Yes, especially when they saw the rescuers come and try to save the injured, they just had to kill those as well. How dare rescuers try to save lives! This is war, which clearly means shooting anything that moves is the best policy. </sarcasm>
This is not a "shoot anything that moves situation." It's a "if you're called in to the middle of a firefight you resolve doubts in favor of whatever protects other U.S. soldiers."
""" Gabriel Schoenfeld, Senior Fellow at the Hudson Institute said of the airstrike:.
It is precisely the presence of weapons, including RPGs, that goes a long distance toward explaining why cameramen for Reuters—pointing television cameras around corners in a battle zone—were readily mistaken by our gunships for insurgents. The video makes plain that in this incident, as in almost all military encounters in both Iraq and Afghanistan, our soldiers are up against forces that do not wear uniforms—a violation of international law precisely because it places innocent civilians in jeopardy. """
Don't get me wrong, I don't think it's never appropriate to second-guess a soldier's conduct in war. But "war crimes" are purposefully malicious actions in the absence of a threat. Not bad judgment calls in response to what you can make out from hundreds of meters away in the middle of a firefight.
This is a war crime: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/My_Lai_Massacre.
And you might want to read up exact transcript of the conversation in the chopper [2].
[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civilian_casualties_in_the_War_...
06:33 Come on, buddy.
06:38 All you gotta do is pick up a weapon.
06:44 Crazyhorse this is Bushmaster Five, Bushmaster Four break. We are right below you right time now can you walk us onto that location over.
06:54 This is Two-Six roger. I'll pop flares [drop flares]. We also have one individual moving. We're looking for weapons. If we see a weapon, we're gonna engage.
07:07 Yeah Bushmaster, we have a van that's approaching and picking up the bodies.
07:14 Where's that van at?
07:15 Right down there by the bodies.
07:16 Okay, yeah.
07:18 Bushmaster; Crazyhorse. We have individuals going to the scene, looks like *possibly* uh picking up bodies and weapons.
07:25 Let me engage.
07:28 Can I shoot?
07:31 Roger. Break. Uh Crazyhorse One-Eight request permission to uh engage.
07:36 Picking up the wounded?
07:38 Yeah, we're trying to get permission to engage.
07:41 Come on, let us shoot!
07:44 Bushmaster; Crazyhorse One-Eight.
07:49 They're taking him.
07:51 Bushmaster; Crazyhorse One-Eight.
07:56 This is Bushmaster Seven, go ahead.
07:59 Roger. We have a black SUV-uh Bongo truck [van] picking up the bodies. Request permission to engage.
08:02 Fuck.
08:06 This is Bushmaster Seven, roger. This is Bushmaster Seven, roger. Engage.
http://www.collateralmurder.com/en/transcript.html https://www2.centcom.mil/sites/foia/rr/CENTCOM%20Regulation%...
Sure, the guy is eager to engage, but remember the whole context of this is that the Apaches were called in to protect American soldiers under fire in that area.