Posted on 11/17/2004 9:02:43 AM PST by areafiftyone
WASHINGTON -- The Marine who shot and apparently killed a wounded Iraqi prisoner in a mosque in Fallujah on Saturday has been removed from the battlefield for questioning, and U.S. commanders in Iraq said they were bracing for a wave of outrage in the Middle East after the airing of the videotaped shooting.
Senior military officials and human rights advocates, including those often critical of the armed services, cautioned that the graphic videotape of the shooting, taken by pool correspondent Kevin Sites of NBC News, left many questions unanswered and underscored the confusion of urban warfare.
Agents from the Naval Criminal Investigative Service have taken over the inquiry, a senior Pentagon official said, and will determine whether the Marine believed he was acting in self-defense when he yelled that the Iraqi was only pretending to be dead and fired at the body.
It is unclear from watching an unedited version of the video tape whether the prisoner was moving before the shot. A senior Pentagon official said Tuesday that an autopsy might be required to help determine whether the man was dead or alive when the Marine shot him.
The inquiry will also have to determine what happened to the other Iraqis in the room. Some of them, according to the initial NBC report, appeared to be dead or dying when Sites entered with a group of Marines, joining other Marines who were already there. He has suggested that the other Iraqis may have been shot just before he entered, according to The Associated Press.
On Tuesday, Sites declined to elaborate on what he had seen.
After the on-camera shooting, Marines pointed their guns at another prone Iraqi who was reaching out weakly with one hand, but they backed off without shooting at him, the videotape showed.
The initial NBC report said that the Iraqis, all of whom had been wounded in fighting on Friday and then had been disarmed and left in the mosque, did not appear to be threatening, and that there were no weapons visible in the room.
The incident captured in the NBC report unfolded as members of the 3rd Battalion, 1st Regiment of the 1st Marine Division entered the unidentified mosque in Fallujah on Saturday. Sites reported that Marines from a different unit had attacked the building Friday after coming under fire, killing 10 insurgents and wounding five others.
The Marines treated the wounded Friday, took their weapons and then left, Sites reported. On Saturday, another group of Marines, accompanied by Sites, entered the mosque, but it is unclear how many of the Iraqis were still alive then.
"Obviously, the shooting of an incapacitated detainee is a fundamental violation of the Law of Armed Conflict," said James D. Ross, senior legal adviser to Human Rights Watch. "But if someone feigns being incapacitated or killed, and then uses that to trick someone and shoot them, that's a war crime, and might justify the shooting."
Lt. Gen. John F. Sattler, the top Marine officer in Iraq, promised a thorough investigation.
saying in a statement, "We follow the Law of Armed Conflict and hold ourselves to a high standard of accountability."
Other senior officers, while not defending the Marine's actions, said that there had been instances in Fallujah in which insurgent corpses had been booby-trapped and that some fighters wore vests with explosives for possible suicide attacks if they came into contact with Americans.
"It is hard for anyone to imagine the stress of urban combat -- the fatigue, the threat, the noise, the filth, the death," a senior Marine officer said Tuesday. "But if the incident turns out to have occurred as it appeared in the video, then it is inexcusable. Understandable perhaps, but not excusable."
Florian Westphal, a spokesman for the International Committee for the Red Cross, said it was not clear what had happened in the mosque, based solely on the videotape.
"We cannot, on the basis of TV images, no matter how disturbing and disconcerting they are, arrive at a judgment about an incident," Westphal told AP "We were not on the spot, so we cannot be aware of all the circumstances."
As Marine commanders in Iraq rushed to learn details of the shooting incident, Al-Jazeera broadcast the unedited version of the footage, complete with a name visible on one Marine's backpack and the faces of the Marines, which were not shown on American networks.
Several commanders voiced concern that no matter what the inquiry determines, the incident had handed the Iraqi insurgency a huge propaganda victory, and this after commanders said they had gone to extraordinary lengths in the battle of Fallujah to avoid civilian casualties.
The situation in the videotape appears to resemble two earlier incidents in Iraq. One, in Kufa last May, resulted in charges of murder and dereliction of duty against an officer in the Army's 1st Armored Division.
In that incident, Capt. Rogelio M. Maynulet shot the wounded driver of the militant Shiite leader Muqtada al-Sadr. Maynulet then told a fellow officer that the man was so badly wounded, with part of his skull blown away, that he had shot him out of compassion.
On Monday, the Army's 1st Cavalry Division announced that 2nd Lt. Erick J. Anderson of the 1st Battalion, 41st Infantry Regiment, had been charged with murder in the death of a 16-year-old Iraqi, who had been badly wounded in Baghdad on Aug. 18.
What is this marine's name?
Done.
Thank you so much. Signed and forwarded.
Have you been posting this petition link because there are many threads on this situation?
good Marine gets removed from his comrades at arms and captured terrorists gets a pork-free,low carb insurgent happy meal.
don't make no sense to me.
Yes, it gets confusing but the petition needs to be signed
and messages need to be sent to the marine. He needs some
positive input for sure.http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1281701/posts
My sentiments exactly! This is what I keep telling people. The world truly has gone crazy when we question something like this. Kill or be killed!
F... this POS
'I think it's absolutely outrageous that he has been charged with murder'
He hasn't been charged, my guess is he won't be.
I hope Kevin Sites waits a split second too long one day....
He would probably suck Osama's toes just to have a photo op with him. Sickening, isn't it!
ping
Everyone write to your congress critters and demand that NBC lose their license over this.
I misread then. Thank you. I hope you're right!
He thinks he's being cute by betraying our brave men. Perhaps he should consider the statement, "Revenge is a dish best served cold". One day someone is going to walk up to him and tap him on the shoulder and say ...
There is not going to be a hole deep enough for these POS.
by the media standards ANYTHING should be fair game. Pointing out the hypocracy, that's all.
I sent an e-mail to the DOD yesterday asking why they had gien this Sites person an IMBED credential. also put a link to his site. I just received and e-mail back that sid I could expect a response within 24 hours. Does this mean they will actually tell me what the H he was doing there in the first place?
I'm not forgiving at all. I just don't want anything to even remotely come back on our guys when this backstabber gets what's coming to him. Dead men tell no tales & hostages say all kinds of crazy things on camera.
The Marine shot the wrong guy.
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