An American pilot and a weapons officer were safely rescued in Libya on Tuesday after their warplane crashed near Benghazi, but the United States Marine Corps dropped two 500-pound bombs during the recovery and faced questions about whether Marines had fired on villagers. In an episode that reflected the unpredictability of an air campaign designed to keep American troops off the ground, the United States military said that an equipment malfunction rather than enemy fire brought down the plane. A Marine Corps officer in the Mediterranean strongly denied that any shots were fired at civilians during the rescue, but Marine Corps officers at the Pentagon said they did not know what happened or whether any civilians were killed or injured when the bombs exploded. ...
Channel 4 News in Britain reported that six villagers were shot by American troops in rescuing one of the two airmen. None of the villagers — who were interviewed by a reporter in a nearby hospital — were killed, although a small boy may need to have a leg amputated. ...
Neither he nor other Marine officials said specifically whether any shots were fired from the Harrier attack jets.
So let me see if I understand this: Our government as led by Barack Obama sent Marines into harms way for lousy reasons to fight a battle with no apparent plan, endgame, or exit strategy, and now it's investigating the Marines for having defended themselves when they or their buddies were shot down in potentially dangerous territory. I don't usually resort to vulgarities on this blog, but that's just seriously fucked up shit.
