Marine Gen.: 'You'd have to know this thing stunk...' (NYT)

[kpete]

Killings
Initial Response to Marine Raid Draws Scrutiny
By DAVID S. CLOUD and ERIC SCHMITT
Published: June 3, 2006

"It's impossible to believe they didn't know," the Marine general said, referring to midlevel and senior officers. "You'd have to know this thing stunk." He was granted anonymity, along with others who described the investigation, because he was not authorized to publicly discuss it.

...............

He acknowledged that the initial verbal reports from the field indicated inaccurately that noncombatants were killed in the bomb explosion. The Marines also issued a press release the day after the killings that said 15 Iraqi civilians had died in the bomb blast and 8 insurgents had been killed in an ensuing firefight.

Yet debriefings on Nov. 20 gave rise to another version of events. Marines at the site said that the civilians had been killed by cross-fire during a firefight with suspected insurgents, the officials said.

Investigators have since come to the view that 24 civilians died, apparently from shots fired at them by Americans, and not as random victims of stray bullets in a gunfight.

But the senior officer said, "On the 19th and 20th of November, there was no information to indicate there was a law of war violation."

more at:
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/03/world/middleeast/03haditha.html?hp&ex=1149307200&en=8b960e3026938b0e&ei=5094&partner=homepage