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For three months the American unit had been in no major battles but had suffered a lot of casualties. On 14 March a small squad from Charlie Company ran into a booby trap, killing a popular sergeant, blinding one GI and wounding several others. The following evening, when a funeral service was held for the killed sergeant, soldiers had revenge on their mind. After the service, Captain Medina rose to give the soldiers a pep talk and discuss the next day's mission. Medina told them that the Vietcong's crack 48th Battalion was in the vicinity of a hamlet known as My Lai, which would be the target of a large assault by the company. The soldiers' mission would be to engage the 48th Battalion and destroy the village of My Lai. By 0700 hours, Medina said, the woman and children would be out of the hamlet and they could all expect to encounter the enemy. The soldiers were to explode brick homes, set fire to thatch homes, shoot livestock, poison wells, and destroy the enemy . .
It seemed as if Medina intentionally gave the impression that everyone in My Lai would be their enemy. By 0800 hours, Calley's platoon crossed the plaza and entered the village. The men began their usual search-and-destroy tasks of pulling people from homes, interrogating them, and searching for the Vietcong. Soon the killing began. The first victim was a man stabbed in the back with a bayonet. A group of fifteen to twenty mostly older women were gathered around a temple, kneeling and praying. They were all executed with shots to the back of their heads. "I rounded them up, brought them back down to Meadlo, and we stood around them for a couple of minutes talking. Lieutenant Calley came back, and said: "Take care of them."" So we said: "okay."" And we sat there and watched them like we usually do. And he came back again, and he said: "we're taking care of them."" And he said: "I mean kill them."" So I looked at Meadlo and he looked at me, and I didn't want to do it.
Is any cliché in American public discourse quite as stale as "liberal media bias-? Probably not, unless it's "tax-and-spend liberal."" Is there a literate adult living in this country who hasn't heard or read that dull, deceptive phrase literally hundreds or even thousands of times? Not unless said...