Haditha and Camp Pendleton
Haditha is going to remain in the news for some time. Camp Pendleton has several nearby towns in San Diego County and is served by several local newspapers. One of those papers is the North County Times (if you've heard it's name before, it's because the paper has been involved, along with the San Diego Union-Tribune, in coverage of the Randy Cunningham scandal). The North County Times has a long perspective on the Marines from Camp Pendleton and the Haditha story:
Notice what Cordesman is saying. It was a war of ideas. Not a war of military attrition as some on the right seem to think. Military force was necessary for regime change (if one is to accept such a concept) but the Bush Administration was never able to shift gears once Baghdad fell. Such a war could not be about killing though plenty of killing is exactly what has happened. It was about changing a country. We were never prepared for that job.
Haditha is going to have to be dealt with. And a chain of command that kept the story hidden for months is also going to have to be dealt with. And I'll add one other thought which is too easily forgotten in all of this: our military has not had much training in peace-keeping nor much training in dealing with insurgencies. The lack of training is one of the reasons a much larger force was called for in the discussions before the invasion. The Marines, being primarily a fighting force, have had the least training in that area.
There are no excuses for those involved in Haditha but we are talking about major institutional problems that go straight to the top civilians at the Pentagon and the highest leadership of the military which has avoided training for peace-keeping and for insurgencies. I opposed the war in Iraq for a variety of reasons but a common denominator was my belief that a gung ho attitude on the part of Bush, Cheney and Rumsfeld hid a fundamental lack of pragmatic realism. Iraq was an optional war we did not need. Worse, in some ways, is that we never bothered to properly prepare for it.
Two incidents of alleged war crimes by Camp Pendleton Marines that resulted in 25 Iraqi civilian deaths are raising critical questions for a service branch that prides itself on discipline.
The allegations, which are drawing comparisons to atrocities committed during the Vietnam War, also may cause irreparable damage to U.S. progress in the political arena and on the battlefield, according to a pair of well-respected national security analysts.
At issue are the alleged shooting deaths of 24 unarmed civilians in Haditha on Nov. 19, 2005, and the possible kidnapping and murder death of a single Iraqi in the city of Hamandiya on April 26.
(snip)
"The problem with incidents like these is that it validates all the false ideas and attacks on the United States and immediately brings to mind other cases, such as Abu Ghraib," said Anthony Cordesman, a leading defense analyst at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington.
There also is significant risk of irreparable damage in the political arena, and on the battlefield, he said.
"This is a major defeat in the war of ideas."
Notice what Cordesman is saying. It was a war of ideas. Not a war of military attrition as some on the right seem to think. Military force was necessary for regime change (if one is to accept such a concept) but the Bush Administration was never able to shift gears once Baghdad fell. Such a war could not be about killing though plenty of killing is exactly what has happened. It was about changing a country. We were never prepared for that job.
Haditha is going to have to be dealt with. And a chain of command that kept the story hidden for months is also going to have to be dealt with. And I'll add one other thought which is too easily forgotten in all of this: our military has not had much training in peace-keeping nor much training in dealing with insurgencies. The lack of training is one of the reasons a much larger force was called for in the discussions before the invasion. The Marines, being primarily a fighting force, have had the least training in that area.
There are no excuses for those involved in Haditha but we are talking about major institutional problems that go straight to the top civilians at the Pentagon and the highest leadership of the military which has avoided training for peace-keeping and for insurgencies. I opposed the war in Iraq for a variety of reasons but a common denominator was my belief that a gung ho attitude on the part of Bush, Cheney and Rumsfeld hid a fundamental lack of pragmatic realism. Iraq was an optional war we did not need. Worse, in some ways, is that we never bothered to properly prepare for it.
posted by Craig at 1:04 PM
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