Military Inquiry Is Said to Oppose Account of Raid
In February and March of this year a US military investigator found that the US marines accounts of what happened in Haditha did not add up with the evidence that he was confronting.
Most beguiling was the fact that the death certificates of these supposed victims of a roadside bombing all contained details of gunshot wounds, mostly to the head and chest.
"There were enough inconsistencies that things didn't add up," said the senior official, who was briefed on the conclusions of Colonel Watt's preliminary investigation.The White House has meanwhile confirmed that all the details of the enquiry will be made public.
The official agreed to discuss the findings only after being promised anonymity. The findings have not been made public, and the Pentagon and the Marines have refused to discuss the details of inquiries now underway, saying that to do so could compromise the investigation.
White House spokesman Tony Snow said he had been assured by the Pentagon that this would happen.
"We'll have a picture of what happened," Mr Snow said.
He said President Bush was "allowing the chain of command to do what it's supposed to do in the department of defence, which is to complete" their inquiries.
The enquiry is not only in to the shooting but also into the alleged cover up that is said to have taken place afterwards.
One of the marines in Haditha that day, Lance Cpl Roel Ryan Briones of Hanford, California, told the Los Angeles Times he had taken photos and carried bodies out of homes as part of a clean-up crew: "They ranged from little babies to adult males and females. I'll never be able to get that out of my head. I can still smell the blood."
Whilst it is right that we condemn the actions taken by these marines on that day, we must never forget that such actions always take place when people are placed into the cauldron of war.
The crime of putting young soldiers into Iraq based on a series of lies is, to me, a larger crime than that committed by these young men.
The marines are being set up to be hung out to dry, but the men who lied to ensure that they ended up there will walk free.
That's the real scandal of Haditha.
Click title for full article.
2 comments:
There's been another one: 11 people in Ishaqi according to the BBC. The investigation is still going.
I know. I came across that this morning when I woke up. It's disgraceful.
Post a Comment