1115.org

At some point you have to ask yourself how the “investigators” who conducted the first “investigation”, in the immediate aftermath of the slaughter at Haditha, were able to produce a “report” which accepted the story the marines had fabricated:

The military’s initial report stated that (Lance Corporal Miguel (T.J.) Terrazas) and 15 civilians were killed in a roadside blast and that shortly afterward, the Marines came under attack and returned fire, killing eight insurgents.

Forget the details that are now emerging of inconsistencies in the story the marines tried to tell, the story they stuck to “throughout the initial inquiry”. Consider just the description of the video that eventually brought everything out into the open:

The case was reopened after a video made by a trainee Iraqi journalist was handed to Time magazine in January. The footage showed bloodstains, bullet holes and shrapnel marks inside Iman’s home and triggered a US Marine inquiry.

The trainee Iraqi journalist merely recorded what the first team of investigators saw with their own eyes. That team, based on this evidence, concluded that the Iraqi civilians had been killed by the same roadside bomb that killed Terrazas? With bloodstains, bullet holes and shrapnel marks inside the homes of those killed?

Of course, the question to ask is not: how did the investigators expect to get away with such a blatant fabrication? Because the sobering fact is that, had it not been for a trainee Iraqi journalist, Taher Thabet, they very nearly might have.

One question to ask might be: what justice will the Marine Corps mete out to the members of this investigation team? Time says:

Almost as damaging as the alleged massacre may be evidence that the unit’s members and their superiors conspired to cover it up.

It is at least equally damaging to the credibility of the Marine Corps that the very people responsible for investigating the incident seem to have conspired with the marines of Kilko Company to cover up the truth.

A question that will continue to haunt many people is whether the investigators expected to get away with it simply because, as many Iraqis cynically believe, such incidents occur all the time, and almost never come to light.