Posted on 04/28/2003 8:48:40 AM PDT by bedolido
Military officials said Friday they will launch an inquiry into whether war crimes were committed by a Las Vegas Marine who described hunting down and killing Iraqi soldiers.
Marine Gunnery Sgt. Gus Covarrubias could be the first member of the U.S. military fighting in Iraq to be investigated for possible violations of rules governing battlefield conduct.
During an interview at his Las Vegas home earlier this week, Covarrubias told a Review-Journal reporter the harrowing tale of an intense April 8 battle in Baghdad that he described as "a firefight from hell."
The resulting story, published Friday, included Covarrubias' account of slipping away from other Marines after the battle in pursuit of the Iraqi Republican Guard member who fired a rocket-propelled grenade at his unit, causing a blast that gave him a concussion and wounded several other troops.
The 20-year veteran of the Marine Corps said he found the soldier after dark inside a nearby home with the grenade launcher next to him. Covarrubias said he ordered the man to stop and turn around.
"I went behind him and shot him in the back of the head," Covarrubias said. "Twice."
Military officials on Friday declined to comment on Covarrubias' story beyond a statement released late in the afternoon by the Marine Forces Reserve headquarters in Quantico, Va.
"A preliminary inquiry has been initiated by the Naval Criminal Investigative Service to examine the circumstances surrounding the statements made by Gunnery Sgt. Covarrubias in an April 25, 2003 Las Vegas Review-Journal article," the statement reads.
"The preliminary inquiry will determine if the actions described by Gunnery Sgt. Covarrubias during combat operations met the established rules of engagement and complied with the law of war. The inquiry will be thorough and impartial and will determine whether a formal investigation is warranted."
On Friday, Covarrubias did not answer his phone or knocks at the door of his northwest Las Vegas home. Sgt. Richard Slider, a Las Vegas spokesman for the Marines, said Covarrubias would not be available for additional media interviews.
But at least one other Marine who fought and was injured alongside Covarrubias said he believes the Las Vegan's actions were not only warranted, but critical.
"If he wouldn't have done it, those guys probably would've come back and killed or severely injured other Marines," said Marine reservist Sgt. Michael Dunn, who took shrapnel in an arm during the battle and is now recuperating at his Las Vegas home. "He did the right thing. I stand behind him 100 percent."
Dunn said Covarrubias' wife told him during a phone conversation that Covarrubias was ordered to appear at the Reserve Training Center after the story appeared Friday morning.
"She said he had got in trouble, but that's all she knew," Dunn said.
John Pike, director of globalsecurity.org, a defense and intelligence policy organization based near Washington, D.C., said the inquiry "undoubtedly" will focus on whether Covarrubias killed a prisoner of war, a serious war crime.
"As soon as (the Iraqi soldier) had surrendered and obeyed a command to turn around, he was no longer an enemy combatant. He was a POW," said Pike, one of the nation's leading civilian experts on the U.S. military. "We do not allow our soldiers to execute POWs at their own discretion. And this, as described, looks like the summary execution of a POW."
Pike said if Covarrubias is not cleared of wrongdoing, the killing as he described it could result in a criminal charge of "failure to accept surrender" or the more serious charge of murder.
"It could be interpreted either way," Pike said. "Normally, when we think about shooting somebody in the back of the head, you think about that as murder. But I think that soldiers who have experienced combat are going to look at it and see it as a failure to accept surrender."
Pike said he wasn't aware of any similar incidents during the conflict in Iraq that have resulted in such inquiries. He said he was surprised by Covarrubias' candor.
"These kinds of incidents are a lot more common than anyone is ever going to let on. But it's usually not the sort of thing people talk about," Pike said. "The Iraqis quite possibly did it to us, and I'm not surprised we did it to them, but it's not supposed to happen."
In a Wednesday interview at his home, Covarrubias, 38, talked in great detail about the firefight that injured him and eight other Marines from Fox Company, 2nd Battalion, 23rd Marines. The unit, drawn from reservists in Utah and Las Vegas, calls itself the "The Sinners and the Saints."
When the fighting was over, the unit settled in for rest, food and water.
Covarrubias, who said he was a former sniper with more than 30 kills during the first Gulf War, told the Review-Journal he took off most of his gear, grabbed a pistol and told the others in his unit that he was leaving for a little while.
Covarrubias said from the trajectory of the grenade, he traced the origin of the strike to a nearby house and sneaked inside.
After killing the Iraqi soldier, he took the man's military ID as a souvenir.
Covarrubias also described finding the man's partner outside trying to escape and chased him down.
"I shot him, too," he said. "I'm not vindictive, and I might get in trouble for telling you this, but I take it very personally when you do that to my family. The Marines are my family."
He also took that man's ID, as well as his AK-47 assault rifle.
Pike, the military expert, said the killing of the second Iraqi soldier as described by Covarrubias does not appear to violate combat rules.
Covarrubias said during the interview that he believed the two Iraqi soldiers got what they deserved.
"This," he said while holding up the two ID cards during the interview, "is justice."
Copyright © 2003, Las Vegas Review-Journal
Exactly. The marines have got to do something to this guy.
Soldiers should be allowed to shoot POWs? Not according to the Geneva Convention.
"I went behind him and shot him in the back of the head," Covarrubias said. "Twice."
If the part of the story is true, then is unacceptable behavior, even during war. Evidently he summarily executed a prisoner.
FReegards,
:) ttt
Read the article again. There was no resistance from the Iraqi.
At the very least this marine should be discharged, dishonorably, for opening his big dumb mouth about this.
I agree 100%.
From the article you linked. "And I might get in trouble for telling you this, but I take it very personally when you do that to my family. The Marines are my family." He's a gunny. He should have known better than to tell the reporter.
The Saddamites are some sick f*cks though. "As the driver sped toward the Marines and fired his gun at them, the man in the passenger seat grabbed the baby and held it out the window, apparently hoping it would keep the Marines from firing on the car." That's not very honorable.
Also...."He hopes, he said, to join the Metropolitan Police Department." I hope he realizes he can't do that sort of thing as a cop.
Never said that. I said I didn't feel sorry for the Iraqi. I don't know how accurate this report is OR how truthful this guy is. I don't know the story. But IF I was fighting a bunch of guys and they took out a buch of my guys, there might be some accidental discharges if they tried to surrender.
That's exactly what soldiers do: they fight until they lack the means to resist. It is irrelevant that he attacked our soldiers first.
As for the Marine in question, a 20-year veteran should know better than to shoot his mouth off like that -- especially a sniper.
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