Thoughts on Haditha
Fox News reporter Rick Leventhal was embedded with the unit that was replaced by the unit involved in the civilian killings in Haditha. His thoughts, and those of his readers, appear here. Read all of it.
For my part, the American media, dominated by the Left, lack any sense of proportionality: following Congressman Murtha's lead, the mainstream media has rushed to judgment, drawing damning conclusions from a single incident in a three-year long war.
Murdering civilians is the goal of the Iraq "insurgency", and the cowards who oppose a democratic state in Iraq have killed and maimed hundreds if not thousands of Iraqi civilians in the past three years.
On the flip side, avoiding civilian casualties is the goal of the coalition's rules of engagement. Indeed, it is our nation's policy to pay compensation to the families of civilian victims killed by U.S. troops.
Another key difference between the cowardly thugs of the "insurgency" and U.S. Marines is that, if the evidence warrants it, the Marines at Haditha will be prosecuted by the country they represent and, if found guilty, punished. That's how a democracy works.
That's why democracy is worth fighting for in Iraq and around the world. That's why antiwar Americans should should seek the defeat of an enemy whose policy and practice is killing innocent men, women, and children. If they want justice in the case of our Marines, then they should seek justice against Iraq's terrorist killers. And that means defeating them.
President Bush's policy is right: we need to find terrorists and kill them, and we need to change the environment that fosters terrorism. And that means creating democracies where tyrants now rule. And that means staying the course in Iraq and around the world.
Ironically, as I've stated before, it is the administration's success in preventing a terrorist attack in America since 9/11 that has its critics calling for a withdrawal from Iraq. With that success, complacency has replaced the immediacy of the threat five years after 9/11.
The most important front in the Global War on Terror is not the Sunni Triangle in Iraq. It's in the hearts and minds of the American people. If we have the will to win, our enemies can't win. If we don't, they will.
For my part, the American media, dominated by the Left, lack any sense of proportionality: following Congressman Murtha's lead, the mainstream media has rushed to judgment, drawing damning conclusions from a single incident in a three-year long war.
Murdering civilians is the goal of the Iraq "insurgency", and the cowards who oppose a democratic state in Iraq have killed and maimed hundreds if not thousands of Iraqi civilians in the past three years.
On the flip side, avoiding civilian casualties is the goal of the coalition's rules of engagement. Indeed, it is our nation's policy to pay compensation to the families of civilian victims killed by U.S. troops.
Another key difference between the cowardly thugs of the "insurgency" and U.S. Marines is that, if the evidence warrants it, the Marines at Haditha will be prosecuted by the country they represent and, if found guilty, punished. That's how a democracy works.
That's why democracy is worth fighting for in Iraq and around the world. That's why antiwar Americans should should seek the defeat of an enemy whose policy and practice is killing innocent men, women, and children. If they want justice in the case of our Marines, then they should seek justice against Iraq's terrorist killers. And that means defeating them.
President Bush's policy is right: we need to find terrorists and kill them, and we need to change the environment that fosters terrorism. And that means creating democracies where tyrants now rule. And that means staying the course in Iraq and around the world.
Ironically, as I've stated before, it is the administration's success in preventing a terrorist attack in America since 9/11 that has its critics calling for a withdrawal from Iraq. With that success, complacency has replaced the immediacy of the threat five years after 9/11.
The most important front in the Global War on Terror is not the Sunni Triangle in Iraq. It's in the hearts and minds of the American people. If we have the will to win, our enemies can't win. If we don't, they will.
posted by Barney at 7:23 PM
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