Haditha, Iraq; My Lai, Vietnam: This Isn't the Good Old Days

The Haditha incident had so much promise.

Monster Marines Massacre Men, Mommies, and Moppets

What actually happened:

• The place
  Haditha, Al Anbar province, Iraq
• The time
  November 19, 2005
• The event
  About two dozen Iraqis died, quite abruptly

What we've been hearing in the news:

• Iraqi My Lai!
• Iraq's My Lai!
• Defining atrocity of the Iraq War!

There's been an investigation, of course. So far, it's been rather anti-climactic. Charges have been dropped against most of the Marines involved, sometimes in exchange for testimony. The 'journalism student' who provided video seems to have been a plucky young reporter in his forties, with ties to Al Qaeda. (That last detail is from a panel discussion - no transcript available - and I've found no solid online corroboration: just references to other references.)

All the News We Feel Like Printing

There are some very interesting details of the Haditha incident in an unclassified report on the events of November 19, 2005. This report, and its contents, aren't a particularly good match to the 'Haditha is Iraq's My Lai' story, which may explain why the news media hasn't taken note of it.

The report appears to identify the enemy action in Haditha as:

"Enemy propaganda

• Use of 19 Nov attack to gain local support"

There's another very odd entry:

"Local Iraqi views and opinions

• 'CF handled the situation perfect'
• Others blamed CF for the death of local Iraqis"

"...handled the situation perfect?!" Aside from the grammatical error, what's strange about this is that it isn't the sort of thing we hear in the news. American soldiers simply aren't to be seen as a positive presence in Iraq, or anywhere else.

The report also acknowledges that "others blamed CF for the death of local Iraqis." Which I expect is true. You may have noticed the same phenomenon here in America: Thug shoots convenience store clerk, carjacks customer, gets chased by police, and runs into a wall. It's the fault of the police, for chasing him.

It also names Muhannad Hassan Hamadi, who was in the enemy force on November 19, 2005, was captured December 11, 2005, turned informant and told the Marines of the insurgent's plan to make a propaganda piece of the "massacre."

Anti-American Bias in Haditha Coverage? Could Be

I don't know what, exactly, happened at Haditha: apart from the near-certainty that about two dozen people died there on November 19, 2005.

I do think that there's good reason to think that 2005's enthusiastic coverage of 'an Iraqi My Lai,' compared to this year's lackluster acknowledgment of a dull legal process, is another example of American news media's fervent desire to see America as a global bully and all-round bad guy.

---

My Lai Massacre: Not Quite as Advertised

'Everybody knows' that the My Lai Massacre was a horrible, awful, brutal case of bloodthirsty American soldiers killing a whole lot of innocent people for no reason at all.

Innocent people probably did get killed, but there's more to the incident than that. ("After Word: My Lai and Abu Ghraib, Perception and Reality" (March 4, 2008))

---

Iraqi My Lai in the News

• Orphan Headlines
  • "What happened at the Iraqi My Lai?"
    (Los Angeles Times, print edition) (May 31, 2006)
  • "U.S. braces for 'Iraq's My Lai' "
    Chicago Sun-Times (May 28, 2006)
  I couldn't find those articles online today, but they're referenced at Newsbusters.
• "Battle for Haditha (2007)"
  The New York Times movie review (May 7, 2008)
  • "The Killing of Innocents Faces a Dry-Eyed Dissection
  • "In 'Battle for Haditha,' the British filmmaker Nick Broomfield revisits a wretched chapter of the war in Iraq. On Nov. 19, 2005, marines stationed in Haditha, a Euphrates River valley city northwest of Baghdad, killed 24 Iraqi civilians, including at least 10 women and children, from toddler age up, who were in their homes. The reasons for the killings remain in dispute, though not this evidence: most victims died from close-range gunfire and at least five were shot in the head. After various investigations, murder charges against four marines were dropped; one still faces reduced charges.
  • "Although Mr. Broomfield has made his name with spiky, pugnaciously personal documentaries like 'Biggie and Tupac' and 'Aileen: Life and Death of a Serial Killer,' this new film is a dramatization, complete with actors and a semblance of a screenplay. Shot in Jordan with mostly nonprofessional performers, including several former marines who fought in Iraq (including in Falluja) and many more Iraqi war refugees, the film is located at the familiar intersection of nonfiction and fiction, where raw documentary grit receives an imaginary glaze. The Middle East dust in this film looks chokingly authentic because, much like the prostrated Iraqi women keening over their dead and much like the battle scar that runs along one marine’s upper leg like a zipper, it is...."
• Iraqi Assails U.S. for Strikes on Civilians"
  The New York Times (June 2, 2006)
  • "BAGHDAD, Iraq, June 1 — Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki lashed out at the American military on Thursday, denouncing what he characterized as habitual attacks by troops against Iraqi civilians.
  • "As outrage over reports that American marines killed 24 Iraqis in the town of Haditha last year continued to shake the new government, the country's senior leaders said that they would demand that American officials turn over their investigative files on the killings and that the Iraqi government would conduct its own inquiry.
  • "In his comments, Mr. Maliki said violence against civilians had become a 'daily phenomenon' by many troops in the American-led coalition who 'do not respect the Iraqi people.'... "
• "The Erosion of a Murder Case Against Marines in the Killing of 24 Iraqi Civilians "
  The New York Times (October 6, 2007)
  • "BAGHDAD, Oct. 5 — Last year, when accounts of the killing of 24 Iraqis in Haditha by a group of marines came to light, it seemed that the Iraq war had produced its defining atrocity, just as the conflict in Vietnam had spawned the My Lai massacre a generation ago.
  • "But on Thursday, a senior military investigator recommended dropping murder charges against the ranking enlisted marine accused in the 2005 killings, just as he had done earlier in the cases of two other marines charged in the case. The recommendation may well have ended prosecutors’ chances of winning any murder convictions in the killings of the apparently unarmed men, women and children...."
• "Iraqi Assails U.S. for Strikes on Civilians"
  The New York Times (June 2, 2006)
  • "BAGHDAD, Iraq, June 1 — Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki lashed out at the American military on Thursday, denouncing what he characterized as habitual attacks by troops against Iraqi civilians.
  • "As outrage over reports that American marines killed 24 Iraqis in the town of Haditha last year continued to shake the new government, the country's senior leaders said that they would demand that American officials turn over their investigative files on the killings and that the Iraqi government would conduct its own inquiry.
  • "In his comments, Mr. Maliki said violence against civilians had become a 'daily phenomenon' by many troops in the American-led coalition who 'do not respect the Iraqi people.'..."

Related posts, on censorship, propaganda, and freedom of speech.