Haditha, Part 2: Ishaqi?
The BBC "has uncovered new video evidence that US forces may have been responsible for the deliberate killing of 11 innocent Iraqi civilians" in Ishaqi in March. This follows the President's promise this week to fully disclose the results of investigations about similar allegations in Haditha. (tip)
[A] report filed by Iraqi police accused US troops of rounding up and deliberately shooting 11 people in the house [in Ishaqi], including five children and four women, before blowing up the building.
In March, an American military spokesman characterized these allegations as "misinformation" designed to "discredit Coalition operations."
However, a local police captain said in March that autopsies show that the Ishaqi victims -- two men, four women and five children -- had been shot in the head, hands bound. The US military said four people (including two women and one child) were killed in the pursuit of an al Qaida suspect.
More on Haditha
Haditha is a war-torn area because "insurgents" are concentrated there -- according to news reports. Philip Brennan writes in NewsMax that "witnesses being quoted in the media are residents of a city where even the U.S. military admits they can't tell a terrorist from an innocent civilian."
However, Samir al-Sumaidaie, Iraq’s Sunni ambassador to the United States -- who is from Haditha -- said this:
"What happened in Haditha is a huge tragedy, for Haditha and for the United States... I know the people, I know the neighborhood. One of my cousins in Haditha was killed by the Marines in Haditha not long before this."
"The people of Haditha are squeezed between two huge threats," he said. On the one hand, they face religious-extremist terrorists, "and on the other hand, there are the Marines, fighting them, shooting, going around killing people." When he was asked if the revelations about the events of November would make him reevaluate what happened to his cousin, he answered in a steely voice. "I already know what happened to my cousin," he said. "It might help others to reevaluate what happened."
Comparison to My Lai Criticized
At RealClear Politics, Jed Babbin, deputy undersecretary of defense for George The Elder, writes:
Screamed about by protesters, shown endlessly on television news, My Lai and the court-martial of one of the perpetrators, Lt. William Calley, provided the final political nail in the coffin of American involvement in Vietnam. We withdrew from Vietnam in 1975, abandoning our allies and hanging our heads in shame. This is the political result the left wants from Haditha, and we cannot allow it to happen for one very big reason. The Vietnam War ended in Vietnam, leaving America incapable of taking action in defense of itself or its allies for decades. The end of the war against the terrorist nations won't occur in Iraq, and we must be prepared - psychologically and politically - to continue the fight. When we lost Vietnam the enemy didn't follow us home. Radical Islamists will. If they win, we will literally lose America.
Through a Mirror, Darkly
Writing in Thomas Paine, Robert Dreyfuss, author of Devil's Game: How the United States Helped Unleash Fundamentalist Islam compares Saddam Hussein with President Bush in one narrow instance:
Permit, if you will, a devilish comparison. Saddam Hussein, at present, is on trial for his role in the alleged murder of dozens of residents of a small Iraqi city. In the wake of an attempted assassination of Saddam by members of the (now ruling) Dawa party of Iraq, Iraqi forces under Saddam’s command reportedly murdered men and young boys. In Haditha, in the wake of a roadside bomb that killed a Marine, other Marines—under the command of George W. Bush—reportedly murdered dozens, including children and babies. Perhaps, when the Saddam trial is over, Ramsey Clark will have a new client?
If nothing else, public reaction to this latest news only reinforces the schism in this country. In that, Iraq has become Vietnam redux.
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