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Ernest L. Medina, the Army captain who was accused of overall responsibility for the March 1968 mass killings of unarmed South Vietnamese men, women and children by troops he commanded in what became known as the My Lai massacre, but was acquitted at a court-martial, died on Tuesday in Peshtigo, Wis. He was 81.

Troops of Co C, 1st Bat. 20th Inf. Reg. 11 Brig. 23rd ID attacked the Vietnamese village of My-Lai. By the end of the day the village and its population were largely destroyed.

Lawrence Manley Colburn, a helicopter gunner in the Vietnam War who helped end the slaughter of hundreds of unarmed Vietnamese villagers by U.S. troops at My Lai, has died. He was 67. Lisa Colburn, speaking with The Associated Press on Thursday evening, said her husband of 31 years was diagnosed with cancer in late September and died Tuesday. "It was very quick," she said by phone from her Canton, Georgia, home near Atlanta. "He was a very peaceful man who had a great desire for there to be a peaceful world."

Those who equate Haditha with My Lai, and Iraq with Vietnam, would do well to remember the last time we gave peace a chance. For millions of innocents, it was the peace of the grave. If there's anyone who condones the deliberate murder of civilians, it is not the U.S. government but the anti-war left and its unindicted co-conspirators in the media. Thanks largely to their efforts, we abandoned Vietnam and ushered in an era of mass carnage, boat people and reeducation camps that resulted in more death after the war than during it. After Saigon's "liberation," summary executions of...

The US army officer convicted for his part in the notorious My Lai massacre during the Vietnam War has offered his first public apology, a US report says. "There is not a day that goes by that I do not feel remorse for what happened," Lt William Calley was quoted as saying by the Columbus Ledger-Enquirer. He was addressing a small group at a community club in Columbus, Georgia. Calley, 66, was convicted on 22 counts of murder for the 1968 massacre of 500 men, women and children in Vietnam. Cold blood "I feel remorse for the Vietnamese who were...

The US army officer convicted for his part in the notorious My Lai massacre during the Vietnam War has offered his first public apology, a US report says. "There is not a day that goes by that I do not feel remorse for what happened," Lt William Calley was quoted as saying by the Columbus Ledger-Enquirer. He was addressing a small group at a community club in Columbus, Georgia. Calley, 66, was convicted on 22 counts of murder for the 1968 massacre of 500 men, women and children in Vietnam

COLUMBUS, Ga. - Speaking in a soft, sometimes labored voice, the only U.S. Army officer convicted in the 1968 slayings of Vietnamese civilians at My Lai made an extraordinary public apology while speaking to a small group near the military base where he was court-martialed

MY LAI, Vietnam - Lawrence Colburn returned to My Lai on Saturday and found hope at the site of one of the most notorious chapters of the Vietnam War. On the 40th anniversary of the massacre of up to 500 unarmed Vietnamese villagers, the former helicopter gunner was reunited with a young man he rescued from rampaging U.S. soldiers. On March 16, 1968, Colburn found 8-year-old Do Ba clinging to his mother's corpse in a ditch full of blood and the bodies of more than 100 people who had been mowed down. Nearly all the victims were unarmed women, children...

The far left lapped up the story about Haditha especially after Murtha convicted the Marines without the benefit of a trial. When Murtha, the ex-Marine, whipped out the My Lai card, the lefties went practically orgasmic. Comparisons between My Lai and Haditha ruled the Internet – even now. Just Google My Lai and Haditha – I can promise you’ll get over 90,000 hits. One of the Haditha/ My Lai comparisons that seemed to be a fave of the Left was Rahul Mahajan’s “Haditha is Arabic for My Lai”. Mahajan’s disgusting piece of leftist drivel is chock full of lies and...

THE MEDIA COVERAGE of the killing of 24 Iraqis at Haditha has given rich new definition to the phrase "rush to judgment." The coverage, plus the reaction of antiwar politicians like Democratic representative John Murtha, amounts to a public verdict of guilty, rendered against a handful of Marines, before an investigation of the bloody incident is completed or a trial (if there is one) held. An egregious example was MSNBC host Chris Matthews's interview with Murtha on May 17. Asked to "draw us a picture of what happened in Haditha," the congressman said he'd tell "exactly" what occurred. "One Marine...

Whether it takes a shoehorn or a crowbar, the Mainstream Media have decided that all Iraq reporting must be squeezed into the Vietnam template. Thus the immediate link, before we had any facts, between Haditha and My Lai. But Christopher Hitchens is having none of it. "All the glib talk about My Lai," Hitchens writes, "is so much propaganda and hot air." Indeed, any comparison between Iraq and Vietnam offends Hitchens, not because the comparison might be a slander against American troops in Iraq, but rather because it slanders the Viet Cong. For in Vietnam, unlike Iraq, according to Hitchens,...

Comparing Wars By: Oliver North WASHINGTON, D.C. -- In an earlier age it would have been a Churchillian moment: The head of state makes a high-risk, secret trip to the war zone; is briefed by combat commanders on the military situation; meets with allies and commends the troops for their steadfast resolve in defeating a brutal adversary. Sir Winston was lionized by the British press for more than 20 such trips during the course of World War II. But that's not the treatment given George W. Bush. The president was still on the ground in Iraq commending U.S. troops for...

As with the formulaic type scenes of Homeric epic, there now arises a sense of familiarity with the current outcries over Haditha. We do not really know yet what happened in that terrorist-infected hellhole, but it seems not to matter. Those who customarily decry the supposed loss of civil liberties are now the first to rush to judgment—reminding us that it is not always principle per se that they embrace, but a partisanship to be advanced at all costs. Once we leave, the killing starts in earnest, not 20 or 30 per day, but wholesale slaughter of any Iraqis who...

NEW YORK - On a March morning in 1968, American troops swept into a village on South Vietnam's central coast in search of communist guerrillas. Instead, they found unarmed civilians — and gunned them down, leaving bodies huddled in ditches. Nearly four decades later, the notorious name of that hamlet — My Lai — has been summoned from memory again, as the U.S. military investigates allegations of mass civilian killings by a group of Marines in the western Iraqi town of Haditha. While the numbers differ — upward of 300 at My Lai, compared to 24 at Haditha — some...

The accelerating media feeding frenzy over the alleged killings of twenty-four Iraqi civilians in Haditha by US Marines last November is about to overwhelm American politics. Propelled by their most irresponsible war critics, the left will try use Haditha as it used My Lai thirty years ago: as a political tool to take apart America's support for the war and to shatter the legitimacy of our cause and the morale of our troops.We don't know what happened in Haditha, an insurgent stronghold in Anbar Province. Unverified press accounts allege that members of Kilo Company, 3rd Battalion, First Marines, were hit...

MATTHEWS: Draw us a picture of what happened in Haditha. MURTHA: Well I'll tell you exactly what happened. One Marine was killed and the Marines just said we're gonna take care...we don't know who the enemy is, the pressure was too much on them, so they went into houses and actually killed civilians and...I... MATTHEWS: Was this My Lai? When you say cold blood Congressman, a lot of people think you're basically saying you've got some civilians sitting in a room or out in a field and they're executed on purpose... MURTHA: That's exactly what happened. MATTHEWS: ...not because any...

On tonight's Hardball, Rep. John Murtha claimed that Marines in Iraq stormed a house and intentionally killed innocent women and children in response to the murder of a fellow Marine. According to Chris Matthews, the Marine Corps is currently investigating this incident. It goes without saying that this is an outrageous allegation to make--especially without any proof--and one would think that Murtha, a former Marine himself, would give the benefit of the doubt to our Marines before making wild accusations. Then again, it's been awhile since Murtha has basked in the glory of the MSM spotlight.The video can be viewed...

Traitors of Record: The Record of the New York TimesBy Fedora “. . .the most untrustworthy paper in the United States. . .” --President Dwight Eisenhower, referring to the New York TimesIntroductionLast week Senator John Cornyn criticized the New York Times for endangering national security with a James Risen story on NSA surveillance timed to coincide with a vote on the Patriot Act and, incidentally, with the release of a book by Risen. A review of the record illustrates that endangering national security through irresponsible leaks is nothing new for the New York Times. Some particularly outrageous examples are worth...

1971 Calley found guilty of My Lai murders Lt. William L. Calley is found guilty of premeditated murder at My Lai by a U.S. Army court-martial at Fort Benning, Georgia. Calley, a platoon leader, had led his men in a massacre of Vietnamese civilians, including women and children, at My Lai 4, a cluster of hamlets in Quang Ngai Province on March 16, 1968. The unit had been conducting a search-and-destroy mission to locate the 48th Viet Cong (VC) Local Force Battalion. The unit entered Son My village but found only women, children, and old men. Frustrated by unanswered losses...

As the Senate Judiciary Committee voted today on the nomination of Alberto Gonzales for Attorney General, we hear a speech by investigative reporter Seymour Hersh on torture from Guantanamo to Abu Gharib to Vietnam.Hersh is the author of 'Chain of Command: The Road from 9/11 to Abu Gharib.' He spoke last month at the Wise Free Synagogue in New York.'The amazing thing is that we have been taken over by a cult of eight or nine neo-conservatives that have somehow grapped the government.' 'Just how and why they did it so efficiently, we will have to wait for much later...