Day By Day© by Chris Muir.

May 31, 2006

Wanting Haditha to Be True

David's Medienkritik, ever vigilant in exposing anti-American bias in the German media, gives us this gem today. The web page of the state-sponsored news program ARD tagesschau claims in a headline that U.S. Marines participated in a massacre in Haditha and murdered Iraqi civilians.

As Ray D. points out:

Certainly, if an investigation and trial determine that the soldiers in question are, in fact, guilty of murder and participation in a massacre, they should be punished to the fullest extent of the law. But the bottom line is that the German media has no right to conclusively label the killings murders (and thus imply that the soldiers are murderers) until all the facts are known and until said soldiers are found guilty and convicted.

This is a point I made in my post from earlier this month regarding John Murtha's ranting and raving over the incident. (Note to commenter "boredbrit": Lame insults don't get you far in the marketplace of ideas. Come up with something intelligent to back your claims next time.)

Ray D. continues:

Ironically, the same ARD journalists who can't seem to stop screaming about the denial of judicial due process to Guantanamo inmates are not even willing to afford the same privilege to American soldiers, despite the fact that American soldiers stood guard for decades and guaranteed their freedom of speech during the Cold War. In the ARD world, Guantanamo terrorists are innocent until proven guilty, American soldiers guilty until proven innocent.

Islamic terrorists good, American soldiers bad. This seems to be the mindset of the European chattering classes, and is illustrated beautifully by this piece in ARD.

"But civilians have died!" you say. "Those who did it must pay!" Is this truly what the German media is concerned about? I don't think so, and neither does Ray D.:

This is about shaming the United States of America and those who supported the war, regardless of the facts, right or wrong. This is about seizing the moral high ground, pure and simple. The killing of two dozen Iraqi civilians suddenly matters to the German media elite. Why? Because it has the potential to discredit the United States, Bush and supporters of the war. Conversely, the same media cynics stood by and largely ignored the mass murder of hundreds of thousands of innocent Iraqi civilians during the Hussein regime. Today they stand by and ignore the fact that their own government continues to promote trade with a government guilty of an ongoing campaign of mass murder in Sudan.

Bottom line: There is an investigation in place. Once its findings are known, and if the soldiers are court martialed and found guilty, then we can call them murderers. However, we must wait for that day to come before we can start putting on our "Down With Marines" party hats. Even then, however, there is no real cause for celebration. Here's commentary from Blue Crab Boulevard's Gaius' son, who is currently stationed in Iraq (hat tip Brainster):

My squad leader is sitting right beside me, and we just compared notes on
how many IEDs we've been through. We counted six each. One of them hit my truck, one of them hit his. I can tell you from firsthand experience that after an IED goes off, every soldier's first instinct is to start shooting at everything in sight that's moving. Someone has just tried to kill you, and you can't kill him back. That said, we've never gone on a shooting rampage after an IED. On the other hand, all the roadside bombs we've encountered have only resulted in minor injuries. To play devil's advocate, I can't imagine how it feels to lose a friend and comrade to an unseen enemy. If the Marines in question are found guilty of committing a crime, I will partially understand their emotions even if I abhor their decision.

And:

The above is the military man in me talking. As a human being, I have a
natural and visceral reaction to this story that turns my stomach. If it is indeed true, these men should suffer the most severe punishment imaginable.

And:

However, the most absolutely important thing to remember in this situation
is that these men HAVE NOT been proven guilty. All that exists right now is
rumor and innuendo. There is no proof, no convictions. Right now, there isn't even a trial.

There are always two sides to every story. Too bad the leftwing German press hasn't figured that out yet.

Technorati: haditha, iraq, german media