Posted on 05/29/2006 8:36:31 PM PDT by MinorityRepublican
PHOTOGRAPHS taken by US military intelligence have provided crucial evidence that up to 24 Iraqis were massacred by marines in the insurgent stronghold of Haditha.
One photograph shows an Iraqi mother and young child, kneeling on the floor as if in prayer. They have both been shot dead at close range.
The pictures also show other Iraqi victims, shot execution-style in the head and chest in their ownhomes.
A US government official said the marines involved had "suffered a total breakdown in morality and leadership".
The killings are emerging as the worst known US atrocity of the Iraq war.
At least seven women and three children were among those killed in the massacre.
Witness accounts obtained by The Sunday Times suggest the number of children killed may be as high as six.
"This one is ugly," a US military official said.
In Britain, the chief of the defence staff, Air Chief Marshal Jock Stirrup, said at the weekend the "appalling" reports of the massacre could undermine British support for the war.
"This sort of accusation does make that harder to achieve," Air Chief Marshal said.
The pictures of the dead, which are being closely guarded by the US military criminal investigation service, were taken by a military photographer who is believed to have arrived on the scene moments after the shootings.
Many US forces are accompanied by photographers to gather intelligence and to shield soldiers from accusations of torture, intimidation and violence.
But the evidence in this case points to a murder rampage by the US marines.
The stain on the US military could prove harder to erase than the photographs of sadistic abuse and torture by US guards at the Abu Ghraib prison in Baghdad.
Comparisons are being made to the My Lai massacre in Vietnam in 1968, in which US troops slaughtered 500 villagers.
Up to a dozen marines may face criminal charges -- including murder, which carries the death penalty -- dereliction of duty and filing false reports.
Three marine commanders were suspended last month.
With a political storm brewing, the top US marine, General Michael Hagee, flew to Baghdad on Friday to tell his troops they must kill "only when justified".
The naval inquiry is focusing on the actions of a sergeant who may have been the leader of a four-man fire team.
Miguel Terrazas, 20, a lance-corporal from El Paso, Texas, was travelling in a convoy of four Humvees in Haditha just after 7am on November 19 last year when a roadside bomb struck his vehicle, killing him and wounding two others.
The events that followed are the subject of two military inquiries due to report soon: one into the facts of the case, the other into a cover-up.
One witness, Aws Fahmi, heard his neighbour, Yunis Salim Khafif, plead for his life in English, shouting: "I am a friend, I am good."
"But they killed him, his wife and daughters," Fahmi said.
Haditha, about 225km northwest of Baghdad, has long been considered a rebel stronghold. It is among a string of Euphrates Valley towns used by insurgents and foreign fighters to infiltrate from Syria to reach Baghdad and the Sunni heartland.
The Sunday Times, AP
LOL! I know EXACTLY what you mean but I've got a mean streak and love to pull chains and tweak people. Nice meeting you.
The women and children killed are definitely a difficulty but are we sure they were killed by American soldiers? No solid facts at this point.
Especially when you realize that there are folks who'll happily fork over a few hundred bucks to have some dominatrix give them the same treatment. Seriously, the media has seen to it that we've lost the true meaning of the word torture.
Hmmm, from what I read they have pictures of dead people, not marines shooting them. How can they claim that is evidence of marines shooting civilians? Anyone could have killed these people and my money is on the terrorists killing them during the fire fight, which supposedly lasted for 5 hours or so, and then blamed it on the marines.
-PJ
Likewise, my FRiend! Look forward to seeing more. There are lots of threads tonight with opportunities for biting commentary...
A couple months ago Michelle Malkin (IIRC) had a link to a story, about an elaborately staged shooting in Palestinian territories - in which members of the intifada acted out being massacred for film, which sometimes was then showing up in news reports (which was the point of the research, following a particularly heavily publicized shooting of a man and his son)
Some French outlet ran with the story, I think.
It didn't actually happen at all. It was strictly staged for the cameras.
BALISTICS WONT MATCH!
Briones indicated that since returning home to Hanford, Calif., he has suffered from post-traumatic stress disorder stemming from the corpses he saw and carried that day. "They ranged from little babies to adult males and females," the Times quoted him as saying.
Less than two days after coming home he was charged with stealing a pickup truck, leaving the scene of the accident, driving under the influence of alcohol and resisting arrest, the newspaper said.
That's another good point. Many have been brainwashed into believing that the accused are guilty until proven innocent.
The Next Conservatism #40: Why Sex is Better than Gender
http://www.opinionet.com/article.php?id=6183&PHPSESSID=2e525856f657572c16926d97672b2f88
Which is more logical, or possible:
A company of Marines Massacres 24 civilians, including children, and agree to cover it up. Because one, maybe two, are freaks? So the whole platoon decides to 'take it up the keister'.
Or, a platoon of Marines comes under fire, defends themselves, and in the ensuing battle the jihadis murder 24 civilians, including children, using a weapon taken from a fallen Marine, so that the exact reaction we are all having now ensues.
Weigh that with the fact that the jihadis have been trying to execute this exact plan since the day our forces crossed from Kuwait. And, in fact, failed in a Baghdad mosque only weeks ago.
These Marines are innocent.
My thought exactly
I know. I've already had my tail feathers flamed a number of times. LOL!
DRIVE BY MEDIA?
KERRY MURTHA FONDA LIBS TERRORISTS EVIL!
ONE IN THE SAME.
The reason is simple. If, if a massacre took place, I trust the truth will come to light and the guilty will be punished. If true, that 24 innocent people died at our hands is terrible.
But how many more people - and not dozens, but 100's, or 1,000's or 10,000's will die because the ACLU will press for those pictures, plaster them over the Internet, and they will be used to recruit large numbers of terrorists, Islamofascists, suicide/homicide bombers and IDE deliverers? They will be used to empower our enemies and weaken the resolve and effectiveness of friends at home and abroad. That will be the real significance of this event, if it happened as is now being reported.
They do it every day in every way.
Why not now as another method of political propaganda to weaken our resolve and make our guys look just like them?
Or how about: make our their guys look just like them us?
So even if they have reports of guys in marine uniforms, does that really prove anything? It sounds like there are no pictures of the act itself. I agree that it could have been some of their own and then our guys shot the perpetrators.
I understand in war, people can crack, but a bunch of them at once? I would expect one of the group to try to disuade the other(s). It smells fishy but we'll have to wait and see. Unfortunately, in the world today, if you're American, it's guilty until proven innocent.
I fear for the reaction in the muslim world; they've gone on the rampage for far less provocation.
Maybe I have too much tin foil, but I have detected a slight change in the air ever since the presser with the President and Tony Snow.
The President was somber and even when he spoke this weekend, his "Stay the course" part seemed to have a new sense of urgency.
Am I the only one who senses something might be going on? I admit, it is nothing more than a hunch based on how things are said rather than what is said.
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