Military Investigators Conclude U.S. Marines Murdered Civilians in Haditha

[LibertyorDeath]

PBS Newshour

Transcript Update

Military investigators are ready to conclude that U.S. Marines killed up to 24 civilians over several hours in Iraq last November, nearly double the number of deaths initially reported by the Marine Corps. New York Times Pentagon reporter Eric Schmitt updates the situation

http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/military/jan-june06/haditha_05-26.html

[mike_c]

1. what military investigators REALLY concluded was that this story...

...was not going to be buried, so now the Marines will work on containment by making it seem that Haditha was an anomaly. The press is already referring to the Haditha killers as "rogue marines."

Ironically, Saddam Hussein is currently being tried for exactly the same crime-- using collective punishment against innocent civilians. The U.S. supports the death penalty for Saddam. I wonder how many of our great watchdogs of moral clarity will also call for firing squads for Marines convicted of killing civilians in Haditha? Oh, but weren't they just following orders...?

[tocqueville]

2. shouldn't George risk the death penalty by the Saddam standards ?

[LibertyorDeath]

3. "just following orders"

That rings a bell.....



The defendants at Nuremberg. Front row, from left to right: Hermann Göring, Rudolf Hess, Joachim von Ribbentrop, Wilhelm Keitel, Ernst Kaltenbrunner, Alfred Rosenberg, Hans Frank, Wilhelm Frick, Julius Streicher, Walther Funk, Hjalmar Schacht. Back row from left to right: Karl Dönitz, Erich Raeder, Baldur von Schirach, Fritz Sauckel, Alfred Jodl, Franz von Papen, Arthur Seyss-Inquart, Albert Speer, Konstantin van Neurath, Hans Fritzsche.
Courtesy of the National Archives.


All claimed to be "just following orders"

The American, British, Russian and French Judges all negated it as a defense against War Crimes

http://fcit.usf.edu/holocaust/resource/gallery/N1945.htm

[TahitiNut]

5. It can ONLY be morally invalidated as a defense if those giving the orders

... are punished equally or more severely. That, indeed, WAS the case in Nuremberg and the (so-called) "Nuremberg Defense" was rightfully invalidated. IF, however, we ONLY prosecute and punish those who followed orders and allow those whose orders and commands led to these atrocities go free to continue their war crimes, we're committing an atrocity ourselves -- an atrocity born of political cowardice!

If, on the other hand, they were found to NOT be following orders and instead were acting against orders on their own initative (a REAL stretch of credibility for anyone that knows the Marines even a little bit), they should be severely punished up to life in prison, depending on the mitigating factors, if any. (I'm against capital punishment.)

[silvertip]

4. Rogue Marines

    I don't think so! What I do think is that these 18- 19- 20
or so yr. old young men saw their friend and fellow Marine
blown to bits and the equaly young Sgt. in charge of the
patrol lost control of his men and they killed everyone in
sight. But before you draw and quarter them why don't you walk
that mile in their boots and live with the killing and the
maiming of their friends and help them pick up their body
parts and put them into a rubber bag to be sent home to their
family.                                                       
              Should there be an accounting and should there
be a punishment? Yes! But I do not think that you can even
begin to compare these young Marines to Saddam Hussein and I
think to even make such a comparasion is an insult to every
man and woman in our military services.There were no orders to
kill those people it was just something that happened, and
those young men will live with the things that happened for
the rest of their life, they lost control and there will be a
reckoning.They are laying life and limb on the line every
second of every day and night and I believe that you owe the
members of our armed forces an apology.                       
                                             I am a former
Marine GYSGT. with two tours of duty in Vietnam and I do know
what I'm talking about I've been in those boots.