MORE ON HADITHA

We still do not yet know the extent of the crimes that were committed in Haditha, or who actually committed them, but this Washington Post article would certainly seem to indicate that there was a cover-up. So far, the company commander, the battalion commander and another company commander in the same battalion have all been relieved of duty. Do not be surprised if, when the investigation is over, we see a platoon leader, a platoon sergeant, a squad leader and some privates getting charged with crimes. I still hold out a very slim hope that, in the end, investigators will find that insurgents actually did the killing of the old people and children (although that might be hard to prove as, so far, the families of the victims have refused to give permission for their loved ones bodies to be exhumed, which makes me a bit suspicious).

W. Thomas Smith, Jr., a retired Marine officer, writes this excellent piece about the stresses of combat from men who know what they are talking about. It provides some much needed context for anyone wishing to understand the Haditha incident. I would add that if we were really fighting a war for our national existence, like WWII, this is one of the reasons why we would censor news reports from the war zones, in order to keep from handing the enemy some easy propaganda victories. Warfare is a street fight on a large scale. If it is fought for survival, then the rule book is thrown away and whatever is necessary to win is the only guideline. How many Japanese women, children and old men in wheelchairs did the boys in the B-29s kill during the summer of 1945,( just to use one example)? Unlike 1945, Americans of today do not think we are in a fight to the finish. We can pack up and leave whenever we want to, just like Vietnam, and the only people who will face the consequences live in a faraway land. So we pretend we can fight the war with limited resources and limiting rules. I am more and more convinced that, since we persist in fighting the Iraq War like we did in Vietnam, we cannot hope to expect a different result.