Findings of Army Court Martial

1
Findings of Army Court Martial

• Concerning Events Surrounding The Son My
  Operation of 16 - 19 March 1968
• (1) During the period 16-19 March 1968, US Army
  troops of TF Barker, 11th Brigade, Americal
  Division, massacred a large number of
  noncombatants in two hamlets of Son My Village,
  Quang Ngai Province, Republic of Vietnam. The
  precise number of Vietnamese killed cannot be
  determined but was at least 175 and may exceed
  400.

2
Findings (cont)

• (2) The massacre occurred in conjunction with a
  combat operation which was intended to neutralize
  Son My Village as a logistical support base and
  staging area, and to destroy elements of an enemy
  battalion thought to be located in the Son My
  area.
• (3) The massacre resulted primarily from the
  nature of the orders issued to persons in the
  chain of command within TF Barker.

3
Findings (cont)

• (4) The task force commander's order and the
  associated intelligence estimate issued prior to
  the operation were embellished as they were
  disseminated through each lower level of command,
  and ultimately presented to the individual
  soldier a false and misleading picture of the Son
  My area as an armed enemy camp, largely devoid of
  civilian inhabitants.
• (5)Prior to the incident, there had developed
  within certain elements of the 11th Brigade a
  permissive attitude toward the treatment and
  safeguarding of noncombatants which contributed
  to the mistreatment of such persons during the
  Son Ply Operation.

4
Findings (cont)

• (6)The permissive attitude in the treatment of
  Vietnamese was, on 16-19 March 1968, exemplified
  by an almost total disregard for the lives and
  property of the civilian population of Son My
  Village on the part of commanders and key staff
  officers of TF Barker.
• (7) On 16 March, soldiers at the squad and
  platoon level, within some elements of TF Barker,
  murdered noncombatants while under the
  supervision and control of their immediate
  superiors.

5
Findings (cont)

• (8) A part of the crimes visited on the
  inhabitants of Son My Village included individual
  and group acts Of murder, rape, sodomy, maiming,
  and assault on noncombatants and the mistreatment
  and killing of detainees. They further included
  the killing of livestock, destruction of crops,
  closing of wells, and the burning of dwellings
  within several subhamlets.
• (9) Some attempts were made to stop the criminal
  acts in Son My Village on 16 March but with few
  exceptions, such efforts were too feeble or too
  late.
• (10) Intensive interrogation has developed no
  evidence that any member of the units engaged in
  the Son My operation was under the influence of
  marijuana or other narcotics.

6
Punishment?

• Calley convicted by court martial and sentenced
  to life in prison March 3, 1971. President Nixon
  promises to personally review the case.
• Charges against all other officers are either
  dropped or the officers are acquitted.
• Charges against Calley are reduced to 20, then 10
  years. He is released on bond on Nov. 9, 1974 and
  then paroled after having served only 3/12 years
  in prison. He now manages a jewelry store in
  rural Georgia.

7
Lt. Calleys Words

• I think Its a terrible thing when the Army
  calls it a crime when it just happens everyday.

8
Lt. Calleys Words

• Even if the people say Go wipe out South
  America, the Army will do it. No questions about
  it. Majority rules, and if a majority tells me
  Go across to South Vietnam, Im going to go. If
  amajority tells me, Lieutenant, go and kill one
  thousand enemies, Ill go and kill one thousand
  enemies.

9
Lt. Calleys Words

• We learned one thing at O.C.S that we had been
  taught through childhood was bad killing.

10
Lt. Calleys Words

• I felt superior to these people. I thought, Im
  the American from across the sea. I can really
  sock it to these people.

11
Lt. Calleys Words

• You realize, Gee, Ive got twenty people now.
  Im going around at half strength. I say if a
  little pussy keeps my platoon together, a little
  pussy theyve got.

12
Lt. Calleys Words

• Even the President calls it a massacre. I lay
  there asking myself, My god, who are they talking
  about? I only know I went to Vietnam and I did my
  job there the best I could.

13
Lt. Calleys Words

• I was sent to Vietnam with the absolute
  philosophy that the USAs right. And there was no
  grey and white, no grey and beige, no green or
  other colors there was just black and white,
  and I was sent to kill an enemy because his
  philosophy was wrong. I personally made noassault
  on anyone in Vietnam, personally. I represented
  my country, and I obeyed it.

14
Lt. Calleys Words

• but Id like it if there was a revolution of
  thinking. Id like all Americans to look at the
  blacks, the Jews, the Mongols the rest of the
  world, and say, Whenit comes down to living and
  dying, what in the hell do I have thats better.

15
Lt. Calleys Words

• The average guy in Miami, he doesnt accept the
  Jews, he doesnt accept the Negroes, he doesnt
  accept anything but Christian and Caucasian.

16
Lt. Calleys Words

• At last it dawned on me. These people, theyre
  all the VC..I heard a brigadier general say, MY
  god! There isnt a Vietnamese in ths goddamn
  country. They are all VC!

17
Lt. Calleys Words

• M.I. (Military Intelligence) and everyone was
  saying eliminate them. In Vietnam, I had never
  met anyone who didnt say it.

18
Lt. Calleys Words

• I got orders to Mylai on March 15. I know damned
  well, I did my duty there. The infantrys duty
  to find, to close with and to destroy the VC.

19
4th Hague Convention

• Article 25. bombardment, by any means, of
  towns, villages, dwellings, or buildings which
  are undefended, is prohibited.

20
napalm

• the aluminum salt or soap of a mixture of
  naphthenic and aliphatic carboxylic acids
  (organic acids of which the molecular structures
  contain rings and chains, respectively, of carbon
  atoms), used to thicken gasoline for use as an
  incendiary in flamethrowers and fire bombs. The
  thickened mixture, now also called napalm, burns
  more slowly and can be propelled more accurately
  and to greater distances than gasoline. It was
  developed by U.S. scientists during World War II.

21
Iwo Jima

• Meanwhile, a new tactic had been found for the
  bombing of Japan from bases in the Marianas.
  Instead of high-altitude strikes in daylight,
  which had failed to do much damage to the
  industrial centres attacked, low-level strikes at
  night, using napalm firebombs,were tried, with
  startling success. The first, in the night of
  March 910, 1945, against Tokyo, destroyed about
  25 percent of the city's buildings (most of them
  flimsily built of wood and plaster), killed more
  than 80,000 people, and made 1,000,000 homeless.
  This result indicated that Japan might be
  defeated without a massive invasion by ground
  troops, and so similar bombing raids on such
  major cities as Nagoya, Osaka, Kobe, Yokohama,
  and Toyama followed. Japan literally was being
  bombed out of the war.

22
Napalm in Vietnam
23
Napalm through the Ages

• In WWII, the US dropped 14,000 tons of napalm,
  mainly on Japan
• In Korea, the US dropped 32,000 tons of napalm
• In Vietnam, 373,000 tons of a new improved napalm

24
Napalm in Iraq

• American jets killed Iraqi troops with firebombs
  similar to the controversial napalm used in the
  Vietnam War in March and April as Marines
  battled toward Baghdad. Marine Corps fighter
  pilots and commanders who have returned from the
  war zone have confirmed dropping dozens of
  incendiary bombs near bridges over the Saddam
  Canal and the Tigris River. The explosions
  created massive fireballs.

25
Iraq (2)

• "We napalmed both those (bridge) approaches,"
  said Col. James Alles in a recent interview. He
  commanded Marine Air Group 11, based at Miramar
  Marine Corps Air Station, during the war.
  "Unfortunately, there were people there because
  you could see them in the (cockpit) video. "They
  were Iraqi soldiers there. It's no great way to
  die," he added. How many Iraqis died, the
  military couldn't say. No accurate count has been
  made of Iraqi war casualties. The bombing
  campaign helped clear the path for the Marines'
  race to Baghdad.

26
Iraq (3)

• During the war, Pentagon spokesmen disputed
  reports that napalm was being used, saying the
  Pentagon's stockpile had been destroyed two years
  ago. Apparently the spokesmen were drawing a
  distinction between the terms "firebomb" and
  "napalm." If reporters had asked about firebombs,
  officials said yesterday they would have
  confirmed their use. What the Marines dropped,
  the spokesmen said yesterday, were "Mark 77
  firebombs." They acknowledged those are
  incendiary devices with a function "remarkably
  similar" to napalm weapons. Rather than using
  gasoline and benzene as the fuel, the firebombs
  use kerosene-based jet fuel, which has a smaller
  concentration of benzene.