I hate to say this, because it sounds cold and harsh, but that "innocent" Iraqi Civilian was far from innocent.

He WAS STEALING and got caught. The car may have been his livelyhood, but at least he is out of jail and can pursue another livelyhood/car. If he was in jail, he would have no chance at any income.

The crushing of the car seems harsh, I'll admit, but the reported twisted the story to make the US seem like the bad guys.

Now while I would normally agree with you, to me it looks like they are "stealing" firewood (electricity and gas being in short supply there at the moment) and the troops seem to have a language problem with the men they captured. Then they _shoot_ the car, before running it over, cheering all the way. It just comes across as the troops enjoying themselves a little too much.
I guess it's because I'm more used to how the British army handles these sorts of things, but it all seems a bit over the top.
And, yes - I'll agree that the reporter gave the biggest spin on the story.

Even if they were stealing firewood, they were taking somebody else's firewood so that person was left without heat. cooking fuel, etc.

Yes, they were rough, and probably did enjoy it a little too much (teenagers tend to do that, even 20-somethings - its immaturity), but there would never have been an issue if the Iraqis weren't stealing in the first place.

Fair enough that it could have been someone Else's firewood - and that the piece isn't designed to show the military in the best light.

...But it still seems that doing that sort of thing doesn't help endear the Iraqis to their "occupying army". I guess I have a different view on things as we Brits have a fair bit of experience of being an "invading army" - Northern Ireland is still fresh in some of our memories, and stuff like that won't help in pacifying the locals. Actually I heard that some of the American army bods are asking the ex-head of operations in Northern Ireland for plans on tactics/strategy for Iraq.

(Which was the point of my post anyway...)

*For the record - yes I was against the war, but I do think that Saddam Hussein was "evil" (although it seems, possibly a necessary evil), now I think we can't leave until the whole mess has been sorted out. And I'd like some British/American/A.N.Other politicians lose their jobs over the whole WMD/lying about a threat issue*