Navy Probes Report Iraqis Were Shot While Giving Up

The Navy has launched a formal investigation into allegations that on the second day of the Persian Gulf War, U.S. servicemen shot Iraqi soldiers as they tried to surrender to a naval combat team, Navy officials said Tuesday.

It is the first major, publicly acknowledged military inquiry into charges of wrongdoing by U.S. military personnel serving in the Persian Gulf. International law governing the conduct of war forbids any attack on troops attempting to surrender.

According to an anonymous letter received by the Navy, U.S. troops opened fire on Iraqi soldiers occupying some of the 11 Kuwaiti-owned oil platforms in the waters of the Persian Gulf, even though the Iraqis had raised white flags of surrender as helicopters and speedboats from the U.S. frigate Nicholas bore down on them.

Defense Department sources said the letter is believed to have been written by a sailor aboard the Nicholas.

The Navy conducted a preliminary investigation of the allegations and found sufficient grounds on June 4 to initiate a formal inquiry, according to Capt. Kendall Pease, a Navy spokesman.

The inquiry by a three-member board is to be headed by Rear Adm. Douglas J. Katz, commander of the U.S. Atlantic Command’s Cruiser-Destroyer Group 2 based in Charleston, S.C. Katz served in the Persian Gulf during the war.

Findings by the board “could certainly lead to recommendations for further action,” Pease said. That action could include court-martial proceedings against U.S. military personnel.

Five Iraqi soldiers were killed and three were wounded in the Jan. 18 nighttime raid, which was conducted by U.S. and Kuwaiti troops operating from the Nicholas. It was not known if any of the deaths or casualties could be attributed to the alleged misconduct.

The operation under investigation yielded 23 Iraqi prisoners of war, the first of thousands of POWs captured by allied forces during six weeks of fighting. A combat pool report filed from the Nicholas after the incident portrayed the Iraqi detainees as frightened and grateful to have been plucked from platforms where they did not have adequate food or supplies.

The inquiry by the board will be conducted primarily in the Nicholas’ home-port of Charleston. The Nicholas, a 445-foot ship armed with anti-ship missiles, torpedoes and an array of machine guns, left Tuesday from New York City where it was participating in festivities celebrating the return of U.S. troops from the Persian Gulf. The ship and its crew are expected to arrive in Charleston early next week.

The Nicholas arrived home from the Persian Gulf in mid-March, when the Navy’s initial inquiry was under way. It was scheduled to leave Charleston for a routine deployment later this month but will stay in port pending completion of the board’s inquiry, Navy officials said.

They said the new inquiry is more formal than the preliminary investigation, which was conducted by one officer. And unlike the earlier inquiry, the latest effort will require witnesses to make sworn statements.

Officials would not say whether the letter that prompted the investigation gave the names of any individuals who may have ignored the alleged Iraqi attempts to surrender. But Pease said the formal inquiry does not focus on the actions of any identified individuals. It would be “premature,” he added, to suggest that individual soldiers or sailors are the subjects of any criminal investigation.