US Navy Seal on trial for War Crimes

neckbeardthethird

neckbeardthethird

neckbeardthethird

Associate
Joined
9 Oct 2018
Posts
1,304
Navy SEAL Special Operations Chief Edward Gallagher is accused of a variety of war crimes ranging from using a knife to kill a teenage Islamic State prisoner in Iraq to murdering numerous civilians including a young girl and elderly lady as well as having a hard-on for firing rockets into civilian areas for entertainment.

He was reported to the authorities by his fellow Navy SEALS who claim to have witnessed him committing numerous war crimes. He denies their claims and says they are trying to set him up.

I personally find it hard to believe fellow Navy SEALS would accuse someone of crimes this serious just because they didn't like him.​

You can read more details about the case here:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eddie_Gallagher_(soldier)#Criminal_allegations

Trump is apparently considering pardoning him if he is found guilty and the conservative media in the US has been trying to sell the story of him being a victim in all this, particularly focussing on the murder of the Islamic state prisoner as that's a lot easier to sell as being 'ok'. They have purposely under-reported the more shocking accusations of him murdering innocent civilians.

What are GD's thoughts on this? Should he be jailed if found guilty? Should he pardoned because war is war? The general perception in conservative America seems to be that he should be pardoned if found guilty and that he's actually a war hero.

edit: why is some of the text in this post black? I've got no formatting anywhere in the post :confused:
 
Last edited:
Whilst war is war there should still be (and there are) rules of engagement. If he is proven guilty he should be punished just like an everyday person.

Apart from anything else if he isnt punished it ruins the reputation of the 99% of honourable people out there just doing their job and trying to do their best in a tough situation.

IF that wiki is accurate then my gut feeling is prison would be too good for him.
 
Last edited:
omnomnom said:
If found guilty he should be punished accordingly. This is obvious surely.
Click to expand...
Yup.

And if he's found guilty but Trump pardons him it's going to do wonders for military discipline with the message that you can break some of the most basic rules of conflict as a member of the US armed forces, in the most blatant ways possible and walk free.

The US spent decades trying to sort out it's discipline after Vietnam, and Trump the GOP are willing to throw it away.

What he is accused of doing is horrific and if half of it is true he should probably be locked away for the rest of his life, to me it's telling that members of his own unit were scared of what he could do.
 
This perhaps isn’t the sort of thing you’d expect multiple US service members to stand by unless it was quite serious/blatant.

Like something more in a grey area, partly accidental perhaps partly negligent then you’d perhaps anticipate people standing by their buddies, closing rank etc...

Obvs innocent till proven guilty but this guy sounds like he might well have been quite a nasty piece of work if the people serving alongside him are reporting him. Rather than say MPs following up an incident or third parties making a complaint.
 
Roar87 said:
He should definitely be jailed if he's guilty, what Conservative media is saying otherwise, do you have any links?
Click to expand...

Pete Hegseth @ Fox recently said this after news broke of a possible pardon.

“These are men who went into the most dangerous place on earth with a job to defend and made tough calls on a moment’s notice. To the people in middle America, who respect the troops and the tough calls they make, they’re going to love this. These are the good guys. These are the war fighters.”

Hegseth has also been privately lobbying Trump on behalf of the family to get a pardon sorted if he's found guilty.

https://twitter.com/PeteHegseth/status/1130650077326970881

Watch some of the Fox videos on youtube about the case, they try and push the American hero angle and like to leave out the accusations of him murdering civilians. There was an article in the Federalist about how no one can judge him until they've been in a war themselves... which sort of sounds legit until you realise that the vast majority of troops don't intentionally kill civilians and furthermore the people who initially judged him, were his fellow SEALS.

There seems to be a sustained attempt to try and rationalise the crimes he's been accused of. Fox viewers (maybe not all of them, but id wager a lot of them) have already come to the conclusion he is innocent, and even if he's found guilty they want him pardoned... that's partly because of how the story has been framed by the media.

It's entirely expected though... all media frames stories the way their viewers want to see them. Conservative Americans love their troops, I don't criticise them for that but when they love them so much that they'd pardon them of war crimes then we've definitely gone into crazy town.
 
Its fine Trump will pardon him for a job well done. The US military might have to go back to just shooting their illegal soldiers, calling it an accident.
 
Last edited:
I suppose there are parallels to how people in this country feel about soldiers being prosecuted for things that happened in Northern Ireland
 
Roar87 said:
I suppose there are parallels to how people in this country feel about soldiers being prosecuted for things that happened in Northern Ireland
Click to expand...

**** no, those were British citizens that were gunned down. Unless of course you feel the Irish are sub human perhaps?
 
jsmoke said:
Jesse Ventura criticised the Iraq war and was smeared by the seal community so it does happen.
Click to expand...

I can't remember exactly but wasn't that just a few of them slagging him off after he sued Chris Kyles wife ?

If so there is a big difference between that and this...
  • According to Naval Criminal Investigative Service (NCIS) files, a member of Gallagher’s unit — Alpha Platoon, SEAL Team 7 — is expected to shed light on Gallagher having previously confessed to killing four women.
  • According to court documents, two other SEALs have told investigators that Gallagher had spoken about killing “10-20 people a day or 150-200 people on deployment.”
  • Another sniper is planning to tell the court that Gallagher claimed that “he averaged three kills a day over 80 days.”
  • According to the SEAL community, Gallagher tried to cover up allegations with threats. These threats included the murdering of witnesses and attempting to blacklist whistleblowers in the special warfare community and ruin their careers.
  • In total, seven fellow SEALs came forward to their troop commander to call for a formal investigation of Gallagher. They claim the troop commander warned them that speaking out could cost them their careers.
That's some pretty bold stuff to fabricate and to then lie under oath about it as well. I guess it's possible but lord knows what he's done to make 7 SEALS hate him so much they are willing to make all this up.

Should be noted there is no physical evidence, the case will be mostly focussed around witness testimony.
 
Last edited:
StriderX said:
**** no, those were British citizens that were gunned down. Unless of course you feel the Irish are sub human perhaps?
Click to expand...

What are you talking about? This guy committed crimes in Iraq and some people in America don't think he should be punished. British soldiers potentially or did commit crimes in Northern Ireland and some people think they shouldn't be punished. How the **** from that did you assume *I* think the Irish are sub human?
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom