Posted on 12/21/2006 11:03:18 AM PST by areafiftyone
CAMP PENDLETON, Calif. - A Marine Corps squad leader was charged Thursday with 13 murder counts stemming from the killings of 24 civilians in the Iraqi town of Haditha last year, his attorney said.
Staff Sgt. Frank D. Wuterich was charged with 12 counts of murdering individuals and one count of murdering six people by ordering Marines under his charge to "shoot first and ask questions later" when they entered a house, according to charging sheets released by defense attorney Neal Puckett.
As many as eight Marines could be charged in the case, the biggest U.S. criminal case to emerge from the war in Iraq in terms of people killed.
The deaths occurred on Nov. 19, 2005.
Lawyers for two Marines already have said they expect their clients will be charged and it’s believed up to six others could join them.
(Excerpt) Read more at msnbc.msn.com ...
Perfect analogy.
:-)
If you are hell bent on bashing the President and all in his administration, please go find one of the other 100s of threads in which to do so. THIS is NOT the thread or the circumstance to do so.
Damn right it does. Check out the bottom of my profile page for my reaction to a similar case a while back.
It's "unpremeditated murder", not premeditated.
This is part and parcel of our weakness in the face of merciless Islam. The Pentagon are pussies who aren't worthy to wipe the asses of our brave fighting men.
Unless they are criminals. Then it is what a just nation does.
That's why we have military courts -- sometimes the good guys aren't good. We don't have a military of saints, but we have a military that seeks to be saints, and will discipline accordingly.
I don't know how any of us here could know whether these young men are guilty or not. There are 11 dead women and children, so we can't simply say the victims deserved to die so who cares.
Obviously women and children die in combat, but the rules of engagement should not have lead to a room of unarmed women and children being shot or fragged by our own troops. We can disagree with those rules, although when you are fighting to save people from insurgents it makes sense not to kill them in the process.
Like I said, I don't know all the facts, and I hope they are all found not guilty because I hope they are not guilty. But I'm not going to deride my military for taking the time to hold a trial to determine the truth in the matter.
These warriors are accused of acting like criminals. Sad, too, if it turns out to be true.
JAGs are vile creatures. They are the sniveling kids you hated in school who ratted everyone else to the teachers for the most minor infractions. Lindsey Graham was a JAG. They are absolute scum.
Should the JAG be eliminated from the US military?
According to the military quoted in the article, the rules of engagement specifically did NOT allow them to "shoot first and ask questions later", instead it specifically prohibited putting women and children in danger unless "absolutely necessary". 11 women and children are dead, so now the question is, was it absolutely necessary.
Someone thinks it wasn't, so there will be a trial to determine whether it was or not. We can either trust the military to hold a fair trial, or we can admit that we can't trust our military to be fair. I'm not going to countenance the charge that our military is incapable of holding a fair trial.
Yep, Haditha was just a quiet mid-west town where everyone watches out for their neighbors and they have potluck suppers on Saturday evening. Then our Marines arrived as they were out for their morning stroll.....
I'm going to be really sick!
Yes, but if they are the rules, you can and will be tried for breaking them.
Here's a reminder of what Haditha was really like...
The REAL Haditha
http://chickenhawkexpress.blogspot.com/2006/06/real-haditha.html
Palehorse is taunting you, hoping to start a fight. He is a disruptor on Haditha Marine threads. Please just ignore him.
This is where I disagree with you. Even if what these Marines did was wrong by any objective standard, there should be no basis for the U.S. military to prosecute them. I say this in light of the colossal blunders and outright incompetence on the part of various government and military officials that resulted in this U.S. military presence there in the first place.
Same here. What a charade--our men and women in uniform probably fear the lawyers more than the enemy.
did i get to the party late here? what exactly did zemo say to get banned?
Except the rules of engagement do not allow deadly force to be used against people who "saw something", or even against people who were related to people who "did something".
Complain about the ROE, but soldiers have to follow the rules as given to them.
Note: The soldiers are claiming they DID follow the ROE, and I hope they are right and are found not guilty.
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