Murtha must tesfity for slandering our troops

[JaJae]

Originally Posted by motivez

I thought not all of those kids were cleared?

He didn't say some were guilty. The ones who have been cleared up till this point are pretty pissed off at the damage he did though.

[motivez]

What damage is that

[JaJae]

Originally Posted by motivez

What damage is that

Their reputation.

[motivez]

Do you have the text of what Murtha actually said?

[kinggovernor]

Originally Posted by motivez

Do you have the text of what Murtha actually said?

GIBSON: I heard you tell George Stephanopoulos on Sunday that you believe this is murder, followed by a cover-up and I’ve heard you also say that what happened is well-known in Marine circles. Why are you so sure it was murder?

MURTHA: Charles, I started hearing about this probably right before the Time Magazine article and then I heard officially about it about two months ago. And there’s no question in my mind, when they pay people, as they did right after the incident - a team went into to investigate this immediately afterward. I mean it breaks my heart to think that Marines would do this. Hopefully, this is an isolated incident. But, you know, we’re supposed to be selling ideas of America, ideals of America, and we’re losing that war.

The reason we’ve lost the hearts and mind is these troops are under tremendous stress. Day after day these explosive devices go off, and if they don’t kill them that day, they hurt somebody, they wound somebody. And I see them at the hospitals. I see - they don’t know who the enemy is, they don’t know who they’re fighting, Iraq – and then they kill innocent people. There’s no question in my mind about what happened here. There was no gunfire. They killed four people in a taxi and then in addition to that, they went into the rooms and killed them. And I don’t know how many were involved in it, but it’s something that we cannot excuse. I can understand it, but it can’t be excused.

GIBSON: Jonathan just mentioned, there’s no charges yet filed against any of the Marines that were in this outfit, but Jonathan mentioned a moment ago, defense lawyers are already saying, well, there’s drone video and there is actual radio traffic to higher-ups that will give a different picture than you have been talking about of this incident. What do you know about that?

MURTHA: I can only tell you this, Charles. This is what the Marine Corps told me at the highest level. The Commandant of the Marine Corps was in my office just last week, so you know, I know there was a cover-up someplace. They knew about this a few days afterwards and there’s no question the chain of command tried to stifle the story. I can understand why, but that doesn’t excuse it. Something like this has to be brought out to the public, and the people have to be punished.

GIBSON: The commandant told you that this was a case of murder?

MURTHA: Charlie, don’t mince words here. The commandant said it was a very serious incident. He was not going to tell me it was murder, but everything looked to him just like it looks to me. He didn’t say that in so many words, but he told me exactly what happened.

[…]

GIBSON: In terms of a cover-up, do you think this ever would have come to light if Time Magazine hadn’t pursued this so relentlessly using the video form this human rights organization?

MURTHA: No, I do not think it would have come out, and it’s unfortunate because this is how you lose the Iraqi people. If you’re going to win a war like this, you got to promote the ideals and ideas of American democracy, and there’s no question in my mind that we’re losing it.

Think Progress » Murtha on Haditha: ‘I Know There Was a Cover-up … The Chain of Command Tried to Stifle the Story’

[RMNIXON]

Originally Posted by JaJae

He was the ranking Democrat on the House Appropriations Defense Subcommittee. He was apparently leaked information that the military later claimed was untrue. He wasn't officially briefed on the incident until a week after he claimed the marines in question murdered civilians in cold blood and continued to spread lies after the military told him to stop because the investigation was ongoing and it was detrimental to their trial.

When he spoke, it was considered truth from a leading figure.

Very well said. And don't forget it was spread far and wide by the media and they were in fact going after the names of these people and any other dirt they could get. It was irresponcible grandstanding in the least and I think slander fits.

[RMNIXON]

Originally Posted by motivez

What damage is that

Why was Murtha so quiet durring the recent hearings if he is not in the Dog House?

[JaJae]

Originally Posted by RMNIXON

Why was Murtha so quiet durring the recent hearings if he is not in the Dog House?

Imagine if it weren't our soldiers who were chastised to the international media, but rather a poor minority. I bet the Democrats would want a Republican to answer for his actions then!

[JaJae]

A classified report was recently released that shows Haditha may have been an Al Qaeda propaganda event against our troops.

http://warchronicle.com/TheyAreNotKi...1%5D.BATES.pdf

Murtha might have some splainin to do in regards to his sources...

[motivez]

Murtha's sources were likely ones in the military who understood the situation.. you can't seriously be suggesting he has sources "inside Al Qaeda"

The Haditha investigation has been fucked from the start, though. Here's a decent article about the charges:

The Erosion of a Murder Case Against Marines in the Killing of 24 Iraqi Civilians
By PAUL von ZIELBAUER

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.

In the recent case, against Staff Sgt. Frank D. Wuterich, the investigator recommended that he be charged with negligent homicide if the case moved ahead to court-martial. In the other two cases, the investigator recommended dropping all charges.

Experts in military justice say the Haditha prosecutions were compromised by several factors having to do with the quality of the evidence, including a delayed investigation and the decision to conduct hearings in the United States, far from the scene of the killings and possible Iraqi witnesses.

The cases also reflect the particular views of Lt. Col. Paul J. Ware, who presided over the hearings and concluded that all three cases lacked sufficient evidence. He made clear in his recommendations to the commander who ultimately decides the cases that he felt that the killings should be considered in context — that of a war zone where the enemy ruthlessly employed civilians as cover.

Perhaps nothing handicapped military prosecutors more than the delay in investigating the killings, on Nov. 19, 2005, because battalion officers initially decided the case did not require an inquiry. The attack began after a roadside bombing of the marines’ convoy killed a comrade; led by Sergeant Wuterich, a group of marines then killed 24 people over several hours. Nineteen of the 24 were killed in their homes.

By the time the Marine Corps announced murder charges against the infantrymen, 13 months had passed. Evidence vanished, witnesses evaporated and memories paled.

Those problems with collecting evidence were further complicated because Haditha remained a combat zone. When forensic experts traveled there last year to interview family members of those killed, heavily armed Marine infantrymen had to guard them, and even then, insurgent fire forced the investigators to abandon the scene after an hour.

Beyond that, Islamic custom dictates that families bury their dead within hours. Relatives of those killed in Haditha refused American requests to exhume the bodies for forensic analysis.

In addition, the collection of evidence was hurt by the decision to hold evidentiary hearings for the marines in the Haditha case at Camp Pendleton, Calif., rather than in Baghdad, where some other cases have been heard.

“In the Vietnam era, you often had the lawyers, the witnesses, the scene, the victims’ families — you had them right there,” said Gary D. Solis, a former Marine judge who teaches the laws of war at Georgetown University Law Center. “If you happened to have a witness who had rotated back to the United States, you could call them back.”

In the end, in Colonel Ware’s view, expressed in dozens of pages of analysis and opinion in his reports on all three cases, the Haditha prosecutors failed to amass enough evidence to win a conviction.

In his latest report, in which he recommended dismissing 10 murder charges against Sergeant Wuterich and reducing seven others to negligent homicide, Colonel Ware wrote that the evidence presented to him “is simply not strong enough to prove beyond a reasonable doubt.”

He made similar conclusions in his reports on the cases against two other infantrymen for whom he urged the dismissal of all charges: Lance Cpl. Justin Sharratt, whose murder charges were subsequently thrown out by the commanding general overseeing the case, and Lance Cpl. Stephen Tatum, who is still waiting to hear the general’s decision. Commanders usually follow investigators’ recommendations.

“When you have an investigating officer like Ware, who says ‘don’t go there if you can’t prove,’” your case, Mr. Solis said, “we’re left with what appear to be very reduced charges.” He added: “He’s aggressive, and he seems to make his judgments without regard for anything but the law. He must know that people — civilians, primarily — are going to howl about this, but that doesn’t seem to be a concern.”

Other military law experts also noted that in his two reports on the charges against Lance Corporals Sharratt and Tatum, Colonel Ware revealed a willingness to give the men the benefit of the doubt, and to consider the impact of the prosecutions on the morale of troops still fighting in Iraq.

“It does surprise me to see that the killing of seven women and children by grenades and rifles, for the purposes of clearing structures, is being treated the way this investigating officer has treated it,” said Eugene R. Fidell, an expert in military law in Washington.

In an unusual departure from the analysis of the facts in Lance Corporal Sharratt’s case, Colonel Ware warned that putting marines on trial for murder without having the evidence to prove it could “erode public support of the Marine Corps and mission in Iraq.”

Michael F. Noone, a law professor at Catholic University and a retired Air Force lawyer, said Colonel Ware was right to assume that rulings in the Haditha cases might have an impact on the overall war effort. Last week, he noted, testimony in a Baghdad military murder trial suggested that an Army sniper, a member of one of the most highly trained infantry units, had planted evidence on the remains of a dead fighter — as insurance against second-guessing.

“That’s somebody who doesn’t trust the system,” Professor Noone said. “Do you want kids out there representing the United States who don’t think they’re going to be treated fairly?”

So, while the murder charges have been dropped or reduced to lesser offenses, it seems mainly because of the time that had passed between the events and the investigation and the inability to conduct a proper one once the time had passed due to poor security conditions in the town.

[kinggovernor]

Originally Posted by motivez

So, while the murder charges have been dropped or reduced to lesser offenses, it seems mainly because of the time that had passed between the events and the investigation and the inability to conduct a proper one once the time had passed due to poor security conditions in the town.

What ever happened to the presumption of innocence? The article is assuming that if an investigation was completed the day after, they would be guilty.

[Stylerod]

Originally Posted by kinggovernor

What ever happened to the presumption of innocence? The article is assuming that if an investigation was completed the day after, they would be guilty.

Presumption of innocence? What's that?

[JaJae]

Originally Posted by motivez

Murtha's sources were likely ones in the military who understood the situation.. you can't seriously be suggesting he has sources "inside Al Qaeda"

The military states Murtha ran to the media before he was properly briefed of the situation. Somebody leaked him information, who leaked the information is the question. It was previously assumed somebody in the defense department. Now it is unsure. And even if it was someone else, where did they get their information from? The idea now is to attempt to trace it back to al Qaeda. How interesting would that be? Murtha on national television telling the world al Qaeda's propaganda without realizing it, jumping to conclusions...

[6SpeedTA95]

Originally Posted by JaJae

The military states Murtha ran to the media before he was properly briefed of the situation. Somebody leaked him information, who leaked the information is the question. It was previously assumed somebody in the defense department. Now it is unsure. And even if it was someone else, where did they get their information from? The idea now is to attempt to trace it back to al Qaeda. How interesting would that be? Murtha on national television telling the world al Qaeda's propaganda without realizing it, jumping to conclusions...

If and its a big IF, but if that turned out to be true that would be horribly irresponsible on his part.

[JaJae]

Originally Posted by 6SpeedTA95

If and its a big IF, but if that turned out to be true that would be horribly irresponsible on his part.

I think it's a very big if that he was directly in contact with an al qaeda operative leaking stories to the media (which we have had many pretending to be police officers, etc). But I wouldn't be surprised at all if his source got it from a source who got it from a source, ... leading back to al qaeda. He knew too much and presented the story the way al qaeda wanted it framed.

It doesn't excuse the actions of the marines, but it does show that the situation was intentionally set up.

[JaJae]

Originally Posted by kinggovernor

What ever happened to the presumption of innocence? The article is assuming that if an investigation was completed the day after, they would be guilty.

The author of that article has written 34 previous articles on Haditha where he compared it to My Lai and called it a massacre. Now that the charges are being dropped it's no wonder he wrote the story he did. Good ol' NY Times.

[motivez]

Paper of record.

[kinggovernor]

Originally Posted by JaJae

I think it's a very big if that he was directly in contact with an al qaeda operative leaking stories to the media (which we have had many pretending to be police officers, etc). But I wouldn't be surprised at all if his source got it from a source who got it from a source, ... leading back to al qaeda. He knew too much and presented the story the way al qaeda wanted it framed.

It doesn't excuse the actions of the marines, but it does show that the situation was intentionally set up.

this wasn't just any unit that was in haditha when this happened. They replaced my unit for a reason, we took more casualties than other any unit has. So they brought in 3/1, the guys that were the main effort for the second battle of falluja, and several army units to settle the place down. It would be very smart of al qeada to try to bring harm to the effort in the haditha area and to 3/1 as a unit. Because if they bring shame to what 3/1 was doing in haditha than it casts doubt about what happened in falluja.