Haditha “Massacre”
A shameful pack of lies, distortions. WSJ:
The incident at Haditha–or the massacre, as it is often called–is due for a wholesale rethinking. The allegations are that in 2005 U.S. Marines went on a killing spree and deliberately executed 24 Iraqi civilians. The casualties have drawn an extraordinary amount of political attention, becoming an emblem for everything critics say is wrong with the Iraq war–in the common telling, another My Lai.
Thus Congressman Jack Murtha, a decorated combat veteran, made accusations of war crimes and said the Marines had killed “in cold blood.” These are serious charges; and military justice continues to deal with them seriously, though thankfully at a slower pace than politics. Now the prosecutions have mostly unraveled. It seems Haditha, though tragic, was exploited politically, and the allegations were exaggerated, if not unfounded.
…
At Haditha, did the Marines act reasonably and appropriately based on their training? They were in a hostile combat situation where deadly force was authorized against suspected triggermen for the IED, and were ordered to assault a suspected insurgent hideout. In retrospect, the men in the car had no weapons or explosives; in retrospect, the people in the house were not insurgents. No one knew at the time.
Innocents were killed at Haditha, as they inevitably are in all wars–though that does not excuse or justify wrongdoing. Yet neither was Haditha the atrocity or “massacre” that many assumed–though errors in judgment may well have been committed. And while some violent crimes have been visited on civilians in Iraq and Afghanistan, overall the highly disciplined U.S. military has conducted itself in an exemplary fashion. When there have been aberrations, the services have typically held themselves accountable.
The same cannot be said of the political and media classes. Many, including Members of Congress, were looking for another moral bonfire to discredit the cause in Iraq, and they found a pretext in Haditha. The critics rushed to judgment; facts and evidence were discarded to fit the antiwar template.
Most despicably, they created and stoked a political atmosphere that exposes American soldiers in the line of duty, risking and often losing their lives, to criminal liability for the chaos of war. This is the deepest shame of Haditha, and the one for which apologies ought to be made.
Murtha apologize over slander of Marines in combat? He’s as likely to do that as he is to let go of the pork pie also known as his congressional seat. But he may be compelled to squirm:
WASHINGTON (AP) — A federal judge refused Friday to dismiss a defamation case against Rep. John P. Murtha and ordered the Pennsylvania Democrat to give a sworn deposition about his comments alleging “cold-blooded murder and war crimes” by unnamed soldiers in connection with Iraqi civilian deaths.
A Marine Corps sergeant is suing the 18-term congressman for making the charge, which the soldier claims is false. Murtha, who opposes the Iraq war, made the comment during a May, 2006 Capitol Hill news conference in which he predicted that a Pentagon war crimes investigation will show Marines killed dozens of innocent Iraqi civilians in Haditha in 2005.
Murtha’s office declined to comment on the ruling. A Vietnam veteran and retired Marine Reserves colonel, Murtha has said his intention was to draw attention to the pressure put on troops in Iraq and efforts to cover-up the incident.
… U.S. District Judge Rosemary M. Collyer said the congressman might be right, but said she won’t know for sure unless Murtha explains himself …
“You’re writing a very wide road for members of Congress to go to their home districts and say anything they choose about private persons and be able to do so without any liability. Are you sure you want to do that?” Collyer said, adding later, “How far can a congressman go and still be protected?”
Collyer said she was troubled by the idea the lawmakers are immune from lawsuits regardless of what they say to advance their political careers.
Mark S. Zaid, the attorney for the plaintiff, Marine Staff Sgt. Frank Wuterich, … said Murtha was not acting within his congressional duties and was instead trying to embarrass then-Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, with whom Zaid said Murtha had a personal dispute.
Posted by Jules Crittenden at 1:32 pm on Friday, October 19, 2007
4 Responses to “Haditha “Massacre””
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October 19th, 2007 at 2:20 pm
Slander is a huge issue and I hope Murtha gets held accountable and SSGT Wuterich gets made whole.
But consider that to get to powerful government official Rumsfeld, powerful government official and senior officer Murtha went through a sergeant.
That members of either party consider powerless citizens mere pawns in their petty power struggles with each other is bad enough, but this from a member of the party that touts itself as the defender of the little guy, the marginalized, (blub) the powerless…
October 19th, 2007 at 2:42 pm
V of the C: “That members of either party consider powerless citizens mere pawns in their petty power struggles with each other is bad enough,”
Murtha didn’t just go after a little guy. Murtha went after Marines in the middle of a war zone, and did so without any evidence beyond the accusation. This is the man who used the phrase “slow bleed” to describe cutting off funds for troops in the field, in the middle of a war. That phrase is the most honest thing out of Murtha’s mouth, for we would have seen our men bleed for sure. Just the proposal caused many to bleed, slowly or otherwise.
Murtha is a particularly loathsome worm and I commend the Sgt. for his courage in taking him on.
October 19th, 2007 at 3:10 pm
Can’t say I disagree at all salty, especially being the career military man that I was. But a good 40% of “us” don’t see things that way, and to get ready for our coming radical egalitarian administration, we are going to have to start putting our arguments in terms they will understand. They understand class and race warfare as their primary means to power and they need to have that used against them, often in my view, because it is an intellectually and morally defunct world view. The fact that they used Marines in combat as mere tools to get back at Bush and Rumsfeld means nothing to them. Does not even register. They don’t acknowledge there is a war or that there is a reason for one, or if there is, they think we are fighting in the wrong “theater” or haven’t rounded up the “inspiration” from his damp moldy cave.
I personally believe they are beyond shame, because had we had the support of so called liberals the last few years, our radically liberal efforts to change a monstrous, threatening regime and jump start the Middle East into something more civilized and less murderous would have been successful long ago. And they should be extremely ashamed of that, being “liberals” and all. But they are not.
Bottom line, I am with you. Going after troops in combat is reprehensible. But it is only reprehensible if it is something you respect above all other endeavors in the first place. You and I do, they don’t. Not sure how to get around that other than to engage them on their terms and destroy their core arguments. Beat them at their own game.
October 19th, 2007 at 8:38 pm
“Destroy their core arguments”. Actually, that is not possible. I believe you are completely right in your statement, “They understand class and race warfare as their primary means to power… ”
But here’s the problem. Marx, the main progenitor of the ‘class warfare’ idea ['The Communist Manifesto', 1848] did not believe in debate, or in argument at all. He thought debate was for the bourgeoisie, and the only meaningful thing to do was seize power by any means. Debate, discussion, and discourse were the tools of ‘bourgeoisie’ classical liberals, like the founding fathers, who strove to refine and advance the cause of democracy.
If you confront socialists/communists to “Destroy their core arguments”, they will not debate with you. They will respond by shouting you down, launching ad hominem attacks, ignoring you, or trying to charge you with a hate crime.
When the communist-hunters of the 50’s confronted their adversaries, they wasted no time in debate with them. They simply strove to remove communists from any position of power or social influence.
Take it from an ex-Troskyite, if you ever win a debate with a ’socialist/communist’, that person is not a true believer.