No time for truth

"No Time for Truth is the first book to investigate the "Haditha Massacre"--the controversial killing of twenty-four unarmed Iraqi civilians by U.S. Marines in November 2005, and the subsequent prosecution of eight Marines charged with violating the rules of combat. Unraveled in this groundbreaking work, this many-faceted tragedy of the Iraq War compellingly illustrates the bitter observation of the ancient Greek playwright, Aeschylus, that "truth is the first casualty" of war. After the explosion of an IED killed one Marine and wounded two others, the counter-attack by Marines against at least nine insurgents hiding in the village of Haditha resulted in the deaths of Iraqi civilians including an old man and ten helpless women and children. Ignited by an expose in TIME magazine, the reports of the killings exploded around the world in headline news reports citing murder and cover-up. Responding to Iraqi claims that the victims were randomly slaughtered by rampaging Marines bent on revenge, the Marines countered that the insurgents had intentionally endangered the civilians. Fueled by international and American condemnation of the killings and aided by the military's botched response to the news stories, the Pentagon and the Marine Corps initiated court martial proceedings against the Marines involved in the incident. Slowly at first and then with greater rapidity the government's case began to fall apart. One after another, the alleged perpetrators walked away without sanction. Only one of the participants was convicted by merely agreeing to submit a guilty plea to a misdemeanor and an honorable discharge. The Haditha incident triggered a divisive and highly publicized trial that left many questions unanswered about military justice and cast doubt on the honor of the tradition-bound United States Marines Corps. No Time for Truth makes it clear that the final cost of this incident is still to be revealed. "--