Pentagon spin on Iraq 'heroes' exposed

Ray · 04-25-2007, 13:01 PM

Quote:

Pentagon spin on Iraq 'heroes' exposed

By Alex Spillius in Washington
Last Updated: 6:50am BST 25/04/2007

He was the American football star who gave up fame and fortune to serve his country only to meet a hero's death fighting the Taliban in Afghanistan. She was the plucky little girl-Rambo who fought to her last bullet before she was badly injured and captured in Iraq.

Those, at least, were the stories put out by the US military about Cpl Pat Tillman and Pte Jessica Lynch, the two most famous casualties from the front lines. Both turned out to be in large part false, and both came back to bite the Pentagon yesterday in the full glare of a congressional committee room.

In a remarkable double act, Kevin Tillman, fellow soldier and younger brother of Pat, testified alongside Miss Lynch in a shared determination to show that truth is only a temporary casualty of war.

Their testimonies provided a strong indictment of the conduct of the military under former defence secretary Donald Rumsfeld.

Henry Waxman, the oversight committee's chairman, said the hearing, which was supported by both Democrats and Republicans, aimed to ensure that military cover-ups and misleading accounts "don't happen again".

Miss Lynch, who was injured near Nasiriyah in the 2003 invasion, said: "I am still confused why they chose to lie and make me a legend."

At the time army spokesmen briefed that Miss Lynch, a driver in an ambushed convoy, fought heroically until she was taken by Iraqi forces and then rescued from hospital by US troops.

In fact she did not fire a shot and was wounded by the crash caused by a grenade attack on her vehicle. Her removal from hospital was co-ordinated with the Iraqis.

Thanks in part to media spin, she became a national heroine only to disappoint the nation by telling the truth.

"The American people are capable of determining their own ideals of heroes and they don't need to be told elaborate tales," Miss Lynch said yesterday, adding that the real heroes were those still fighting in Iraq.

Mr Tillman, a specialist, said the army had hijacked his brother's "virtue and legacy" by putting out a story that he had been fighting the enemy, when it was clear to all those present that he had been killed by friendly fire.

Several army investigations have not exposed who was responsible for his death nor who decided to conceal true events, a deception which "crossed the legal definition of fraud", Mr Tillman said.

Citing evidence from an earlier, military hearing, he recounted how in April 2004 in eastern Afghanistan his brother died from multiple bullet wounds to the head fired from 35 yards away by a fellow ranger in a convoy.

The gunman, said Mr Tillman, lost control, breaking multiple rules of engagement in an extended burst of fire, ignoring flares and shouts that he was firing on fellow soldiers.

His brother was hit once and then uttered: "Friendlies! Ceasefire! I am Pat f------ Tillman damn it!" over and over until he died.

An army ranger who was with Pat when he died told the committee he was ordered by their battalion commander to conceal the facts from Pat's family. Specialist Bryan O'Neal said Lt Col Jeff Bailey also made it clear he would "get in trouble" if he told the truth.

Mr Tillman said a political decision was reached to create a "false narrative" of his brother's death in part to distract from the abuses by US guards at the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq.

The family was not told that Pat was killed by friendly fire for five weeks. His mother, Mary Tillman, said she believed Mr Rumsfeld must have known. "The fact that he would have died by friendly fire and no one told Rumsfeld is ludicrous," she said.

Paratroopers killed

Nine US paratroopers from the 82nd Airborne Division were killed when suicide bombers driving rubbish lorries smashed into their base in Diyala province, north-east of Baghdad.

Monday's attack was the worst on US ground forces in Iraq in a year. A Sunni group linked to al-Qa'eda and calling itself the Islamic State of Iraq said it was responsible. Diyala has seen violence spike since the US "surge" strategy began in the capital.

The attack came as Congress sought to make George Bush's call for £53bn more war funds conditional on combat troops beginning to leave Iraq on Oct 1.

Pentagon spin on Iraq 'heroes' exposed | Uk News | News | Telegraph

It is rather brave for the people to tell the truth after the event.

However, in the fog of war many things that are odd and even immoral happens! And such happenings are not confined to any army. It, I am sure, is an universal failing!

Possibly, because of the worry that it would have serious repercussion on the morale as also on the careers of people, the truth about the poor soldier dying because of friendly fire was suppressed and the spin of bravery and courage manufactured.

To believe that Rumsfeld would be reported all these thing is another fallacy. Such micromanagement at such a high level is not imaginable, if the army is to function and the Generals and others are to have some independence in the conduct of war and battles.

All this is unfortunate no doubt, but then it happens!

Another thing that sort of makes one rather uncomfortable is that REMF (as the Colonel puts it) sit in judgement. I am not talking of the relatives who have all the right to do so.

Rhetoric that the hearing will ensure that 'it will not happen again' is utter tripe. Such rhetoric has been heard before. Say what you want, it WILL happen again. That is but the truth!

It reminds me of the film I saw which made me bristle where the Captain of the US Navy sat in judgement over a crippled diver who proved, thanks to his Master Chief, that the peacetime soldiers are blasted bookish and without knowing a sausage about battle sit in judgement!

In most armies, the penpushers and those who timeslot and ensure a ''peaceful and without hassle' command assignment, do well. Such people when caught at the wrong end of the stick during a timeslotting command assignment, also are the ones who cannot face the truth and fabricate events!

The media does what it is best at - sensationalise!

My views and I need not be right!

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