Los Angeles Times
September 16, 2004
BAGHDAD -- U.S. commanders acknowledged Wednesday that their helicopters fired
seven rockets and 30 high-caliber machine-gun rounds onto a crowded Baghdad
street earlier this week during a battle that killed 16 Iraqis and sparked a
heated debate about how civilians often become the victims of U.S.
firepower.
Army officials called the helicopter attack an appropriate
response after U.S. soldiers were fired on by insurgents from the vicinity of a
Bradley fighting vehicle set ablaze by a suicide car bomb.
"The actions
taken by our soldiers and pilots were clearly within their rights," said Maj.
Gen. Peter Chiarelli, commander of the Army's 1st Cavalry Division, which
patrols Baghdad.
U.S. officials said it was unclear what caused the
casualties -- volleys from the helicopters, explosions from ammunition in the
Bradley, or insurgent fire. "We regret the loss of any innocent civilians,"
said Col. Jim McConville, who heads the aviation brigade for the 1st Cavalry
Division.
The carnage along the capital's Haifa Street has enraged many
Iraqis who say that U.S. troops often attack without provocation and fire
randomly when attacked.
Army commanders Wednesday gave an unusual
public recounting of Sunday's battle in an effort to defuse charges that the two
helicopters fired randomly into a crowd of civilians.
The Army gave a
new account of the battle, disavowing an earlier account by U.S. military
spokesmen who said the helicopter fired on the street to provide cover for
escaping U.S. troops.
Military officials here have adamantly denied
oft-repeated charges by Iraqis that U.S. forces bomb civilian targets in places
such as Fallujah and fire indiscriminately when attacked in Baghdad and
elsewhere. But the charge that American soldiers are trigger-happy is repeated
in Arab-language news media, damaging U.S. forces' credibility with some Iraqis
and across the Arab world.
On Sunday, television viewers around the
world saw footage of the Haifa street battle that also injured 61 Iraqis. Among
the dead was Mazen al-Tumeizi, a reporter for Al-Arabiya, the Arab-language
satellite network, who was taping a report with the smoking U.S. armored
vehicle in the background when an explosion occurred and he was hit.
"I'm dying," al-Tumeizi gasped as he doubled over and screamed in a report shown
repeatedly on the Dubai-based network. "I'm dying."
U.S. commanders
say their soldiers are often required to respond swiftly to life-threatening
situations. U.S. troops are fighting a guerrilla force here that wears no
uniform and quickly blends into the civilian population. The urban nature of
much of the fight also affords insurgents ample opportunities to fire from
crowds, apartment buildings and other civilian sites. Edgy U.S. troops on
patrol must view people encountered on the streets as potential threats.
Soldiers are also wary that civilian cars approaching military vehicles may be
car bombs.
Sunday's deaths sparked a rancorous debate because the
mission of soldiers in the helicopters was to scatter a crowd gathered around
the burning armored vehicle. Iraqi commentators have suggested it would have
been more humane to allow the Bradley to be ransacked, or to have retaken it
with ground forces.
"A tank can always be replaced, but you can't
replace human lives," said Kadhim Sultani, chairman of the Iraqi National Human
Rights Association, a non-governmental group.
But U.S. commanders say
it was critical to disperse the crowd and make sure no one looted the weapons,
ammunition and communications equipment inside. Troops are authorized to use
deadly force to protect "sensitive equipment" from falling into enemy hands,
Gen. Chiarelli said.
Military commanders acknowledged on Wednesday
that earlier U.S. accounts that the helicopters were providing cover for
escaping U.S. troops were not correct. The troops had already retreated to a
strong point 400 meters away by the time the two Kiowa Warrior helicopters
appeared in the sky above Haifa Street at about 7:30 a.m., commanders said. The
six wounded soldiers from the Bradley had been evacuated.
Images of
celebratory crowds gathered around burning Humvees, tanks and other U.S.
vehicles have become commonplace in post-invasion Iraq. Photographs now
circulating on militant Islamic Web sites show a young man placing the black
banner of Tawhid and Jihad -- a group led by Abu Musab Zarqawi, the Jordanian
guerrilla allegedly orchestrating a campaign against U.S.-led forces--into the
armored vehicle's cannon
The Army said it was not the sight of the
insurgent flag on the Bradley vehicle that triggered the U.S. helicopter
strike. Commanders said a "preliminary investigation" showed that soldiers in
the helicopters fired only after bullets from the vicinity of the disabled
Bradley came their way.
The two helicopters made three passes each and
fired a total of seven rockets and squeezed off 30 rounds of .50-caliber machine
gun fire, said Col. McConville. He said soldiers in the helicopters were
aiming at "insurgent or terrorist forces firing at our aircraft," and not at
civilians gawking and poking at the disabled fighting vehicle.
Officials also disavowed an earlier U.S. account that a rocket was launched at
the Bradley to destroy it and ensure it did not fall into enemy hands. The fire
was aimed solely at armed insurgents in the vicinity of the disabled vehicle,
the commanders said.
The crowd dispersed after the firing and U.S.
ground forces eventually were able to reach the blazing vehicle and tow it away.
U.S. officials could not say if sensitive equipment had been looted .
Several survivors interviewed on Wednesday at Kerama Hospital in Baghdad
disputed the U.S. account.
"I saw no one among the people near or on
top of the burning tank who had a weapon," said Alaa Naeem Amlwan, 30, who had
shrapnel removed from his abdomen and was being treated for a broken leg. "The
Americans felt angry when they saw the people celebrating and carrying the black
banner of Tawhid and Jihad."
Hamoodi Abdul-Hadi, 24, said gunmen who
had earlier fired at U.S. ground troops had fled the area by the time the
helicopters arrived.
"There were people surrounding the burnt tank,"
Abdul-Hadi said, "but the fighters had left the scene by then."
Special correspondents Raheem Salman and Salar Jaff in Baghdad contributed to
this report