Correction To Vanden Heuvel Sniping

22 March, 2006. 356 words.

I must make a small retraction/correction. A while back I sniped at Katrina Vanden Heuvel for spreading rumors on CNN about “the slaughter possibly of innocent women and children” during that Operation Swarmer thing. I called her comment “purely inflammatory and completely baseless.” Well, today I came across this disturbing article on Daily Kos: Iraqi police report details civilians’ deaths at hands of U.S. troops.

So I apologize to KVH for saying she was making something up just to defame American troops. I should have said she was seizing an unsubstantiated early field report to defame American troops. (I also feel compelled to add that KVH failed to mention that “accusations that U.S. troops have killed civilians are commonplace in Iraq, though most are judged later to be unfounded or exaggerated,” according to Knight-Ridder.)

Yes, I agree it’s very sad and terrible that innocent civilians sometimes die in combat. (Innocent civilians frequently die outside of combat, too, in ordinary life-for example, in traffic accidents.) But here’s why my sympathy is not endless in this case: Assuming the Iraqi police account is completely accurate, all those civilians knew that an al-Qaeda soldier was in their house. The al-Qaeda soldier knew he was in a house containing civilians. All those civilians knew that the U.S. was at war with al-Qaeda, and al-Qaeda was even more at war with the U.S. Any responsible adult in the house should have known they were putting innocent women and children in mortal danger. So, remind me again, whose fault is this?

As for the Iraqi report’s claim that “the American forces gathered the family members in one room and executed 11 people,” I’m going to need some corroborating evidence before I accept that. I’d also like to know exactly what happened inside that room-something the Iraqi report does not describe. If it’s true that the civilians were simply tied up and shot in the head, of course there’s no justification for that kind of behavior and those soldiers should be prosecuted for war crimes. (Knight-Ridder, by the way, indicates that the U.S. investigation so far does not corroborate the Iraqi police account.)

Related