Snipers and the Targeting of Journalists

How has the enemy developed its tactics in Iraq? DefenseTech points us to a PowerPoint presentation for insurgent sniper training (the HTML version is available for those without PowerPoint). The presentation has some tried and true tactics for all snipers: target officers, communications and heavily armed soldiers; do not engage overly superior forces; target high value civilians over military; and other such information. The presentation lists the duties of the sniper and then has a question and answer section on “who would you kill first?”

Two items jump out in this slide show. In one of the “7 Duties of a Sniper”, the trainees are encouraged to target non-combatant military personnel, in clear violation of the Geneva Conventions:

Killing doctors and chaplains is suggested as a means of psychological warfare.

In the “who would you kill first?” Q & A section, targeting journalists is explicitly encouraged. On the order of targeting:

The first one is the Soldier  because he has a MG [machine gun]. Then is the stupid soldier on the left. He is a very easy target (look how he is elevated from the ground), then the soldier or the reporter carrying the camera. First, because the camera can be used as binoculars; second, it is the most difficult thing to hide the death of a reporter in Iraq.

This is a clear and explicit policy to target journalists in a combat zone.

Where is Linda Foley’s outrage over this?

Bill Roggio is a Senior Fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies and the Editor of FDD's Long War Journal.

22 Comments

  • Daily Pundit says:

    Miserable, Lying, America-Hating, Military-Loathing Beeyotch

    Part of the written terrorist doctrine in Iraq is to specifically target and kill journalists. Bill Roggio has the story,…

  • crickets…chirp, chirp…hmmmm

  • Kartik says:

    Astonishing. These left-wing journalists are more interested in opposing Bush and the US military than exposing those who are actually trying to kill them.
    Their ideological hatred supercedes even their desire for self-preservation (much like with Al-Qaeda terrorists). Maybe their DNA is preprogrammed to make them take actions that hasten their own demise. Perhaps this is merely nature’s way of ensuring a continued filtering of refuse out of the gene pool as a process of evolution. Darwinian natural selection at work…

  • Richard Wing says:

    Dear Mr. Roggio:
    I am becoming more and more irritated at the PC for Islam witheach days news reports…..What follows is My thoughts & comments on Islam & response to a Belmont Club Post of 18 Feb. 2005:
    At age 75 I don’t plan on living long enough for it to matter much, and for a long time now I have believed that in our war-on-terror, we should fight fire with fire! This means that if insurgents blow up a Shiite mosque in Baghdad then we should blow up a Sunni mosque in Tikrit! If a cleric preaches sedition in a Mosque in Chicago, then He should be arrested, stripped of citizenship, and either deported or killed as a traitor! According to books written by Craig Winn, that the world is entering the “End Times”

  • Insurgents, Snipers, and Action Figures

    VIA LGF comes this manual intended for terrorist snipers and which was gathered from an insurgent website. LGF points out this little tidbit about who should be shot first in a particular picture:
    The first one is the Soldier  because he has a MG…

  • Marvin says:

    Mr. Wing,
    While your frustration is quite clear, and in large part justifiable, it is my belief that one should refrain from painting a religion (and thereby all its adherents) with such a broad rush. It is true that a portion of those who call themselves Muslims embody what to many is the essence of evil, it is unwise and, frankly, wrong to condemn the religion and its believers for the actions of men.
    Terrorism is truly an evil upon the earth, and as Islamist spread the hatred and vitriol that fuels the willingness to die committing acts of terror, we are challenged to show even greater moral clarity in our response. Yes, we should fight fire with fire, but not indiscriminately. Whether in word or deed, the people of the U.S. and Christians such as yourself, are better served to direct our anger and our responses to those who are responsible for Islamic Terror rather than at Islam or Muslims in general.
    History and current events both show the potential for using religion as a tool for achieving the goals of men. In the end it is that sin that the terrorist commit against God that they will have to answer for, and one we should avoid.

  • Richard Wing says:

    Marvin:
    My response to you is…read the Koran and point out to me anything that is not evil in their book! Anyone who follows the rules and admonitions therein has to be anti-american, anti-freedom and anti-demoncratic or they are labeled a heretic and are shunned or worse. Read and heed, friend, the writings I refer to so that you may understand our enemy!
    Richard

  • Marvin says:

    Thanks for your suggestion Richard. It just so happens that I have read the Qur’an, on more than one occasion (as well as multiple translations of the meaning into English).
    Thanks for commenting at the Fourth Rail.

  • Marlin says:

    This is a little off topic, but for all those interested in Operation Matador there is a great e-mail from a Marine posted over at Little Green Footballs.
    http://littlegreenfootballs.com/weblog/?entry=15924_On_Operation_Matador&only

  • Simon World says:

    Daily Linklets-arity

    Japanese hilarity, Korean killarity, Chinese riot-arity, Taiwanese election-arity, South Asian military, Straits of Malacca-rity, Uzbek violence-arity, and the Middle East and Araby, all on today’s Daily Linklets

  • BR says:

    Thank you, Bill Roggio, for this post. I have quoted it and linked it in the comments section in this thread at wizbangblog.

  • Richard Wing says:

    To Marvin:
    I apologize for the terse, brief response to your reply to my comment. Here is a a better answer to what you comment….
    Your comment shows a woeful lack of understanding and education on the subject. You really are just parroting the screed of the Islamist propagandists and anti-war activist cowards who play directly into our enemies hands and avoid confronting the fact that the fundamental source of all this evil and those that perpetrate it on the innocent are the mosques and madrasses that indoctrinate their Muslims followers with the call to Jihad.
    Also, you overlook the fact that one can, by choice or intimidation, join Islam, but cannot, when disillusioned leave without being labeled Apostat and suffering pain of torture, mutilation, and/or death …a real incentive to remain and do what one is told whether one likes it or not. This is full loss of freedom!
    Now it is time to reread the Koran, (its all there in black and white) as well as some of the other articles and books I cite to fully understand the enemy we face. Then maybe you can bring some refutation or valuable criticism to the table for discussion. Blaming the actual perpetrator of the evil deeds done in the name of this “religion”

  • Bill Roggio says:

    Richard Wing,
    Besides your post being completely off topic, it is 180 degrees from my thinking. I find it abhorent and repugnant to suggest extermination billions of people just as much as I find the pacifist approach to be naive.
    Your ideas make are no better than ideas of the enemy we fight. They also wish to destroy our civilization. But, as Iraq shows, they are a small percentage of the population, and they need to be routed out.
    I will not expand upon this theme because it is a belief system I do not share.
    And do not accuse those whowrite for this site as Islamist propagandists. You know nothing about who they are, and do not pretend you do. Bill, Marvin, Justin and I are committed to victory. We just don’t happen to believe every single Muslim is worthy of death in your perverted war.

  • Words Mean Things: Dissecting Foley’s Statements In Search of Meaning

    Journalists and those in the journalism industry earn their livelihoods and practice their trade on the intellectual and purposeful use of language and precise choice of words. Being a professional, Linda Foley’s words were precisely chosen for a rea…

  • Dittos to Marvin and Bill. Especially to Bill’s last comment. ‘nuf said there.
    As for the sniper issue, yes that is just like the enemy we’ve been facing. I recall reading time and time again during the actual invasion how insurgents would hide behind women and children, then, when we did an “end around” would immediately surrender. Cowards.

  • They Shoot Reporters, don’t They?

    Check out The Fourth Rail for the link they posted to a Powerpoint presentation that the insurgent terrorists in Iraq made for their snipers.
    They, uh, target reporters. Get that, Eason Jordan and Linda Foley?

  • Good Question

    Bill Roggio asks, “Where is Linda Foley’s outrage over this?” A very good question, indeed.

  • Shoot the Reporter

    Sniper training reveals targeting guidance. Some excerpts: Killing Doctors and Chaplains is suggested as a means of psychological warfare. If you see a line of soldiers, kill the one you think is the officer. Then, shoot the communications officer -…

  • Words Mean Things: Dissecting Foley’s Statements In Search of Meaning

    Journalists and those in the journalism industry earn their livelihoods and practice their trade on the intellectual and purposeful use of language and precise choice of words. Linda Foley chose her words carefully…and meant them.

  • JunkYardBlog says:

    LINDA FOLEY WAS RIGHT

    This is just unbelievable. Linday Foley, the journalist union exec who said that journalists are being targeted for death in Iraq, was right. Journalists are being targeted, deliberately. Bill Roggio has the proof, which he found in a PowerPoint presen…

  • The Dogs of War

    While the media continues to press for American self-flagellation over supposed flushing of Qur’ans in Gitmo (which by the way has no basis in fact), our enemies in Iraq continue to act in the most…

  • Journalists are targeted

    Concrete evidence of the intentional targeting of journalists has finally emerged. A training manual for snipers instructs students to target doctors, chaplains and journalists. In the section labeled “7 Duties of a Sniper”: Killing doctors and chaplai…

Iraq

Islamic state

Syria

Aqap

Al shabaab

Boko Haram

Isis