John Murtha and John Warner Lost in the Fog

The lib media lapped it up when John Murtha spoke out against the atrocities allegedly committed by U.S. Marines in Haditha.

To say that Murtha rushed to judgment was an understatement.

For example:

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- A decorated Marine colonel turned anti-war congressman has said Marines killed at least 30 innocent Iraqi civilians "in cold blood" in Haditha in November, suggesting the death toll may be twice as high as originally reported.

Rep. John Murtha, D-Pennsylvania, told reporters Wednesday that he got his information from U.S. commanders, who said the investigation will show that the Marines deliberately killed the civilians.

..."There was no firefight. There was no IED that killed these innocent people. Our troops overreacted because of the pressure on them, and they killed innocent civilians in cold blood," Murtha said.

Murtha, who was decorated for his service in Vietnam, said the death toll may be more than twice as high as originally reported.

"They actually went into the houses and killed women and children," the congressman said.

Decorated Marine John Murtha spoke with metaphysical certitude.

He KNEW what happened.

Another example:

(Washington Post) -- Murtha said he understands the stress being put on Marines fighting in western Iraq's turbulent Anbar province: "The pressure builds every time they go out," with roadside bombs exploding "every day they go out."

But, he said, "I will not excuse murder, and this is what has happened," adding that there is "no question in my mind about it." He reiterated a previous statement that shootings of women and children occurred "in cold blood" and that there was no firefight in which civilians were killed in a crossfire, as some Marines asserted after the event.

"This is worse than Abu Ghraib," he said, referring to the abuse of Iraqi detainees by U.S. soldiers at a prison west of Baghdad that, when revealed in spring 2004, became a major setback for the U.S. effort in Iraq.

In May 2006, Murtha became the lib media's darling for insisting that Marines murdered civilians in cold blood.

He wasn't the only one to keep the Haditha snowball rolling. Murtha was joined by John Warner, the former Marine and "influential Republican," in the effort to highlight the crimes of U.S. Marines in Iraq.

"There is this serious question . . . of what happened and when it happened, and what was the immediate reaction of the senior officers in the Marine Corps when they began to gain knowledge of it," he said on the same program. He added, "That is seriously a question that is going to be examined."

Warner said he intends to hold hearings on the Haditha incident as soon as he can without interfering with the prosecution of criminal charges, which are expected to be brought this summer.

John Warner, of course, has been getting a lot of attention for his recent calls to withdraw about 5000 American troops from Iraq by Christmas.

WASHINGTON -- Sen. John Warner's suggestion that some troops leave Iraq by the end of the year has roiled the White House, with administration officials saying they've asked the influential Republican to clarify that he has not broken politically with President Bush.

But Warner said Friday that he stands by his remarks and that he did not object to how his views have been characterized.

"I'm not going to issue any clarification," Warner, R-Va., said in an interview with The Associated Press. "I don't think any clarification is needed."

...Warner's remarks were significant. While he said he would still oppose Democratic legislation ordering troop withdrawals, it was the first time he had embraced pulling troops out by a certain date. It also put him at odds with the president by rejecting Bush's long-held assertion that only security conditions on the ground should dictate deployments and that any announced redeployments would be an unhelpful broadcast of war plans to the enemy.

Before stepping before the television cameras, Warner met with Lt. Gen. Douglas Lute, the president's chief adviser on the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

After Warner made his ideas public — and attracted headlines suggesting he had effectively broken with the president on the war — White House officials said they reached out to Warner's staff and asked him to clarify his position.

According to an administration official, Warner's staff agreed that his views were being portrayed incorrectly as splitting with the president. The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss details of the private conversations, said Warner's office asserted his staff would deal with it.

However, in the AP interview, Warner said he personally had not been asked to revise his comments and he had no problem with how his views were reported. Asked whether he had indeed split with Bush on Iraq, he declined to say and said his remarks speak for themselves.

Like Murtha, Warner seems to relish all the attention he's getting now; just as he did when he jumped on the rush to judgment bandwagon over the "Haditha massacre."

As it turns out, that rush is becoming more embarrassing for Murtha and Warner and other vocal critics of the Marines involved in the incident.

The case against yet another Marine accused of murdering civilians in cold blood in Haditha has fallen apart.

From The Washington Post:

An investigating officer has recommended that a Marine Corps general drop all charges against a Marine accused of murdering civilians in Haditha, Iraq, finding again that the 2005 shootings were "tragedies" but that the Marine did not violate the laws of combat.

Lt. Col. Paul J. Ware wrote in a 29-page report that there is insufficient evidence to show that Lance Cpl. Stephen B. Tatum did anything other than follow Marine Corps rules when he killed women and children in two houses in a residential neighborhood in Iraq on Nov. 19, 2005. Ware found that Tatum followed orders to attack the houses and shot a group of civilians only because another Marine in the unit was already shooting at them.

The case is the second in which Ware has recommended to Lt. Gen. James N. Mattis that charges be dismissed, arguing in both instances that the Marines were operating in a complex combat environment. Mattis agreed with Ware's earlier recommendation and dismissed all charges against Lance Cpl. Justin L. Sharratt, who killed a group of men in a house hours after Marines stormed into two homes and killed civilians inside.

The shootings began after a bomb blast killed one Marine and injured two others as the unit drove a convoy through Haditha. The Marines then killed a group of men who were in a car nearby before heading into two houses in the vicinity. Ware found that Tatum was following his rules of engagement when he fired his rifle in the two houses.

"What occurred in house 1 and house 2 are tragedies," Ware wrote. "The photographs of the victims are heart wrenching, and the desire to explain this tragedy as criminal act and not the result of training and fighting an enemy that hides among innocents is great. However, in the end, my opinion is that there is insufficient evidence for trial. LCpl Tatum shot and killed people in houses 1 and 2, but the reason he did so was because of his training and the circumstances he was placed in, not to exact revenge and commit murder."

It bothers me that both print and electronic media were obsessed with Haditha and besmirching Marines as cold-blooded killers.

It bothers me that the media consider Murtha and Warner beyond reproach when it comes to their statements on military conduct and operations.

It especially bothers me when information about dropped charges in the Haditha case are not front page or top story news.

The Marines deserve better than that. The men accused of being cold-blooded killers deserve so much better.

The very real fog of war is fundamentally different from the convenient fog with which elected officials and the lib media blanket themselves.