[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.