Peter1469
04-13-2013, 05:32 AM
http://triblive.com/investigative/specialprojects/rulesofengagement/
Shortly before noon on March 6, 2007, Small Kill Team leader Michael Barbera rose from his squad's position in high grass in a palm grove here and shot two teenage cattle herders.
A short time later, the Army staff sergeant ordered his soldiers to kill a third teenager walking toward them.
Barbera would report to his superiors that the three dead boys were insurgents operating out of this farming village about 50 miles northeast of Baghdad.
In reality, Ahmad Khalid al-Timmimi, 15, his brother, Abbas, and their cousin, Muhamed Khaleel Kareem al-Galyani, both 14, were unarmed deaf mutes with no known ties to the insurgency. Their slayings angered most members of Barbera's squad — decorated combat veterans who reported the killings to Army investigators in Fort Bragg, N.C.
Those soldiers believed Barbera's actions triggered two reprisal suicide bombings at their combat outpost that killed 10 of their fellow paratroopers in the 5th Squadron of the 73rd Cavalry Airborne Reconnaissance Regiment.
In late 2010, several of Barbera's former soldiers asked the Tribune-Review to get answers about what happened to a secret Army probe into their allegations. In a two-year investigation, a Trib reporter traveled to Fort Bragg, across the United States and into an area of Iraq vacated by American troops to find out what happened.
No charges have been filed yet, and the reporter has been threatened. Not sure what is going on with the Army JAGs. They are usually all over this stuff.
Shortly before noon on March 6, 2007, Small Kill Team leader Michael Barbera rose from his squad's position in high grass in a palm grove here and shot two teenage cattle herders.
A short time later, the Army staff sergeant ordered his soldiers to kill a third teenager walking toward them.
Barbera would report to his superiors that the three dead boys were insurgents operating out of this farming village about 50 miles northeast of Baghdad.
In reality, Ahmad Khalid al-Timmimi, 15, his brother, Abbas, and their cousin, Muhamed Khaleel Kareem al-Galyani, both 14, were unarmed deaf mutes with no known ties to the insurgency. Their slayings angered most members of Barbera's squad — decorated combat veterans who reported the killings to Army investigators in Fort Bragg, N.C.
Those soldiers believed Barbera's actions triggered two reprisal suicide bombings at their combat outpost that killed 10 of their fellow paratroopers in the 5th Squadron of the 73rd Cavalry Airborne Reconnaissance Regiment.
In late 2010, several of Barbera's former soldiers asked the Tribune-Review to get answers about what happened to a secret Army probe into their allegations. In a two-year investigation, a Trib reporter traveled to Fort Bragg, across the United States and into an area of Iraq vacated by American troops to find out what happened.
No charges have been filed yet, and the reporter has been threatened. Not sure what is going on with the Army JAGs. They are usually all over this stuff.