[Gank]

http://www.aljazeera.com/cgi-bin/news_service/middle_east_full_story.asp?service_id=2020
look at point 4.

[Petrarch of the VBB]

"His left head"

It's not Zaphod, is it?

[Flipside]

Interesting indeed..... Though not condemning evidence, it certainly makes one pause for thought, especially those bright orange overalls...........

[aldo_14]

Sounds a bit iffy to me.... i mean, based upon (largely) a white picnic chair and yellow walls?  I have a chair like that in my back garden,it's not exactly custom decor.

It just seems pretty damn unlikely to me.... I haven't (I'm glad to say) seen the video, but there's nothing they say which can be considered particularly daming - in particular, the orange jumpsuit could be an intentional reference to the Iraqi prisoners.    

The US military cap, I couldn;t see - and it's not beyone reason that a) it isn't a Us military cap or that b) it is, and it's a 'trophy' from some battle or otherwise.  In terms of the bloke not moving (which again, I haven;t seen), it's plausible and even likely he was heavily drugged beforehand.

As for the blood - i can't say (not seen the video and have no intention of seeking it out)

[adwight]

It's real, if you don't think it isn't, you are stupid.

[Rictor]

seriously, its not that gory. I watched it (though with the sound off, it was like 2am and I don't want to wake anyone), but it not terribly frightening. Probably I have been desensetized to violence, but I don't know why everyone is claiming the most horrific thing ever.

I admit, any of those pieces of evidence alone would not be a convincing case. But all of them together do make it seem like quite a coincidence. Same jumpsuit, same walls, same chair, and the military cap that pokes in.

There are some people out there who will claim that such an act is beyond the US military, that they could never commit such a thing. I'm not one of them. And I'm sure that these claims will be refuted by some people on that alone.

Two more things that I saw on another website regardnig the peculiarities is that one of the killers appears to be wearing very clean white sneakers, and another claim is that part of a US military uniform pokes in at one point, much like the cap.

Originally posted by adwight
It's real, if you don't think it isn't, you are stupid.

your logic is simply outstanding, sir. I applaud you. Irrefutable evidence, to be sure.

[01010]

I personally saw no cap, I saw a hand and that was about it.

[Grey Wolf]

The video did seem rather odd. Admittedly, I saw a very low bandwidth version. But it did look rather odd.

[Rictor]

It should also be noted that apparently, the captors offered Berh in exchange for prisoners. The US refused, and well, you know what happened next. That is, if we are indeed talking about two different groups of people.

[Rictor]

here it is, the website with the military jacket stuff:

http://www.aztlan.net/berg_abu_ghraib_video.htm

edit: image removed, not everyone might be OK with it...

[Carl]

Originally posted by adwight
It's real, if you don't think it isn't, you are stupid.

double negative.

[vyper]

Uhum, Rictor that image might be considered a tad... out of place. I reckon ye should keep yer link up but loose that image from ur post.

[Flipside]

I think the problem is that this whole war is being fought in peoples minds, in both the West and the East.

I can accept that there are American Soldiers who believe enough that doing something like this would be 'for the good of America' that they could justify it to themselves.

I can equally accept that such things were deliberately and silently put into this video by the Al Quaida fighters so that they could be 'found' at a later date.

It's mind games on all of us, that's what truly disgusts me about the behaviour of all our governments, I don't like my head being screwed with

[Reez]

Even if he was drugged, once a person has their head removed, they're nerves left to the rest of the body go off like crazy... so legs should be twitching, as well as his arms and what not. That's why they say that after you cut off a chicken's head, it'll keep running for a few seconds before it dies. And If you've ever cut your head, it gets pretty damn bloody around you. If you cut your head off, I would expect it to be worse, and with far more blood than the video showed.

However, with all that said, I can't believe that it was completely fake. The chair is common. Everyone has seen those chairs or has them. My neighbour has a set, I don't think he imported them from Abu-Ghraib. And of prisoners have escaped from Abu-Ghraib because of the lax secuirty and horrible roll counting. So it's quite possible that they got those prison jumpsuits from one of their guys that escaped. of the evidence is circumstancial.

Perhaps the most damning would be the hat though. As we can see from all the flag burning going on, they don't hold too much value for American symbols. I find it highly doubtful they'll keep a beret as a souvenir.

[Corsair]

I'm dubious. Highly common chair, highly common color wall. Like Reez said, the orange uniform could've come from an escaped prisoner. I didn't see a hat though...

And honestly, if the U.S. military had done this video, you think they would've kept in an army guy poking his head into the video for a second? I don't think so. Editing videos isn't all that hard...

[Lightspeed]

But then again, U.S. Military aren't really smart.

Now if it were indeed fake, that would make a lot of sense in a worrying way.

[Rictor]

yeah, suddenly all those people yelling "barbaric" would have to direct that rage against their own camp. Quite inconvenient..

[Reez]

not really. remember the lack of twitching and blood. if we're going to go with the conspiracy theories, then he's probably not even dead. I doubt the Americans would be willing to kill one of their own, cuz they do see themselves as superior.

[Bobboau]

I like how some people are willing to beleive that we decapatated a man just so we could make propaganda against Al Qeta, but if someone sais something like "the US military does not intentionaly kill unarmed civilians" they go nuts.
if for just once, JUST ONCE, I could click on a "hey this is funny" or "isn't this interesting" thread, that had evedence that the US may NOT be the most concentrated source of evil, maybe I could posably consider not thinking that some people are just ****ing brain washed morons!

[Rictor]

You think you can take the worst speller spot from me that easy? You don't know who you're messing with, I was bastardizing the english language while you were still in diapers boy.

but seriously, I'm a skeptic. I try to go on proof as much as possible. So, for this, there seems to be a certain amount of proof (in addition to several peculiarities regarding Berg himself), so I have reason to doubt the official story.

If there is proof that 9/11 didn't happen exactly as certain people would like the world to believe, I'll look into that. If there is evidence that casts doubt on theories or conclusions, thats worth looking into.

This works both ways, in that I will doubt a particular story if there is evidence to justify that doubt, even if it would vindicate Americans and indict someone else. If evidence came to light that indicates the Abu Ghraib photos were faked by insurgents as propaganda (just as an example), I would look into that.

But I admit, I do have a certain bias. While most people here can agree that Osama & Co are barbarians (in their methods at least), some people do not regard the other side, the US troops, as harshly. In this, I will admit a bias, in that I do regard the troops as equally savage and equally brutal. I could argue that this is not a bias at all, but rather a lack of hypocrisy, but it is a bias from the norm, thats much is true.

The thing is, I always assume that there is more to a story than meets the eye. If someone says "incompetence", I see "plausible deniability". If someone says "accident", I see "pre-meditated". If someone says "isolated", I see "systemic".

But this does not make me a tinfoil hatted nutter. Just think back to a year ago. How many stories were exposed as false? As lies? As cover-ups?I can think of at least half a dozen*, and I assume that if someone has lied before, they are likely to do it again. Doesn't that make sense.


* Jessica Lynch, Saddam's capture, pre-war WMD "proof", a missle attack during the opening invasion - debunked by Robert Fisk, the "decapitation strike" on Saddam during the first day of the bombing, the Abu Ghraib coverup, the toppling of Saddam's statue, various civilian killings of dubious intent, the helium vans...and thats just off the top of my head.