Time magazine is all about Haditha this week (or at least the cover story is all Haditha) and that's not a surprise. It's the story they broke and it is growing at warp speed as everybody and their third cousin weighs in on what to do or why or who and on and on. A few days ago I was not happy to see Slate's political correspondent make a comparison between Haditha and the US soldier who was convicted of rape in Japan a few years ago. It is clear that only a political writer would see any basis for comparison there - he could not possibly have ever been in a war situation let alone read about them to see that an act commited by a soldier in a strong allied country where he is stationed in a peaceful, nonthreatening manner (how different is it really in Japan or Norfolk, VA for a US soldier?) versus soldiers under fire and under stress in Iraq, Afghanistan or any manner of other peace keeping operations around the globe. There are so many things wrong with this comparison that it quite blew my mind that Slate would run the piece - but then again, it is Slate. They didn't want to write something serious, they just wanted to say something loud.
It seems we should be very serious - deadly serious - about Haditha.
There is a one page section in Time where several people have written a few paragraphs about the tragedy - retired General Wesley Clark among them and Vietnam vet and author Philip Caputo has some very insighful thoughts. (Caputo wrote the classic Vietnam memoir, A Rumor of War.)
Incidents like this are not just likely, they're inevitable in insurgencies. They happened in Vietnam and even to the British, who committed atrocities during the American Revolution. They happen because one of the things an insurgent does is attack the counterinsurgent's state of mind. The insurgent makes the counterinsurgent feel constantly insecure, constantly scared and constantly unaware of who or where the enemy is. The guy fighting the insurgent often feel lost in a hostile sea."
There's a bit more as well as General Clark's remarks and Gary Solis and Ruel Marc Gerecht, a former Mid East Specialist at the CIA.
