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WASHINGTON D.C. (ABC News) May 26 — Senior Pentagon officials are bracing for an investigation into the killing of 24 Iraqis last November in the town of Haditha. The officials tell ABC News the investigation will likely result in criminal charges that could range from dereliction of duty to murder.
As this unfolds, military officials say they fear “Haditha” will come to mean what “My Lai” — the massacre of Vietnamese civilians American troops in 1968 — meant for an earlier generation. The incident is still under investigation, but several senior military officials say at least seven Marines could face criminal charges.
Although the investigation is not complete, the Pentagon has already briefed key members of Congress on the details of the investigation. After a briefing, Chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee John Warner told reporters, “there are established facts that incidents of a very serious nature did take place.”
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By the time the dust settled, at least 24 Iraqi civilians, most unarmed, lay dead.
«« click on pic for video Iraqi girl witness
Haditha war crime?
The military issued a press release that day saying a roadside bomb killed one Marine and 15 civilians and that an additional 8 insurgents were killed in a firefight. It was not until February — when Time Magazine showed a US military spokesperson a videotape of the bloody aftermath taken by a Iraqi journalism student — that the military investigated the incident.
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Military officials say Marine Corp photos taken immediately after the incident show many of the victims were shot at close range, in the head and chest, execution-style. One photo shows a mother and young child bent over on the floor as if in prayer, shot dead, said the officials who spoke to NBC News. One military official says it appears the civilians were deliberately killed by the Marines, who were outraged at the death of their fellow Marine. “This one is ugly.”
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In a sign of how serious the Pentagon takes this, Marine Corps Commandant General Michael Hagee is traveling to Iraq to offer a stern reminder to fellow Marines. The Marines have distributed a copy of the speech General Hagee plans to give. “We do not employ force just for the sake of employing force,” General Hagee will say. “We use lethal force only when justified, proportional and, most importantly, lawful.”
"But I will not let myself be reduced to silence."
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(The Nation) April 12, 2006 — As the Los Angeles Times reported on Saturday, this much is known to be true: On November 19, after a roadside bomb killed Lance Cpl. Miguel Terrazas, 15 Iraqi civilians – including seven women and three children – were allegedly shot and killed by a unit of US Marines operating in Haditha, Iraq. Then, this past Friday, a battalion commander and two company commanders from the same unit were relieved of their duties.
US media coverage of the Haditha allegations has been startlingly limited. In addition to the Time investigation, AP reporter Bassem Mroue has followed the case and Knight-Ridder reporter Nancy A. Youssef has written an article as well. That’s it. Much has been written in the UK press and in English-language papers around the world.
● Aug. 3, 2005 – 14 Marines Killed in Haditha
● Iraqi Doctors Beaten and Arrested in Haditha Hospital
● U.S. Forces Destroy Eight Bridges over Euphrates
● Children of Abraham: Death in the Desert ◊ by Gandhi
≈ Cross-posted from Arminius’ diary —
Bombshell! Murtha describes Marine massacre of Iraqi civilian ≈
LEAVE Iraq to the Iraqis
"But I will not let myself be reduced to silence."▼ ▼ ▼ MY DIARY
I can’t connect to that video. Is there a certain player I need to download?
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ITV Video – March 30 2006 — A young Iraqi girl has exclusively given ITV News a shocking first hand account of what witnesses claim amounts to mass murder by US troops in the war-torn country.
Ten-year-old Iman Walid lost seven members of her family in an attack by American marines last November. The interview with Iman was filmed exclusively for ITV News by Ali Hamdani,our Iraqi video diarist.
ITN TV – an earlier video w/o interview
"But I will not let myself be reduced to silence."▼ ▼ ▼ MY DIARY
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Iraqi Girl Tells of US Attack …
"But I will not let myself be reduced to silence."▼ ▼ ▼ MY DIARY
Here was my May 17th
diary on this. Some more good links.
I’ll bet there have been many slaughters like this. And every air strike amounts to the same thing.
But with this one there are hints that a perfect storm may be brewing. The evidence is overwhelming and cannot be denied. The situation is archetypal for the Iraq war. The international press is outraged. The initial pathetic coverup has been blown apart. The U.S. military is forced, just like the check of a king, into movement.
But the cold hard truth is that the majority of Americans does not give a shit. “War is hell” is the closest some come to acknowledging a problem. Many cheer the death of infidels.
Thanks for that video. What called my attention was that the patrol was iraqi-american. Looks like death squad training to me.
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MILWAUKEE (AP) May 22 — Those who count the increasing number of American soldiers killed in Iraq are missing the bigger picture, retired Gen. Tommy Franks said.
“What we’re talking about is neither 2,400, 24,000 or 240,000 lives,” Franks said at the National Rifle Association’s annual banquet. “Terrorism is a thing that threatens our way of life. It doesn’t have anything to do with politics. We have to secure ourselves. We have to secure our Constitution.”
U.S. troops death toll rises ...From my diary :: Tony Blair Secure In Green Zone Visit
≈ Cross-posted from Betsy L Angert’s diary —
President Bush, Prime Minister Blair Come To Visit, Converse With Me © ≈
"But I will not let myself be reduced to silence."▼ ▼ ▼ MY DIARY
Tommy Franks is a piece of shit. He and Rummie and their shortsighted war planning has led us to massacre and torture by design. Franks and Rumsfeld should be tried and executed.
an American who just recommended this diary along with the others in the past outlining this atrocity (apologies for the profanity that follows)
WHY WHY WHY must I endure endless news articles outlining the horror that is supposedly done in my name? I grew up with a near-iconic respect for my flag and the values that were supposedly united with the words ‘United States’. FUCK, SON OF A BITCH, GADDAMITTOHELL!!!!!! How could ANYONE justify this type of murder?!?!? I spend my days wishing both of my granfathers who served in Korea and World War II were alive so I could sit them down by themselves and ask them what they really thought about the time they served. Were they a part of something similar in their lives? Were they haunted until their dying day by the screaming of another human being being massacred by their hands or those of their compatriots? How did they square it with the good people I know and love as veterans, people whom I will gladly honor on Monday as I remember their memory on Memorial Day. WHY? And HOW as human beings do we continue to enshrine, idolize and support acts of war under ANY circumstance?
Sigh….these are such hard inner-conversations, but they must be done so that not only horrific events like Haditha will never occur ever again, but any and all acts of aggression.
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In WWII some 60 million people died from 1939-1945. There were battles on military fronts, troops attacking the civilian population were minimized. The “war crimes” came from aerial bombardments of London, Coventry City, Rotterdam, Dresden …. and more. The revenge killings on civilian populations were performed by hardened SS troops: Putten 1944 – btw during the German occupation and a revenge for an act of resistance.
When frontlines are blurred and the battle runs in civilian suburbs, the Pentagon and US Military should have a tough discipline in command structure to avoid killing of innocent civilians.
There was never the intention to show this kind of leadership going into this illegal war, nor once the U.S. and British forces got bogged down, to stop the abuse, torture and indiscriminate killings of suspects. The Coalition is the agressor by invading a sovereign nation and evolved into an occupier. The primary goal is to avoid casualties of their own in the short run. However by inflicting suffering on the civilian population, the blowback in the long run will be “terror” for years to come.
Get out now and make a true effort for peace between Israel and its Arab neighbors. Not by stopping humanitarian and medical aid to the Palestinian people in the occupied territories.
Bush promised a two-state solution by the end of … 2005!
"But I will not let myself be reduced to silence."▼ ▼ ▼ MY DIARY
It should, but I don’t have faith that our media will give it more than one news cycle and then let the story recede into the ether. I hope I’m wrong. It’s not like they can make it go away all over the world, our media only has the power to keep americans ignorant.
Will there be any reaction to the possibility these troops might be eligible for the death penalty in this?
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Thu Nov 24th, 2005 at 10:06:45 AM PST
BAGHDAD, November 24, 2005 (IslamOnline.net) – Residents of Haditha, western Iraq, are being massacred by the Iraqi national forces and US occupation troops, according to the Association of Muslim Scholars (AMS), Iraqi’s highest Sunni authority.
Orders to Kill
Qubaissi further cited another “horrible massacre” committed by US troops in the city.
“US forces ordered a vehicle carrying 11 Iraqis to stop and ordered them out for claims of being ‘terrorists’,” he said, citing one of the survivors. “The men denied the claims, but a US commander ordered gunning them down.”
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An Iraqi source in the city said US forces banned residents from moving with their cars.
“They also threatened to kill citizens if US forces came under attacks from the resistance groups,” the source was quoted as saying by Al-Quds Press.
It added that US occupation forces also banned food and fuel into the city, the move which aggravated the already difficult humanitarian situation in the city.
● U.S. Forces Destroy Eight Bridges over Euphrates
Sat Oct 8th, 2005 at 02:17:23 AM PST
WASHINGTON D.C. (NYT) May 27 — Officials briefed on preliminary results of the inquiry said the civilians killed at Haditha, a lawless, insurgent-plagued city deep in Sunni-dominated Anbar Province, did not die from a makeshift bomb, as the military first reported, or in cross-fire between marines and attackers, as was later announced. A separate inquiry has begun to find whether the events were deliberately covered up.
Evidence indicates that the civilians were killed during a sustained sweep by a small group of marines that lasted three to five hours and included shootings of five men standing near a taxi at a checkpoint, and killings inside at least two homes that included women and children, officials said.
That evidence, described by Congressional, Pentagon and military officials briefed on the inquiry, suggested to one Congressional official that the killings were “methodical in nature.”
"But I will not let myself be reduced to silence."▼ ▼ ▼ MY DIARY
More parallels.
to minimize the horror of this situation, or to somehow advocate that the individual marines who perpetrated this atrocity should go unpunished.
Many, many years ago, as a former Army infantry lieutenant, I wrote a NYT op-ed piece about the situation with Lieutenant William Calley — the platoon leader in charge during the My Lai massacre, and the only man to be convicted of a crime in that situation.
My point then, as it is now, is only to understand that when you take young, barely-past-adoloscence men, with little worldly experience or formulated values systems, then put them into the military, which then brainwashes them to become soldiers — a brainwashing that basically inverts any moral values system you might have brought with you from civilian life, that teaches you to dehumanize your enemy, turn him into a gook or a towel-head or camel-jockey or whatever the current term might be, the easier then to kill him (or her) because it’s no longer a him or a her, it’s an “it”, then throws you into a situation where you can’t tell the “good” locals from the bad locals, so for survival’s sake you start seeing ALL locals as “bad” — then I’m afraid the question is not why did this happen, but why doesn’t it happen more often?
As another poster here mentioned, we massacre civilians all the time — from the air. No one is in an uproar about the pilots who massacre civilians. So where is the logic of prosecuting some men for killing civilians with bullets, and making heroes of others who kill civilians with bombs?
All I know is this: nobody who trained those marines, nobody who was responsible for providing them guidance and leaqdership in a tough morally-ambiguous situation, is going to be punished for this (I mean REALLY punished, not just “relieved” of command). And as far as the military is concerned, the main thing these sad-sack marines did wrong was they got caught.
I have a hard time with your post as the “I was just following orders.” line is bullshit. In Germany, Nazi’s who parroted that one were executed.
it is clear you don’t understand what I was saying, nor do you understand what war is about.
As if there is any other kind! Why do vets always feel they can talk down to others? Have had that experience too many times to count.
And I do know history!
you have stooped to Kossian methods of dealing with those you don’t agree with.
If you will read my original post, you will see that I NEVER indicated that those who engaged in this were not guilty because they were following orders.
I only tried to supply some context in terms of how basically ordinary — perhaps at one time decent — young men could stoop to such animal behavior. And I bemoaned the fact that those who put them in that situation — and contributed to forming the mindset that allowed them to do what they did — will get off scott free.
Clearly, you have a problem with veterans. I don’t claim to know it all, never have. I have strong opinions and I state them.
But, if you haven’t been to war, then you’re fuckin A right that I know moere than you.
And if you can’t deal with that, tough shit.
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It’s criminal for U.S. leadership to enter the Armed Forces, in a battle to operate as killing machines on a mission of pacification, rebuilding and “democratization” of a nation. The German and Japanese forces were very disciplined, therefore the command structure caused the responsibility and accountability of Nazi leadership at the Nuremberg trial.
No soldier was made accountable, unless there was reason to believe he acted alone without orders to unlawfully murder civilians.
● American military personnel are allowed to refuse unlawful orders
"But I will not let myself be reduced to silence."▼ ▼ ▼ MY DIARY