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| Frontline's "Haditha" -- reviewed by Jules Crittenden |
| 2008-02-19 |
| Like most Frontline treatments, it is well-documented and painstakingly fair. To the extent it can be in the space of an hour, it is the story of the unit and the military, media and political history of the incident. The high points of the investigation, prosecution and defense are woven through. Not everything is there. It starts but does not complete the job of describing what a rallying cry Haditha became for the anti-war movement, which used the incident to smear combat troops in Iraq and the Bush administration, but like much of the press, seems to have suddenly lost interest. Call me petty, but while Murtha's massacre charges are cited for what they are, as political agenda-pushing that caused a press firestorm, I'm disappointed that the delightful video is missing, of Murtha being buttonholed to apologize after murder charges were dropped. Nonetheless, Frontline deserves credit for, in reserved fashion, showing how full of crap and quick to condemn Murtha and his fellow travellers are. Also absent is much discussion of al Qaeda's role, beyond the fact that Haditha was a transit route from Syria to Fallujah and Baghdad, al Qaeda was interested in reinfiltrating Haditha and that's what they were doing that day. Marines are quoted early on dismissing massacre claims as al Qaeda-inspired propaganda. Defense attorney Gary Meyers is interviewed at length, but the documentary does not address this material citing Meyers and an intel report -- which as near as I can tell never got much mainstream attention -- claiming al Qaeda purposefully set out to engineer a propaganda event that day. How al Qaeda intends Marines to react is not necessarily relevant to how they do react, but is somewhat more relevant given the media and anti-war camp's willingness to see ill intent on the part of Marines. . . . In the end, as the title "Rules of Engagement" suggests, it becomes a question of what the Marines themselves perceived that day and their understanding of their rules of engagement on what constitutes a hostile threat and how they should react to it. There is considerable discussion of the subject. To steal a phrase from a Marine judge advocate, it's a cop out on reporting the entirety of the incident, but as Frontline's reporting suggests, nothing else much matters. The treatment tends to suggest the Marines acted as they had been told to on perceiving hostile threats -- aggressively -- and Frontline in balance does not appear to be willing to condemn the Marines for what they did. . . . The final word goes to Marine Lt. Alex Martin, a 3/1 Marine who at production time is with the unit on its fourth Iraq deployment: The biggest takeaway from Haditha for me was this human element where the junior subordinate leader might be a 19, 20-year-old corporal, who has to make a decision in a split second, or in a series of seconds. That will effect where he -- he does a calculus of balancing the safety of the Marines, the accomplishment of the mission, the threat level of the enemy and -- collateral damage. And all these other things that are going on in his mind. That he has to make in absolute seconds. Without hesitation. So the difference between, you know, murder and killing, he is judge and juror, in that split second in that environment. And that is the moral authority these young men have. |
| Posted by:Mike |
| #1 That is a big thing, the difference between killing and murder. |
| Posted by: trailing wife 2008-02-19 13:52 |