Some of the training I received in the military was driving and protecting Senior Officers and Senior Civilian employees overseas.

The rules of engagement were pretty simple:

1. Protect the passenger by any means necessary, including lethal force.

2. Distance them from the incident area immediately, by any means necessary and without stopping.

3. If stopped, lay down a 180 degree field of fire to suppress the threat and evacuate the passenger to the backup vehicle.

4. If rushed by a crowd, do not stop until you have enough bodies piled up to lose traction and then refer to rule three.

My trainers were retired Secret Service agents and these are the rules they follow every day when in motion.

This is the reality folks when it comes to protecting someones life and your own. Blackwater was following standard SOP and successfully extracted their client from harms way.

The unwritten rule is: Do what you have to do and let God sort out the bad guys.

OK, when have we ever seen car bomb video footage before? And was this video hand-picked by the State?

And we're supposed to take special interest in the bullet dents of a vehicle in a war zone? How do we know it is from this particular instance?

And the ABC's coverage only shows the car bomb. What about when blackwater opened fire?

Will ABC get other video from other sources? Does ABC want to be the propaganda machine of the State?

The only people more full of BS than the Iraqi govt and the US govt are the people on this board. We should be ashamed that our govt supports and pays mercenaries to do our fighting for us. This goes about as low as the terrorists. In 2004 during the election cycle GWB told the world the Iraqi military would be fully trained, armed, and ready to take control by Sept. 2005. What ever happened to that? Why does it take so long to train their military to protect themselves? It all seems a little to self serving to me. We are still there for a reason and in my heart I believe it has to do with the lack of oil production.

THis is shameless.

As others have noted, these pictures have nothing to do with the attack that resulted in civilian deaths. The aerial photo isn't even from that day...it just a picture of where the vehicles supposedly were on the square. Nor does the caption of the picture of the armored vehicle -- which puports to show "damage" from "small arms fire" even claim that the damage was sustained in the square at the relevant time.

guardian's right; put yourself even 200 yards from this blast. whatch'a gonna do? Who you gonna call? Okay, the civvie's aren't as trained or as disciplined as the soldiers, but don't you want the soldiers home? If that's your option, then the mercs are gonna stay and provide detail for the suits...

These pictures are proof positive that Blackwater did nothing wrong. The reality of war is that civilians unfortunately get killed. In this case it seems obvious that the 20 civilians were either NOT civilians or were killed by the roadside bomb itself.

The Dems need to either shut up, get with the program, or move to another country.

The people of Blackwater are heros and are doing a very difficult job in a very difficult place. They deserve our praise.

The scorn of the Dems on the brave men of Blackwater is a badge of courage.

Terrorist are waging a propaganda war, our main stream media and the Liberals have fallen for it and are compelled to past it on to the rest of the world. it this war has a out come that will dissolve global terrorism, it won't be because the left and media had anything to do with it....

Is this a joke? One lousy photo of what could have happened anywhere at anytime.
Where is the video? And, how did the first blog post just happen to be pro-Blackwater?

you wing nut really have me laughing at all you "bush lied" "blackwater lied" bullcrap

someone spell out exactly what the lie was...tell me exactly what bush lied about...what did black water lie about?

senerio: a cop gets infomation that a drug dealer is dealing inside a specific house but while the cop is geting his team together and the nessesary warrents the dealer flushes the drugs down the toilet...oh no! they didnt find any drugs,,,does that mean the cop lied? or better yet the drug dealer slipped the drugs to one of his nieghbors.

at least 18 UN resolutions telling irag "you better stop and prove to us you have stopped or else"

how many warnings do ou have to give before someone should do something?

would you give a drunk driver 18 warnings before you locked him up?

Been there, done that. BW is completely out of control. We stayed away from known BWs.

Pictures show little. State department dude should have stayed in his well-protected bunker for the duration. Next time, the freedom fighters will likely be better prepared, perhaps mining the road.

BTW, white car was approaching at oblique angle, at high speed against the convoy traffic flow? Why was that a threat? That is total hogwash. Whitewash!

Iraq PM uses BW because he is a puppet of our govt, duh!

Blackwater is only carrying out Bush and Cheney's policy to reduce the population of Iraq, so it will be convenient to turn Iraq into another Saudi Arabia. One must realize that George Bush has turned the United States into a very sick, sadistic country.

There are lies and then damn lies...regardless of what transpired, governments lie and kill with impunity while the "peasants" are either forced into the lies or killed. Also, the Geneva Convention will not protect mercenaries.

Civilian vehicles interferring with a line of civilian vehicles (blackwater vehicles are NOT military). Iraqi policemen firing a "civilians" (Blackwater are NOT military) that are firing at their civilians.

Why is it we have Blackwater anyway? Why are they serving the function of military personnel and/or secret service? Oh, that's right, Iraq was the great privatization experiment. Everything was to be privatized, then brought back to the States. What's going to happen when these mercenaries return to the U.S.? Why is it now o.k. to have corporate militia's on American soil? (North Caroline, San Diego bases for Blackwater) This is absolutely nuts.

The reason we have Blackwater over there in Iraq is, basically, two fold.

1. With the cuts in the military in the 90's. We don't have the personnel like we use to.

2. The civilian agencies operating in Iraq don't want to compromise or relinquish control of their security to the military. They would much rather come and go as they please and not be confined by supposed limitations by the military.

I'd much rather have the military do the job and not have guns-for-hire over there. But the reality dictates otherwise, hopefully not for long.

KoS

THIS INFORMATION IS NOT TRUE.

PLEASE FOLLOW THROUGH WITH THIS.

DO NOT ALLOW MORE INNOCENT IRAQIS DIE
BECAUSE OF THIS RELIGIOUS GROUP WITH AN AGENDA.

JIMMY

YES I KNOW IT IS NOT NICE TO YELL.

IT IS ALSO NOT NICE TO KILL.

When serving military who have seen Blackwater in action are prepared to label them racist goons causing more threat to the troops I am prepared to believe them. Blackwater should be disbanded as a murderous institution.

Blackwater is seeking employment in the United States. They were employed after Katrina. At that time there were a lot of phony claims about criminal activity. These claims were probably a large factor in Blackwater getting that employment. They now seek to be retained to 'help' after natural disasters or to provide 'security' to hotel chains. Any state or organization which employs them should be boycotted.

Nice touch, ABC, adding the "exclusive" images of the explosion, which was miles away and 15 minutes before the actual shootout, and the damage it caused - which has absolutely no bearing on the shooting incident - right before showing the Blackwater convoys. There are no images or video of the actual shootout that the mercenaries engaged in to "save their lives." If those mercenaries are so spooked by every white sedan, Iraqi policeman, civilians who might be disguised insurgents that they see then they clearly don't belong in our country.

Nice spin, ABC. You're doing a good job for the U.S. government and good "journalism."

If there are police raiding the crack house next door, does a civilian have the right to kill the crack house's occupants?
No, because only the police are authorized to use such force.

Since when is it legal for civilian businesses to engage in warfare? Blackwater should receive the same due process as I would if I went to another country and started killing people. Even if they claim self defense, they should claim it in a legal process.

Just ignoring the shootings establishes a dangerous precedent for American businesses to start killing people to serve their profit agenda.

Sorry ABC... I am not buying the bush lies being peddled here in this story. The entire Blackwater boondoggle needs to be shut down, in fact all mercenary contracts need to be canceled, and return the job of war to the experts in the military.

Just more proof that privatizing government is a complete and total bust, as it only creates more costly failure than the socialist military we used to have could ever have created.

These criminals will have their day in court...