Posted on 11/30/2007 8:15:25 PM PST by RedRover
WASHINGTON -- A Marine company involved in the shooting of civilians in Afghanistan last March responded appropriately to an ambush against them, and should not have been pulled out of the country, the commander of Marine Corps special forces said Thursday.
Marine Maj. Gen. Dennis J. Hejlik, head of Marine Corps Special Operations Command, also told reporters that a legal tribunal investigating the incident has been postponed until mid-January at the request of one of the officers involved.
"Obviously it was not my decision to bring the company out of theater," Hejlik said. "It was the theater commander's decision. I will never second guess the commander on the ground. I will say, I did not agree with it. To this day, I do not agree with it."
Eight members of the Marine Corps company involved in the March 4 shooting -- which left as many as 19 civilians dead and 50 injured -- were ordered back to Camp Lejune after the incident, and the rest of the company was told to leave Afghanistan and return to ships in the Persian Gulf.
Hejlik, however, stopped short of clearing the Marines of any blame in the incident, saying he could not speak to what may have happened after the initial ambush, when the unit was returning to their base.
A preliminary military investigation found that the Marines used excessive force and referred it for possible criminal inquiry. And Afghanistan's Independent Human Rights Commission said in a report that the troops fired indiscriminately at pedestrians and people in cars, buses and taxis in six different locations along a 10-mile stretch of road in Nangahar province after an explosives-rigged minivan crashed into their convoy.
In other comments, Hejlik said the creation of the new Marine Special Operations Command is moving along well. So far, he said, there are about 1,700 Marines in the special forces command, and he will reach the goal of 2,600 by late 2008.
The Marines formally entered the world of military special operations in February 2006, under the direction of then-Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld.
Hejlik said he expects the units to continue to work in Afghanistan, and also to concentrate their efforts in the Pentagon's new Africa Command that is being set up now. A key priority, he said, is to work with military from other nations, providing training and additional expertise.
Rumsfeld added Marines to the Pentagon's Special Operations Command because he said the military needed to continue to adapt to the tactics of terror networks such as al-Qaida, who use unconventional warfare to counter American firepower.
Now hold on one minute. I thought the reverend Al Sharpton from NY told us the military drags in poor black guys to fight this nations battles and all the white boys go off to Ivy League colleges to prepare their futures to amass fortunes.
She’s out now. Did one tour. Married a Marine, who got out after his second tour. Oddly enough, I suspect, given my comments here - one of his concerns was going back into combat and having lawyers second guess everything he did. I think he has 75% disability for loss of hearing and damage to his back and shoulders from lugging around a machine gun & gear...he’s tall and skinny, and it takes a toll. My son is in the Army Guard. He did one tour in Iraq, and is concerned as he thinks about marriage that he might be going back.
My assumption is always that the guys on the ground did their best, unless proven otherwise. I think this incident has cause for concern. My guess is that they will conclude no malicious intent, but that mistakes were made. A lawyer I met there had taken part in 13 15-6 investigations, all for the death of an innocent civilian. In all 13 cases, the conclusion was that in the seconds he had, the soldier made his best attempt to follow the rules. I was involved in one 15-6 investigation...conclusion was that an honest mistake was made by folks trying hard to do what is right.
Don’t know...
I heard that!!!!!!!!
SEMPER FI
Maybe Al got it backward.
Ya, but supposing you have only one tourniquet.....;~)
I remember a story about a VC who was captured and bleeding from several body wounds so it was decided the best place for the tourniquet was around his neck.
Didn’t happen. An ambush 7 miles long?
Well shoot. If you say that there's no way you can get shot up on that road, then I gotta believe that the Marines just panicked.
Cause you know that Marines that end up on Force Recon and then go on up to SOCOM are just the types to "panic". that's what they're known for.
Heck, I thought fire discipline and counter ambush fire and maneuver was for really, really, really smart brave guys in the Army or Navy. So most Marines in an ambush will usually just hide and then when the shooting stops everybody opens up at once.
They would never practice assaulting and maneuvering.
Cause we know that the f'ing muzzies like ALL guerillas wouldn't hide themselves among civilians and open fire or use them as shields...or hide in their houses/huts/holes in the ground. Right?
The elements not in the killing zone wouldn't flank the ambushing elements and kill the living sh#t out of them. If they set up the ambush near a group of civilians hoping to keep them from returning fire then guess what? Everybody in that enemy's area of directed fire is going to get shot up, mortared and grenades shoved down their throats. Then the fun starts when you call in the artillery or CAS.
Marines panic, I'm sure some do. I'll even go so far as to say most of them "panic". Sounds like you've been in a firefight, maybe even in that area. Usually well trained troops have controlled panic. Like the "holy sh#t, that almost hit me" panic. Then the training comes in to play.
I'll venture to trust what the Marines are saying. Sorry, that's just the way I'm going to think it shook out.
There is no way investigating this incident was going to help his career,Bullsh#t. If you're an officer you know that once you get to staff level, politics as much as anything else helps. He doesn't have to "make it go away"...or do anything. just cut these men loose and let "justice be served".
Cause if they are found innocent, then the system worked. How long would you like to be on trial after serving a rotation and getting your unit shot up and then have to defend yourself from going to Leavenworth?
unless he swept it under the carpet. He wouldn’t do so. He made General based on an outstanding record, NOT being a suck up.
If you say he wasn't a major assk#sser and brown noser, then by all means this guy's the next Major General James Day. Cause we all know that no Army general would sell out Marines in order to further his career. I'm sorry I ever posted that.
hahahahahaa... very good. Heck it's so treasured that Dan Rather and Hillary Clinton both wanted it. ROFLMAO.
BTTT
You can believe whatever and whomever you wish. But if you knew the area, you would also go, “WTF,O?!” - but you don’t, so believe whatever you want.
If you want to believe the higher ups in their own unit fired folks for no reason other than sucking up politically - go ahead.
If you want to believe a General (whom I didn’t know or work with) made the decision to send the entire unit out of the country because he was bored that day and he didn’t realize the attention it would get - go ahead.
If you want to believe the soldiers who worked the area for over a year lied about physical evidence and twisted statements around because they hate Marines more than they hate terrorists - go ahead.
BTW - this incident remains the only ‘ambush’ to ever take place along this highway. It has plenty of IED strikes, but this is the only ‘ambush’ - and it is the only ambush that was 7 miles long located next to the gate of a major FOB - but believe what you want.
...gee, thanks. Since I wasn't there and didn't see the evidence, I'll take my chances and believe the Marines.
I didn't say that the good officer in charge was bored and sent the Marines home. I said that the fine Army officer in charge was making sure that his star wouldn't be delayed by doing the politically correct ASS K@SSING thing by sending an entire unit home for the investigation.
Thereby #1 getting rid of any problems that the New York Times, AP, Reuters and MSM would present pics of bodies stacked like cord wood being splashed about during his review.
#2 By sending the entire unit home made it seem that the entire unit, it's officers and training were geared towards producing this civilian killing machine.
Finally by doing this, showed that if you can somehow get enough civilians killed with collateral damage you can insure that an entire unit may be removed from theatre with minimal cost of your units life.
If I was fighting for the muzzies and had enough time, I'd could set up a line of IED's with radio/cell phone/garage door opener/or delayed charges and put my RPG's/automatic weapons in the houses with some civilians that were made to stay in the house with my men. Have them fire a magazine load, let off two RPG's and then scoot out before I got flanked. Wait for the Americans to dismount and attack the hooches I was in and then go up the road and repeat the process to the next kill zone.
I would make sure that I hit towards the end of the column in order to make sure all the other trucks kept pushing forward. The key would be setting up the firing positions so that once my ambush team fired a short load into the kill zone and pulled out another team could lay down cover fire and draw the men further along the trail/road in order to "attack into the ambush". As they come forward and attack their positions (inside of houses/schools/mosques/holes in the deck) the prior team would let off another IED, followed by short firing to move the ambush a little further up the road....and on and on till choppers arrive.
Then as a muzzie I would bend over, kiss my rear good bye cause the choppers are gonna turn me into red mist if I'm caught in the open.
That's unless I can get my hands on some Strela or Igla missiles, then I want the choppers to come around too.
Of course that's just me.... usually when I set up ambushes I would probably just wet myself and panic. Marines tend to do that and also lie and cover up there mistakes like you said.
I'll defer to your opinion and judgement of the Marines in question since you know the Army officer in question would never do that (sell out his men for his star), the area in general is impossible to conduct ambush operations and the Marines probably felt like killing a bunch of civilians and got caught this time...(thank God).
They should open up a Marine barracks in Leavenworth with some apartments on the end for Blackwater. Cause there's a whole lot of plundering and killing going on.
No, only Marines that have been in combat, which is why it's the "Combat" Infantryman’s Badge. Then again, these days it seems like all Marine units would eventually rotate thru Iraq or Afghanistan
I don't think the complicity of the "civilian" population with the insurgents, terrorists, al-queada, Taliban can be overstated. If a group of my neighbors, family, friends were used as slaughter house pawns, I sure as hell wouldn't be standing on the sidelines waiting for that to happen to me. "Innocent civilians" in Afghanistan and Iraq rhymes with "crock of sh!+", IMO.
Your tactic wouldn’t work on this road. It is the main road linking Kabul to Pakistan via Jalalabad. This did not take place inside the city, but in a fairly open area. I’ve gone jogging within sight and easy rifle range of this road many times.
At no time before or since has there been any indication the enemy is capable of putting together an ambush running for miles along the road, nor would there be any reason to do so immediately next to a major FOB with regular helicopter patrols and helicopters on alert. There are regular patrols going into bad guy country nearby offering excellent conditions for an ambush, except for the fact that it is still uncomfortably close to the FOB.
There are also regular patrols going into bad guy country not too far away that ARE ambushed because the terrain is so favorable...remember, the Pech River and Tora Bora are close to Jalalabad. The Korengal Valley isn’t too far away, and a number of men have been killed during operations there within the last few months.
One of the things the Army guys I talked to frequently mentioned (not in response to this incident) was the need to match training with the role expected in theater. If you spend 6 months training to kick ass no questions asked, and are put into an area where counterinsurgency tactics say ‘work with the locals and pass up opportunities unless you are completely certain of the target’...bad things will happen, particularly during the first few months.
There is more that will be covered by the official investigation. I’ve made comments on this thread because I think people should be aware that sometimes - certainly not always, and I would NEVER trust a press report about anything the military does - but sometimes people do the wrong thing, and this may well be one of those cases. We’re not talking about a press driven circus based on civilian accounts.
The military already has done a lot of investigating, and has already decided to pull the unit out of country and fire some individuals. It has been investigated by several services.
Even the General in the article here is not saying nothing bad happened - “Hejlik, however, stopped short of clearing the Marines of any blame in the incident, saying he could not speak to what may have happened after the initial ambush, when the unit was returning to their base.”
And frankly, I don’t know of anyone who was excessively concerned with the initial response. We KNOW they were hit by a VBIED, and they might have taken fire in the immediate area. The focus of concern is what happened as they made their way BACK to Jalalabad.
Believe what you want, but this is not a case of mean Army guys or butt-kissing paper pushers conducting a witch hunt based on press accounts.
How many VBIED ambushes have been thwarted by the helicopters? Weren't they on patrol that day?
Why wasn't the VBIED bomber intimidated by their close proximity?
Does the FOB span the entire 7 miles?
Do the official reports you have read indicate the Marines were engaged continuously along the entire 7 mile stretch, or sporadically?
The way you are presenting this indicates the Marines gave a picture of insurgents lined up elbow to elbow for 7 straight miles, while you're painting a picture of an FOB of similar length, and every inch of the road being under constant surveillance.
You say there would be "no reason" to put together an ambush, as it's "uncomfortably close" to the FOB. Was this meant tongue in cheek? Obviously, the insurgents aren't playing by that book.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.