I've Said It Before

...but Pierre Tristam says it so much better.

There is no question that the murder of innocent people, whether fighting-age men, women or children, is a culpable act in any circumstance. There is no question that the Haditha massacre is no different than cold-blooded killing. It was cold-blooded killing. But the Haditha massacre is barely a symbol of the war that produced it, and the Marines who committed the murders merely bit players in the comedy of duplicity in whose second act they will now be ordered to star, so the rest of us moralisers, the Marine Corps above all, can feel better about God, country and conscience. So the Marine Corps can cleanse itself of the inhuman stain that happens, in this rare case, to make a public appearance, but that happens to be what the Marine Corps (and the military, any military) is designed to inflict first, foremost and always. The Marine Corps, the nation’s elite killing machine where uniforms, ritual, mottos and Jack Nicholsonisms à-la-you-can’t-handle-the-truth do such a seductive job of obscuring the reality of what, in the end, is nothing more than a honed and polished bringer of savagery at its consummate best. The Marine Corps that is just now playing the atrocious comedy of seeming so righteous in the severity of the charges it is meting out. The Marine Corps that every day has its boots’ imprint on Iraqi doors and Iraqi necks, dishonoring the very words its stands for. Semper fidelis, yes, but to what? You can start with prettily uniformed savagery and make your way up the chain of command, all the way up to the man who so lovingly, lustily, stupidly calls himself the Commander in Chief."