Firefight in Haditha: An eyewitness account

Defend Our Marines ^ | July 16, 2007 | Nathaniel R. Helms

[RedRover]

EXCELLENT!!! You’re the MAN (regardless of your actual gender)!!!

[Clam Digger]

DAMN! That was incredible. I was literally sitting on the edge of my seat just reading that - if I had not been in my office I would have been chain smoking...,/I>

No kidding! That was intense! I find it amazing that men can accomplish what these guys live with routinely. Amazing people. Thank God for our fighting men who make all of our lives safer and easier.

[Gene Eric]

Incredible story.

>> Currently Haman attends a private university in Saint Charles ...

I pray he and his comrades have bright and prosperous futures; Lord knows they deserve it.

[Girlene]

This is another outstanding article by Nat Helms. God bless him for helping out the defense by interviewing these Marines. This stood out as extremely relevant to the Haditha Marines' hearings:

Then a nearby helicopter reported to headquarters that a large group of insurgents were fleeing out the back of the small cluster of houses now under counter-attack by Wuterich’s squad. The pilot spotted the insurgents when they abandoned the houses where the civilians died, Haman said.

The pilot reported that some of the insurgents had peeled off from main body and fled into another house situated by a palm grove about 100 or 200 meters south of where Wuterich was engaged, Haman says.

"Air - helos - saw insurgents that split into groups. One of the groups ran into another house in a palm grove. Air picked them up going in," Haman said.

Red, do you know if any of the pilot's report has been addressed in the hearings? This would prove there were insurgents in or around these houses. Also, the proximity and fierceness of the action that Haman describes needs to be part of these hearings. These were not isolated events, they were connected. Aeiral schematics of all of the events/actions would be helpful in depicting the total action that day.

[RedRover]

I’m trying to get maps. Fingers crossed.

As far as I know, no pilot was interviewed by NCIS or has given testimony. The closest is the video evidence from the drone.

Nat’s doing great work here. I hope to have another piece like this to post tonight or tomorrow morning.

[freema]

I can't decide which one is most applicable.

Somebody call 1-800-LOOKIE-HERE-NCIS

[Brad from Tennessee]

This link on Murtha’s controversial military awards and conflicting war stories:

http://www.sweetness-light.com/archive/murthas-purple-hearts-questioned

[Marine_Uncle]

The more stuff that gets released, the more it is quite apparent general Mattis really has only one option. Every Marine connected and charged in this case will have to go free with no strings attached.

[jazusamo]

Dang, Red!! Words fail me regarding the NCIS not interviewing this Marine. Our suspicions were right on about the ineptness or the intentional slanting of their investigation. I’m very anxious to hear his testimony in these hearings, it’s got to help blow the prosecutions case out of the water.