Haditha = "Apocalypse Now" (Sunday Herald)

[tocqueville]

Haditha: the worst US atrocity since Vietnam … Iraqi women and children massacred by American marines. How did it happen?

CIVILIANS who spent time at the Haditha Dam base of the Third Battalion of the First Marines describe the place as something out of Apocalypse Now or Lord Of The Flies. It was “feral” one said. Soldiers didn’t wash. They had abandoned regulation billets and had built make-shift, primitive huts bearing skull-and-crossbone signs. The place stank. One American civilian engineer attached to the camp, with the task of keeping the huge hydro-electric dam nearby operating, said he was terrified of the soldiers he had to live alongside.
Kilo Company was part of the Third Battalion. At 7.15am on November 19 last year, as a column of Kilo Company Humvees drove down the Hay al-Sinnai Road in Haditha, a bomb exploded under the last vehicle – the “tail-end charlie” – killing the driver, 20-year-old Lance Corporal Miguel Terrazas.

What happened next will go down in US military history as the worst deliberate atrocity carried out against unarmed civilians by American forces since the notorious massacre at My Lai in Vietnam when GIs killed around 500 people – mainly women, children and the elderly.

Minutes after Terrazas died, the remaining 13-strong unit of marines went on a bloody rampage, wiping out whole families, killing women, children and an elderly man in a wheelchair, and hurling grenades into homes. In all, 24 Iraqi civilians were murdered by American troops. The killings are already having a corrosive effect on US society, war-weary from scandals such as the torture of detainees at Abu Ghraib and the ever-mounting death toll of American troops. US government sources say some of the marines involved will be put on trial, and could face the death penalty for their crimes.

http://www.sundayherald.com/56107

[Viva_La_Revolution]

1. "just one isolated incident" "a rogue unit"

You'll hear those phrases a lot in the next few weeks.

They are trying to spin it as the only incident. Don't let them.

[Bluebear]

2. Yes, Bushbots, they used the word ATROCITY.

Of course, you don't care about the "international press", I bet. We don't need a permission slip, as I recall. :cry:

[Hubert Flottz]

16. Invading Iraq was the "ATROCITY"

The war that didn't need to be fought. Karl Rove's political ATROCITY...

[Robbien]

3. That is an article which will never be re-printed in the US

But it will be re-printed in many nations all over the world. Just like Abu-Ghraub, everyone outside the US will know the details of what happened but only those those who surf the web in the US will know.

[Swamp Rat]

7. ok, so let's recommend it a hundred times so it stays up on the greatest

Then when network news interns scan DU's front page, they will see it... over and over ... and so will lurkers... and freeps and lizards and...

[Selatius]

4. I don't know how anyone could rationalize shooting women and children

This sickens me the most:

Eman Waleed, a nine-year-old girl, was a few minutes walk from the site of the bomb which caught the Humvee, at the home of her grandfather Abdul Hamid Hassan Ali, an 89-year-old amputee in a wheelchair. Eman recalls the moment the killings started. “We heard a big noise that woke us all up. Then we did what we always do when there’s an explosion – my father goes into his room with the Koran and prays that the family be spared any harm.”

While her father prayed, Eman, her mother, grandfather, grandmother, two brothers, two aunts and two uncles stayed together in the main room. Eman recalls sitting in her pyjamas and hearing shooting as the marines moved towards her home. They stormed into the house, went to the room where Eman’s father was praying and shot him dead. Then they entered the room where the rest of the family were huddled together.

“I couldn’t see their faces very well,” said Eman, “only their guns sticking into the doorway. I watched them shoot my grandfather, first in the chest and then in the head. Then they killed my granny.”

The marines started to spray the corner of the room with automatic fire where Eman and her eight-year-old brother Abdul were being shielded by the other adults. Both Eman and Abdul were wounded but survived. Eman’s aunt fled the house as the shooting started, taking her five-month-old niece with her. She escaped. Her husband, who also tried to escape, was shot in the head. In total, seven family members died. Eman’s grandfather was shot nine times. His death certificate notes that his intestines had spilled through the exit wounds in his back.

Only one of the adults in the house that day survived. Eman and her brother hid under a bed, with their family lying dead around them, and waited two hours before Iraqi soldiers arrived to help them.

The marines then moved to the house of Younis Salim Khafif, which he shared with his wife, Aida, and their six children. Aida was in bed recovering from an operation so her sister was in the house to help out with family chores. A neighbour says he heard Younis beg for his life, telling the marines in English: “I am a friend, I am good.” They shot him anyway. Eight people in the house that day – everybody apart from a 12-year-old girl – were murdered as the marines opened fire and then lobbed in hand grenades. The children who died were aged 14, 10, five, three and one.

How could anyone shoot children? How could anyone shoot a one year-old? How do you slaughter an entire family of innocent, unarmed people? What the fuck kind of shit is that!?

[HipLibMom]

6. So sad...

How could anyone shoot children? How could anyone shoot a one year-old? How do you slaughter an entire family of innocent, unarmed people? What the fuck kind of shit is that!?

It breaks my heart... :cry:

And you just know that this is just the tip of the proverbial iceberg.

[man4allcats]

8. "What the fuck kind of shit is that!?"

The kind that warrants a sentence of death for those convicted of this crime.

[Swamp Rat]

5. But My Lai was 500 people! This was only a dozen or two.

WHAT THE FUCK IS WRONG WITH MY COUNTRY?!?!?!

MY FELLOW AMERICANS, ARE YOU FUCKING PSYCHO?!?!?!???

[unschooler]

9. This is what happens in wars. It's predictable, and everyone who

supported this war should have known this sort of thing would happen.

[haab]

10. No it is NOT what happens in wars...!!!!

The murder of civilian women and children is not acceptable in war...

These are war crimes and the perpetrators must be punished.

[Disturbed]

11. Even if this has happened a thousand

times is various wars it is still not acceptable and never will be.

This is murder!

[unschooler]

26. Did I say it was acceptable?

:shrug:

I said Bush should have known it would happen. He probably did, and didn't give a damn.

[unschooler]

25. I didn't say it was "acceptable" and I DIDN'T say it shouldn't be

punished. I said it's predictable.

It's not just about "rogue" soldiers. It's about top-level leaders who should have known that a certain percentage of our soldiers would go berserk, as they have in every war, and should have (or maybe did but didn't care) considered that reality when they decided whether to go into Iraq.

My Lai was wrong. Srebrenicza was wrong. Darfur is wrong. Haditha was wrong. YES. The individual soldiers should be punished.

But the civilian leaders who started this mess should be held responsible.

[DoYouEverWonder]

13. This isn't a war

We invaded a sovereign country and we are the OCCUPYING POWER.

We own the place, it is up to us to provide for the safety and security of the Iraqi people which we seem incapable of doing.

[unschooler]

27. Yep. But that's not what happens when you arm a bunch of 19-year-olds

and put them in hostile territory and teach them that the local people are terrorists and deploy them for second and third combat tours. What we saw in Haditha (and how many other places that we haven't learned about yet) is the predictable result of decisions made by Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld and the rest of them.

I'm not for a minute defending those Marines, just as I wouldn't defend the guards at Abu Ghraib. But it's completely disingenuous for the military and civilian brass to disassociate themselves from "rogue" soldiers, when they created conditions they should have known would likely result in the extremely bad behavior. The blame for this belongs squarely at the feet of the Bush Administration.

Sure. U.S. soldiers are supposed to secure the country. The reality, though, is that "occupations" are rarely benevolent for the occupied.

[fasttense]

12. Troops allowed to ignore regulations will eventually

turn into a pack of criminals. Men do like war and battle. There is an adrenaline high when aggressions are let lose to slaughter and mame anyone in their path. That is what happened here. Because the leadership turned its back on the out of control behavior of these Marines, the Marines let loose on the innocent.

The leadership failed to control them, so they took control themselves. Is it any surprise what with Generals more concerned about their careers than about the troops that these Marines were allowed to ignore all common military procedures and regulations. Is it any surprise that our dysfunctional government can't lead troops. I bet those Marines thought they were abandoned by their leaders, thought that no one was looking after them as their military bearing slowly disintegrated. They were no longer a functioning military unit, they were spiraling out of control on the brink of self-destruction. That's why their behavior was so reckless. They were asking their leadership to take control and rein them in. Instead, their leaders ignored them and let them go wild.

[lebkuchen]

19. That's why Rummy should be fired right now!

excellent post, btw.

[unschooler]

28. And Bush and Cheney with him!

:mad:

[Olney Blue]

14. Rummie knew in March.

From the article:


President Bush has said of the marine massacre that “those who violated the law will be punished”. Bush also apparently roasted his secretary of defence, Donald Rumsfeld, for not informing him of the killings promptly when Rumsfeld learned of the events in March.

[lebkuchen]

20. Bush, get off your lazy privileged ass and make a REAL admin change.

For every day you keep Psycho Rummy on the taxpayer dole, the GOP loses thousands of votes. What's that madman worth to your party?

[flyarm]

21. rummy knew well before march...if i knew about it in jan rummy

sure as hell knew about it in nov or dec!!

fly

[opihimoimoi]

15. Bush has allowed a STAIN on our Marines by not vigereously

determining wha happon and punishing those guilty.

Bush has pushed the boys to the limit and beyond...for that he is partially to blame...

Bush should be pulling out the troops as suggested by Murtha...

But he won't...

[lebkuchen]

18. Bush should have begun a draft months ago.

He didn't, and Haditha is the result.

There were vets who had deployed more than once to Vietnam, but that was by choice. What Bush has done to the NG/Reserve units alone is calamitous.

Rummy has not even admitted to soldiers' being deployed for three tours to Iraq/Afghanistan. Time flies, eh Rummy, when "cakewalks" are half-baked?

Stories of four or five deployments to a war zone will be commonplace over time because the Bushies will not begin a draft before the Nov. '08 elections. The result: atrocities will become SOP. Meanwhile, Condi has the temerity to give Iran "just weeks" to comply with her demands. And if Iran doesn't, Condi?-- who's going to fight your latest trumped-up battle?

The Bushies, as civilians in ivory corporate headquarters, can't understand the depth of physical and emotional wear and tear involved with each deployment, so they push and push units to deploy, endlessly. There's a price to be paid for such indifference to the human condition.

[opihimoimoi]

24. SAD Pathetic and TRUE....Damn these dudes for their boneheadedness

[lebkuchen]

17. Camp Pendleton Marines were interviewed the other day

One Marine, about to go on his second tour, said that when a friend gets his head blown away, you develop "a different attitude," which sounds like a rationalization for what had happened in Haditha. I wonder if that Marine had experienced a similar situation relative to Haditha on his 1st tour. The reporter didn't ask. I would have.

A Navy vet said Americans were in Iraq because of terrorism, i.e. that Iraq had something to do with 9/11, which Bush has admitted was not true. The absurdities Americans still believe...it's tragic. The Navy vet thinks that we've probably been over there too long. I guess he hasn't heard about the $1 billion embassy Halliburton is building in Iraq, not to mention the 14 enduring bases.

Military--active duty and vets alike--often claim expertise over the civilian sector because they've "been there" while civilians haven't, but I often find that so many vets don't know shit.

A retired LT COL dismissed Bush the other day to me after years of singing his praises: "He's finished. He's a lame duck. It's time to move on to the 2008 elections."

Bush is FAR from finished with destroying the U.S. The tighter the noose around his neck, the more desperate his actions will become. Our military will sense that desperation and mimic the behavior, as they have been doing.

http://video.msn.com/v/us/msnbc.htm?f=00&g=0af8f59e-de3e-42f8-b127-142139a5d5cd&t=m5&p=Source_Nightly%20News

[FreeStateDemocrat]

22. Sunday Herald reader's poll: Should the Marine commanders responsible for

Haditha be prosecuted?

Response Votes

YES 82%
NO 18%


http://www.sundayherald.com/

[lebkuchen]

23. Yes, but

who's responsible for the Marine commanders? Prosecute that person as well.

[unschooler]

29. That would be the Commander in Chief.

And the people who put him in office.