The Unraveling of Haditha-Part I
Monday, June 12, 2006 at 02:14PM As the investigation continues into “alleged” Marine atrocities in Haditha, Iraq, back in November 2005, the “alleged” facts get murkier and murkier. In new developments, the Marine Captain James Kimber, who was relieved of command after members of his battalion were accused of killing civilians in Haditha, denied any role in the slayings and complained that he had become a “political casualty.” He was one of 3 officers reassigned to new duties last month. None of the three officers has been charged with wrongdoing.
“It makes my blood boil to see my name lumped in with this massacre, when I was in a different city not playing any role in this incident,” Capt. James Kimber told The Associated Press.
Kimber said he first learned about the shootings in February when he heard that a Time magazine reporter was asking questions about civilian deaths.
Kimber said he heard nothing about a civilian massacre during city council meetings and talks with local leaders.
“It would have been huge, there would have been no question it would have filtered down to us,” he said. “We reported no significant atmospheric change as a result of that day.”
Hmmmm……
In other developments, two ministers embedded with Kilo Company, 3rd Battalion, 1st Marine Regiment at the time of the “alleged” incident saw and heard nothing out of the ordinary when they were embedded in January 2006, just a month and a half after the “alleged” incident. One minister embedded the unit was Rev. Ben Mathes, 53, a Presbyterian minister and father to 1st Lt. Adam Mathes, Kilo company’s executive officer. The other embedded minister was Rev. Christopher Price. This is what they had to say:
Rev. Christopher Price:
“I knew he (Lance Corporal Miguel Terrazas) had been killed (by the I.E.D.) and there had been a response. I got the impression insurgents were killed and also some civilians got killed.”
“As it was presented, it seemed a normal part of what happened. It seemed a sort of regrettable but also fairly typical incident. I saw nothing that betrayed any difficulty between the Marines and the people of Haditha.”
“Nobody disparaged the Iraqis while we were there. They were proud stores were beginning to open, the town was coming back to life.”
Rev. Ben Mathes:
“If this thing had been as horrible as it’s been made out to be, the people of Haditha would have been up in arms when we were there. “So many (Marines) kept saying, ‘I want to be part of doing something good in this country,’ and when you walk the streets and you see how these folks would greet them and talk to them and the kids would come out and wanna play with them and stuff … they just become part of the community.”
“You would think that if something horrible had happened they would just disappear or just have nothing to do with these folks. They (Iraqis in Haditha) came out on the streets and brought us bread and tea and invited us into their homes. The businessmen would have them come into their shops.”“It was freezing cold and everybody gathered around this kind of metal fireplace where we chopped up wooden pallets and burnt them and we’d sit there and talk about home and family and the deepest things with these kids,” he said in an interview on Thursday. “Not once did anything come up that something horrible had happened.”
“They talked about the first battle of Fallujah and things that haunt them. They’d talk about they had mortars land right beside them that were duds and three landed right beside them and a third one went off and it injured the buddy next to them and they didn’t get hit.”
“How do you think it makes these kids feel, to come in exhausted, scared sometimes, maybe wounded, maybe having been in some type of combat exchange and turn on the TV set and be told they are just full of crap and they snapped and are just not worth a damn?” he said. “Why in the world would any young person want to continue to defend our county if that is what they are hearing?”
Iraqis were proud that Haditha was beginning to thrive and coming back to life? Iraqis in Haditha came out on the streets and brought us bread and tea and invited Marines into their homes? All this AFTER Marines “allegedly” brutalized children and murdered civilians in cold blood as they begged for their lives?
Take into account this CNN reporter, Arwa Damon, who was embedded with these Marines up until October 2005, and her shocked reaction:
I know the Marines that were operating in western al Anbar, from Husayba all the way to Haditha. I went on countless operations in 2005 up and down the Euphrates River Valley. I was pinned on rooftops with them in Ubeydi for hours taking incoming fire, and I’ve seen them not fire a shot back because they did not have positive identification on a target.
Do yourself a favor and read the entire article by Arwa Damon.
The Washington Post is reporting that Marines followed rules in Haditha. Staff Sgt. Frank Wuterich, who led a squad of Marines during the incident, said several civilians were killed on November 19, 2005, when his squad went after insurgents WHO WERE FIRING AT THEM from inside a house. The Marine said there was no vengeful massacre, but he described a house-to-house hunt that went tragically awry in the middle of a chaotic battlefield.
“It will forever be his position that everything they did that day was following their rules of engagement and to protect the lives of Marines,” said Neal A. Puckett, who represents Wuterich in the ongoing investigations into the incident. “He’s really upset that people believe that he and his Marines are even capable of intentionally killing innocent civilians.”
As the leader of 1st Squad, 3rd Platoon, Kilo Company, 3rd Battalion, 1st Marine Regiment , Wuterich was in the convoy of Humvees that was hit by a roadside bomb. He entered the house from which the Marines believed enemy fire was originating and made the initial radio reports to his company headquarters about what was going on, Puckett said.
Wuterich’s version contradicts that of the Iraqis, who described a massacre of men, women and children after a bomb killed a Marine. Haditha residents have said that innocent civilians were executed, that some begged for their lives before being shot and that children were killed indiscriminately.
A four-man team of Marines, including Wuterich, kicked in the door and found a series of empty rooms, noticing quickly that there was one room with a closed door and people rustling behind it, Puckett said. They then kicked in that door, tossed a fragmentation grenade into the room, and one Marine fired a series of “clearing rounds” through the dust and smoke, killing several people, Puckett said.
The Marine who fired the rounds — Puckett said it was not Wuterich — had experience clearing numerous houses on a deployment in Fallujah, where Marines had aggressive rules of engagement.
Neighborhood residents have offered a different account, saying that the Marines went into the houses shooting and ignored pleas from the civilians to spare them.
These are normal tactical operations within a combat situation. The Rules of Engagement (ROE) allow for this and the SOP (Standard Operating Procedure) that US Military train for is to follow the source of the enemy fire, enter the room and toss a fragmentation grenade into the room. This is the way war works.
Time Magazine, who broke the “alleged” story has now written several retractions/corrections:
Collateral Damage or Civilian Massacre in Haditha?
Last November, U.S. Marines killed 15 Iraqi civilians in their homes. Was it self-defense, an accident or cold-blooded revenge? A Time exclusive
By TIM MCGIRK / BAGHDAD
Sunday, Mar. 19, 2006
In the original version of this story, TIME reported that “a day after the incident, a Haditha journalism student videotaped the scene at the local morgue and at the homes where the killings had occurred. The video was obtained by the Hammurabi Human Rights Group, which cooperates with the internationally respected Human Rights Watch, and has been shared with TIME.” In fact, Human Rights Watch has no ties or association with the Hammurabi Human Rights Group. TIME regrets the error.
The Hammurabi Human Rights Group is an Iraqi group created in 2004 by Thaer Thabit al-Hadithi, the source for the Time story.
The blog Sweetness & Light found:
- -Time originally reported that it was Human Rights Watch who had provided the tape
- -Time retracted and claimed it came from Hammurabi which works with Human Rights Watch
- -Time retracted and said there is no connection between Hammurabi and Human Rights Watch
- -Time’s source, Thaer Thabit al-Hadithi, is not a “young man.” He is not a “budding journalism student.” He is a 43 years old “created” Hammurabi
- -Hammurabi has only two members; al-Hadithi, who serves as “Secretary General” and Abdul-Rahman al-Mashhadani, performs as its “Chairman”
- -Al-Haditha is the one and only person behind this tape. He made it. And he sat on it for four months before turning it over to Time magazine
- -Al-Hadithi worked directly under the head of Haditha’s hospital, Dr. Walid al-Obeidi, who pronounced that all the victims had been shot at close range
- -Al-Hadithi spoke with Human Rights workers after the December 2005 elections and NEGLECTED TO MENTION ANY “ALLEGED” MARINE ATROCITIES OF CIVILIAN KILLINGS
And Dr. Walid, noted above, who declared that civilians were shot at close and purposeful range, and who admitted that the victims’ bodies convieneintly cannot be exhumed in accordance with the laws of Islam, was at the center of this story titled Haditha: River Gate… to Hell by the anti-American Information from Occupied Iraq. In this account, he lies about Marines occupying an Iraqi hospital and abusing him and others:
The general hospital was occupied for 10 days;
Dr. Walid Al-Obeidi, the director of Haditha General Hospital and Dr. Jamil Abdul Jabbar, the only surgeon in the Haditha area, were arrested for a week, very badly beaten and threatened to face the same treatment in the future by the American troops.
Dr.Walid said “they arrested me in my house in front of my family, covered my eyes, and tied my hands to the back on Oct 5 2005 morning, during the last attack on Haditha (360 kilometers west of Baghdad). They occupied the hospital for 8 days and made it their office. The first day they beat me on my eyes, nose, back, hands, legs… My face was covered with blood. I could not wash my face because bleeding would start again. When they removed the tie I could not see.
Few days later, one of the soldiers came in the room, did not say anything, kicked me again on my face and left.”
Is Time’s main source perhaps an anti-American propagandist? It would appear so. Another Time Magazine retraction:
The Haditha Scandal’s Other Casualty
With the Pentagon completing its probe into whether U.S. forces massacred civilians one November morning in Western Iraq, the damage to America’s image abroad could take a further hit
By MATTHEW COOPER/WASHINGTON
Posted Friday, May. 26, 2006
In the original version of this story, TIME reported that “one of the most damning pieces of evidence investigators have in their possession, John Sifton of Human Rights Watch told Time’s Tim McGirk, is a photo, taken by a Marine with his cell phone that shows Iraqis kneeling — and thus posing no threat — before they were shot.” While Sifton did tell TIME that there was photographic evidence, taken by Marines, he had only heard about the specific content of the photos from reports done by NBC, and had no firsthand knowledge. TIME regrets the error.
Time built charges on “one of the most damning pieces of evidence” against Marines on hearsay? But Time regrets the error.
Marines involved in the incident say they did NOT intentionally target civilian targets and are appalled by the allegation. Iraqi civilians, according to embedded accounts, are not fearful of Marines. However, Iraqis are fearful of insurgents. Time “mistakenly” claimed there was photographic evidence taken by a Marine to prove civilians were begging for mercy before they were shot….
Smell a rat yet?
Related: A Suspicious Piece to the Haditha Puzzle
Other’s Blogging: California Conservative Michelle Malkin Sweetness & Light
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Reader Comments (8)
I hope they go back under the rock they came out from.
Will we ever see the mainstream media portray anything positive about our military men and women who keep them free to spread their vicious lies and propaganda? I doubt it.
Can't wait for Part Two...
AubreyJ.........
This is one of the most important stories of the war.
GREAT job...you are sorely tempting me to break my self-imposed hiatus from blogging! ("I will not blog, I will not blog, blah blah blah....")
Ah shoot...it's only a comment! My answer to this is twofold: 1) Let's wait for the facts, and 2) Even if some of this were true, it does NOT represent what our troops do every night and day.
The willingness of Murtha and Kerry (among others) to condemn our awesome troops, before the facts are known, makes me sick and truly pissed off!
...okay.....back to my sabbatical! See y'all again soon.
Amy, you ROCK! ;-)))))
Timmer
Timmer, is your wife making you take this hiatus? Come back, come back! Thanks for your comments. You are very missed.
What about Lucian Reads photographs?