‘Lack of investigation’ after My Lai

Press, Volume CXI, Issue 32587, 22 April 1971, Page 26

‘Lack of investigation’ after My Lai

(N.Z. Press Association—Copyright) FORT MEAD (Maryland), April 21. The defence counsel in the court-martial of Colonel Oran Henderson on charges of “covering up” the My Lai shootings has contended that General William Westmoreland might have been derelict in his duty in not investigating the incident.

Mr Henry Rothblatt, the defence lawyer, a civilian, told reporters that General Westmoreland, as the leader of United States forces in Vietnam, was briefed on the My Lai operation on April 20, 1968—36 days after the incident He was told that more than 120 people—at least 20 of them civilians—had been killed.

“Being commander-in-chief and having all the personnel available to him and knowing what he did, he should either have known there was an atrocity or he was derelict in not knowing,” Mr Rothblatt said.

Colonel Henderson is charged on two counts of failing to investigate and report the massacre of Vietnamese civilians and another two counts of giving false information to an official inquiry. He was commander of the 11th Brigade of the Americal Division, which included the platoon led by Lieutenant William Calley, who was recently convicted of the murder of at least 22 civilians. Colonel Henderson, aged 51, has admitted investigating reports of wild firings, but said that he found nothing which would indicate an atrocity had been committed. The Judge, Colonel Peter Wondolowski, later rejected a defence motion for access to secret Army documents bearing on the My Lai investigation. Defence lawyers believed that they might have been able to prove that Colonel Henderson was considered by the Army as a prime suspect when he gave testimony in December, 1969, to an official

inquiry under LieutenantGeneral William Peers. They say that the Army victimised Colonel Henderson by giving him inadequate warning before testifying, and that if he were considered a suspect, the two charges that he gave wrong and false information to the Peers Commission should be voided.