Ongoing Investigations Into Haditha Incident

Michelle Malkin has a good roundup of opinion and news on the continuing investigations into the Haditha incident. There are currently two separate inquiries into the Haditha incident. One is examining the potential criminal misconduct of Marines who might have murdered civilians. Apparently the military investigators are doing a very thorough examination of the incident - including reconstructing the movements and actions of the unit and individuals involved. That's gotten positive marks:

Those memories would have come in handy for sleuths of the U.S. Naval Criminal Investigative Service (NCIS, who have spent time in Haditha in recent weeks, to uncover the facts of the massacre. Belated as the investigation was, the residents of Hay al-Sinnani say they were gratified by its thoroughness. That there have been three separate enquiries suggests the U.S. military “want to get at the truth,” says Walid Abdel Khaliq, the doctor of the Haditha morgue where the victims' bodies were taken.

They were especially impressed by the NCIS investigators. “They must have visited the houses 15 times,” says Khalid Raseef, a spokesman for the victims' kin and uncle of Emaan and Abdel Rahman Waleed, the children who lost almost their entire immediate family in the massacre. The investigators “asked detailed questions, examined each bullet hole and burn mark, and took all sorts of measurements. In the end, they brought all the survivors to the homes and did a mock-up of the Marines' movements. It was a very professional investigation.”

The families say they cooperated fully with the NCIS, but drew the line at exhumation; investigators' requests for the bodies to be dug up for forensic examination were flatly turned down by the families. Islam doesn't permit bodies to be disturbed after burial.

Raseef also commends the investigators for the sensitivity to the families' concerns, reassuring them that the enquiries would not be swept under the carpet. “One of them said to me, 'I have been sent here personally by President Bush to make sure that justice is done,” he says.

The highlighted section above may cause problems in determining culpability for those deaths. It is extremely unfortunate that the investigators were not allowed to exhume the bodies. Since the bodies were not exhumed, it is quite possible that critical evidence was not recovered as to who specifically shot those people and whether the forensic evidence matches the recollections of those present since bullet fragments, angles of entry, and other evidence could not be collected. That evidence could go a long way to fleshing out key details of the incident.

The second investigation is into whether there was a coverup. To the latter investigation, the revelation that there was a UAV drone in the area providing video radio traffic and audio could prove to be quite significant:

Two of the lawyers said the message traffic will show officers in higher headquarters knew early on that a large number of civilians had been killed and that they did not raise alarms.

"The chain of command knew about it," said one, and "the number of deaths was reported" by the commander of the company involved, Capt. Lucas M. McConnell of Kilo Company, 3rd Battalion of the 1st Regiment of the 1st Marine Division.

Lt. Col. Scott Fazekas, a Marine spokesman, said yesterday he could not comment on the reports of drone-aircraft video or other aspects of the case because "the investigation isn't complete." Last month, the Marines relieved of command the battalion commander, Lt. Jeffrey R. Chessani, as well as McConnell and another company commander, citing a lack of confidence in their leadership.

The presence of the drone is potentially significant because such surveillance craft are in high demand in Iraq and their use is supervised by senior officers -- which could indicate there was interest among higher officers about what was occurring in Haditha.

One of the military lawyers said Nov. 19 was the 3rd Battalion's "hottest day" in Iraq, and was unusually violent even for al Anbar Province, which is where the insurgency began and where it remains extremely active.

While these investigations are ongoing, we must keep from making and passing judgment on those involved, and on the Marine Corps and the larger mission in Iraq. We should not let a single terrible incident overwhelm all the good deeds that have been done in Iraq. But that doesn't mean that we should push this particular incident under the rug.

If the facts and evidence bears out the need to harshly punish those involved, then that must be done.

At the same time, we should not let members of Congress with an agenda push this issue further and faster than the facts and evidence allows or dictates. If the evidence supports contentions that the Marines acted properly and did not murder those individuals, those Marines should not be railroaded.

Hot Air notes that at least one witness has come foward to discuss his version of events. Also, quite a bit was going on in Haditha on November 19 when the incident occurred. This wasn't some placid city, but a snakepit where Marines were coming under heavy fire from all corners. None of this is an excuse for illegal conduct, but provides additional context of the situation on the ground.

UPDATE:
Conservative Cat notes that Murtha's gone over the top and overreaching on facts and evidence that simply hasn't been corroborated.

News Hounds thinks that Fox News has made Murtha the object of the Haditha story, and not the real or alleged misconduct by Marines. Well, since Murtha is alleging that the Marines are covering up atrocities, I think he has become central to the story. After all, he's either lying or exaggerating, in which case Murtha's conduct is reprehensible and odious (and that's staying within the PG-13 nature of this blog), or there are kernels of truth. Thus far, Murtha claims that there is a coverup, but the facts are far from clear. After all, there are two ongoing investigations into the incident that occurred in November, with one investigation looking into the possibility of a coverup at the local level and through the chain of command.

Others posting: Pajamas Media, Not a Pundit, with more to follow.

UPDATE:
It seems that more than a few people are jumping to conclusions that the Haditha incident occurred as Murtha and others claim - that there were atrocities and that certain Marines murdered innocent civilians. Just peruse a technorati search of haditha and see for yourself. And others claim that this is the tip of the iceberg. All without evidence and all the facts, mind you. Others note that those Marines are still innocent until proven guilty.

Sweetness and Light finds the reporting of a former CNN embed that undermines the massacre allegations. In fact, her story notes the way Marines refused to return fire unless they specifically identified targets:

I was pinned on rooftops with them in Ubeydi for hours taking incoming fire, and I’ve seen them not fire a shot back because they did not have positive identification on a target.

I saw their horror when they thought that they finally had identified their target, fired a tank round that went through a wall and into a house filled with civilians. They then rushed to help the wounded — remarkably no one was killed.

I was with them in Husayba as they went house to house in an area where insurgents would booby-trap doors, or lie in wait behind closed doors with an AK-47, basically on suicide missions, just waiting for the Marines to come through and open fire. There were civilians in the city as well, and the Marines were always keenly aware of that fact. How they didn’t fire at shadows, not knowing what was waiting in each house, I don’t know. But they didn’t.

Rick Moran notes that there might be a coverup that extends at least through the battallion level, based on discrepancies and other issues. Don't people learn that as bad as the criminal act is, the coverup is even worse? And most often you simply don't get away with the crime.

Patterico wonders just what Murtha knew when he started spouting off about Haditha and how he came into possession of such information. The timing makes you wonder whether he made statements before any such investigation or report was completed. Malkin notes that there are military sources leaking all over the place about the incident - and it isn't good for the investigation.

Others blogging: Expose the Left, Blue Star Chronicles, Bare Knuckle Politics, All Things Beautiful, In Search of Utopia, and Hyscience.

Technorati: haditha, iraq, war+crimes, murder, jag, marines, investigation.