Channel 4’s documentary is an engrossing look at Royal Marine Al Blackman, who was charged with battlefield manslaughter. But it fails to ask basic questions about the real victim – the man he killed
“I don’t think I am a murderer,” says ex-Royal Marine sergeant Alexander Blackman. “I don’t think I was a murderer. I am not a murderer.”
But if what Blackman did in a field in Afghanistan almost 11 years ago doesn’t make him a murderer, what is he? On 15 September 2011, after a firefight, Blackman and two other marines from J Company walked across the field to the injured body of a Taliban fighter who had earlier attacked a military checkpoint. The insurgent had been hit by some of 139 anti-tank bullets fired from an Apache helicopter but was still alive.
