DATE=5/16/2000
TYPE=BACKGROUNDER
TITLE=MCCAFFERY - GULF
NUMBER=5-46327
BYLINE=JIM RANDLE
DATELINE=PENTAGON
CONTENT=
VOICED AT: 


INTRO:  One of America's most highly-decorated 
generals is disputing allegations that his soldiers 
slaughtered retreating Iraqis who were no threat to U-
S forces during and after the Persian Gulf War.  The 
charges come in a magazine article by an award-winning 
investigative journalist who says the U-S Army covered 
up the incidents.  General Barry McCaffrey calls the 
charges "nonsense."  V-O-A's Jim Randle reports.


TEXT:  In an article in this week's New Yorker 
Magazine, investigative reporter Seymour Hersh says 
two days after a cease-fire, a retreating Iraqi unit 
ran into McCaffrey's 26-thousand troops.

Mr. Hersh says General McCaffrey -- eager for a fight 
--- used a minor incident as an excuse to launch a 
ferocious four-hour assault that mauled the hapless 
Iraqis.

            /// Hersh Act ///

      He claimed the Iraqis were hostile, a lot of 
      fire directed at us, at the American troops, um, 
      um, (but) an investigation determined that there 
      was one grenade thrown, and perhaps one shell 
      fired.

            /// End Act ///

Mr. Hersh says General McCaffrey's 24th Division 
soldiers destroyed seven-hundred vehicles, including 
tanks, killing an unknown number of Baghdad's 
soldiers.  He calls the large attack grossly out of 
proportion to the danger.

Retired General Barry McCaffrey used interviews with 
several major U-S television networks and newspapers 
to strongly deny the charges.

He says the soldiers Mr. Hersh used as sources were 
too far from the action to see what was going on.  The 
general says the large Iraqi army unit was well armed 
and a real threat.

            /// McCaffrey Act ///

      Two company commanders say they are under fire.  
      We had to support our soldiers and Hersh cites a 
      scout platoon that was nine kilometers away from 
      this action as explaining that they didn't think 
      it was going on.  It is nonsense, it is 
      revisionist history.

            /// End Act ///

The Hersh article quotes other soldiers who said 
before the cease-fire, the 24th Division shot at some 
Iraqi civilians waving a white flag and a group of 
several hundred disarmed Iraqi prisoners.

But General McCaffrey says Mr. Hersh's sources were 
once again too far from the action to get the story 
right.

He says "an exhaustive" 21-hundred page Army 
investigation cleared him and his troops of any 
misconduct in the cases.

            /// McCaffrey Act ///

      The allegations, the bottom line, are not true.

            /// End Act ///

But Mr. Hersh, who won journalism's top honor (the 
Pulitzer Prize) for uncovering a massacre by U-S Army 
troops in Vietnam, says the Army does a poor job of 
policing itself.

            /// Hersh Act ///

      It happened.  It was not investigated properly.  
      I think the only fair word to use, would be it 
      was covered up inside the Army.

            /// End Act /// 

But Pentagon officials say there is no reason to 
reopen the lengthy investigation of the alleged 
incidents.

General McCaffrey served in Vietnam as well as the 
Persian Gulf war and was wounded several times and 
awarded a number of medals for valor.

He has retired from the Army and now holds a cabinet-
level post directing Washington's war against drugs.   
(Signed)

NEB/JR/ENE/JP





16-May-2000 17:44 PM EDT (16-May-2000 2144 UTC)
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Source: Voice of America
.