Thursday, December 21, 2006

 

The Penultimate Shoe Drops

Three of eight marines were charged with murder (of some sort) vis a vis the killing of 24 civilians in Haditha, Iraq late last year. The squad leader, Staff Sgt. Frank D. Wuterich, got the bulk of the charges (including 12 counts of murder with "intent to kill or cause great bodily harm"). One other marine got one count of murder--"involving unpremeditated killings of three males in a house" which I guess is like Colorado's second degree murder; and the last of the three isn't talking.

There are five others who are under investigation so they could face murder charges as well. I continue to hope these guys are innocent and had a tough fight where lots of civilians, alas, were killed. Of the three other cases, I've given up on the rapists who then killed the girl and her family and burned the bodies. Execute them soon. I need more information on the other two, but my memory is one case is not looking good for the American soldiers involved.

Comments:
This brings to mind a line from "Apocalypse Now" when Capt. Willard says "Charging someone with murder here is like handing out speeding tickets at the Indy 500."

Sometimes innocents die in combat. It's an ugly, tragic fact. But if these guys got out of control, let 'em swing.
 
There are war crimes and we'll see if these guys did any. That several guys pled to the killing the wrong guy (and putting a gun next to his body) makes me believe that happened, and the same with the rape (my imperfect memory is that one guy pled to that as well). For the others (shooting running prisoners and 28 civilians in Haditha, I, unlike Rep. Murtha (D-PA), am content to wait for trial before I call those guys guilty. Nice parrot.
 
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