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| PC: Getty Images |
"Soldiers were almost robotic as they massacred civilians" Ron told.Ronald Haeberle, 26 at the time, watched a dazed six-year-old through his viewfinder, clamber out of a rice paddy and limp towards a pile of warm bodies. The boy, already wounded in the arm and leg, was shot dead seconds after emerging...
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| PC: The LIFE Images Collection |
“I saw him flipping. He landed in the heap of bodies.”Ronald turned to confront the GI who shot the innocent boy – but the man strode off.
“We were about four inches from each other. We looked at each other and I remember asking ‘Why?’
“He looked at me with a hard stare, turned and walked away.”
The American troops were tasked with fighting off the North’s Viet Cong guerrillas but within minutes of landing landing by helicopter an hour after the troops had arrived, Ron realised there were no Viet Cong.
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| PC: The LIFE Images Collection |
Instead, the GIs were slaying and mutilating civilians, mainly women and children, aged one to 82. Over 500 in total were raped, mutilated and killed by American troops in the hamlet of My Lai and the surrounding villages in Vietnam.
Committed by soldiers from Company C, 1st Battalion, 20th Infantry regiment, or “Charlie Company”, it ranks alongside history’s most wicked mass murders.
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And it was made worse because the army immediately covered it up and sold it as a victory – that is until Ronald Haeberle took the decision to expose the lies by sharing his heart-wrenching photos with the public.
When they appeared in all their full-coloured horror there could no longer be any cover up.
It would be 50 years today since the atrocity now known as the My Lai Massacre.
Ron says:
“Gen Westmoreland sent a congratulatory letter to Company C praising ‘a wonderful job’. It was one big cover-up from the top down. My photos convinced the GIs to speak out.”Today, at 76, the horror still runs deep. Ron has visited My Lai four times after that horrific day and plans to make his fifth trip as he can't seem to forget what he saw that shocking day.
It is a journey, an apology, he feels he needs to keep making.
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| Ronald Haeberle |
By the time he arrived the population was almost obliterated, the frenzied soldiers almost spent and about to torch the villagers’ homes. But Ron was in time to witness the horror and, importantly, capture it on film.
He says:
"The men were cold and silent. Almost robotic. It was a macabre scene. I saw 75 to 100 bodies."
"It was silence but then sporadic fire. I saw chips of bone flying in the air when they shot one woman."
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"I remember an old man and two children walking towards us shouting ‘No VC’, meaning ‘No Viet Cong’."
"They were scared, they had their hands in the air. They were six yards away when one GI shot them."
Ron and Duc - a survivor of My Lai massacre
"I was shaking my head, trying to find out right then what was happening, but the soldiers just turned and walked off."
"I will never forget one particular soldier."
"He got his bayonet out and jumped on the back of a water buffalo and was trying to ride it and kill it at the same time. He had lost all sight of reality.” He recalls another group of villagers herded like terrified animals."
"Soldiers were surrounding them. They were fondling one young girl, trying to unbutton her blouse."
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"One man yelled ‘Here’s someone with a camera’ so they all stopped. I thought they were going to interrogate them so I stepped back."
"But then I heard firing, turned round and saw two soldiers with M16s firing into this group."
"It was too much. I continued walking. I didn’t turn around."Ron reveals he feared troops might have shot him, too, had he stood in their way.
He tried to get explanations, approaching Capt Ernest Medina. He was joined by a Vietnamese interpreter, demanding ‘Why are you killing civilians?’ But Medina refused to speak.
"Quite a few soldiers that day had lost reality, this was revenge. They weren’t seeing human beings, or children – they were seeing the enemy."Ron didn’t see any rapes – he later learned that women and children were hideously attacked – but he heard that a soldier who protested about one was almost shot. In the end, all Ron was able to do was take shots of razed houses and pile of bodies of defenseless villagers killed in cold blood.
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It was learning of the rapes of children that convinced him.
After his photos were published, a full investigation was launched. But shockingly, only one man, Lieut William Calley, was convicted.
He was found guilty of 22 murders in 1971 and sentenced to life with hard labour. Three years later he was pardoned by President Nixon.
Only in 2009 did Lieut William Calley offer an apology, explaining:
"I feel remorse for the Vietnamese who were killed, for their families, for the soldiers involved and their families. I am very sorry."It clearly isn’t enough. But Ron believes the whole blame could never rest on one man.
Lieutenant william calley
There were other leaders in charge that day, others who went along with it.
The criminals were never properly brought to justice. Ron even blames himself for that.
He says:
"We are all guilty of something there that day."
"I have apologised for what happened. It should never have happened. In my own way I go and pay my respects."
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