Online petition supports Fallujah Marine

An online petition addressed to Congress supporting the Marine who shot a wounded enemy fighter in a mosque – a controversial act caught on videotape and broadcast worldwide – has received over 150,000 signatures, according to records on the hosting site.

The petition, created by Alan Swinney, calls on Congress to urge the Pentagon, which is investigating the incident, to spare the Marine shooter from any punishment.

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"It is my opinion that NOTHING should happen to this American Marine," states the petition. "He should be returned to his unit or be given an honorable discharge. We don't need our young men and women taking an extra second to decide if its right to shoot an enemy terrorist when that could mean that one of our soldiers could lose their life. The lives of our soldiers should be the single most important factor in this war against terrorism. The rights of terrorists can come second."

The petition points out that terrorists do not follow the rules of war:

"These terrorists kill innocent women by disemboweling them, cut of the heads of innocent truck drivers, detonate car bombs in crowds full of innocent people, and fly planes into buildings filled with innocent Americans."

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As WorldNetDaily reported, on Nov. 13, freelance camerman Kevin Sites, who was working for NBC, shot footage of the incident, which involved a Marine from the 3rd Battalion, 1st Marine Regiment.

From the dialogue on the footage, it appeared the Marines were unsure if the insurgent was dead or faking death. A Marine in the same unit had been killed just a day earlier when he tended to the booby-trapped dead body of an insurgent. The Marine seen shooting the Iraqi insurgent had himself been shot in the face the day before, but quickly returned to duty.

Sites posted on his blog over the weekend: "The Marine who fired the shot became aware that I was in the room. He came up to me and said, 'I didn't know, sir – I didn't know.' The anger that seemed present just moments before turned to fear and dread."

Retired U.S. Army Lt. Colonel Bob Maginnis believes the incident needs to be put into context.

He told AgapePress that many of the enemy in Iraq, after they were wounded, were "still continuing to fire and to throw grenades at us and to do everything they could to kill us. That has to be put into perspective, given the nature of what we're dealing with here."

The Army veteran also noted, "The Marine, just the prior day, had been wounded himself going into a firefight in a house. Perhaps he was a bit trigger-ready."

Fallujah insurgents have often broken the rules of warfare, as evidenced by another incident over the weekend. On Saturday, insurgents waved a white flag of surrender in the war-torn city before opening fire on U.S. troops and causing casualties, a Marine spokesman said.

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