The Party The Marines Spoiled In Haditha ... Here's a little background on the city the Marines walked into last November:

From the UK Guardian, August 22nd 2005:

The executions are carried out at dawn on Haqlania bridge, the entrance to Haditha. A small crowd usually turns up to watch even though the killings are filmed and made available on DVD in the market the same afternoon.

One of last week's victims was a young man in a black tracksuit. Like the others he was left on his belly by the blue iron railings at the bridge's southern end. His severed head rested on his back, facing Baghdad. Children cheered when they heard that the next day's spectacle would be a double bill: two decapitations. A man named Watban and his brother had been found guilty of spying...

A three-day visit by a reporter working for the Guardian last week established what neither the Iraqi government nor the US military has admitted: Haditha, a farming town of 90,000 people by the Euphrates river, is an insurgent citadel.

That Islamist guerrillas were active in the area was no secret but only now has the extent of their control been revealed...A three-hour drive north from Baghdad, under the nose of an American base, it is a miniature Taliban-like state. Insurgents decide who lives and dies, which salaries get paid, what people wear, what they watch and listen to.

The Guardian reporter did not say he worked for a British newspaper. For their own protection interviewees cannot be named.

There is no fighting here because there is no one to challenge the Islamists. The police station and municipal offices were destroyed last year and US marines make only fleeting visits every few months

The court caters solely for divorces and marriages. Alleged criminals are punished in the market. The Guardian witnessed a headmaster accused of adultery whipped 190 times with cables. Children laughed as he sobbed and his robe turned crimson.

Two men who robbed a foreign exchange shop were splayed on the ground. Masked men stood on their hands while others broke their arms with rocks. The shopkeeper offered the insurgents a reward but they declined.

DVDs of beheadings on the bridge are distributed free in the souk. Children prefer them to cartoons. "They should not watch such things," said one grandfather, but parents appeared not to object.

One DVD features a young, blond muscular man who had been disembowelled. He was said to have been a member of a six-strong US sniper team ambushed and killed on August 1. Residents said he had been paraded in town before being executed. (the US army denied that)

There was a rumour that Zarqawi, Washington's most wanted militant after Osama bin Laden, visited early last week. True or not, residents wanted to believe they had hosted such a celebrity...

I think the above is worth noting. There are other things that bug me, too, as I described earlier today.

StetsonTip RedStater ExSalvo, responding to AcademicElephant's excellent article on the basic differences between Haditha and MaiLai -- except, of course, the press coverage is the same. Here's a link to the article on her own blog.

UPDATE: A reporter at CNN shares her own shock. She apparently traveled with some of the Marines in the unit, and is experience cognitive dissonance. http://edition.cnn.com/2006/WORLD/meast/05/30/damon.iraq.btsc/

SECOND UPDATE -- 4 pm: This WashingtonPost story mentions that the marines were indeed under small arms gunfire from the houses. There's also some radio transmissions, and perhaps a videotape of at least parts of the incident. Will continue to follow.  ¶ 10:00 AM