politics

Pondering Haditha, Mass Graves and a War Without Remorse

Bloggers try to put into context allegations about Marine executions of civilians in Haditha, and ponder the point of introducing a constitutional amendment banning gay marriage.
June 5, 2006

What’s this? Stephen Spruiell over at the National Review‘s Media Blog praising the New York Times? Interesting times, indeed. Jokes aside, Spuiell links approvingly to a piece in today’s Times by the paper’s Baghdad bureau chief John Burns about the exhumation of a mass grave containing the remains of at least 28 of Saddam Hussein’s victims.

Spruiell ties this in to the unfolding allegations that U.S. Marines executed Iraqi civilians in November, 2005 in the town of Haditha, writing that, “From the brutality of Saddam Hussein to the insurgents’ daily terrorism, the U.S. military has always been the best hope for delivering Iraq into a free and peaceful future. It’s time to put Haditha into that context and focus on the 99 percent of the troops who are bringing that future about through strength and compassion.”

Fair enough, but for even better perspective, we’d suggest Spruiell (and everyone else, for that matter) check out another excellent piece by the prodigious Burns in Sunday’s Times, one that puts Haditha itself into the context of battle-worn troops desensitized by wave after wave of carnage. Burns writes, “Whatever emerges from the military investigations, the narrative of the Marines’ experiences in Iraq will have a central place for the brutalities associated with Haditha.”

Burns continues: “Last summer, in two separate attacks over three days, Taliban-like insurgents operating from bases at mosques in the city killed 20 Marine reservists, including an enlisted man who was shown disemboweled on rebel videos that were sold afterward in Haditha’s central market.

“Like other Marine battles, from Tripoli to Iwo Jima to Khe Sanh, the story of their battles in Iraq will center on themes of extraordinary hardship, endurance and loss, as well as a remorselessness in combat, that offer a context, though hardly any exoneration, for what survivors allege happened that November day.”

His point is that Haditha didn’t occur in a moral or historical vacuum. If the Marines did do what they’re accused of doing, it wasn’t because they thought it would be fun — rather, it was because sometimes soldiers snap in war, and sometimes chains of command break down. War is a nasty, confusing and sometimes necessary business, and to expect it to go cleanly is to expect too much.

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Outside the Beltway also read Burns’ piece about the mass graves, and writes that “Such stories are a useful reminder of what Iraq was like before the Coalition invasion. As horrible as Abu Ghraib, Haditha and other crimes committed under our watch may be, they are isolated and the offenders being investigated and punished by our government. That’s in rather stark contrast to systematic slaughter carried out as a matter of government policy.”

In other news, it looks as if the president is trolling for a bump in the opinion polls, and is set to propose a constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage. Bark Bark Woof Woof (sigh, yes, we’re quoting something called Bark Bark, Woof Woof), comes out swinging, arguing that the proposed amendment would “violate the Establishment clause, it would demolish the intent of the ritual itself, turning marriage from a private matter into a weapon of social change. Isn’t that something that the conservative movement has accused the liberals of doing all these years?”

BBWW continues by arguing that in proposing the amendment, “It would seem to me that again Mr. Bush is making the very anti-conservative argument of using the federal government and the Constitution as an instrument of social change.”

Count Blue Crab Boulevard as unimpressed, as well. “Suddenly reintroducing the proposal to amend the constitution to ban gay marriage strikes me as a particularly weak move,” BCB writes. “First, I can’t see it passing through Congress, second it smacks of trying to divert attention away from the real issue on voter’s minds — illegal immigration … I just can’t see that this issue will translate to better results at the polls in November.”

Paul McLeary is a former CJR staff writer. Since 2008, he has covered the Pentagon for Foreign Policy, Defense News, Breaking Defense, and other outlets. He is currently a defense reporter for Politico.