Well said!

I was the victim of a grand jury investigation. I was not allowed to appear, was not allowed legal counsel, no judge was present, hearsay evidence (gossip) was allowed, the grand jurors were not screened in any way and the prosecutor was the only one to talk about the evidence.

Sometimes our "justice" system is a joke.

Well, fair is fair. No more attributing atrocities to Osama bin Laden until he's had a chance to defend himself in court, OK?

(Put this way, the silliness of the letter's position is pretty clear, isn't it?)

"Put this way, the silliness of the letter's position is pretty clear, isn't it?"

No. But put that way, you're silliness is pretty clear.

Looking forward to Celebrim's defense of Rep. Jefferson.

No. But put that way, you're silliness is pretty clear.

Well put.

I'd say #2 rather has provided the Smackdown of the Propogandist Yehudit, if anything!

These kind of ridiculous arguments only work on the already-converted, which is a rapidly shrinking number, I'd happily note.

Murtha is a political leader of great courage, not a judge or a jurist.

As Andrew says, if you'd like to hold everyone to the same tough "legal" standard, fine, but I think you'd wake up to find that your side has suddently gone silent (oh wouldn't that be a wonderful day! Excuse me, I'm a hopeful dreamer who loves his country...)

Of course, your response to this would likely be that Republican War Leaders make their own laws in a Time of War and so are above any silly "court of law" standard, or some such nonsensical obfuscation.

Happy Memorial Day to my father, a WWII veteran who agrees strongly with Congressman Murtha.

#4 "Looking forward to Celebrim's defense of Rep. Jefferson."

Huh? I don't recall having a public position on Rep. Jefferson one way or the other. I have defended the investigation of Rep. Jefferson, which the Left generally and some Republican party leadership generally do not, and I'll happily defend the investigation of the Haditha incident.

#6 "These kind of ridiculous arguments only work on the already-converted, which is a rapidly shrinking number, I'd happily note."

Yeah, that's exactly what I'm saying, only I know where to properly attach a relative pronoun. But please, if you wish to continue to discredit yourself, feel free to continue to make them. There is nothing which makes my life easier than idiots diplaying thier own lack of seriousness.

Murtha was a battalion S-2 in Vietnam. I hate to think what kind of intelligence that battalion got.

Maybe it was great. Mayube he was perfect at that job. But he sure as hell doesn't have the judgment or the temperament to be any kind of leader in civilian life.

I'm tired of Murtha using his past service as a shield while he pisses on people who are serving now, including brother Marines.

The naked stupidity of what he is doing is obvious to any grown-up who has any knowledge of judicial proceedings, civil or military. Regardless of what the facts turn out to be, he had already fouled the water. This kind of thing makes it harder for the innocent to defend themselves, and harder to convict the guilty. Murtha's big mouth has done the job either way.

Murtha is not a hero, he's the new L. Fletcher Prouty, and he'll be recognized as such as soon as the Democratic Party is tired of exploiting his mental illness for their own cynical purposes.

Greengrass Liberal writes: "Of course, your response to this would likely be that Republican War Leaders make their own laws in a Time of War and so are above any silly "court of law" standard, or some such nonsensical obfuscation"

The likelihood of such a response from any one here is roughly zero. And that ought to be obvious. Is there a reason you feel it necessary to interject such a flaming fraudulent strawman?

At boot camp and on the way to Iraq this mantra was drilled into us over and over and over:

"To be a good soldier, you have to be a bad human being."

There is NOTHINB NOBLE in being henchmen for the corporate greed that sent us to Iraq.

Mr. Lazarus (#2);

I would love to see Osama in a court of law. The rule of Law is exactly what he is fighting against.

Of course, the courts seem to be dismissing trials these days for fear that a secret may be exposed. Congressional oversight is too risky ... secrets may be exposed. Warrants for domestic spying may expose secrets, therefore aren't required.

The rule of law IS the law of this land. Maybe we need to get back to using it.

#9 "Is there a reason you feel it necessary to interject such a flaming fraudulent strawman?"

It's the school of rhetoric he comes from.

1) Compare something to Hitler.
2) You've won the debate, because:

a) Either the guy loves Hitler, in which case, duh!
b) He has to concede that you pwned him.
c) There is no other possibility, go back to 'a' or 'b'.

Grassroots Liberal thinks Yehudit is a poor debater because he couldn't think of a good way to compare his opposition to Hitler (or equivalent figure), which GL believes is dumb because he believes everything you don't like makes a valid comparison to Hitler. He also thinks Yehudit really goofed because he didn't label his oppononent a 'Propagandist' right off the bat and didn't begin by declaring rhetorical victory. Every convincing argument GL has ever heard had this structure.

#10: LOL. It's like a billboard top 40 countdown of dumb liberal trolls.

Grassroots Liberal thinks Yehudit is a poor debater because he couldn't think of a good way to compare his opposition to Hitler (or equivalent figure)

And Hitler? Huh? Here's a suggestion: take your meds and step away from the keyboard, propoganda troll. Come back when you have something serious to argue other than demonstrating how ignorant and effete your response is or how crazy those on your side can be.

I just showed 3 other people here "crazy celebrim's" post, and for the life of us no one can figure out what the heck he is talking about. Raising the whole "Hitler" thing out of the blue is a real kicker! But whatever it is that's going on in his head, its sure coming out with a load of Right wing righteosness and conviction! Hey, I'll let them speak for themselves (if I can get them to stop laughing):

Dude, what are you on? And where can I get some (is it prescription stuff?)-JP

I'm guessing his malady is either genetic or political...either way, I hope it's not contagious. Dr. D

(Unfortunately, Dr. D is not a psychiatrist.)

If he's a Republican, then it is likely political, and luckily the pandemic is in remission. (Dr. D's wife.)

OK, back to the BBQ....thanks for providing a nice example of the craziness of the modern Right wing!

Your new friend,

GGL

Since there appears to be no escape from "Murtha the Old Marine", not even on Memorial Day, I'll re-post this bit of gringo commentary.......

Interesting on what's become of Congressman Murtha, who spent less time in Vietnam than I did---although admittedly he was military, unlike me, and knew how to play that old "war hero" card so very, very, very useful in U.S. politics. He's become the Democrats' go-to drama queen on questions of war and peace and how to attack Bush (who once snubbed him, according to reports.)

It's the media-enabled theatrics which are so suspect. If there is a criminal case against these young Marines---and let's assume there is, without knowing all the facts---the Marines will court martial accordingly. Everyone knows that. Murtha has to know that. But now he seems like a deranged old grizzly,improperly medicated, as he keeps chewing on that chewed-up bone (but not too loony to enjoy the media spotlight and adulation from the grateful who wouldn't be caught dead in the uniform of the country that fattens them.) Even on the solemn occasion of Memorial Day. To what purpose, aside from anti-Bush rage and Dem lust to regain position and office?

Which raises the question yet again: Is today's Libstream intelligent, or just hopelessly tone deaf?
Are crude polls and poll shakers and $500 an hour "consultants" convincing it that Americans will react favorably to this orgy of American Guilt and shame about the one sector of U.S. entitlement society that truly sacrifices and understands responsibility? There used to be a time, on the other extreme, when Americans focused on the war crimes of the enemy. That ended, of course, with the Vietnam War, when the World Left turned on the U.S. which was no longer pals with the "worker's states."

Do the Democrats and their media really think this will play---despite Republican failings (and the DemoPub mutual surrender of the U.S. border to Mexico and the Business/Illegal Alien Lobby?).

Do they really think that an old Murtha and his media enablers, exploiting the noble 'Duty, Honor and Country,' will be excused from the duty and honor of focusing on the daily unspeakable atrocities of the enemy, instead of grandstanding exclusively on what is, by most accounts, occasional and alleged, of his own country? They gorge on what might be aberrations (if proven) from the most courageous and disciplined Americans. Have they no sense of shame left for the beastliness of the enemy? Final question: Have they no sense of shame left about themselves?

Gringofoto. "Mekong Delta, 1973." Face to face, at last, with the Vietcong, down in that Delta below My Tho. (Black and white original.)

Well, I probably could have used the Nazis and the Nuremberg trials, but I didn't feel like the Godwin's Law instantiation. The first line of defense was that the massacre in Haditha didn't happen or was some heat-of-combat incident magnified and distorted by the mainstream media (a few of whom died today in covering Iraq's aborted march to freedom). That trench having been overrun by the facts, it's time to bring in the reserves: carping about the time and manner in which the massacre was brought to the attention of the American public. (Is there any doubt that the Iraqi public already knows?)

I don't expect Yehudit's (and others', of course) rear-guard action to be any more effective, because it involves taking positions that are intellectually worthless. And the idea that we can't deal with the policy implications of the crime until the conviction of those responsible is inane when applied to Osama—and just as inane when applied to the War in Iraq. To say that something has gpne horribly amiss does not interfere with the presumption of innocence for those members of the Armed Forces who eventually stand trial. If it weren't for the (probably brief) confusion created by this verbal smoke grenade, it wouldn't be worth discussing.

I am one of those members of the Left who can't wait for Rep. Jefferson to resign (as is the infamous Kos). I am not going to make silly statements about the presumption of innocence for this guy.

Nor, for that matter, do I see the problem in any possible political motivation behind Rep. Murtha's actions. You might think about the motivations of the senior officers who gave him the leak in the first place, but in any event, to the extent his motivation is ameliorating the horrible mess we've created and can't disentangle ourselves from (i.e., a quagmire), good on him. Only the declining number of Bush Dead-Enders don't recognize a situation where chaos reigns and our efforts in Haditha and Abu Ghraib are not helping.

I'd say the pony-hunt is in its last throes.

"Well, fair is fair. No more attributing atrocities to Osama bin Laden until he's had a chance to defend himself in court, OK?"

You're comparing 2 soldiers in our Marines to Osama bin Laden. Yeah, right.

And you have no idea how that destroys your credibility. Right.

This place is really infested with trolls today. This post must have gotten linked to some troll haven.

Okay.

1) Osama is not a US citizen and is not entitled to US law.
2) He is openly an enemy, has declared himself as such, and is acting according to his own law.
3) The raison d'etre of US Marines is to defend their country. Therefore they are not our enemy, either declared or undeclared. Even if they did what they are accused of, they are not our enemy, just citizens guilty of a crime. We don't call civilian murderers "enemy" either.
4) The vast majority of our Marines are US citizens and a few are in the process of becoming US citizens. They are entitled to US law, including being presumed innocent until proven guilty.
5) Osama has never denied doing what he has done, he is proud of it. He is guilty of it by his own statements.
6) There is plenty of evidence of Osama's actions, they are clear.
7) What the Marines did or didn't do is still unclear. As it was with Lt. Pantano until he was cleared through thorough investigation.

Do you understand now the difference between Osama and the accused Marines?

Actually you did before, but you would rather be a troll.

"Looking forward to Celebrim's defense of Rep. Jefferson."

I would call that a non-sequitor. And I never expected Andrew Lazarus to be a troll. You have fallen far, Andrew. BDS got hold of you and turned your brain and moral sense to jelly.

"At boot camp and on the way to Iraq this mantra was drilled into us over and over and over:
"To be a good soldier, you have to be a bad human being.""

Somehow I don't think you were ever a US soldier in Iraq. Or you would know you also got lectures about what war crimes are and not to commit them. I know our military recruits get those lectures, and in the vast majority of cases respect them.

"And who the heck are you around here? You come out swinging with your confused and angry rhetoric and think that this amounts to anything?"

celebrim has been a respected commenter on this site for several years. Who the hell are YOU? and you are in no position to come onto this site and call other people trolls.

"The first line of defense was that the massacre in Haditha didn't happen or was some heat-of-combat incident magnified and distorted by the mainstream media"

Which is a reaasonable assumption when you don't know the facts of the case. Given how our media has built up a storm of indignation before and turned out to be wrong. Which Lt. Pantaro knows all about., which is why he wrote his letter.

"I don't expect Yehudit's (and others', of course) rear-guard action to be any more effective, because it involves taking positions that are intellectually worthless. And the idea that we can't deal with the policy implications of the crime until the conviction of those responsible is inane when applied to Osama—and just as inane when applied to the War in Iraq."

Since the armed forces already have statutes and training about war crimes, and diligent investigation into same, and since so few of them have occured with 150,000 troops in country, I would say they have been dealing with the policy implications of this.

What policy implications do you think we are not dealing with, and how would you suggest we do so? and can you please make your response more serious than: "They're just like Osama, yuk yuk."

"You sure seem to "know" a lot about me from one post, "Celebrim"."

I only know what you've told me.

"And who the heck are you around here?"

Why do I have to be somebody?

"You come out swinging with your confused and angry rhetoric and think that this amounts to anything?"

Mr. Pot, meet Mr. Kettle. I believe you should read your post #6 again.

The fact that I ridicule your debating technique in no way implies that I'm either confused or angry.

"I don't honestly know that I can say I've ever seen such an elaborately crazy straw-man erected in the name of debate before."

Errr... I believe that was the charge against you. (see for example #7 and #9) What is this the, "I'm rubber and you're glue" school of rhetoric?

"On the basis of this behavior, I will have to conclude you are most assuredly a Bush voter"

Guilty.

"...and a Republican shill"

Now that is humor folks.

"...who very possibly never competed high school."

Which is only topped by that.

"And Hitler? Huh?"

Yeah, I figured I would need to explain it to you.

In post #6, you strongly endorsed AJL's comparison in post #2 in which he compared accused US marines to the self-confessed mass murderer and enemy of the United States Osama Bin Ladin. He then concludes on the basis of this outlandish comparison that there ought to be no difference in how we talk about accused US citizens, and how we talk about publically gloating US enemies. This is a clear case of comparing two things which are highly unlike in exactly the area that matters the most, and claiming that they are exactly alike.

Typically, when people want to end a debate by demonizing one side of it, they reach for Hitler. But, since all that really matters is that you have something which both sides agree is absolutely evil - Satan, Stalin, or as in this case Osama Bin Ladin will do just fine.

So, returning to AJL's post which you claim was such a "smackdown", the entire substance of the post is to compare the Marine's with Osama Bin Ladin. That is to say, he reached for the easiest and most intellectually lazy comparison at hand - and therefore also the one most likely to be fraught with difficulties - and dared anyone to disagree with him. I can only assume that he thought that those debating with him would have only two choices: either agree with him, or defend some sort of obviously silly claim that we couldn't be critical of Osama Bin Ladin.

Of course, there is obviously a third line of debate not being considered by either AJL or you, and that is whether or not comparing marines with Osama Bin Ladin is actually a useful analogy or not. You see, when you compare things that are, the tendancy is not to provide illumination on the subject but rather to obfuscate the point. The result isn't clear thinking, but muddled thinking. Tables and cats both often have four legs, but beyond that any assertion about the nature of cats based on the nature of tables - especially by someone who clearly knows nothing of cats - is greatly suspect.

"I just showed 3 other people here "crazy celebrim's" post, and for the life of us no one can figure out what the heck he is talking about."

You should get smarter friends.

#16: "The first line of defense was that the massacre in Haditha didn't happen or was some heat-of-combat incident magnified and distorted by the mainstream media."

I believe you are missing the point entirely, as you go on to carp from there on all sorts of unrelated things.

I've no position on what happened in Haditha at all. I don't know what happened. However, given who the accused are, and given that they have not confessed and given the rather third hand nature of the details that have been made available I think we owe the soldiers the benefit of the doubt. It's that simple. I don't know why you feel the need to make it more complicated than that.

If you cannot see why we don't owe Osama Bin Ladin any such respect, then well, I don't suppose its going to be very useful to try to reason with you.

"To say that something has gpne horribly amiss does not interfere with the presumption of innocence for those members of the Armed Forces who eventually stand trial."

If something has not gone 'horribly amiss', then it certainly follows that the members of the Armed Forces who may eventually stand trial are innocent. If something has gone 'horribly amiss', then its almost certain that they are guilty. If you presume that something has certainly gone 'horribly amiss', I cannot see how you can presume innocence.

Greenglass Liberal's testosterone said:

how ignorant and effete your response is ...

Effete? Did you say effete?

You can't have meant it in the sense of "worn out", because Celebrim is intellectually indefatigable. So I take it that you meant he dresses very well and has a much better vocabulary than you do.

Sorry, Yehudit, but it's pretty clear by now that something "ugly" happened in Haditha. Republican members of Congress are saying so, and that's good enough for me. So let's just take that as a given, OK?

Where exactly does that leave your smackdown? What will you be writing about Murtha if next month the facts come out officially and they are as he stated? Well, you're left whining that Murtha jumped the gun, a point I don't concede, but whose importance, relative to that of the massacre itself, is trifling.

Now as to the comparison between our Marines and Osama, that is exactly what I am doing, but not in the way you perceive. I am stating that whatever embargo on discussing Haditha because the perpetrators have not been convicted has to apply equally to Osama, and if that example is too inflammatory for you, you may take Milosevic or whoever the chief butcher of Darfur is. I'm sonething of a structuralist, and you (and Bush) are not: I believe that the structure of whether we discuss these crimes does not depend on who perpetrated them.

What we now see as BDS is Bush Devotion Syndrome, where the total failure of His glorious plans must be disguised by incoherent attack on the ever-increasing numbers who have come to their senses.

Actually, since there has been no released information from any investigation or court martial proceedings, everybody here is ignorant. The honest folks like Celebrim are the ones saying "I don't know."

I consulted a legal dictionary, and in the strictest of legal terms, Murtha should probably "shut his Pie Hole." He rails on Marines who could very well be innocent of all charges (could be guilty as sin, too; I don't know, neither do you) but is silent about a guy on film taking stacks of hundreds for bribes.

Whose joke was this:

"Two men greeted each other on the sidewalk one day. They hadn't seen each other in a while. One said, `Hey, weren't you mixed up in that watch theft?'

The second replied, `Yes. It was my watch that was stolen.'"

"Well, you're left whining that Murtha jumped the gun, a point I don't concede, but whose importance, relative to that of the massacre itself, is trifling."

This is a really bizarre statement, because if this is the summary of your position I don't see what you have to disagree with Yehudit over. I certainly don't disagree with anything in that statement, and if you'd made that statement first rather than the poorly thought out analogy regarding Osama Bin Ladin, likely we'd never have had much to argue over.

Yes, jumping the gun like this is a trifling point compared to what is potentially a massacre of innocent civilians by US soldiers. If a court martial finds those soldiers guilty of what would appear to be impending charges of murder, I for one will favor the death penalty.

But, I can fully believe that and not feel that Murtha acted wisely, properly, considerately, and in good faith. The wrongness of what might have happened doesn't justify his own actions. Two wrongs don't make a right.

"I am stating that whatever embargo on discussing Haditha because the perpetrators have not been convicted has to apply equally to Osama..."

And that's equally bizarre. Of course it doesn't. The most obvious reason is that Osama has already publicly confessed to his role in the planning of the attacks. Even if you are 'a structuralist' that ought to make a big difference. Another reason that should occur to you is that Osama Bin Ladin is not an American soldier, and not even an American citizen. And more subtly, but maybe even more importantly, Osama Bin Ladin is not merely a criminal - he is a a declared enemy of the United States in a time of war. Your self-proclaimed 'structuralist' ideology doesn't excuse you from needing to think complex thoughts.

"What we now see as BDS is Bush Devotion Syndrome, where the total failure of His glorious plans must be disguised by incoherent attack on the ever-increasing numbers who have come to their senses."

That is beneath you.

Not really. AJL is projecting.

"a point I don't concede"

Nevermind. My apologies. I found your bone of contention. I don't know why I'd been reading that as "a point I concede". I can only assume that its because I find it so inexplicable how you can't concede that Murtha jumped the gun, regardless of what ever else you think of the situation, that I was doing my best to make your position seem reasoned.

What will you be writing about Murtha if next month the facts come out officially and they are as he stated?

No need to wait until next month. If someone deserves to be prosecuted, Murtha's remarks will both make it harder for the Marines to do so, and harder for the accused to get a fair trial. And if he's blabbing information that was provided to congress, he ought to be censured at least.

Therefore, I don't need to wait until next month to call Murtha an ignorant and irresponsible clown who isn't qualified to lead a latrine digging detail. And that will still be true when Hillary Clinton makes him Secretary of Defense.

"where the total failure of His glorious plans"

Well, i could list all the aspects of the war that aren't failures, but I've done it before and the hell with it. Your statement is just a rhetorical device that also doesn't have much thought in it, or much heart.

I mean, what you are saying is that all the Iraqis have been doing to pull their country together is a total failure. You shit on their heads so you can feel clever.

Yehudit, that is indeed what I am saying. It's too bad that is the outcome, although not altogether surprising.

Shitting on someone else's head is not only more fun than wading through shit trying to find the pony, as you are, it's more sensible, too.

Actually Andrew Lazarus, it isn't "clear" that something ugly happened at Haditha - what you're quoting is MSM coverage, whose credibility has consistently been shot full of holes here and elsewhere.

"Shitting on someone else's head is not only more fun than wading through shit trying to find the pony, as you are, it's more sensible, too."

Boy, you really have turned into a troll.

Well, if I ever see a comment by you with the least bit of hand-waving about human rights, I'll remind you of this quote.

Mike, since even the word of Republican members of Congress [2nd link] isn't good enough for you, can you let me know what the standard is? When the story is verified by Powerline?

Yehudit, I suppose I should insert <snark> tags, but isn't it a little tedious looking for the newly-painted schools in amongst the assassinated pro-US leaders, the dead journos, the unfillable Cabinet posts, the exodus of any Iraqi who can get out, etc.? When exactly does it stop being a romantic sacrifice and start being a stupid waste of lives? It doesn't really matter after all of our blunders how meritorious or even heroic individual Iraqis might be, any more than it mattered what a nice person Terri Schiavo was.

Well, call me stodgy, how about when it's confirmed in an impartial investigation? Or proven in court? The whole "beyond a reasonable doubt" thing seems pretty swell to me. If the Marines committed murder they will (deservedly) be punished.

Problem with Murtha's mouth is that even if they DIDN'T commit murder, they will still be punished. They might not have had anything to with anybody. And there's Murtha trotting them out for publicity points.

And there you are, Lazarus. For all your better angels, soldiers are your N-word of choice. "Yeah it hasn't gone to court yet, but you know how they are. I hope they swing." That's what we're hearing. We all have bad weeks, and there are threads where I've less than articulate, so, reread your posts. Just double check and clarify.

No one here is saying "Right or wrong let them go." We're saying, (and I know this is crazy-go-nuts, but hear me out) find out what happened first. Murtha doesn't find the situation compelling, he finds it useful. He's snowboarding onto the floor with this one. {Blank} him.

And we can go into the Iraq action bolt by bolt if you want. But this thread is about Murtha and what he did or said. For you this is about Bush, and the loathing of a policy that had to happen. There wasn't anything romantic about the decision to end the government that we had been trying to contain for twelve frickin' years.

So the Marines getting smeared? Unimportant. Murtha making it tangibly more difficult to track the parties reponsible? Unimportant. Murtha making it harder to punish or exonerate the Marines? Unimportant.

Makes Bush Look Bad? Wheeeeee! I get to be righteously indignant! [ahem] WHEN will it END!

Oh for heaven´s sake, get real. Look, if there really was a massacre in Haditha, the guilty must and will rightly be punished – and that should conclude the matter. It´s an outlier. It is meaningless in that it does not invalidate the war. Ask yourself if you really want to lose a war over nothing more than your own lack of perspective.

Here´s perspective: If something like Haditha happens every few years in an environment like Iraq, I can only conclude that the disipline and humanity of American soldiers is amazing and admirable by any meaningful comparison. If you want perfection – if you absolutely want to keep something like that from happening – then you cannot ever go to war anywhere for any reason. Go ahead, make that choice. Then you can go on to feel good about yourself until you find out that your enemies (and some of your allies and "loyal critics") are not nearly as squeamish.

And for once, since this is a global conflict, will you not consider the propaganda effect in foreign countries? It is as clear as the light of day that Murtha and his ilk are providing propaganda for America´s enemies. I encounter it every day. You are not getting any credit for your soul searching and navel gazing. You are not generating any good will. Let me put it this way: Putin´s troops have slaughtered tens of thousands, he is selling arms and nuclear technology to terrorist states, he is using energy exports for blackmail, he is undermining democracy in neighboring countries, his police are beating up gay demonstrators. But he is a respected statesman across Europe (where I live). Gets better poll numbers than President Bush, who has done none of these things. That is what decades of self-flagellation will accomplish.

wf, what do you think is the propaganda effect of the actually-existing clusterf--k? Of continuing it for another decade? More disastrous than anything I could concoct! Don't compare withdrawal to the benefits of a free, democratic, pro-American Iraq. Compare to a chaotic, Hobbesian Iraq with American soldiers holed up in the Green Zone and some massive bases. There's no pony in there.

Look, if there really was a massacre in Haditha, the guilty must and will rightly be punished – and that should conclude the matter. It´s an outlier.

It's something that some arabs made such a big fuss about that they managed to get it into the US media, and then the Marines decided to investigate. There was one like that last year, wasn't there? US military were interrogating a young man in his bedroom and when they came out he was allegedly dead, they didn't say anything to the family who found out he was dead right after the americans left. It turned out he was the nephew of a prominent iraqi politician and after the politician went to the media then the military investigated.

And wasn't there one year before last? The claim was that a US unit forced a couple of random young iraqis to jump off a bridge, and it turned out oen of them survived to tell the story. A close relative of a prominent iraqi blogger who made a big stink about it, and then the military investigated.

These things are outliers from what? Our military amkes a public investigation of a possible criminal event after word of it gets out to lots of US civilians. This tells us nothing about what usually happens. We might have a careful system in place that maintains discipline, with lots of soldiers getting minor punishments for minor infractions and a few getting major punishment for major infractions, and nobody hears about it at all. But every now and then the media hears some wrong rumor and trumps it up.

Or we might have an unofficial policy to treat iraqis like cockroaches, and nobody gets disciplined for following it, but very rarely the media hear about some typical offense and make a big deal out of that one.

Or somewhere inbetween. Where's the evidence whether these few cases are outliers?

If something like Haditha happens every few years in an environment like Iraq, I can only conclude that the disipline and humanity of American soldiers is amazing and admirable by any meaningful comparison.

I agree, it would be amazing if the examples that reach the press were the only ones. What data is there on how many more there are? Very little. Only the stories that the soldiers mostly don't tell. I once had the pleasure to listen to an argument about how many undiscovered caves there were in georgia. It's like that.

It is as clear as the light of day that Murtha and his ilk are providing propaganda for America´s enemies.

Follow up that reasoning and it leads to censoring the news even more. The public's role in the war is to pay their taxes and listen to patriotic speeches and wait for victory. I dunno. This particular war has cost (including some of the indirect costs) somewhere between a half trillion dollars and 2 trillion, all borrowed. And years out of our soldiers' lives, not to mention the relatively few dead and wounded.

And so what really matters is propaganda for the US public. If the US public loses confidence in the war then we'll have to withdraw. So if anything bad does happen in iraq, it makes sense to hide it from the US public as much as possible so they'll support the war.

Putin´s troops have slaughtered tens of thousands, he is selling arms and nuclear technology to terrorist states, he is using energy exports for blackmail, he is undermining democracy in neighboring countries, his police are beating up gay demonstrators.

If I had a chance to vote on Putin, I'd vote against him. I'm just as glad he isn't running for any election in my government and I hope he never does.

I wonder if Murtha is aware that he is providing the Defense a perfect opprotunity to argue that their clients won't be able to get a fair trial. I tend to doubt it. He should be well aware that his near daily public specatcle will be brought up during trial. I'd be curious to know if any of the defense attorneys would press for his sources for leaking information prior to any indictments, etc.

Gabriel Chapman, are these guys going to get a civilian trial or military?

If I was giving them advice for defending a court martial, I would not suggest they say the brass can't be fair because they've heard stuff from Murtha.

"If I was giving them advice for defending a court martial, I would not suggest they say the brass can't be fair because they've heard stuff from Murtha."

There is a real legal defense involved here. Fortunately, it's Murtha and other members of the legislature involved here and not members of the executive. If Rumsfeld or the President had mouthed off in the same fashion, these guys would get off no matter what they did. A prejudicial comment in the chain of the command of a convened court martial can render the whole proceedings a mistrial. If the defence can show that the officer on the tribunal is under pressure from a superior to render a particular verdict - so called 'unlawful command interference', you can forget about finding the accused guilty.

Even as it is, Murtha's comments don't help the prosecution any because as a member of government he's now politicized the whole issue. It could be argued that even though Murtha is outside of the chain of command, his comments place indirect pressure on the tribunal to render a particular verdict. It would have been one thing if he'd hedged his comments or had endorsed the investigation or some such, but Murtha flat out said 'this is what happened'. Murtha sits on the House Appropriations commitee, and is the ranking member and former chair of the Defence Appropriations subcommitee which is responcible for Army funding. I can gaurantee you that the defence will argue that Murtha's position of influence has caused the chain of command to expect a particular result from the court martial. They'd be incompotent not to.

This will be a Military trial, but the defense objections can still be made, in my view its even more relevant given how small the jury pool is in the military, and how fast scuttlebutt travels within military circles. If someone within DoD is leaking to Murtha or the press, in hopes of hurting Bush or the war effort, it will become part of the trial if a competent defense is put forth.

Murtha knows how little information has been made available to the general public, and he is trying to score points politically by playing the Guilt Card so early. By time a trial rolls around, most people will have forgotten Murtha's claims, except those involved I would guess. So during the current media frenzy he can get his face on the TV and will have probably little to no repercussions for doing so.

He seems convinced of their guilt, and I am not privileged to what he has seen in the way of evidence, but his motives are suspect in my view, and I for one do not trust him to be fair.

My initial hunch is there will probably be a murder charge brought against 2 or 3 individuals, with a conspiracy charge against 5-8 more. Acts like this tend to not involve large groups. Its understandable that lower level chain of command wouldn't want this to get out, and in my personal experience incidents of all levels of seriousness would have been dealt with almost exclusively by higher ranking NCO's before any Officer corps above say 0-4 was involved. I don't see a major cover-up by the upper echelons of the CoC, even though I fully expect the media to somehow paint it that way, see Abu Gurab and Rumsfield for an example.

My prediction:

The investigation turns up absolutely no evidence that the Marines killed anyone who didn't need killing, and concludes that most likely, the women and children were shot by Jihadis who sought (successfully) to frame the Marines, with the help of the media and Murtha. But it all doesn't matter, because a year from now all anyone "remembers" is that "Marines committed an atrocity"; whether its true or not is irrelevant, it's been repeated enough to be "common knowledge". So the Jehadis, and their allies in the media and the US congress, win a round in their war against us and exchange high fives- but don't call them Anti-American.

Ben

So far as I can tell (correct me if I'm wrong) the only witnesses who came forward were those who collected the bodies. No eye witnesses.

I'd like to see the autopsy reports. The balistic evidence.

It is possible that the terrorists murdered these folks and then blamed the Marines. It is possible the terrorists were hiding behind the civilians.

If in fact the evidence points to the Marines then they should face severe punishment based on the appropriate charges.

So far all we have is hearsay.

#41,

Great minds think alike.

Ben, I tend to agree with your predictions.

Arabs won't believe it was done by insurgents trying to blame the USA, because it's largely relatives and close neighbors of the dead making the claims. I can see terrorists killing people and trying to blame US soldiers on it -- even carefully using captured weapons to do it, to make it more authentic. But arabs have a harder time seeing people falsely blaming the USA for killing their own relatives. They wouldn't accept that the big picture demands they side with the killers and falsely blame somebody else.

Similarly, it isn't unlikely that the investigation will see absolutely no evidence that the Marines killed anybody who didn't need killing, because that's the best outcome for us.

If we still have bases in iraq when the Marines are cleared of all wrongdoing, it will put more pressure on the iraqi Assembly to tell us to go away. But there's a fair chance we'll be gone by then.

"(correct me if I'm wrong) the only witnesses who came forward were those who collected the bodies. No eye witnesses."

If Iraqis count as people, then there are plenty of witnesses, including several children who survived the shootings by hiding under a bed or their dead siblings.
One of many news accounts

The WOC discussion fits the Bush party line so perfectly that I am amazed that the pattern is not evident even to the True Believers. Whenever a discordant message is heard, ATTACK THE MESSENGER and ignore the message. This pattern has held from before the invasion (anybody remember Shinseki's accurate pre-war prediction?).

Sure it is easier to believe, against all evidence, that nefarious "Jehadis" conspired to frame innocent Marines. When leftists indulge in similar tortured theories, they are called wingnuts & moonbats. What is the equivalent term for a rightwinger who ignores reality in favor of an ideological construct?

Since reporters in Iraq are essentially prisoners in the Green Zone unless embedded, an objective observer has no real evidence to tell whether the Haditha atrocity is an "outlier" or rare reporting of a common occurence.

History shows that armed occupation of a resistant populace usually results in brutality/atrocity as the frustration of the occupiers grows.

Given the clear evidence of attempted cover-up of Haditha by various levels of the military (google it yourself), Murtha is serving the ideals of the United States and the principles of human rights by bringing these crimes to light. The chain of command has known about these killing since November 2005 but is only adressing them after Time's investigative reporting and Murtha's comments. This process is democracy in action, which might be why it bothers some WOC commenters so much.

"Murtha is serving the ideals of the United States and the principles of human rights by bringing these crimes to light."

I was largely with you up to that. Murtha isn't 'bringing these crimes to light'. He's leaking the briefing the military gave him on the state of the investigation.

"...but is only adressing them after Time's investigative reporting and Murtha's comments"

BS.

USA Today Story Noting That Time Magazine Reporting Re-opened a Closed Haditha Probe

"But one particularly disturbing aspect is that it took reporting by Time magazine in March to reopen a quickly closed Haditha probe. Time challenged official accounts that civilians were killed in a roadside bombing or in a crossfire between insurgents and Marines."

Murtha is pushing his agenda, which has nothing to do with "Human rights".

I'm inclined to belive that the event took place. I disagree with posters above who claim (with zero supportive evidence) that this was a setup. Haditha was a massive stronghold for insurgents and their supporters, and the Marines were definatly on edge in an area that was overly hostile.

That said, I cannot condone the kind of revenge killings that appear to have taken place.

There is no excuse for this, and as far as I can see, not mitigating factor that would offset the assault, but I am going to reserve final judgement for when the trials take place and a proper accounting of the evidence is laid out. I've heard that directly after the event, personal cameras were used to photograph the aftermath. It's evidence such as this that will provide far more context and detail than eyewitness accounts.

What I tend to find puzzling, is the attention garnerd by this event months after it occured and months after the story broke. Murtha appears to have taken a cue from his handlers that it was about time to shift attention elsewhere (away from corruption charges in DC or immigration debates in congress) and onto something that the media always seems to take great relish in, assaults on our own military.

But the military stood by its initial contention —that the Iraqis had been killed by an insurgent bomb— until January when TIME gave a copy of the video and witnesses' testimony to Colonel Barry Johnson, a U.S. military spokesman in Baghdad. After reviewing the evidence, Johnson passed it on to the military command, suggesting that the events of Haditha be given "a full and formal investigation." In February an infantry colonel went to Haditha for a weeklong probe in which he interviewed Marines, survivors and doctors at the morgue, according to military officials close to the investigation. The probe concluded that the civilians were in fact killed by Marines and not by an insurgent's bomb and that no insurgents appeared to be in the first two houses raided by the Marines. The probe found, however, that the deaths were the result of "collateral damage" rather than malicious intent by the Marines, investigators say.

Evidence, What Evidence?

What you have are claims. Claims are not evidence. Claims are not even evidence when fitting a pre-existing pattern. If you want patterns, be mindful of the fact that the Jehadis (why the quotes, "Tom"? Do you not know what a Jehadi is? It is someone obeying what Islam's holy book has to say on the subject of Jehad, nothing more, nothing less. Read it.) routinely kill civilians, not as accidents, but as mission objectives. They routinely use civilian homes, clothing, vehicles, houses of worship, and even use civilians as weapons- suicide bombers. They routinely lie.
There are no American tanks within a hundred kilometers of Baghdad, remember? So give me a reason to believe them over us. You don't convict someone of murder on he said/she said argument.

The Times article posted by Gabriel, in fact, mentions one young "eye witness" who is apparently unable to tell Iraqis from Americans, and has to be told they were Americans. Let me quote:
"Afterward, some Iraqi soldiers came. They carried us in their arms. I was crying, shouting 'Why did you do this to our family?' And one Iraqi soldier tells me, 'We didn't do it. The Americans did.'""

So there is your potential set-up angle. An Iraqi thought the killers were Iraqis, but had to be "corrected"- you know, Iraqis are so naive about such things! Now the set-up has legs.

Many of the "witnesses" (note that in "Tom's" article, there is only one, who conveniently relates to us the stories of other witnesses, thereby saving the journalist some shoe leather, it seems) were not actual witnesses, just second hand witnesses. The video maker didn't film it as it happened- just filmed the bodies the next day. This is like taking pictures of the craters on the moon and declaring you have "evidence" that the US bombed the moon.

You know, statistically, a genuine war crime is likely to occur. But that also insufficient for making a case that this specific episode is a war crime. You can't use statistics to prove a single instance, ever.

Just once, though, ONCE, goddam once, I want to see the OTHER side investigate a potential war crime of its own. Can you imagine that? "Zarquawi jails 3 of his men for firing mortar at market." Yeah, likely, right? But you know, one of the perks of being a Jehadi- or one of their allies- is never having to say you're sorry. Ever.

Ben

"Murtha appears to have taken a cue from his handlers that it was about time to shift attention elsewhere".

Is there no possibility that Murtha was genuinely disturbed and horrified by accounts like the following? I certainly am. Is the right to life itself the most fundamental human right?

From the SF Chronicle
"In the house with Ali and his 66-year-old wife, Khamisa Tuma Ali, were three of the middle-aged men of their family, at least one daughter-in-law and four children -- 4-year-old Abdullah, 8-year-old Iman, 5-year-old Abdul Rahman and 2-month-old Asia.
Marines entered shooting, witnesses recalled. Most of the shots -- in Ali's house and two others -- were fired at such close range that they went through the bodies of the family members and plowed into walls or the floor, doctors at Haditha's hospital said.
A daughter-in-law, identified as Hibbah, escaped with Asia, survivors and neighbors said. Iman and Abdul Rahman were shot but survived. Abdullah, Ali and the rest died. Ali took nine rounds in the chest and abdomen, leaving his intestines spilling out of the exit wounds in his back, according to his death certificate.
The Marines moved to the house next door, Fahmi said.
Inside were 43-year-old Khafif, 41-year-old Aeda Yasin Ahmed, an 8-year-old son, five young daughters and a 1-year-old girl staying with the family, according to death certificates and neighbors.
The Marines shot them at close range and hurled grenades into the kitchen and bathroom, survivors and neighbors said later. Khafif's pleas could be heard across the neighborhood. Four of the girls died screaming.
Only 13-year-old Safa Younis lived -- saved, she said, by her mother's blood spilling onto her, making her look dead when she fell, limp, in a faint.
Townspeople led a Post reporter this week to the girl they identified as Safa. Wearing a ponytail and track suit, she said her mother had died trying to gather the girls. Safa burst into tears after a few words. The older couple caring for her apologized and asked the reporter to leave."
""They are waiting for the sentence -- although they are convinced that the sentence will be like one for someone who killed a dog in the United States," said Waleed Mohammed, a lawyer preparing a file for Iraqi courts and the United Nations. "Because Iraqis have become like dogs in the eyes of Americans." "

Who are Murtha's handlers? How do you have special knowledge about this "handling", since I can find no references elsewhere?
Is everyone who disagrees with you being "handled" and does simple difference of opinion not exist in your world, being replaced with anonymous "handlers".

The reason that Haditha is becoming an issue now is that information is flowing to the public via the free press and free speech, despite months of disinformation from military sources. There are two investigations underway, one into the war crimes, the other into the coverup. I wish I had more confidence in the integrity of either, but only a fool or a zealot would trust the Bush administration given their track record.

#45,

I'd take the local's accounts with a grain of salt considering the conditions reported in Haditha.

People do strange things when you threaten to kill them or family members.

The reason that Haditha is becoming an issue now is that information is flowing to the public via the free press and free speech, despite months of disinformation from military sources.

Not quite. This is an issue because members of Congress were briefed a couple of weeks ago on an ongoing military investigation in which charges are soon be made, including murder.

"Get out in front" Murtha ran to the MSM to complain about a cover-up of an investigation into the murder of Iraqi civilians. Not only did he "get in front" of the announcement of charges, he got in front of the verdict.

#50 Tom V,

Asssuming you are correct I'd like to see a report on the American rate of war crimes vs jihadis.

Something like "One American War Crime in Three Years of Combat - 15 killed" "Soldiers tried and convicted"

"Tens of Thousands Killed by Jihadi War Crimes in Three Years of Combat" "No trials by jihadi chain of command reported"

I'm still rooting for the Americans. The Jihadis are scum. It is why we fight them. And should continue to do so until the Iraqi Government decides otherwise.

Not to say the numbers in #53 are correct.

The general tone is though.

Tom: "I wish I had more confidence in the integrity of either, but only a fool or a zealot would trust the Bush administration given their track record."

Well, since the truth in this case is zero-sum, either the Marines did or did not commit an atrocity, and the Bush administration has yet to weigh in, Tom has only the choice of trusting the Marines or the "insurgents". Those, of course, are the head chopping video guys.

Which Tom evidently trusts over the dreaded Bush administration. Tom's false feelings are evident with:
"Is there no possibility that Murtha was genuinely disturbed and horrified by accounts like the following? I certainly am. Is the right to life itself the most fundamental human right?"

Right on, Tom, now let's hunt down the terrorist bastards who set off bombs and mortars every day in Bagdad. Sounds good? Oh, wait, when THEY kill its just a perfectly understandable reaction to... to what, exactly, sharing Bagdad with Shi'ite infidels?

Tom, remember the old routine from Get Smart?

"No, Max, we know What and Where, but we don't know WHO."

"But 99, if we know What and How, then of course we know Who and When."

Not really.

Ben

Let's stop and think. Suppose that these accusations are all true, what would it mean?

The Marines don't have a policy of shooting women and 5-year-old girls and babies. It happened because a few guys went temporarily crazy, and their leaders didn't stop them. It was like an accident.

What does that say about us occupying iraq? Only that some of the troops are getting sort of worn down, and maybe some of the newer ones aren't trained all that well. These are potentially fixable.

Also, if the officers knew about it and did a cover-up that says something or other. We have a military culture that tends not to use its official justice system. There's an informal system that quietly punishes soldiers who do bad and rewards soldiers who do good. How effective is it? No way to tell, it isn't official and doesn't officially keep records. What are its goals? Again, it's unofficial and the goals aren't written down anywhere.

An officer who protects his men from capital charges, who chews them out for being dumb and punishes them appropriately, might not be doing the right thing officially. But he's going to have troops who'll watch his back for him. Was that what the coverup was about? Or was it officers hiding a propaganda disaster? Or maybe the Marine Corps is better off when civilians don't find out what really happens? Or maybe they were hiding something that would hurt their own personal careers?

The guys on the spot didn't have much sense that they were doing war crimes that needed to be covered up. They left live witnesses. They didn't blow up or even burn any of the buildings. (Maybe they didn't have the munitions to do that?) They took photos. They didn't do much on the ground to make their false report plausible. A leftist interpretation of that would be that they simply had no idea they were doing anything wrong, like the Abu Ghraib idiots who got caught. But it's just as plausible that once they calmed down they saw how much trouble they'd be in, and panicked, and did an incompetent low-level coverup because of that. With the lefty interpretation you'd expect atrocities would be common and these guys had no thought they'd get caught since they usually didn't. With the panic explanation the atrocities would be so unusual that they made an incompetent defense because they'd never needed to before and had no idea how to do it.

I just don't see an far-reaching conclusions from this even if it turns out to be completely true.

It would suggest that some other claims about iraqi casualties from IED or suicide bomber might be wrong. I've occasionally read reports where there were 100 or so casualties, and they're asking a wounded iraqi what happened, and he says "There was a helicopter in the sky, and a big flash from the helicopter and I saw this little flame coming at us, and then it went off, and after that there was this loud noise from the direction of the helicopter. It was an airstrike. I think maybe they were aiming for that car." And then the US military sources say it was really a suicide bomber driving the car and there was no airstrike. But just because they tried to disguise iraqi casualties as IED hits one time doesn't really say anything about how often it happens.

If it turns out the officers tried to do a cover-up yet again, that doesn't mean it happens often. Maybe there just isn't much going on they need to hide. It doesn't say much.

One incident doesn't even mean the troops are all that ground down. It's an indication, nothing more.

It isn't good for us that the iraqis heard about it. But then, we couldn't very well stop them. They hear about all sorts of atrocities that the foreign media never catches. It was the video and the little girl witnesses and such that got the media interested this time. Stuff that looked to them not only like an impressive story but also ironclad evidence. Usually it's more like he-said/she-said and they just ignore it. But the iraqi civilians don't ignore it, they tend to believe it all.

It just isn't that big a deal even if it's all true.

"Is there no possibility that Murtha was genuinely disturbed and horrified by accounts like the following?"

Does it necessarily follow that based on ones horror at what happened - the full details of which he almost certainly only learned after the military briefed Congress - that you'd be motivated to speak to the press? I could ask you the same leading question, changed only slightly: "Is there no possiblity that Murtha is speaking at least in part out of a genuine desire for political gain, or otherwise advance his own interests?"

The DNC has had a pretty overt policy since 9/11 of designating one member of Congress an 'attack dog', to take an agressive stand and take the heat that the rest of the party feels politically uncomfortable taking. They started doing this with Daschel, but that was a mistake because being from a red state, he wasn't nearly secure enough in his job for the role. After that they've been using Ted Kennedy, but Ted's problem is that though his job is as safe as any enfeudated medieval aristocrat, he doesn't have any credibility left. It seems Rep. Murtha is thier latest go to guy in this position. I'm curious to see how well it works out. His district is so well gerrymandered, that he's probably safe, but I've lived in those PA hills and they aren't so blue that I think his comments are going over well with all of his constituients. There is a reason he's one of the most socially conservative members of the Democratic party.

He needs this scandal to be big, to ensure he has an easy time of it in November.

"I certainly am."

You think I'm not?

"Is the right to life itself the most fundamental human right?"

Agreeing with this statement doesn't make Rep. Murtha's actions correct.

Andrew J. Lazarus, the standard is objective truth, and as the varied responses here indicate, the MSM's take on Iraq in general and this incident in particular have problems of credibility.

Let me try to be succinct.

I've been pretty careful to avoid stating my opinion on what happened, because I don't have much information. In my experience, talking about things you don't understand tends to lead to embarassment down the road. I have some ideas that I think are pretty good guesses as to what happened and why, but that's all they are: guesses.

Murtha, by virtue of his position and briefing from the military, knows abit more about what happened than I do. His guesses are likely better than mine, or at least better informed. But that's all they are: guesses.

Murtha's position in this can be summed up with a short quote he's made on the matter:

"We don't know how far [the coverup] goes. It goes right up the chain of command."

If this situation wasn't so serious, those two sentences taken together would be humorous. In the first, he states that he lacks complete information. In the second, he goes ahead and asserts that he does have complete information. If Murtha doesn't know how far the coverup goes, he certainly can't state honestly that it "goes right up the chain of command". If Murtha does know that it "goes right up the chain of command", he can't assert he doesn't know how far the coverup goes.

Alot of Murtha's rhetoric has this sort of problem.

The question is, "Why would Murtha speak in such an obviously self-contridictory way?"

The worst problem with those two sentences is that there is a good chance both are lies. Murtha has been briefed. There is a good chance he knows exactly how far up the coverup went, and there is a good chance he knows that it doesn't go 'right up the chain of command'. From this, I gather that Murtha is more interested in making certain sorts of soundbites than he is in getting the truth out.

#56,

Re: Iraqi's reactions.

From what I have read the Iraqis don't seem very concerned about the incident.

Perhaps give all else that is going on in the country from the head choppers, rogue police, etc. they feel relatively safe in the American presence.

The two parts of Murtha's statement directly contradict each other. Some context.

One of my comenters said:

"Our troops overreacted because of the pressure on them, and they killed innocent civilians in cold blood."

If the troops "overreacted because of the pressure on them," then they were not killing "in cold blood." And if they did kill "in cold blood," then by definition it was a dispassionate, calculated, and premeditated act, and not an "overreaction" to any kind of "pressure" whatsoever.

This muddled statement is typical of the antiwar Left (think Kerry), who want to have it both ways: they don't want to be perceived as "anti-troops", but they go on to make the most outrageous allegations against our men and women in uniform. In other words, they do not want to be seen for what they are."

Yehudit, try parsing it this way: the soldiers are under tremendous pressure day in and day out (true!), and as a result they cracked and killed some civilians in cold blood. Nothing in the statement you are parsing except a a particularly ungenerous reading implies that the alleged incident should be explained away as a result of misjudgment in the heat of battle.

M. Simon, would you be so kind as to share with us how you conducted the analysis of Arabic-language Iraqi press that enables you to make conclusion #60?

I read Iraqi blogs.

The one's that can use English with fair to excellent competence.

You should try it some time.

Of course some of them are opposed to the American presence. So are very grateful.

Given that the Iraqi Government has not asked us to leave I'm giving more weight to the grateful side.

YMMV.

I might note that the antis tend to fall in the former Baathists and their families category. No doubt they are pissed that the Saddam gravy train has ended. I believe Riverbend falls in that category.

Iraq the Model falls in the pro-American side.

They have links to other blogs you can find a whole range of opinions.

There are a LOT more bloggers since Saddam is gone. Information and opinion is now flowing. Get some.

Perhaps the 3rd verse of the National Anthem can provide some insight?

And where is that band who so vauntingly swore
That the havoc of war and the battle's confusion,
A home and a country should leave us no more?
Their blood has wash'd out their foul footsteps' pollution.

No refuge could save the hireling and slave
From the terror of flight or the gloom of the grave:
And the star-spangled banner in triumph doth wave
O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave.

of course the 4th verse is not to bad either...

O thus be it ever when free-men shall stand
Between their lov'd home and the war's desolation;
Blest with vict'ry and peace, may the heav'n-rescued land
Praise the Pow'r that hath made and preserv'd us a nation!
Then conquer we must, when our cause it is just,
And this be our motto: “In God is our trust!”
And the star-spangled banner in triumph shall wave
O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave!

heh..

try parsing it this way: the soldiers are under tremendous pressure day in and day out (true!), and as a result they cracked and killed some civilians in cold blood.

It is the exact opposite of a crime committed because of stress, duress, or rage. As in the Webster definition of sang froid: "Freedom from agitation or excitement of mind; coolness in trying circumstances; indifference; calmness."

For those of you talking about Osama and guilt I would just say that Osama admits to his guilt. He also declared war on the US at least twice during the 90s.

Why would anyone need to stop talking about his guilt until he is foung guilty in a court is beyond me.

This issue has little or nothing to do with what Murtha said or meant, but everything to do with how the chain of command, both military and civilian, acted in these (that's right, there's likely more than one) situations at the time and retrospectively.

If the allegations of unprovoked civilian killings are true (and they sure seem to be at this point), this is unacceptable behavior for soldiers serving under the US flag.

In response to these apparent atrocities, it is completely understandable and appropriate to direct anger at those who sent them there in the first place, in addition to the cowardly insurgent fighters who think nothing of using civilians as human shields.

My sympathy goes out to my fellow humans who are caught in the crossfire of the radical idealogical leaders on both sides. If there is any cause that sorely needs championing in this era, it is that of the silent majority of innocent civilians worldwide who want to live their lives in peace, free of both fear and harm.

In my view, that should be the role of the United States of America. Unfortunately, our leadership obviously doesn't see it this way.

Here's some interesting background on the marines on question:
A reporter's shock at the Haditha allegations

Walter,
It is not rational, in response to a criminal act by US troops, to attack the administration for sending troops to carry out our nation's foreign policy.

Your comment about our leadership does not actually make sense to me.

"My sympathy goes out to my fellow humans who are caught in the crossfire of the radical idealogical leaders on both sides. If there is any cause that sorely needs championing in this era, it is that of the silent majority of innocent civilians worldwide who want to live their lives in peace, free of both fear and harm."

Moral equivalence alert!

Walter, are you implying that the majority of citizens of Iraq lived "free of both fear and harm" under Saddam? Oh, that's right, Michael Moore said so.

Got news for you buddy. The West in general, and the United States in particular, has done more to promote freedom and safety than any other force in history. My hunch is that if the Bush Administration had a magic wand, all of Iraq would look more like today's Zurich than 1990's Beirut.

There are people in Iraq fighting for a better world and people in Iraq fighting against it. Choose a side.

The individuals who may be placed on trial should get a fair trial, yes, without a rush to judgement. Our policy, however, should not move at the glacial speed that the law does. Lt. William Calley was not sentenced until 3 years after the My Lai massacre, and further court action lasted 3 more years after the sentencing. If the men in Haditha are innocent or guilty, that should be determined at the speed the law moves, but we shouldn't wait til 2009 before we try to gauge what kinds of events are taking place in Iraq and what changes in policy might be required. If military policy (and strategy) move at the speed of the law, we'll face a slaughter.

"Walter,
It is not rational, in response to a criminal act by US troops, to attack the administration for sending troops to carry out our nation's foreign policy.
Your comment about our leadership does not actually make sense to me."

It makes total sense to me. Grinding guerrilla war and brutal counter-insurgency with spiraling civilian casualties were predictable (and predicted) consequences of unilateral invasion and occupation, to anyone with common sense, which clearly excludes the incompetents in the Bush administration. Their pre-war speechs are painfully embarrassing to read today, with frightening detachment from reality.

The problem with the "kill-em-all" method of dealing with "Jehadis" is illustrated by comparing the number of "Jehadis" in Iraq today with the number before the invasion. Apparently, invasion/occupation/counter-insurgency creates more enemies than it kills.I put "Jehadi" in quotes because insurgents in Iraq are a mishmash of nationalist resistance to occupation, tribal revenge, Sunni/Shiite pride, bandits and opportunists, Baathist ideologues, and some Jehadis too, but pretending all insurgents are Jehadis is dishonest propaganda, which even the Bush administration disavows.

Of course, US policy does not allow murder of innocent civilians and these perpetrators will be punished, but Abu Ghraib and Haditha are not anomolies, but normal components of protracted counter-insurgency. Neither Iraqis nor US citizens are very suprized by the allegations.

What the neo-con die-hards do not understand is that their theories have been tested against reality and failed the test.

From the conservative Financial Times,
"Neo-conservative commentators at the American Enterprise Institute wrote last week what amounted to an obituary of the Bush freedom doctrine.
“Bush killed his own doctrine,” they said, describing the final blow as the resumption of diplomatic relations with Libya. This betrayal of Libyan democracy activists, they said, came after the US watched Egypt abrogate elections, ignored the collapse of the “Cedar Revolution” in Lebanon, abandoned imprisoned Chinese dissidents and started considering a peace treaty with Stalinist North Korea."....
But the ranks of the neo-conservatives are also being depleted. In his new book, America at the Crossroads, Francis Fukuyama, perhaps the movement’s most outstanding intellectual force, confirms his defection from the brand concepts of “pre-emption, regime change, unilateralism and benevolent hegemony as put into practice by the Bush administration”.
“It seems to me better to abandon the label and articulate an altogether distinct foreign policy position,” he writes.
Advisers to the White House say it would be premature, however, to write off the doctrine of pre-emption, which was restated in the National Security Strategy released in March. But on Iran, for example, they believe the Bush administration is moving towards a cold war-style strategy of containment and deterrence with as broad an international coalition as possible.
Graham Fuller, former diplomat and intelligence officer, suggests the US is suffering from “strategic fatigue” brought on by “imperial over-reach”.
“The administration’s bark is minimised, and much of the bite seems gone,” he writes in the Nixon Center’s National Interest journal. “Has superpower fatigue set in? Clearly so, to judge by the administration’s own dwindling energy and its sober acknowledgment that changing the face of the world is a lot tougher than it had hoped.”
Short-term economic costs of the empire have been bearable, says Mr Fuller, but long-term indicators show it is not sustainable – massive domestic debt, growing trade imbalances, an extraordinary gap in wealth between rich and poor Americans, the growing outsourcing of jobs.
More immediately, the unprecedented unilateral character of the US exercise of global power has proved its undoing."

Like Japanese survivors abandoned on Pacific islands, the neo-con diehards will keeping fighting a lost war forever, while the world moves on, leaving the Echo Room on the web behind.

Tom,
Your description of administration and "neo-con" policy are mostly strawmen.

SPQR, it would be more useful if you would provide a realistic description of (or link to) administration and neocon policy.

It´s your country, not mine. All I´m saying - and remember I am living in Europe and am trying to talk about the effect here - is that nobody but you Americans makes such a big show out of every mistake. Not correcting it, not doing what has to be done, but putting ash on your heads and ripping your shirts and coming to sweeping conclusions, all in front of the whole world (no shortage of Americans who will go on TV here to crap on their their homeland). How could it not encourage our common enemies? It is also undignified and it does not win you any friends.

I believe it was in November 2004 when French troops fired into a crowd in the Ivory Coast. They shot many people. Shot the head off a woman. There were some really nasty photos. But this was hardly mentioned in the evening news and in the major papers over here. I bet it was hardly mentioned in the US. Because some of these demonstrators had allegedly been firing at the troops and besides, it was a UN-approved mission, so that´s ok. Now, if it had been American troops...

I know that all this is disgusting and not the American way and you do not want to use the French or Russians as role models. Thank you for that. But you still have to deal with them, you are competing with them, and as far as I remember, many leftists accused Bush of not listening enough to those "friends and allies", and I bet that includes some commenters here. Well, this is who they are. Aren´t liberals often saying that America is too insular and should engage more with the world? This is how the world works. Many governemnts and people there do not want a nice America, they want a weak America. The world sees a pattern: an America that believes every accusation against itself, is impatient to turn on itself and will always lose its way before two four-year terms are over. And some of you still haven´t realized they will have you for breakfast if you don´t watch out for yourself. You have to cover yourself (as a nation) a little better. Pull together and don´t wash dirty linen in public. Why do you think nobody is talking about all the "clusterf--ks" in the world but about Iraq, where the US has (this time, at last, thanks to GWB) honorable intentions and which is not going too bad by any reasonable comparison. Hey, it´s only been three years.

"In his new book, America at the Crossroads, Francis Fukuyama, perhaps the movement’s most outstanding intellectual force..."

That's a chuckle worthy quote. It's clearly written neither by a conservative nor even by a former conservative. Francis 'flip-flop' Fukuyama who first came into prominance with the publication in 1992 of 'The End of History' - which laughably claimed that world conflicts were basically over - and who has radically changed his grand outlook on the world every few years ever since then as history keeps refusing to actually end, is a laughingstock in conservative circles and is more closely associated with Clinton foreign policy than anything the Bush team ever did.

The rest of the citation isn't much better at describing reality.

J Thomas wrote: "If I had a chance to vote on Putin, I'd vote against him. I'm just as glad he isn't running for any election in my government and I hope he never does."

Very funny. It´s not all about you and your domestic concerns. Right now, Putin is selling SAMs to Iran to kill your pilots, in addition to all the other things I mentioned. Putin has his veto on the UNSC and that means he can veto your foreign policy. Yet he is not the world´s bad boy, Bush is. Why do you think that is? It is plainly unjust and irrational, and the emotional weakness and immaturity projected by the American public in all directions is certainly one reason, as is the tendency of Americans to advertise their mistakes, even invented ones. It smells like weakness. I believe there is a kind of autism at work.

Recently in Germany a Pakistani (who had tried to kill a journalist over those Mohammed cartoons) killed himself in police custody. Pakistanis claimed (implausibly) he had been tortured to death and burned German flags (for a change). But Germans quite sensibly did not believe it and the story disappeared within 24 hours. I am getting the impression that in the US it would have caused a lot of hysteria, three official investigations and lots of speeches. You may think that speaks for you. I used to think that, too, but now I say it has become an obsession because it is hurting America. And if you cut and run in Iraq, the rest of the world will be sorry, too, even if they don´t know it.

wf,

America could do as you suggest if it had, ala France, better control of its press.

Frankly, as much as it hurts, I prefer our system.

The problem with the "kill-em-all" method of dealing with "Jehadis" is illustrated by comparing the number of "Jehadis" in Iraq today with the number before the invasion.

Wf, Putin plausibly claims that russia's military spending is about 4% of US military spending.

So which looks like more of a threat, the desperate declining superpower or the ex-superpower?

Putin hasn't invaded anybody recently unless you count the Chechens who haven't done much to make themselves look like victims worthy of sympathy. Putin hasn't even threatened to invade anybody. Bush threatened iraq, iran, north korea, and syria, and libya, carried out the threat on iraq, and plausibly is about to attack iran. Nonamericans who need middle-east oil might reasonably be concerned -- if they need oil, are they safer getting it from suppliers who very much need their money, or are they better off having it controlled by somebody who also needs oil and doesn't need money, who wants to control them?

Etc.

See, all through the cold war we thought we were protecting the world from the russians. But I'm afraid a big part of the world thought they were balancing us off against the russians. They thought they were ensuring a degree of independence by keeping the USA and the USSR busy scheming against each other. And now the USSR can't balance us, and the more we throw our weight around the more we look like a threat.

We still think we're protecting the world, when to a lot of people we look like the biggest threat around. The strongest military. The most nukes. Bush might not be the craziest world leader around, but his power is far more than the next-strongest insane leader.

To the extent that it matters what foreigners think, we're probably better off looking like our population is divided. The less we agree among ourselves the less threatening we look. But then something like 9/11 comes and unifies us, and for a little while everybody knows we're going to lash out at somebody, and they hope it won't be them....

But to a very large extent it is about our domestic concerns. Americans tend not to notice the rest of the world, it's just a backdrop for our domestic politics. When we do notice the world we tend to concentrate on one particular threat and we ignore everything else, it's all about how everything else deepens that one threat. We used to be enough of a superpower that we could get away with that. Maybe we still are.

We're like a rhinoceros in a china shop. Big, strong, armored, poor eyesight but excellent hearing. Every now and then we hear something we don't like so we rush over to trample it. A lot fo the time we stand around confused and argue with ourselves. You do not want to attract our attention.

LOL at the posts here
Regardless of how many pople were killed by the Marines under the stress of war, the only people in a position to alert the authorities were the Marines at the scene. The information clearly was floating around since Nov 2005 and suppressed by the rank and file, the noncoms and the officiers across the board. It is very clear that the events could not be suppressed even by the realization/rationalization of the severe stress which soldiers under go in combat.

A Marine talked to the appropriate Marine, an investigation intiated, must likely w/ dragging feet understanding what was at stake. All of this only made it worse for all of us.

Robert M,
Your claims are simply exaggerations, the military's own investigators found the inconsistencies in reports and pressed the investigation.

J Thomas, that´s what I meant when I said autistic. How can you have sympathy for the idea that Russia is less of a threat than the US? To whom?

In post #34 I mentioned some things Russia does - right now - that the US clearly does not do. If some people claim to be more afraid of the US (as some chose to prefer the Soviet Union in the 70s and 80s, as I remember all too well) they are in fact appeasing or favouring a totalitarian and unyielding system over a democratic and responsive one. And when, say, China behaves like the rhinoceros, there will not be anti-Chinese rants and lies in our papers. Because we know they won´t care. But you suckers will.

No German, French or Russian is really afraid the US might invade them, or bomb them, or cut off their oil. If they did, believe me, they would suck up to you, too. And I know for a fact most do not care about Iraqis ("I don´t give a s--- if they kill each other down there") or any other faraway country, except when it suits them. Turkey - whose army has razed many a Kurdish village - is even a plausible candidate for EU membership. Do you really believe you are getting a fair deal?

Nor is America as powerful as you think it is. All those nice harmless regimes, from Russian and China to Venezuela and Iran are ganging up on you with Europeans - including my countrymen - nodding approvingly. How long until you stop thinking you deserve that? And if you deserve that, what about the Kurds, Georgians, Taiwanese, Israelis etc. etc. that depend on US protection? They will go before you.

You cannot disengage either. If you want to get along with all the world, you must be aware what that means. It means cutting up the world into spheres of influence (none of them yours), making nice with dictators, trading with them, delivering their enemies into their hand, selling them arms and technology to suppress and conquer. Think it through. You will just get your hands dirty in another, less justifiable way.

The national German newspaper I read this morning had their second big article about Haditha today. They already treat the massacre as fact. They mention claims of a military cover-up by US congressmen. Well done! They also assert the US troops are always "shooting indiscriminately" when the feel threatened. The author´s Iraqi informant claims to have lost a relative who was shot in the back "without a reason" from a moving convoy. And then there is the Iraqi ambassador who says Marines "intentionally" killed his cousin in Haditha. Maybe, maybe not. Maybe you really should pull out. The Sunni are a minority. Without the US, Haditha would have been de-sunnified already. And you´d have one less ambassador and one more asylum seeker.

iam indonesian, iam include in local students organozation PMII (pergerakan Mahasiswa Islam Indonesia) and this organization include or second line in NU (Nahdlatul Ulama). We wont to supports you about indonesians problem, and this problem is how to rage againts indonesians islam fundamentals comunity (Majelis Mujahidin Indonesia, Hizbut Tahrir Indonesia, MUI,and many more organization) to succestely for RUU APP ( Rancangan Undang-undang Anti Pornografi and Pornoaction). we need serioust supports you and may be you can wont some logiistics to counter attack indonesians fundamental comunity to succestely program in indonesians parlemens.
if you serioust to back up and supports me you can transfers some logistics to me :
Retno irawan
member in BCA (Bank Central Asia) Indonesia
no Account/Registration 6630160551, BCA Bekasi Barat.

thank you.

Yehudit: May I respectfully request that you pull #84 as totally off-topic? Perhaps you or some other WoC regular contributor can look into this person's Indonesia-related projects. I can't make heads or tails out of the post. What I get out of it seems self-contradictory, but that might be just an ESL problem.

How can you have sympathy for the idea that Russia is less of a threat than the US? To whom?

WF, only the USA can effectively project military power. Russia is not currently a big military threat to anybody except maybe the Chechens. I don't sympathise with the idea that we are more of a threat, but it appears to be a rather common idea that we shouldn't ignore.

Of course when China starts to develop the ability to project power we'll have anti-chinese rants. We get a few already but we're mostly too busy thinking about a tiny minority of islamofascists just now. We prefer to let china ripen a decade or two before we concentrate on that threat beyond spending many billions a year to develop weapons systems that hypothetically might be useful against china.

Germany and france (and to some extent russia) do suck up to us. They let us run NATO. Germany lets us keep military bases in their country. They cooperate with us investigating international terrorists. Very often they vote with us at the UN, though we make a big deal about the occasional times they don't. What kind of fair deal would you want? If we're a superpower we don't need regional powers to be "fair" to us. And if we aren't a superpower then we need to notice that and adjust our rhetoric. Remember when Condi said "Punish france, ignore germany, and reward russia"? That was stupid. If we're strong enough to train other countries with dog biscuit and whip, we should be polite enough not to come out and say so. Nationalism isn't dead even in germany or france. And if we aren't that strong, then it's real real stupid to talk like we are.

Nor is America as powerful as you think it is. All those nice harmless regimes, from Russian and China to Venezuela and Iran are ganging up on you with Europeans - including my countrymen - nodding approvingly.

Yes. Maybe we shouldn't have pretended we were so powerful. If we'd made friends with a third or half of those regimes and pretended we respected and needed them, we could have split that alliance. Bush senior would have known how to do that. W didn't listen.

You cannot disengage either. If you want to get along with all the world, you must be aware what that means. It means cutting up the world into spheres of influence (none of them yours), making nice with dictators, trading with them, delivering their enemies into their hand, selling them arms and technology to suppress and conquer.

There are more than two paths, it isn't either/or. But yes, we'd have to make some compromises we wouldn't like. As we do trying to be the only world superpower. Currently my thought is we need to put lots of resources into finding cheap alternate energy and better industrial automation. Our current automated plants are too expensive and too inflexible. We might have to pull our horns in until we can retool. But we could bounce back much stronger! Using up the last of our strength fighting while our economy gets increasingly untenable, might be, well, unwise. If we were facing just one enemy then it might make sense to use ourselves up to destroy them -- like britain in WWII. But if we get too battered fighting the first foe, the next opponent will be that much better off. We need to be strong enough to at least maintain ourselves against all comers.

Maybe you really should pull out.

Yes, maybe. Winning would be a big commitment and we don't have that much committed support from americans. The last time we tried something like this was a century ago, and that one didn't turn out particularly well -- though we did get bases that lasted us nearly 40 years. Then the japanese took them and it was probably about as hard to take them back as it would have been if we hadn't had them in the first place. That is, those bases lasted right to the point that we really needed them and then they were gone.

We've been trying to do iraq on the cheap right from the point we first converted combat troops to occupation troops without even a rest period between. Counting indirect costs we've used up something like $2 trillion trying to do it on the cheap. If we use another $2 trillion and fail, what good is that? We need to either get the public commitment to do what it takes, or cut our losses.

If I was a Congressman, I would just say they are innocent until proven guilty, and although the evidence passed to me by Gen Hagee (where Murtha got the info from, not the news stories, but all the evidence)shows that we need to improve, we must wait to pass judgement and give the men the benefit of the doubt. But if he and the president where to say this, then guess what, the media would find out that they knew all the facts, and defended the boys...so it's a no win situation for these guys.

I don't know Murtha, but his job is to make laws, debate laws, and to pass them. But he is still a man that loves the Corps. I have heard alot about him. I am sure that some good and bad is true, and I think he makes a mistake by giving his opinion he didn't have to give. If anything it hurt him, but he felt it had to be said, tough love is what we call it. But he is a civilian leader and he is entitled to it. GWB pretty much said the same thing, although in a different tone..that they should be punished. I don't like to hear that. I don't know what happened, I wasn't there, but Murtha and the president seem to be passing judgement, and I don't like it, but they are within their rights to give their opinions, although not politically wise. It may hurt some morale though, piss people off, but isn't t