its support for syria's president assad, in the wake of last week's chemical attack. foreign ministers from the g7 group have been meeting in italy, trying for a co—ordinated response, which could include new sanctions on moscow and damascus. united airlines is underfire for having one of its passengers dragged off a flight in chicago. the plane was overbooked and when no one volunteered to leave, to let some of united's staff onboard, they selected the man and his companion at random. a security guard has now been sent on leave. there've been more violent anti—government protests in venezuela. they began last week when the opposition leader was banned from holding office for 15 years. the organisation of american states says fresh elections are the only way to resolve the deepening crisis in the country. now on bbc news, it's time for hardtalk. when it comes to seeking justice for some of the wrongs committed

by american forces, the record hasn't always been that good. my guest today flew into the middle of the my lai massacre in vietnam in 1968 and stopped the wholesale slaughter of vietnamese civilians. it was more than 30 years before anybody even bothered to say thank you. has the us military now learned the lessons it should have done from vietnam? hugh thompson, a very warm welcome to the programme. thank you very much. when you hear allegations of brutality by us troops in iraq, failure to respect the geneva conventions, what goes through your mind? bad leadership. the past and my situation goes through it and wondering, has nothing been learned? how something like this could happen

in the present that seems to have happened. i don't know to what degree because i don't have the facts, but it shouldn't have happened. in 1991, commanders were told when they went for desert storm, no my lais. that's what i heard general schwartzkopf‘s marching orders were to his officers. that made me feel good because i thought we had learned something and were going forward. and then to get slapped in the face with this is horrendous. do you think there will be a full investigation? you've been part of investigations in the past. i think there will be a full investigation and i think... no cover up? it's out now. see, the situation i was involved in wasn't made public till

about 18 months later, from when it happened in the united states. this didn't take that long. so it's out there. technology is better and i think there will be an investigation. i think people in the military, their careers are really ruined. i don't think they'll walk scot—free this time, i really don't. when president nixon first commented on the my lai massacre, he said it was an isolated incident. was it? i think it was. i would have a very difficult time with myself if i thought that i was part of something that was done all the time. i didn't see it. innocent civilians do get killed in wars. i don't care what army, what country... but my lai wasn't that, was it? no, it wasn't.

this wasn'tjust one of those awful things that happen in war time. these were murdered. some of them — 170 of them. and hands above their head and executed. that's not war. that's not what a soldier from any country does. these are murders. were you taught about the geneva conventions? yes, sir. and yet in 1971, a soldier goes before a jury and says he couldn't remember a single army class on the geneva convention. his name was rusty calley. the one man who was found guilty of the my lai massacre. he has...i would say if he says that he has a very short memory. i will not say a lot of emphasis went in those classes. just about everybody who went through basic training had

about three 50 minute blocks of instructions. code of conduct, geneva conventions and treatment of... i don't remember what it was called. something like treatment of prisoners. but standards were set? i won't say they emphasised them a lot or really delved into it. it was more or less, you know, your ticket had to be punched so you had to go to this class. it wasn't, you know... it wasn't a lot of emphasis being put on it. hugh thompson, march16th, 1968, 36 years have gone past. how clear in your mind are the memories of that day? certain things too clear. other things not clear. what is clear? when you shut your eyes, what do you see? a lot of pain and suffering by a lot of people. i remember the first girl getting

killed after i asked help for her. how was she killed? medina walked up and blew her away. this is one of the commanding officers on the ground? commanding officer. he shot her at point—blank range? yes, sir. you saw it in front of your eyes? yes, sir, we asked for help for her. and we were just kind of in shock because, by that time, we had already questioned what was going on, or what we had seen happen or seen the aftermath of what had actually happened. but when you landed your helicopter, it started all over again and was still going on? mm—hm. on two different occasions. and then we asked for help and i got a girl killed.

and then we asked for help again and we got a bunch of people killed. so it was kind of obvious that asking wasn't getting the mission accomplished like i thought it should have been. so these unarmed civilians were being shot right in front of your eyes and at some point you said "enough" and you asked your men to turn their guns on the american soldiers who were doing this? yes, sir. we didn't have any choice. we tried to... ..i wouldn't say be nice and friendly, but we had asked and we were just kind of like a penned animal in a cage, i guess. it's the only way i could think of to get it to stop. if that's what it would take, that's what we would have to do.

were you prepared to open fire on fellow american soldiers? yeah. i remember that day, i thought, well, you're gonna spend the rest of your life injail. i thank god to this day and a lot of days in between that everybody played it cool and nobody started shooting, ‘cause i'd really hate to have that on my conscience. but it was somethin — we didn't volunteer to do, it was the only way out and i felt we had to take it. you said in one of the reports that a lot of the girls didn't scream too much because they had already had their tongues cut out. a bayonet can kill two real quick if they are pregnant. this is bestiality on an unbelievable scale, isn't it? there was a lot of bad things going on. somebody, i guess, who was actually

lucky that day was one who just took a round right through the brain. because there was a lot of evil. how do you carry around the memory of that for 36 years? went for a long time just... didn't say anything. and most of the time i'm thinking about it now, i'm talking to a class of students and if...if i can reach one person in that class and make them think to do the right thing, it'll be worth it. do you have any explanation for why presumably previously normal people could have butchered their way through over 500 unarmed civilians

on that day? i blame the number one cause is bad leadership. negative leadership, bad leadership. but these people killed with their hands, didn't they? some of them did. they killed with bare hands and bayonets and they raped and murdered. how do you explain soldiers doing that? i think the leadership that allows them to do it, negative peer pressure, prejudice. fear. not everybody on the ground that day took part in it. we put i think somewhere around 190 people on the ground. only somewhere between 13 and 18,

i've been told, actually took part in what was going on. the others didn't do anything to stop it, just kind of turned the other way. they knew what was going on. you could follow where the squads went. this part over here isjust a normal village and this part over here looks pretty bad. when you got it to stop, when you threatened your fellow us soldiers and you got it to stop, you called in assistance, you called in a gunship, you managed to get some children out and some survivors out. i...civilians, there were children with them. there was old men, old women. i remember the one little girl, you know, she was hanging onto her mother's knee.

she was probably four or six, something like that. got them out. i could only see three. when they started coming out, reality started coming in. what in the world am i going to do with these people? i can't leave them here. they're going to die. i can't get them out of there, i don't have the capability. that's when i called a friend of mine in and i said, hey, do me a favour and get them out of the area. you got them out and when you flew back to headquarters, what did you do then? i was very mad. you were crying, weren't you? yeah, crying. screaming. and at people who outranked me, you know, and just lost it. tootally. you can't make me fly. to show that you are a pilot,

you had a set of wings. you wanted to leave? i said i would rip my wings off because i didn't want to take part in this. there was an investigation. i think i thought something had been done. but it was a whitewash because the official army report, the first army report claimed a great victory and said 128 enemies dead and only one american casualty. but they already knew better than that because they had your evidence, didn't they? yes. i cannot remember... everyone lied, didn't they? all the commanders on the ground lied? that one didn't. there was a report that 20 civilians had been killed inadvertently. that was a straight lie, wasn't it?

yes. captain medina lied, as well. and admitted later in the end that he had lied. this was the man you'd seen shooting a girl. his scenario when he was in his court martial, they believed his scenario rather than mine, i guess. you stayed 13 years in the service after that. it wasn't the same, though, was it? as fast as it came up after the court marshalling, it died down. but you were ostracised for a while? for a while. you'd go somewhere and people would disappear? when it first broke and people didn't know the facts, they forgot all about it very soon after it happened.

but personally, you paid a heavy price in terms of depression, over the years. a lot of nightmares that you went through. mm—hm. four marriages. well, there's been multiple marriages. it's been hard for you to carry around, hasn't it? no. no, it's life, you know? you've gotta do it. life goes on. can you ever forgive the people who did that? no. nope, i can't. i don't think i am man enough to. ‘cause i know...i know the pain and suffering that was inflicted for no reason, no reason whatsoever. there was no threat. you know, there was no enemy. now, they might have all grown up to be enemy, but that's not what a soldier does, in any country. it's just not. and when you think of those

who walked away from it, got on with their lives, had children, set up businesses. they've got to live with themselves. i imagine some of them don't have an easy time. i'm ok with what i did. ijust, you know, know the unnecessary pain and suffering and know how fragile human life is. in 1969, rusty calley, the officer on the ground who was eventually held responsible, was flown back for an identification parade. you were asked to identify him. mm—hm. what went through your mind when you saw that? just, uh... well, i knew i'd seen him and i couldn't remember

whether it was at the ditch or the bunker. i knew he was one of them. i blocked a lot of that out of my mind. i think that's god's way of maintaining sanity. only 25 officers and enlisted men were prosecuted. only a handful ever came to trial. only one man was found guilty and he served four and a half months behind bars. no, i think three days. three days? and a little bit of house arrest. oh, yeah, he had a lot of house arrest with conjugal visits. now that's a rough life. this was a farce, wasn't it? armyjustice was a farce. in that case.

the army justice system is a good system. i do believe, yes, it let us down. i think it let the army down, i think it let the united states down. it let you down as well, didn't it? yeah, mm—hm. not many people said thank you, did they? oh, nbobody did. you got intimidated, you had dead animals left on your porch, threatened by congress. one of the congressmen in the inquiry suggested you should be put behind bars. mm—hm. so you didn't get many thanks from a grateful nation? no, i didn't get any. but it's not the nation's fault. you know, they were... but you stopped the killing and rusty calley had jimmy carter, the then governor of georgia, rooting for him, you had flags flying at half mast on state legislators, you had this man being proclaimed on radio stations as a hero and you, who stopped the killing, were being ostracised. yeah, it makes you think.

yeah, i had a hard time going into georgia, because that's where calley was being court marshalled. and he's, ithink, originally from florida and i'm a georgian native and i'm hearing my governor on the radio saying, leave your lights on today to show support for lieutenant calley. what's this world coming to? but the people didn't have the facts, that's what it was. you believe something that a high—ranking congressman says. it should be true, but low ranking congressmen were standing off to the side and asking one another, was he in the same room i was in? because they heard that i said there was a massacre and he says, i saw nothing to indicate there was any wrongdoing. and it was secret testimony.

i couldn't say anything because, believe me, i was under a gag order and i was scared, that i was gonna go to jail. so i wasn't talking to anybody. hugh thompson, you went back to my lai. you went back on the 30th anniversary. there was no official representative from the american government there, was there? not one. uh...i guess i'd be the only representative of the american government there. you met one of the women who survived, several people who survived. mm—hm. what did they say to you? thanked me. one of them came from out of nowhere. you know, we didn't know she was coming. her interpreter brought her up and says, "i want to meet mr thompson". everyone was kind of shocked. mr wallace said,

"here's mr thompson". she wanted to know why, and i was very upset. i couldn't answer, sorry i couldn't help her. i had always wondered in my mind, did somebody there know that not all americans were crazy and went mad that day? i wonder if they ever knew somebody was trying to help. and, boy, i was real happy when she knew we tried to help. and she thanked me and i told her i was sorry i couldn't help that day and then going through the interpreter was real difficult because they only say, like, half a sentence at a time. and she asked, you know, why didn't the people that had done the killing come back with us? and i lost it.

you know, ithought, how do you answer this, you know? and i was getting ready to and then she finished the sentence and said, "so we could forgive them". oh my god... it was over with for me right then because itjust tore me up. these people, my enemies, you know have that much forgiveness in their hearts. and i'm not man enough to forgive my own people, who did it. i can't do it. but you lecture. you've lectured at west point, at the naval academy. i call it talking. i don't lecture. and you counsel, veterans. mm—hm. i still work with veterans every day, trying to help them. and what do you tell them about my lai? i don't have to tell them anything.

now some of the ones i work with know about it, well, all of them know about it now, i guess. they tell me things. i have never talked at a military or a veterans function where anybody had agreed with me. you know, if you get somebody... i'm not... i don't cut down a brigade or soldier. i think a soldier in the army or navy or marine corps is a very honourable profession. these were not soldiers, these were hoodlums and terrorists, disguised like soldiers. no soldier is taught to do that. if he does something like that he's no longer a soldier, because he's not living by the creed of a soldier.

you think it's time to remind people of that, given what's been going on in iraq? i think very obviously it's time to remind them again. hugh thompson, it's been good having you on the programme. thank you. yes, sir, thank you very much. i appreciate it. good morning. sunday was the warmest day of the year so far, with 25 degrees, 77 fahrenheit recorded, so whatever the weather on monday, it could have been a little bit disappointing, or was it? on the whole, not too bad across the south coast, as you can see from this weather watchers picture, and temperatures peaked at 16 celsius, which, with the sunshine, still felt reasonably pleasant. different story, though, in the highlands of scotland, a grey, dreich day and it looks

like we're likely to see more cloud and outbreaks of rain into the north—west today. the wind swinging round to a bit more of a westerly, so that will take the edge off the feel of things as well but with some sunshine, not too bad on the whole, cloud and rain continuing out into the far north—west of the great glen in particular. top temperatures of around 11—16 degrees. as we move out of tuesday into wednesday, we'll see a series of weather fronts slipping their way steadily south and the winds pivot round more to a north—westerly, that will make it feel that little bit fresher on exposed coasts, especially as the winds will strengthen gusting to gale force wind in the far north and west. with those weather fronts slowly slipping their way south it will bring showery outbreaks of rain, nothing particularly heavy but a bit of a nuisance. top temperatures of 10—16 the high. so that's the story through wednesday, but with clearer skies through the night we could in rural spots sea

temperatures into low single figures. a touch of light frost not out of the question for thursday morning but some sunshine in central and eastern areas before cloud and showery outbreaks of rain gather again from the north and west. so there's a bit of a theme developing as we head towards easter weekend. the jet stream slicing the country into two and always coming from a north—westerly direction so a colder source, low pressure out to the east, high pressure to the west so the settled weather is likely to be into south—western areas. but, with that north—westerly flow, the chances are temperatures are going to dip a little into the easter weekend and perhaps just below where they should be at this time of year. but we could be heading for that classic case of sunshine and april showers, so if you catch the sunnier moments, the sunshine is quite strong and it will feel reasonably pleasant from time to time. so on good friday, another weak weather front making its way slowly south across the country, sunny spells and scattered showers following on behind, 7—15 the high. into saturday, the start

of the easter weekend, well, again it's predominantly cloudy, but a good deal of dry weather in the story, but that cool north—westerly breeze as well. take care. hello, you're watching bbc world news. i'm ben bland. our top story this hour: rex goes to russia. america's secretary of state, rex tillerson, prepares for crucial talks over moscow's continuing support for syria's president assad. he's been finalising a joint message from the g7 nations, which may include a threat of new targeted sanctions. welcome to the programme. our other main stories this hour: smartphones capture the moment a passenger is forcibly dragged off an overbooked united airlines flight. one of the security officers

involved has been placed on leave. we'll hear from someone who saw it all.