It found that US troops often shot and killed innocent Iraqi civilians, including families, at checkpoints when they wouldn't slow down or stop after being instructed to and warning shots.
The interesting thing about the article is that The Guardian, while quite sympathetic towards the victims, is also sympathetic towards the soldiers who make these tragic mistakes and it explains the difficulties of avoiding killing civilians in wartime:
In the secret logs the killings mainly figure as "escalation of force incidents". Commanders send in reports outlining how soldiers faithfully followed the rules of engagement: first signals, then warning shots, and as a last resort direct fire to disable a vehicle or its driver.The relentless drumbeat of civilian deaths illustrates the nature of 21st century warfare and key differences from the way the Americans conducted themselves in their eight-year war in Vietnam.Suicide attacks were unknown in America's last major foreign conflict before Iraq. There was no expectation that anything on wheels or indeed any pedestrian could be a moving bomb. The second difference is a change in western military doctrine, common to other Nato armies during counter-insurgencies.Known since 2001 as force protection, it puts a high premium on minimising all conceivable risk by permitting troops to bypass traditional methods of detecting friend from foe in favour of extreme pre-emptive action.
Notice how different the tone is from all the articles about Israeli actions during war in The Guardian and elsewhere. This is real reporting, describing the difficulties for modern professional armies in urban environments to avoid civilian deaths. In no way does The Guardian accuse the soldiers of deliberately targeting civilians or of even being reckless in enforcing their own policies. Additionally, the article points out that the US soldiers do what all NATO nations do under similar circumstances.
In short, this article provides context.
It is jarring to read something like this after a year of anti-Israel articles that consistently assume Israeli mendacity, Israeli guilt, Israeli depravity.
The other interesting thing about providing context of how Western armies acted in other conflicts is that they had no transparency. These incidents - and much more egregious ones, involving actual executions of innocent civilians including women and children - were covered up and only mentioned in secret memos, or the soldiers engaged in these actions were exonerated or given a slap on the wrist many years later after the incidents were publicized.
The contrast with the relative transparency of IDF investigations in incidents could not be starker. The IDF admits mistakes far more readily and quickly than the US Army ever has, often within days instead of years. And when the IDF finds that it did nothing wrong, as the US Army usually does when it mounts its own investigations, it is accused of covering up the truth or outright lying.
Here we have an example of journalism in The Guardian. Ask yourself why we aren't seeing this context and even-handedness in the mainstream media during the current war.
