MY LAI REVISITED? US Troops Kill 11 Iraqis, inc. 6-Mo-Old

WAS OPERATION SWARMER A COVERUP?
Was the offensive launched to provide a "fog of war" cover story for what may become the "New My Lai?"

FROM Knight-Ridder, Via
Editor & Publisher

http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1002199341

NEW YORK Matthew Schofield, a Knight Ridder reporter in Baghdad, has obtained an Iraqi police report which, he reveals today, accuses American troops of executing 11 people, including a 75-year-old woman and a 6-month-old infant, in the aftermath of a raid last Wednesday on a house about 60 miles north of Baghdad.

The villagers were killed after American troops herded them into a single room of the house, according to the police. Then the soldiers burned three vehicles, killed the villagers' animals and blew up the house. Knight Ridder has distributed a copy of the report.

A U.S. military spokesman, Major Tim Keefe, said that the U.S. military has no information to support the allegations and that he had not heard of them before a Knight Ridder reporter brought them to his attention Sunday. "We're concerned to hear accusations like that, but it's also highly unlikely that they're true," he said. He added that U.S. forces "take every precaution to keep civilians out of harms' way. The loss of innocent life, especially children, is regrettable."

Just last week, Navy investigators announced they are looking into whether Marines intentionally killed 15 Iraqi civilians - four of them women and five of them children - during fighting last November.

Schofield points out that the report of the latest killings "is unusual because it originated with Iraqi police and because Iraqi police were willing to attach their names to it....

"Brig. Gen. Issa al-Juboori, who heads the center, said that his office assembled the report on Thursday and that it accurately reflects the direction of the current police investigation into the incident."

The raid was conducted, according to the U.S. account, in response to a tip that a member of al-Qaida in Iraq was at the house. Neighbors, interviewed by a special correspondent for Knight Ridder, agreed that the al-Qaida member was visiting at the house.

The Knight Ridder article continues:

"According to police, military and eyewitness accounts, U.S. forces approached the house at around 2:30 a.m. and a firefight ensued. By all accounts, in addition to exchanging gunfire with someone inside the house, U.S. troops were supported by helicopter gunships, which fired on the house.

"But the accounts differ on what took place after the firefight.

"According to the U.S. account, the house collapsed because of the heavy fire. When U.S. forces searched the rubble they found one man, the al-Qaida suspect, alive. He was arrested. They also found a dead man they believed to be connected to al-Qaida, two dead women and a dead child.

"But the report filed by the Joint Coordination Center, which was based on a report filed by local police, said U.S. forces entered the house while it was still standing.

"'The American forces gathered the family members in one room and executed 11 persons, including five children, four women and two men,' the report said. 'Then they bombed the house, burned three vehicles and killed their animals.'

"The report identified the dead by name, giving their ages. The two men killed were 22 and 28. Of the women, one was 22, another was 23, a third was 30 and the fourth was 75. Two of the children were 5 years old, two were 3, and the fifth was 6 months old, the document said."