Murtha Returns, slams the Corps

[Gunslinger]

CHRIS MATTHEWS, HOST: Let me ask you Mr. Murtha to give us some details about that. Draw us a picture of what happened at Haditha.

REP. JOHN “JACK” MURTHA: Well, I’ll tell you exactly what happened. One Marine was killed and the Marines just said we’re going to take care – we don’t know who the enemy is, the pressure was too much on them, so they went into houses and they actually killed civilians. And, and –

MATTHEWS:—was this My Lai? Was this a case of – when you say cold blood Congressman, a lot of people think you’re basically saying you got some civilians sitting in a room around a field and they’re executed.

MURTHA: That’s exactly it.

Murtha's comments were the first on-the-record remarks by a U.S. official characterizing the findings of military investigators looking into the Nov. 19 incident. Murtha, the ranking Democrat on the Defense Appropriations subcommittee and an opponent of Bush administration policy in Iraq, said he hadn't read the report but had learned about its findings from military commanders and other sources.

Three Marine officers — commanders in Haditha — have been relieved of duty, and at least 12 Marines in all are under investigation for what would be the worst single incident involving the deliberate killing of civilians by U.S. military in Iraq.
The Marine Corps issued a statement in response to Murtha's remarks:

"There is an ongoing investigation; therefore, any comment at this time would be inappropriate and could undermine the investigatory and possible legal process. As soon as the facts are known and decisions on future actions are made, we will make that information available to the public to the fullest extent allowable."

Murtha held the news conference to mark six months since his initial call for "redeployment" of U.S. forces from Iraq.
 
http://msnbc.msn.com/id/12838343/

Yup, more political granstanding at the sake of our troops on the ground.  The investigation is still open, no charges filed, no courts martial, no verdict, but he says they murdered innocents.......what a guy!

Of course the opposite could be just as true.  We could all jump to the conclusion that  they are automatically innocent (maybe even until provent guilty) and just assume the best.

There is the possibility that the Marines did gun down innocent civilians as local Iraqis claim. But it is equally as possible that one or more people inside the house opened fire upon the Marines in an ambush after the IED went off. It has happened that way frequently, and that exact scenario left ABC anchor Bob Woodruff and cameraman Doug Vogt seriously wounded, when the IED attack that wounded them was followed by small arms fire from nearby buildings. The attack was broken when coalition forces counterattacked.
Someone who truly supports the troops, even if they do not support the war, would want this incident fully investigated to uncover the truth. They would want to know the facts.

They would want to know if the Marines fired out of blind rage at the loss of their friends, and they would be equally interested in finding out if the Marines assaulted that location because someone inside fired upon them, as they claimed. Was it a slaughter of innocents, or were insurgents firing from within civilian homes? Were those that triggered the IED among the dead? We do not yet know, and some are already passing judgment.

-Bob Owens

Time Magazines Report from march The incident seemed like so many others from this war, the kind of tragedy that has become numbingly routine amid the daily reports of violence in Iraq. On the morning of Nov. 19, 2005, a roadside bomb struck a humvee carrying Marines from Kilo Company, 3rd Battalion, 1st Marines, on a road near Haditha, a restive town in western Iraq. The bomb killed Lance Corporal Miguel (T.J.) Terrazas, 20, from El Paso, Texas. The next day a Marine communique from Camp Blue Diamond in Ramadi reported that Terrazas and 15 Iraqi civilians were killed by the blast and that "gunmen attacked the convoy with small-arms fire," prompting the Marines to return fire, killing eight insurgents and wounding one other. The Marines from Kilo Company held a memorial service for Terrazas at their camp in Haditha. They wrote messages like "T.J., you were a great friend. I'm going to miss seeing you around" on smooth stones and piled them in a funeral mound. And the war moved on.
But the details of what happened that morning in Haditha are more disturbing, disputed and horrific than the military initially reported. According to eyewitnesses and local officials interviewed over the past 10 weeks, the civilians who died in Haditha on Nov. 19 were killed not by a roadside bomb but by the Marines themselves, who went on a rampage in the village after the attack, killing 15 unarmed Iraqis in their homes, including seven women and three children. Human-rights activists say that if the accusations are true, the incident ranks as the worst case of deliberate killing of Iraqi civilians by U.S. service members since the war began.

In January, after Time presented military officials in Baghdad with the Iraqis' accounts of the Marines' actions, the U.S. opened its own investigation, interviewing 28 people, including the Marines, the families of the victims and local doctors. According to military officials, the inquiry acknowledged that, contrary to the military's initial report, the 15 civilians killed on Nov. 19 died at the hands of the Marines, not the insurgents. The military announced last week that the matter has been handed over to the Naval Criminal Investigative Service (ncis), which will conduct a criminal investigation to determine whether the troops broke the laws of war by deliberately targeting civilians. Lieut. Colonel Michelle Martin-Hing, spokeswoman for the Multi-National Force-Iraq, told Time the involvement of the ncis does not mean that a crime occurred. And she says the fault for the civilian deaths lies squarely with the insurgents, who "placed noncombatants in the line of fire as the Marines responded to defend themselves."

Because the incident is officially under investigation, members of the Marine unit that was in Haditha on Nov. 19 are not allowed to speak with reporters. But the military's own reconstruction of events and the accounts of town residents interviewed by Time—including six whose family members were killed that day—paint a picture of a devastatingly violent response by a group of U.S. troops who had lost one of their own to a deadly insurgent attack and believed they were under fire...

[Captain Virgil Hilts]

Originally posted by moot
Foaming at Tarmac sure will make that happen.

Who's foaming? I'm not. Just because you'd like to think it is so does not make it so.

[Hap]

Is there a "foaming" smiley?

hap

[Hangtime]

Guns, we both know **** happens in a war.

Civilians will never 'get it'.

If this turns out to be a case of retaliation the left here will use it to push for a pull out.

Reality on the ground there is a bit more cut and dried than politics here. In most areas the local 'non-combatants' do not support the occupation, they; despite having knowledge of an impending attack on our troops, melt away and make no attempt to warn our kids they are stepping into a trap.

Rage would be my reaction, too.

Dosen't make it right.. but I think I know how it could happen. An IUD.. men down, incoming fire from homes, buildings, hospitals, schools... it doesn't matter. HIT 'EM!!

I stand with our Marines. In this, Murtha is wrong. It is a regretable incident. It is a regretable war. To use this as his hammer and our marines as the anvil... He has lost my respect.

[Flatbar]

Have any of you guys actualy read the transcript in total from Murthas press conference?

If you had, those who read it w/o your red or blue glasses on would have realised that Murthas love and respect for the corps is the reason he's speaking out on this issue.

His comments were ment to bring focus on the fact that our troops are stressed to the point that it creates the environment where incidents like this will happen. His use of the term 'cold blood' isn't an indictment of the corps or any small group of soldiers but rather the reality of what happened according to his sources, current military commanders who, because of the rules governing their contacts with the press, cannot speak out publicly.

Read the transcript for yourself and tell me where he's laying blame on the corps for this incident.

http://www.house.gov/list/press/pa12_murtha/PRiraqtrascript.html

Congressman Murtha:

    Yes. If you look, the basis laid for it. It happened on November 19th. It was discovered by Time magazine in March, and they started to investigate it in March. And I kept hearing reports from Marines who had come out of the field that something like this had happened.

    And now I understand the investigation shows that in fact there was no firefight, there was no explosion that killed the civilians in a bus. There was no bus. There was no shrapnel. There was only bullet holes inside the house where the Marines had gone in.

    So it's a very serious incident, unfortunately. It shows the tremendous pressure that these guys are under every day when they're out in combat.

(There is) stress and the consequences. You saw the other day where we have so few people. I think it was today's paper (that) they have an eight-page report that I looked at that shows some people with psychological problems are being given drugs and sent back into combat. That's how short they are. And we don't have enough troops.

So, don't you guys think it's time to think about the welfare of our troops and the grave seriousness of their situation rather than trying to color those who would try to get the truth out as being a detriment to that very situation?

[Gunslinger]

Originally posted by Hangtime
Guns, we both know **** happens in a war.

Civilians will never 'get it'.

If this turns out to be a case of retaliation the left here will use it to push for a pull out.

Reality on the ground there is a bit more cut and dried than politics here. In most areas the local 'non-combatants' do not support the occupation, they; despite having knowledge of an impending attack on our troops, melt away and make no attempt to warn our kids they are stepping into a trap.

Rage would be my reaction, too.

Dosen't make it right.. but I think I know how it could happen. An IUD.. men down, incoming fire from homes, buildings, hospitals, schools... it doesn't matter. HIT 'EM!!

I stand with our Marines. In this, Murtha is wrong. It is a regretable incident. It is a regretable war. To use this as his hammer and our marines as the anvil... He has lost my respect.

I agree with you 100%....except that there is a major difference between an IUD and an IED.  Ironically they both have to deal with getting screwed.  

[Yeager]

So, don't you guys think it's time to think about the welfare of our troops and the grave seriousness of their situation rather than trying to color those who would try to get the truth out as being a detriment to that very situation?
====
your talking about murtha here.... he is the pathetic male equivalent to sheehan.

Lets talk about welfare of the men and womem of the United States Armed Forces in a seperate thread, to preserve their dignity by not tainting them with any discussion involving murtha.

[Arlo]

Sheehan was a decorated Marine war hero in Vietnam? Go figure. Let's talk about the welfare of our service people without all the hate politics hooplah, while we're at it.

[Gunslinger]

Originally posted by Arlo
Sheehan was a decorated Marine war hero in Vietnam? Go figure. Let's talk about the welfare of our service people without all the hate politics hooplah, while we're at it.

That's just it......we are dicussing just that "hate politics" at our armed forces member's expense.  Saying this is like the "mai lai" massacure prior to even reading any of the investigation on the issue (AGAIN it's just in the investigation phase) is irresponsible for an elected member of congress no matter what the party affiliation is.

[Arlo]

I'm seeing more than just his leg jerking, though. I think I'll reserve my judgement until the dance is over.

[Hangtime]

Originally posted by Gunslinger
I agree with you 100%....except that there is a major difference between an IUD and an IED.  Ironically they both have to deal with getting screwed.  

oh, crap.

whups.

ok, you get one lug nut back.

[Captain Virgil Hilts]

Originally posted by Flatbar
Have any of you guys actualy read the transcript in total from Murthas press conference?

If you had, those who read it w/o your red or blue glasses on would have realised that Murthas love and respect for the corps is the reason he's speaking out on this issue.

His comments were ment to bring focus on the fact that our troops are stressed to the point that it creates the environment where incidents like this will happen. His use of the term 'cold blood' isn't an indictment of the corps or any small group of soldiers but rather the reality of what happened according to his sources, current military commanders who, because of the rules governing their contacts with the press, cannot speak out publicly.

Read the transcript for yourself and tell me where he's laying blame on the corps for this incident.

http://www.house.gov/list/press/pa12_murtha/PRiraqtrascript.html

Congressman Murtha:

    Yes. If you look, the basis laid for it. It happened on November 19th. It was discovered by Time magazine in March, and they started to investigate it in March. And I kept hearing reports from Marines who had come out of the field that something like this had happened.

    And now I understand the investigation shows that in fact there was no firefight, there was no explosion that killed the civilians in a bus. There was no bus. There was no shrapnel. There was only bullet holes inside the house where the Marines had gone in.

    So it's a very serious incident, unfortunately. It shows the tremendous pressure that these guys are under every day when they're out in combat.

(There is) stress and the consequences. You saw the other day where we have so few people. I think it was today's paper (that) they have an eight-page report that I looked at that shows some people with psychological problems are being given drugs and sent back into combat. That's how short they are. And we don't have enough troops.

So, don't you guys think it's time to think about the welfare of our troops and the grave seriousness of their situation rather than trying to color those who would try to get the truth out as being a detriment to that very situation?

If you read that and you don't see a pre-existing agenda on the part of Murtha, and a willingness to exploit the incident to further that agenda, then you need to read it again.

[moot]

I had my doubts, it coming from you, but it seemed like another OClub insta flame, my bad.

[rpm]

Originally posted by Captain Virgil Hilts
If you read that and you don't see a pre-existing agenda on the part of Murtha, and a willingness to exploit the incident to further that agenda, then you need to read it again.

Try reading it again without the Rove Colored Glasses.

[Captain Virgil Hilts]

Originally posted by rpm
Try reading it again without the Rove Colored Glasses.

I read it several times, trying to find something other than the Democratic agenda of "Iraq is the Vietnam quagmire all over again", but all I see is EXACTLY that. Too bad some people can't read between the lines. I know too many people who are either there now or have been over there to buy the load of crap Murtha is peddling. He's currently wandering around portraying what he says as fact, without the investigation being over yet. He's made up his mind that it is the Mai Lai massacre all over again, complete with drugged up psycho soldiers. I prefer to wait and see what the investigation reveals. And an isolated incident does not make a statement about the entire war, nor the entire military. So I'm more than a little pissed about him painting my friends and their fellow soldiers with his broad brush.

Too bad you see it all through your Kerry Winter Soldier goggles. You're just as guilty as Murtha is of judging soldiers without knowing what the investigation is going to reveal when it is completed. Even if it did happen, and you and Murtha don't know that yet, it DOES NOT mean all of the soldiers there are doing the same thing. If they were, it would be all over every mainstream media outlet 24 hours a day, and you couldn't get on the 'net without reading about it. Or have you forgotten Abu Graib.