complex situation on the understanding of one small cog in part of a machine which is not involved with the gathering, processing and interpretation of intelligence.

Fair enough.

I guess the only full understanding of this situation would come from a full follow-up investigation. Which appears unlikely because the military will do anything it can to prevent it, and there will be no public support for an investigation because it is assumed that allegations such as these are only ever motivated by anti-military or unpatriotic sentiment.

So random locations, as you stated earlier. Any link? As this isn’t the situation as I understood it.

Hmm, don't get me wrong, I'm sure there are things that are covered up but look at Marine A, IHAT, recent reports from Kenya. A number of those investigations were not supported by the public but still happened. These things tend to come out anyway.

Let's be frank, decisions about investigations probably looked at the practicalities of conducting an in depth police investigation in an area that was a fairly punchy war zone at the time. I mean this investigation required Taliban minders for their "protection"...

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-62083196

"Several sources who were involved in selecting targets for special forces operations told the BBC that there were grave problems with the intelligence behind the selection process, meaning civilians could easily end up on a target list."

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2022/jul/12/ministry-of-defence-bbc-pan...

"One of those killed was a former district governor, Haji Ibrahim, who had worked with the British. The SAS report of events on the night of 29-30 November 2010 states that Ibrahim was detained, then sent to help with a search at a building – where he was shot dead “when he demonstrated hostile intent by brandishing a hand grenade”.

However, his family told the BBC that his hands were bound and he was summarily killed. His son described having to remove plastic handcuffs from his father’s wrists before the family were able to bury his body.

Similar incidents were noted by the BBC to have taken place on 15 January, 7 and 16 February, and 1 April 2011."

Thanks, I’d read the same. However, anonymous sources alleging “grave problems with the intelligence” is an entirely different allegation to your earlier assertion that they were “raiding some random family's house”.

These things matter. The allegations are serious enough without further embellishment.

Fair enough. The BBC paragraph I cited suggested it was inevitable that some civilian homes were raided. The Guardian paragraph suggested a known non-combatant was executed. I accept that there are other interpretations of those passages, and that I did some extrapolation.

Yes. Your essay broadly reflects my thoughts.

The Panorama report was a clumsy, unintelligent and blatantly leading piece of journalism. It was actually so bad, that it might end up being good.

It wasn't even interesting, It was click bait.

Yeah, sorry, kinda went off on one... :-D

Unfortunately Mrs Num Num would be delighted to see me being shot up in Afghanistan

"Happy for you to argue against the SAS's actions (assuming any of us here actually know the real facts??) but at least please argue from non fallacy."

it seems that the reports submitted by participants in these extra judicial killings (post capture of persons whose identity had not been checked)

was not even believed by people within the organisation.  How can you justify your faith in the "troopers" on the ground who did this?

I do agree with you - they certainly did not prove their case.  It seemed to be put very "persuasively" for watchers who are not too interested in substantiation.  However, it probably raises concerns that merit further investigation.

I thought it, on the whole very poorly presented lacking in supporting evidence as it built its case on assertions based on earlier assertions and while there could be substance they certainly did not present any evidence of independent corroboration.  Pretty typical of modern broadcasting style.  I am concerned that there could be substance at what was presented but not fully convinced by the "evidence" as presented.

It is worth remembering, however, that many wholly uninvolved civilians were killed in actions carried out by the allies, particularly by the US, based merely on "credible intelligence" and that there is thus a context of civilian losses not being given due consideration when intelligence was less than certain.

Look.. I wasn't there: they may have committed crimes against orders, they might have committed following orders, they may not have committed any crimes. Certainly interfering with an investigation which their senior officers did is deeply bad and should be prosecuted in itself. It should be investigated.

However... a lot of comments in this thread, follow the logic of:

• terrible atrocities have been committed in the past (undeniable) then examples with no connection to this such as shameful history in Ireland, US crimes, US contractors crimes, other British army units, all different people in other places at other times.
• Then this is all lumped together in a kind of  "those people"  are bad logic  (based on unrelated examples given, even by different countries). 
• *Therefore*   the events/people we are discussing here can be assumed guilty because they are also "those people" and those people are always bad

How is assuming guilt based on pigeonholing into "tribes" of "those bad people"  different from any other form of   -ism?

Because the Taliban remained very mobile....it was their MO. Intel is only so good ...it's not definite. Bomb maker/local Taliban bully A comes to stay in your house for a few days you don't say no. He'll also make sure you and your children are sleeping next to all points of entry to protect himself. He'll potentially be wearing a vest packed with explosives or may well have a grenade under his clothing. You go in at night and try to lift him ...first you need to separate him before he gets the chance to martyr himself and the surrounding family....and you plus 3 others.

It's a messy business....messy things happen in war. It was a war.

Absolutely. Assessing and neutralising apparent threats, as you've described, is not the focus of this controversy, though. Where this particular SAS squadron allegedly differed from other units is what they did if it turned out that suspected "bomb maker/local Taliban bully A" was unarmed. The crux of the issue is that other UK special forces units were allegedly not handling the messy business of war in the same way as this particular SAS squadron.

Our special forces are world-leading and our interests are furthered by their adherence to rules of engagement. As has been proven with e.g. Abu Ghraib, our interests are never furthered by rogue elements in the military carrying out war crimes.

It's quite one thing to shoot someone engaged in a terrorist operation or preparing to (eg Gibraltar) but quite another to detain someone who may or may not be the suspect you are after and then kill them before identity has been established. 

Yep I agree....I'm not convinced by the Panorama show though. I'm not saying it hasn't happened but unless there is actual evidence....

Lots of claims are made......

Does that apply if/when unarmed British prisoners are shot?