What to think about reports of atrocities?

Like every Vietnam veteran I know, one of the lessons I learned in that war was that young Americans who do their duty in grave danger, and struggle mightily to bring one another home alive, have earned our admiration.

Some I admired in particular. As I watched the breathtaking risks taken daily by Green Berets, Rangers and U.S. Marines, some not old enough to buy a beer, I am reminded of the brief words of General Maximus in the 2000 movie “Gladiator” as he encouraged his Roman soldiers just before a battle in which many of them would die: “Strength and honor!”

And when I hear that U.S. Marines in Iraq have done something horrible, my belief that Marines typify “strength and honor” makes me give them the benefit of the doubt, withholding judgment until the facts are known.

Not everyone shares my view.

In the Iraqi town Haditha, an insurgent stronghold in Anbar Province, last November U.S. Marines allegedly murdered as many as 24 civilians.

Are the allegations true? I don’t know, but I do know these things:

(1) our mainstream media, more like the Keystone Cops than a thoughtful body of research and reason, will eagerly leap to the conclusion our Marines are guilty as reporters follow one another through a 24-7 frenzy;

(2) the media will fail, as they always do, to put such incidents into perspective for the public, and

(3) if the incident proves to be true, it will be misused to wrongly discredit our military and the war in general.

These things will happen because our reporters and the public do not understand one of the realities of war – atrocities are inevitable in war; they occur in every war, on all sides.

I am not condoning war crimes. War crimes should be vigorously prosecuted and the guilty punished. But I do believe when we involve ourselves in a war, as adults we should open our eyes to the baggage that comes with it. Some of our troops will come home in boxes. Errors on the battlefield will kill some of our own troops with friendly fire. Noncombatants will be killed inadvertently, and some deaths might be murder committed by our own troops, requiring bold investigation and prosecution.

What kind of person, you might ask, is capable of murdering civilians? The answer, I believe, is each and every one of us because it is human nature in extreme circumstances.

Imagine what our troops are going through in Iraq, fighting an enemy that uses despicable tactics like bombing innocent people, luring our medics into death traps by pretending to be wounded and needing medical attention, or sawing off the heads of hostages on TV.

Add the inability to distinguish indigenous friends from foes and watching fellow troops you care for die a violent death, and you, too, would lust after some bloody payback no matter how virtuous you might be. Don’t say, “Not me,” until you have been there.

In Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar, in a rage Anthony threatens to “Cry ‘Havok,’ and let slip the dogs of war.” What Anthony meant was that war is like a release of evil demons from Pandora’s Box — uncontrollable murderous mayhem, savage and chaotic, unfair and foul, feeding the dark side of its participants. These demons are the worst of human nature, like soldiers indulging their lust for revenge.

Because we are civilized, unlike some of our enemies we try very hard to manage our demons of war. When we go to war we raise the lid on Pandora’s Box just a little, trying to release selected demons that kill by the rules, and we try to hold back the demons of lustful revenge.

We keep demons in the box by applying strict military discipline at all levels of command with officers responsible for anticipating the passions surging through their troops, keeping their troops under control, keeping the lid on the box to keep the demons from running amok. Once in a while, that discipline breaks down, the demons get loose.

Even now, before the Haditha incident facts are known, naive reporters are interviewing our troops to capture the stress on them as they fight an egregiously dishonorable enemy. The reporters will likely build a credible case to help viewers understand why a lust for revenge builds, why hot passions are inevitable, and in developing this semi-rationale for war crimes the reporters completely miss the point.

The point is the lust for revenge is no surprise to military professionals, it is normal in war and it does not excuse a war crime. The lust for revenge is understandable, foreseeable and predictable, and for that very reason our military trains officers to maintain strict discipline among their troops.

You and I might sympathize with our troops’ passions, considering all they have endured, for losing their self-control and shooting unarmed people – if they did.

But even though the passions of our troops are understandable, even though isolated atrocity incidents are inevitable in war when discipline breaks down now and then, we have to fight the demons back into the box. As civilized people, we must prosecute the guilty to demonstrate that war crimes are not tolerated.

We can count on the Arab world to react to the Haditha incident with irrational hysteria. We can count on the New York Times to hyperventilate for political advantage, to call for changes in national strategy, and to characterize our military as worse than the enemy we fight. But I would hope sober adults, readers like you, would remain calm and let the military investigation follow its natural course, with oversight from the clowns we call Congress.

What if there are other isolated war crime incidents under investigation? If others emerge while the Haditha frenzy is in full swing I would expect many talking heads on TV may react like children, conceding in defeat that our troops are the bad guys, recommending the U.S. withdraw from Iraq with its tail between its legs.

Anyone who understands the atrocity reality of war will know how silly such reactions can be.

At a Vietnamese village named My Lai, in 1968 U.S. troops murdered 347 old men, women and children, a dark chapter in U.S. military history. My Lai was a matter of shame for those of us who fought in that war. The demons ran amok at My Lai and far too few U.S. troops were prosecuted.

Even though My Lai was an aberration, a nasty and rare exception, the anti-war left used My Lai skillfully to paint us all with the war criminal brush. For decades many have thought of us as babykillers, but the truth has always been we served with honor and courage, just like our troops in Iraq today.

When we returned from Vietnam long ago, we were met with insults instead of parades. The really sad part is America lost something important — America lost knowing it should have been proud of its Vietnam veterans, and that the bad things that happened were isolated incidents involving just a few.

Let’s not make that mistake with another generation of troops we sent to war, troops who deserve our belief in them, troops who deserve the benefit of any doubt, troops who have earned our admiration as they do their duty in grave danger and struggle to bring one another home alive.

If war crimes did occur in Haditha, I will hope the guilty pay the price for their crime; I will continue to admire the young Americans who are doing the country’s dirty and dangerous work; and I will always think of the U.S. Marine Corps when I hear the words “strength and honor.”

The story of the photo

The Marine Corps Gunnery Sergeant in the picture is Michael Burghard, part of the Explosive Ordnance Disposal (EOD) Team that is supporting 2nd Brigade 28th Infantry Division (Pennsylvania Army National Guard). Known as “Iron Mike,” he is on his third tour in Iraq. He had become a legend in the bomb disposal world after winning the Bronze Star for disabling 64 IEDs and destroying 1,548 pieces of ordnance during his second tour. Then, on Sept. 19, he got blown up.

He arrived at a chaotic scene after a bomb had killed four U.S. soldiers. He climbed into the bomb crater and searched below the surface with his knife for secondary devices. When he saw the detonating cord between his legs he knew it was too late and as soon as he shouted “Get back!” an insurgent, probably watching through binoculars, pressed a button on his mobile phone to detonate the secondary device below the sergeant’s feet.

The blast threw him in the air, and when he landed he couldn’t feel anything below his waist. His colleagues cut off his trousers to see how badly he was hurt. None could believe his legs were still there. After his wounds were bandaged, he insisted on standing and walking to the helicopter for a ride to the hospital, and gave his enemy a gesture communicating his thoughts and as a signal he would return soon.

Strength and honor.

The photo and story were published in the Omaha World Herald.