Redstate

one acquittal and unlawful command influence

By streiff Posted in Haditha | War — Comments (11) / Email this page » / Leave a comment »

I've covered the Haditha events fairly extensively since they first broke (here | here | here) including an interview with the the defense team of LTC Jeffrey Chessani.

As a career Army officer I have to admit that my faith in the military justice system has been both shaken and bolstered by what has happened thus far.

But first the news.

Read on.

The top story is that the first Marine to be court martialed in conjunction with the alleged massacre at Haditha was acquitted.

A military jury acquitted a Marine intelligence officer Wednesday of charges that he tried to help cover up the killings of 24 Iraqis.

Cheers erupted as the seven-officer panel cleared 1st Lt. Andrew Grayson, who was the first of three Marines to be tried in the biggest U.S. criminal case involving Iraqi deaths linked to the war. The verdict came just five hours after deliberations began.

This leaves two more Marines facing trial over the incident: LTC Jeffrey Chessani and SSG Frank Wuterich. Of the eight Marines originally charged in the incident six have now been exonerated.

From the beginning politics have played role exceeding that of the administration of justice. It is at least arguable, both Murtha and the LA Times having done so, that the source for Jack Murtha's characterization of the actions at Haditha as "cold blooded murder" was none other than Commandant of the Marine Corps.

The more this Orwellian nightmare persists the more it becomes apparent that these Marines have been offered up as a latter day human sacrifice to appease angry political gods.

For instance, witness the thin gruel charged against LT Grayson. He was charged with obstruction of justice for ordering the deletion of digital photos when regulations required their deletion of photos of dead Iraqis if they had no intelligence value and when he did not know that Haditha was under investigation. He was charged with improperly separating from the Marines even though he was advised by his military attorney and his commander that there was no reason he could not discharged.

The case against LTC Chessani has hit a snag which might very well result in the dismissal of all charges. The defense team alleged that unlawful command influence had permeated the case. The military judge agreed that there was sufficient evidence of such influence that he has directed a hearing on the matter.

[The military judge] Colonel [Steven] Folsom found that the defense met its burden of presenting “some evidence” of actual and apparent unlawful command influence. His decision was based upon the evidence that the Generals who controlled the disposition of the case were apparently or actually impermissibly influenced by Marine lawyer Colonel John Ewers, who was permitted to attend numerous, closed-session meetings in which LtCol Chessani’s case was discussed.

Colonel Ewers was one of the investigators of the Haditha incident from the beginning. He is a witness that the prosecutors plan to call in its case against LtCol Chessani. Consequently, he should not have been involved in any of the meetings in which the disposition of the Haditha cases was discussed with the Generals who convened the court martial. During the hearing, the defense called Col Ewers as a witness. Col Ewers admitted that he was present during at least 25 meetings in which LtCol Chessani’s case and the other Haditha cases were discussed with the Generals and other legal advisors.

This has led to the unprecedent action of a Marine four-star general being hauled into court to explain why his actions have not perverted the course of justice.

As I've written much earlier, I've no sympathy for war crimes. I don't think any soldier does. But at the same time young men -- and women -- on the sharp end of our nation's spear deserve much better that being second guessed at leisure by people who weren't there. And if they are going to be second guessed they deserve a chain of command who will at least give them a fair hearing.

Sadly, the Marines have failed in much of this. Arguably there is reason to bring SSG Wuterich to trial. He lead the rifle squad which did most of the fighting. LTC Chessani did nothing more or less than every officer in his chain of command. If he goes on trial his regimental and divisional commanders should be at the defendant's table with him.

Even as we're seeing that individual investigating officers, jurors, defense attorneys, and military judges are not willing to kowtow to political exigency, the next act is waiting to come on stage. When LTC Chessani and SSG Wuterich are eventually and rightfully exonerated, notwithstanding that their careers will have been ruined and their reputations permanently sullied, there will be a hue and cry to bring these allegations under the purview of federal grand juries and federal courts. A forum that would provide immediate gratification to any ambitious prosecutor and place the freedom of our men and women in uniform in the hands of people who cannot possibly understand the situation and who are quite possibly hostile to them in principle.