1115.org

What is one to make of last week’s developments in the Pat Tillman story?

When I read on Friday that there were, at this late stage, new developments — that there was actually new information that the U.S. military had successfully managed to sit on all this time — my first response was outrage and anger. A stream of most unladylike words issued from my mouth, and kept on issuing for a good long time. (For the record, my second, third and fourth response was also outrage and anger.)

It boggles the imagination that basic facts about Tillman’s death have been successfully concealed till now. Especially such potentially explosive facts:

Army medical examiners were suspicious about the close proximity of the three bullet holes in Pat Tillman’s forehead and tried without success to get authorities to investigate whether the former NFL player’s death amounted to a crime, according to documents obtained by The Associated Press.

“The medical evidence did not match up with the, with the scenario as described,” a doctor who examined Tillman’s body after he was killed on the battlefield in Afghanistan in 2004 told investigators.

The doctors — whose names were blacked out — said that the bullet holes were so close together that it appeared the Army Ranger was cut down by an M-16 fired from a mere 10 yards or so away.

Ultimately, the Pentagon did conduct a criminal investigation, and asked Tillman’s comrades whether he was disliked by his men and whether they had any reason to believe he was deliberately killed. The Pentagon eventually ruled that Tillman’s death at the hands of his comrades was a friendly-fire accident.
[…]
Army attorneys sent each other congratulatory e-mails for keeping criminal investigators at bay as the Army conducted an internal friendly-fire investigation that resulted in administrative, or non-criminal, punishments.
[…]
The documents show that a doctor who autopsied Tillman’s body was suspicious of the three gunshot wounds to the forehead. The doctor said he took the unusual step of calling the Army’s Human Resources Command and was rebuffed. He then asked an official at the Army’s Criminal Investigation Division if the CID would consider opening a criminal case.

“He said he talked to his higher headquarters and they had said no,” the doctor testified.

As a general rule, the more explosive the facts you’re trying to conceal. the more quickly they emerge into full public view. The U.S. military is obviously very good at what they do. And I don’t mean fighting wars, I mean obfuscating the truth.

If the Department of Justice had only swallowed their pride, and subcontracted obfuscation to the military establishment, Kyle Sampson and Monica Goodling would not be household names today. In fact, they would still be doing what they do best at the DoJ.

If you rewind to what we learned about the Army’s first response to Pat Tillman’s death — years after it all happened, of course — it is a truly bizarre tale:

Within hours of Pat Tillman’s death, the Army went into information-lockdown mode, cutting off phone and Internet connections at a base in Afghanistan, posting guards on a wounded platoon mate, and ordering a sergeant to burn Tillman’s uniform.
[…]
For example, the day after Tillman died, Spc. Jade Lane lay in a hospital bed in Afghanistan, recovering from gunshot wounds inflicted by the same fellow Rangers who had shot at Tillman. Amid his shock and grief, Lane noticed guards were posted on him.

“I thought it was strange,” Lane recalled.
[…]
Nearby on the same base, a staff sergeant was in his tent when a captain walked in and told him to burn Tillman’s bloody clothing.

“He wanted me alone to burn what was in the bag to prevent security violations, leaks and rumors,” the staff sergeant testified. The superior “put a lock on communications” in the tent, he testified. Other Army officers said this was probably a directive to the staff sergeant to keep the conversation to himself.

Then he left the staff sergeant to his work: placing Tillman’s uniform, socks, gloves and body armor into a 55-gallon drum and burning them.
[…]
But the truth was quickly becoming evident to a small group of soldiers with direct access to the evidence.

Two other sergeants who examined Tillman’s vest noticed the bullet holes appeared to be from 5.56-caliber bullets — signature American ammunition. An awful realization dawned on the sergeants, whose names, like those of others who testified in the investigation, were deleted from the recently released testimony.

“At this time was when I had realized Tillman may have been killed by friendly fire,” one of them said.

The other sergeant, who was higher-ranking, told him to “keep quiet and let the investigators do their job,” the subordinate sergeant testified. He was not to go “informing unit members that Spc. Tillman was killed by friendly fire.”

At this point, knowing what we know now, how many people are willing to believe that the Army was only covering up an accidental friendly fire incident? Remember, at that point the Army had not started publicly lying about the circumstances of Tillman’s death. It had not yet created a vested interest in covering up the truth about Tillman’s death. Tillman had been killed. It was obvious to all who saw the evidence that it was by friendly fire. It was not obvious at all that it was accidental.

And what does the Army do right away? It destroys evidence, it starts covering up the truth. Why was that deemed to be necessary right away?

And let’s not forget how Gen. Stanley McChrystal, chief of the Army’s Special Operations Command sent a cable to Gen. John Abizaid, chief of U.S. Central Command, “only a week after Tillman was killed by friendly fire in Afghanistan”, suggesting that President Bush and other senior officials should be informed immediately that Tillman had probably been killed by friendly fire, lest they embarrass themselves by publicly claiming otherwise.

While U.S. military authorities are still feeding us these stirring accounts of Tillman’s heroic death under enemy fire, Gen. McChrystal shoots off a warning to Bush. A couple of days later, at the the White House Correspondents Association annual dinner, Bush refers to Tillman’s death in his speech, and somehow makes no mention whatsoever of the manner of Tillman’s death. This is the master manipulator, the guy who never saw an Iraq war or TWAT development with propaganda potential that he did not milk for all it was worth. The guy who shamelessly strutted on an aircraft carrier in a jump suit making premature ejaculations, the guy who shamelessly exploited 9/11 fifty ways to Friday. This guy mentioned Tillman in a speech nine days after his death — at a time when the entire military establishment was putting out stirring tales of his glorious and heroic death, the day after Tillman was posthumously awarded a Silver Star for combat valor — and this guy did not make hay out of Tillman’s death in this speech even though the sun was shining, and the iron was hot, and a spellbound nation was watching with rapt attention and tears in its eyes?

At this point, how many people are willing to believe that Bush did not receive and act on Gen. McChrystal’s warning? How many people are willing to believe that Bush was not the co-conspirator-in-chief in this conspiracy of lies that continued to unfold for several weeks more, before the Tillman family and the nation were finally told Tillman had died in a friendly fire accident?