HADITHA MASSACRE IS THE NORM, ACCORDING TO SOLDIERS INVOLVED

[Jeffersons Ghost]

Dad supports Pendleton Marine investigated in Haditha incident

MERIDEN, Conn. - The father of a Camp Pendleton Marine being investigated in the deaths of two dozen civilians in Haditha, Iraq, said Monday he does not believe his son would have intentionally killed innocent civilians.

"I just don't believe that he would do something like that," said Dave Wuterich, the father of Staff Sgt. Frank D. Wuterich, in an interview at his Meriden home. "He is a very caring kid, always trying to help somebody out, very smart, and I don't think he would do something like that. I really don't."

Frank Wuterich's lawyer, Neal A. Puckett, told The Associated Press in an interview Sunday that the event was tragic, but he denied innocent people were killed intentionally and said troops followed military rules of engagement.

No one has been charged in the Haditha case, which centers on allegations that a small number of Marines from Camp Pendleton's 3rd Battalion, 1st Marine Regiment, killed 24 Iraqi civilians, including unarmed women and children, on Nov. 19 after a roadside bomb killed a fellow Marine.

Puckett quoted the sergeant as describing a house-to-house search that went wrong and resulted in unintended civilian deaths. Wuterich denied allegations of an intentional massacre, Puckett said.

http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercurynews/news/breaking_news/14800803.htm

According to a CNN story the back door of the house full of civilians was given little initial attention by US Marines and after the killings found open, which allegedly prompted other killings. Is it "standard procedure" to only secure one door of an isolated dwelling when suspected insurgents are inside? We will not catch many terrorists if that is the case.

[TomInTib]

1. Regarding the open back door..

That's the kind of thing that gets a lot more people killed in a situation such as Haditha.

All pumped up and scared to death, those guys would surely spook at the sight of an unsecured exit.

That is precisely the type of trigger that will make people do crazy shit.

[Jeffersons Ghost]

3. a rookie beat cop knows enough to guard the back door in a bust!

are our troops trained at all?

[TomInTib]

7. Yeah, J G, they're trained. You know Rule #1..

When the shooting starts, all plans fly out the window.

An urban scene like that is unreal scary.

And the other guys aren't sticking to the script.

[Jeffersons Ghost]

12. I wonder where the true My Lai lurks if this is "standard."

When "standards" are low people tend to go lower. I can't believe they even tried to pass off their first "script" as the truth. Is lying about events during a fire-fight also "the rules of engagement and standard protocol?"

[cantstandbush]

34. Please keep this violent bastards in Iraq! We don't need them here.

sorry, but that's how I feel.

[Stargazer99]

2. God help the common footsoldier

These gutless wonders (politicians) will punish the common soldier following orders while the upper echelon military will get a pass. This administration morally stinks to high heaven.

[Jeffersons Ghost]

5. hear hear to that Stargazer99

I want to hear why the cover-up occurred and why the story that describes the event changed at least three times.

[genie_weenie]

30. I hope you're not expecting anyone over the Rank

of Sgt to get real jail time, maybe Staff Sgt. The BN CO (a LtCol) will get a pass. At most maybe the XO (Major) will get caught up in this with the Captain in charge of the unit. Look at Abu G, when I was in country I knew Gen Karpinski was going to be the top "man" to take the fall, and all she got was a reduction in rank to Full Chicken Col.

[Jeffersons Ghost]

31. I hate to agree with what you just said but I gotta face the truth...

No German would have stood trial at Nuremberg if the Nazis had won. I really wanted to see a bird fry in this killing spree but I've got to be realistic. Staff Sgt. is as high as it will go and he might not even be convicted.

[genie_weenie]

32. Sorry to rain on your parade.

"Well, Peter, this is what comes of empire-building." -
Harry Harbord "Breaker" Morant

[Vogt]

6. It's always the way it is

I was listening to the lawyer of that guy mentioned and the Marines did indeed gun all those people down - that's not in dispute, not even by the lawyer. What is to be blamed, according to the lawyer, is the procedure itself which the soldiers were following. It is to break a door down, throw a grenade inside and then burst in and kill everything not already dead. It's some pretty sick shit. But, if anyone is punished it will be the grunt who was doing what the sicko above him told him to do and who deserves the real blame. Same thing as Abu Ghraib. The perpetrators of those crimes were no doubt a bunch of indentured servant-descended morons from the hills, but they were only doing what they were told to do. The blame for those crimes belongs to the generals, the Attorney General and most of all: RUMSFELD. Oh, and Bush. The buck always stops with him. The gool ol' Truman doctrine. It's all a lot of BS.

[Jeffersons Ghost]

8. it looks like this won't even reach officer level of blame. no Lt Cally...

a lowly inexperienced sgt. is as high as it will go and no one will get blamed for a rather extensive cover-up where stories about the massacre radically changed over at least six month period.

[Arkansas Granny]

17. If anyone is punished for this, it will be the "few bad apples" just

like Abu Ghraib.

[Jeffersons Ghost]

23. it's sad but true. I suspect even Bushyboy was involved in a cover-up

[bluescribbler]

25. What they told us in Basic Training

Shit always rolls downhill.

[Jeffersons Ghost]

26. yep, that's what they told me in Navy boot-camp too...

Now we see the true "rules of engagement."

[Ghost Dog]

36. True, I see, My question was to be: what exactly are these

"military rules of engagement"???

(And who ordered them???)

[Ghost Dog]

39. No answer, huh: No Rules, Right? n/t

[shance]

4. If this Administration is capable of enacting what they have on Iraq.

And on the innocent people of Iraq and truly our own women and men from this country who would have never signed up for this death dance, then rest assured, they will do it anywhere and everywhere else we continue to allow it, including our own country. Look at Katrina as being a warm up.

Who would think our own troops would be targeted by our own Administration??

[lagavulin]

9. Article does not actually say or indicate "massacre is the norm"...

...this one from an Egyptian paper does however: http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=364x1407991">DU discussion here

[Jeffersons Ghost]

11. CNN said it was "standard operating procedure." the story above...

goes on the say, it was "certainly a tragic result and (Wuterich) understands that it's tragic and he feels extremely badly about the fact that innocent civilians were killed," Puckett told the AP in a telephone interview from Alexandria, Va. "But he was following what he understood to be the rules of engagement and standard protocol." I wonder if leaving the back door of a dwelling full of suspected insurgents totally unmonitored is considered, "standard protocol."

[Igel]

13. No, the article says that the

civilian deaths resulted from the application of what somebody understood the 'rules of engagement and standard protocol' to be.

This doesn't mean that the rules of engagement and standard protocol have this level of civilian deaths as their norm. It doesn't even mean that the guy understood the rules and protocol correctly.

The question is whether it was too extreme an application to be acceptable; this rather implies that it's not the norm.

"That paint isn't really white." "Aha! Then it must be black!"

[Jeffersons Ghost]

22. I just posted the HEADLINE and CNN article below. what did it say?

and what's your opinion of Haditha, in general???

[butterfly77]

10. No surprise...

they have had 7 months to fix the story.

[Tin Man]

14. Your title is, at best, misleading

Your OP fails to cite any source backing the claim made by your title "HADITHA MASSACRE IS THE NORM, ACCORDING TO SOLDIERS INVOLVED". The link you provided to the story at mercurynews.com doesn't provide any supporting info, nor does your anecdotal accounting of some CNN report, for which you fail to provide a link.

Can you explain who are these 'soldiers involved at Haditha' that claim 'massacre is the norm'?

[Jeffersons Ghost]

21. read the CNN account. did you think to try that before commenting?

It either was not available or not on Google before I posted. Why not tell us your opinion on Haditha tin man?

[Tin Man]

33. At the time of my post, you hadn't posted any link nor direct quotation

...Although now I see that later in post 19, you did cite a quotation from CNN. Still doesn't change my opinion of your misleading title, "HADITHA MASSACRE IS THE NORM, ACCORDING TO SOLDIERS INVOLVED".

You seem to be construing a quote from a defense attorney interviewed in the CNN piece, in which he claims his USMC client followed rules of engagement that day in Haditha, to mean that massacres of unarmed civilians are within the rules of engagement. That's clearly not the case, because the military is pursuing a criminal investigation into the incident, with Marines facing possible courts martial. What would you expect the defense attorney to say anyway - admit that his client violated rules of engagement and participated in a massacre?

[nebenaube]

15. goddammit they executed an infant and little girls!

Standard operating procedure to cuff civilians then put them out of their misery?

[Jeffersons Ghost]

27. combatants claim everything at Haditha is "standard procedure"

so I guess everything you describe is fine.

[Jade Fox]

16. Messy, stupid, poorly planned wars.....

on civilian-based combatants can be counted on to deteriorate into atrocities, IMO.

[Jeffersons Ghost]

29. there's been countless sociological experiments...

You can do it with adults or kids on a playground. Put one group in authority and then tell them the other group is bad or demonize them in some way. It's always the same outcome.

[RedEarth]

18. I'm confused...what is the norm?

MASSACRE IS THE NORM??....perhaps you could provide a link to the CNN article....

[Jeffersons Ghost]

19. thanks, the CNN article is now available...

'Rules were followed at Haditha': Marines

A sergeant who led a squad of US Marines accused of killing 24 Iraqi civilians at Haditha told his lawyer the unit did not intentionally target civilians, followed rules of engagement, and did not try to cover up the incident, The Washington Post has reported.

The newspaper said Staff Sergeant Frank Wuterich, 26, told his lawyer several civilians were killed in November when the squad went after insurgents firing on them from a house. But Wuterich said there was no vengeful massacre and described a house-to-house hunt that went awry in a chaotic battlefield, his lawyer said.

"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 Puckett, who represents Wuterich in the investigations of the deaths.

[Ghost Dog]

37. (Legally verifiable) Link to "their rules of engagement", please?

...and to those of their officers/commanders all the up the chain of command...? Is that possible?

[opihimoimoi]

20. We haven't tried Peace Lately, have we?

War is a LOSER

Bush is a Loser

The Pub Philosophy is a Loser

Greed is a Loser

Arrogance and Anger are Losers

So is Ignorance.....

[Philosoraptor]

24. Peace is hard, and there's no money or power in it.

War is so easy, you just sign documents and make speeches. And man o man the money!

[earth mom]

28. Those who make those speeches & sign those documents don't allow THEIR

sons and daughters to enlist, now do they?! It's so god damned easy that way, isn't it?! :grr:

[opihimoimoi]

35. Money for WHO ... and Who does the Bleeding?

War is WASTE

Peace is Profitable....How can it NOT BE???

[sandnsea]

38. That's the impression I got

I read an article yesterday where the response was a sort of baffled "blank stare". I think maybe it was a lawyer speaking for one of the Marines saying the incident was SOP, to the point it didn't even occur to them to cover it up. As I was reading I was thinking, holy cow, do they not realize what they're admitting to?? They hear a rustle of people behind a door in a house and throw in a grenade?? Run into another house and just open fire?? How many families have been slaughtered like this over there? Then, the really bad part, is that after this, they took a sniper position on a rooftop which is what they should have done in the first place.

Things are very fucked up over there. Unless this gets swept under the rug, lots of ugly stuff is going to start coming out.