CSI Baghdad: Guiliana Sgrena is Lying

According to Guiliana Sgrena, America forces fired "300-400" bullets at the vehicle she was in as it sped towards the Baghdad International Airport.

Pictures say thousands words, and every one of these says that Guiliana Sgrena is wrong. I know a bit about firearms, and I know a bit about shooting sheet metal objects (old real estate signs, acquired legally, are great target holders). The five pictures of Sgrena's escape vehicle on the Jawa Report doesn't appear to match up with her story of 300-400 rounds, for several reasons.

There aren't enough holes in the windshield and other passenger compartment glass. As a matter of fact, only one is readily apparent in the windshield, which should have been perforated by slightly off-target shots at the car's engine block, and ricochets from shots that did hit the engine block, frame, and other heavy metal elements in the car. The rear glass and backseat passenger's window on the driver's side also show no damage.

There are no holes in the sheet metal around the engine block, one apparent hit to the driver's headrest and only one apparent tire puncture. I say apparent, because the pictures are too blurry to be sure what is going on here, but that the arrows are pointing at bullet holes are the obvious assumption we have to work with.

These photos immediately establish several points with solid evidence proving Sgrena wrong for anyone with a minimal knowledge of military weapons.

M2 heavy machine guns, M240 medium machine guns and M249 light machine guns are the only belt-fed weapons in wide deployment by U.S. ground forces in Iraq to the best of my knowledge (Rambo's famous and fragile M60 is largely phased out). These are the only weapons that could lay down the amount of fire claimed by Sgrena in the amount of time she claimed. M-4 carbines, M-16 rifles and even the experimental XM-8 rifle all use 30-round box magazines, and would have had to make multiple reloads in that time period, even if several rifles were firing. The physics of her claim simply doesn't add up.

However, all of these rifles have single-shot capability, which is the preferred method of operation when placing precision shots, which most closely matches the few bullet holes in the vehicle.

If the rate of fire Sgrena claims was true, by definition it would have required automatic fire to occur in the few seconds she claims it did. As anyone who has ever watched an action movies knows, weapons firing in automatic mode "walk" their fire across the target area. This did not happen here, or the sheet metal and glass around the three apparent holes would contain many, many more bullet impacts.

Furthermore, M2, M240, and M240 machine guns would have left very dramatic high-velocity exit wounds on the passenger side of the vehicle, made all the more dramatic (and "holey") by shrapnel. And yet, these pictures do not exist.

We are left to draw only one logical conclusion for this, and that is that Guiliana Sgrena dramatically inflated the number of shots fired at her speeding car. That she is alive to make the claim only confirms it.

Disclaimer: Confederate Yankee is not now, nor has ever been, a crime scene investigator at home or abroad... but I can tell what a bullet hole looks like, and they aren't here.