Prisoner punched to death on the way to secret camp. Oh dear.

[Garbarsardar]

But this new world faces a new threat: of disorder and chaos born either of brutal states like Iraq, armed with weapons of mass destruction; or of extreme terrorist groups. Both hate our way of life, our freedom, our democracy.

You may chuckle at will with the above, but the following makes for some infuriating reading.

It's the usual story: enemy combatant or some other living euphemism gets kicked and punched to death by RAF servicemen on his way to a secret detention camp. Nothing really new or surprising here; however the degree of Orwellian double-speak, evasion and obfuscation from MoD, coupled with their perennial ineptitude to cover their tracks deserves your attention.

Asked about these mysterious deaths, the Ministry of Defence named one of the deceased as Tanik Mahmud, and said he had "sustained a fatal injury" while travelling aboard an RAF Chinook. Perplexingly, the ministry added that the cause of his death remained unknown.

Asked how they could be sure he had suffered a fatal injury when the cause of his death was not known, the MoD took five weeks to answer.

Eventually, officials admitted that the RAF had received a complaint – anonymously, they said – that "three RAF Regiment personnel on board the helicopter had kicked, punched or otherwise assaulted Mr Mahmud leading to unlawful killing".

9 years it took to the British Government to make an inquiry on to these events of which the result shall not see the light of day.

The review of Operation Raker being conducted by IHAT is nearing completion, and a report is expected to be handed to the head of the RAF police at the end of this month. The MoD says it is not going to be published.

I am aware that enemy combatants have a special place in every nation's armed forces at least since WW1 where many Belgians were gunned down as "franc-tireurs". But I am also aware that behavior as the one delineated in the quoted article had always being branded as barbaric or tyrannical and is not worthy of country as the UK. Or is it a moot point nowadays?

[Magicman2051]

Its verging on moot.

For the most part the armed forces of various countries, regardless of intent, are adopting a "things happen" approach to incidents like this. It isn't as simple as just assigning blame or demanding better conduct, in many cases blame is irrelevant and to demand better conduct is redundant as the idea of even trying to aim above the bar they've established is absurd.

[Ahlerich]

in astan a german major ordered an airstrike when fuel trucks got stolen. the result was colleteral damage. many civilians stealing the fuel were killed. the major had to take responsibility and got punnished hard "for coleteral damage" only. sure germany is especially carefull due to its history and yet..
..maybe some countries should set themselves strikter rules and punnishments to avoid murders. i am not even talking coletaral dmg, i am talking killings like this or that wuterichs kill squad for example.

i think especially in conflicts where we are supposed to be the good guys with the moral highground some efforts should be taken that we behave like the good guys. in general that might even be the case and yet these exceptions seem to be ignored as good as possible.

[Oswald von Wolkenstein]

Isn't it odd how the fact that if the same prisoner had been shot in the face, this wouldn't be a story. Shoot them? Fine. Blow them up? Fine. Set them on Fire? Fine. Punch them? God good man, have you no decency!!!?

[lordoftheT]

Isn't it odd how the fact that if the same prisoner had been shot in the face, this wouldn't be a story. Shoot them? Fine. Blow them up? Fine. Set them on Fire? Fine. Punch them? God good man, have you no decency!!!?

There was a time when fisticuffs was considered right and honorable. Truley we live in dark times.

[Ahlerich]

öhm, i thought the beating resulted in a death. so shooting to death > beating to death? i must be lost in translation or maybe its just a cultural difference?

[Condottiere 40K]

Shootings can be quick and accidental; beatings tend to be prolonged and usually require intent.

[Jom]

Shootings can be quick and accidental; beatings tend to be prolonged and usually require intent.

You can't really "accidentally" shoot someone whilst transporting them in a helicopter. This is a very strange line of reasoning to go down, and I think we should return to the issue at hand rather than debating whether it's better that a detainee was murdered via a bullet or a fist.

I wonder why they use "unlawful killing" rather than "murder". The two are essentially synonymous, no? It certainly wasn't manslaughter, unless you want to go down the route of arguing that the servicemen didn't really want to kill him, just rough him up a bit.

[Yoda Twin]

You can't really "accidentally" shoot someone whilst transporting them in a helicopter. This is a very strange line of reasoning to go down, and I think we should return to the issue at hand rather than debating whether it's better that a detainee was murdered via a bullet or a fist.

I wonder why they use "unlawful killing" rather than "murder". The two are essentially synonymous, no? It certainly wasn't manslaughter, unless you want to go down the route of arguing that the servicemen didn't really want to kill him, just rough him up a bit.

Though it's hard to comment without the complete set of facts, if the local jurisdiction's definition of murder includes the intent to cause grevious bodily harm (local legal term, basically really serious injury), then murder would be fairly reasonable.

On the "unlawful killing" thing, it does seems odd to use such terminology, as it's not necessarily a fact, merely an opinion, something the MoD wouldn't want to display usually IMO.

[Jedi1]

Connotations and the art of PR, its the practice of putting as positive a spin as possible on every thing a government, military, company, etc does.

At any rate one can't make a judgment on the act without further details, though it sounds like it was murder. It is however unavoidable that incidents such as this occur during war, however much we try to avoid them. That is one of the reasons the war (and wars in general) should never have been started in the first place.

[Heinz Guderian]

I want to say these are just "Bad Apples", but i'm getting pretty sick of that. May God punish Blair for what he has done to my country and the way he handed over our sovereignty to Washington.

[nein]

>barbaric or tyrannical and is not worthy of country as the UK

agreed, the UK used to pull off much worse . This is a joke in comparison, the good old days of mass genocide and starvation are clearly over. Still britain has left behind quite the legacy

>May God punish Blair for what he has done to my country and the way he handed over our sovereignty to Washington.

no such thing, and you don't understand how reality works. You are talking about nationalistic crap designed to keep the masses retarded. Britain is not the US' lapdog, both of these peoples are owned by the same elites. And these same people use nationalism as a tool, the same as politics and religion. Divide and conquer, make the slaves hate one another and keep the focus away from themselves. The only difference now is that the US is the platform of tyranny instead of the UK

[Heinz Guderian]

Cant argue with that

[John ''True Grit'' Wayne]

People are beaten in custody all the time..
I know many people who have been beaten...

[LSJ]

People are beaten in custody all the time..
I know many people who have been beaten...

Where do you live, Detroit?

[Kanaric]

I want to say these are just "Bad Apples", but i'm getting pretty sick of that. May God punish Blair for what he has done to my country and the way he handed over our sovereignty to Washington.

You should apply for statehood so you have rights as an American rather than just being a puppet colony

[Davius]

You should apply for statehood so you have rights as an American rather than just being a puppet colony

Denied.

It's payback for British warcrimes in the 1700s and early 1800s.

[John ''True Grit'' Wayne]

Ireland.In Dublin the Garda do not have guns but they have nice big shoes and battons to make up for it.
I had a detective point a gun at my head during questioning.He got angry at me saying no comment for nearly 6 hours...And he had to write his question and my answer for that time LOLZ..
A cop can beat you and tell you ur going to be in the papers and get raped in jail etc to mess ur head up.Its their job.The weak rat up everybody but the strong say Yuuuuuuu

[Spitfire -WONDERBOLT!]

This, is not what the RAF does, there must have been someone from Sis on that plane, or flogging needs to come back.

God save us.

[Ahlerich]

why are we comparing and connecting dick slapping with murder here?