In February of 1966, fed up to the eyeballs with official deceit over what the government was doing in Vietnam in the name of the American people, Senator William Fulbright, Democrat of Arkansas, opened hearings of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee into just what the hell was the true purpose, if any, of getting all those people killed over there. The committee heard from the architects of that misbegotten adventure, and from the people opposing it. The ostensible purpose was to discuss seven bills then pending before the Senate aimed at ending the U.S. involvement in Vietnam in one way or another.

The televised hearings were a full airing before the country of the agony brought upon Vietnam by the country’s leaders. Fulbright was still sailing into strong headwinds. The New York Times criticized Fulbright as undermining our plucky little ally, and Lyndon Johnson, seeing himself put on the spot by a fellow Democrat, went completely up the wall. No matter. The hearings were one of the first windows into the dubious origins and questionable prospects of our adventures in Southeast Asia.

Sen. William Fulbright (L) at Senate Foreign Relations subcommittee hearings. Getty Images

I was thinking about that when I was reading the incredible story in The Daily Beast about the murder of Green Beret Logan Melgar, whom, the Beast reports, was killed in Mali by a pair of Navy SEALS. Melgar reportedly had stumbled on the fact that the two were embezzling money meant for anti-terrorist operations in that country.

Melgar, two special operations sources say, discovered the SEALs were pocketing some of the money from the informant fund. The SEALS offered to cut him in, but Melgar declined, these sources said. It is unknown what specifically started the June 4 altercation at 5 a.m. but it escalated. Melgar lost consciousness—and, worse, stopped breathing. The SEALs attempted to open an airway in Melgar’s throat, officials said. It is unknown whether Melgar died immediately. The SEALs and another Green Beret, according to former AFRICOM officials, drove to a nearby French clinic seeking help. Melgar was dead when he arrived at the clinic, the official said. Asphyxiation was the cause of death. With Melgar dead, an apparent panic set in. The SEALs told superiors that Melgar was drunk during so-called combatives—that is, hand-to-hand fighting exercises. The Intercept reported that one of the SEALs, Petty Officer Anthony E. DeDolph, was a mixed-martial arts pro. A source told The Daily Beast the SEALs filed at least one operational report about the incident and possibly two. At least one of the reports included an account that Melgar was drunk.

This could have been a killing to shut Melgar up. It also could have been a brawl that went sideways. In either case, there clearly was a scramble to hush the matter up.

It was the worst excuse the SEALs could have made up. A former AFRICOM official who saw the autopsy report said no drugs or alcohol were found in Melgar’s system. At least one source believes he did not drink alcohol at all. The SEALs’ story was unraveling.

The story comes hard on the heels of the killing of four soldiers in Niger, a story that keeps getting worse. I can remember in July of 2012, when it was revealed that three U.S. soldiers had been killed in an vehicle accident three months earlier in Mali, that it came as a surprise to almost everyone that there were any American soldiers in that relatively obscure African nation. Now, unfortunately, we have learned that, not only are there Americans dying mysteriously in Mali, but in Niger as well, and that all of them are casualties of a “war on terror” that has been expanding in many different ways, some of them covert, over the past 16 years.

It’s long past time for a full airing of what this war is all about, and of how many different places it’s being fought, and of how much it’s costing us in blood and treasure, and of how it’s all going to end, if it ever is going to end, and we should have an airing of that, too. I have no hope that some Republican will have Fulbright’s courage and take on a president of his own party, not even this one. However, like the Vietnam debacle, the war on terror is a bipartisan project, and so is the secrecy surrounding it. Bad things bloom in darkness. As William Fulbright said upon opening his hearings:



“Under our system, Congress, and especially the Senate, shares responsibility with the President for making our Nation's foreign policy. This war, however, started and continues as a Presidential war in which the Congress, since the fraudulent Gulf of Tonkin episode, has not played a significant role. [...] The purpose of these hearings is to develop the best advice and greater public understanding of the policy alternatives available and positive congressional action to end American participation in the war."

If this is indeed to be a “forever war,” the Congress and the people ought to know that. Instead, we get stories that pop about American soldiers dying in places we never knew they were. That’s not how a democracy decides such things.

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Charles P. Pierce Charles P Pierce is the author of four books, most recently Idiot America, and has been a working journalist since 1976.

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