mkcerusky, I'm not going to pretend I know all the circumstances of the shooting. But don't you think it is possible this was a tragic accident???? You are sitting in your safe chair behind your computer, so I very much doubt that you can comprehend the incessant fear of being an American soldier in Iraq. Every day they hear about a colleague being killed. There are suicide car bombers EVERYWHERE. They come out of nowhere and you have VERY little time to act and save yourself. I'm sure every second, the soldiers that get checkpoint duty are stressed out to breaking point,looking for any possible threat such as a jihadist car bomber. Iraq is an INCREDIBLY dangerous place, and that airport road is THE MOST DANGEROUS in Iraq. The notion that the US soldiers purposely shot up an Italian rescue operation is LUDICROUS!!!! All this theory confirms is that Italians really are an incredibly emotional people, ready to accept the most sensationalist explanation for anything. And on a second thought, that Italian anti-american journalist really should not be in Iraq, trying to drum up support for withdrawing Italian forces in Iraq. All she is doing is providing the terrorists with a kidnap target so that they can demand millions in ransom, which go to fund further killings of innocent people.