Australian SAS Soldier Allegedly Killed Unarmed Afghan

Cast your minds back to December 2013 when Royal Marine Sergeant Alexander Blackman was sentenced to life imprisonment. Australian SAS Soldier Allegedly Killed Unarmed Afghan.

A War Crime?

Back in September 2011, Royal Marine Sergeant Alexander Blackman responded to a patrol base that had come under small arms fire from two Taliban insurgents. The Taliban insurgents were enemy combatants, men who had probably taken other British soldiers lives. The Taliban are responsible for some of the cruellest and most depraved murders known to man.

They are jihadists; they kill indiscriminately and with brutality.

One of the Taliban insurgents was mortally wounded by Apache helicopter gunfire. When Sergeant Alexander Blackman managed to reach the insurgent enemy combatant, he shot him dead with a 9mm pistol saying "shuffle off this mortal coil you c**t". Sergeant Blackman also mentioned its nothing the Taliban wouldn't do to him and those serving with him at the time.

The British press and their spin on the story was a disgrace; they focused on a few minutes of camera footage and audio, then tried Sergeant Blackman in their "slanted" court of public opinion. The left and right-wing press referred to the incident as an "execution" a "murder" and that it was an act carried out "in cold blood".

The Guardian - Who Else?

Pretty much all of the British press smelt blood themselves, and immediately went on the offence to murder a loyal, experienced and talented Royal Marine, one who killed an already mortally wounded "enemy prisoner". The Taliban insurgent was not captured or imprisoned; he died on a battlefield in a theatre of war.

That was the truth. However, the British press decided otherwise and painted a very different picture.

Sergeant Blackman was given a life sentence for killing an enemy combatant, on a battlefield, in a theatre of war.

History Repeating Down Under?

Our colonial cousins in Australia produce brilliant, hardened and talented soldiers as we do. They too serve for Queen and country with honour and distinction. Back in 2012, an Australian SAS squadron was patrolling in an Afghan village - Deh Jawz-e Hasanzai.

Three squadron SAS were looking for an insurgent bombmaker after disembarking from a Black Hawk helicopter. The helicopters guided the squadron towards a mud compound; a person had been spotted in a wheat field nearby.

A dog handler with the SAS let his K-9 go and caught the Afghan, another SAS operative was there at the time. The dog was called off, and the Afghan man was shot dead, apparently at short range.

An Australian Defence Force investigation claimed that the man's killing was justified because it was in self-defence. Australian broadcaster reported that an unarmed Afghan man was shot three times in the head and chest as he cowered on the ground.

TR.News doesn't have any "inside source" nor do we have any witnesses to the event in question. What we do know from the report is that the Afghan had been seen with a radio and what "little footage" there is on the ABC article does not show any radio.

This report of an "alleged incident", much like in the case of Marine A, gives little footage and audio; therefore, it provides minimal context. Virtually no context but a headline suggesting a SAS soldier shot dead an unarmed Afghan man at close range. The article also goes on to suggest that this incident is "potentially a war crime".

Just as we said before, TR.News does not have any background to the incident in question and certainly not from the soldiers perspective, but neither does ABC!

ABC has already tried the SAS soldier in the court of their "slanted" public opinion, just as the British press did with Marine A - Sergeant Alexander Blackman.

Maybe the press should be sent out to fight in war-torn Islamic shitholes, sleep-deprived, stressed, over exerted and all while their colleagues are shot dead, captured, tortured and murdered brutally in front of them.

Then maybe, just maybe, the press might start actually appreciating what our Armed Forces do, and realise the real-life combat stresses our serving soldiers endure to keep us safe.

Until that time comes, always expect half a story and a sensational headline that tries our soldiers before any investigation is complete. Such is the state of the "journalistic profession" these days.