Italian Journalist: U.S. Lied

Former hostage Giuliana Sgrena Who Was Shot By U.S. Soldiers In Iraq Talks To Scott Pelley

(CBS)  Sgrena says that as the car rounded a turn, driving no faster than 30 miles an hour, it was hit by gunfire and at the same time, a bright light. She and Calipari were in the back seat. "He [Calipari] pushed me down and with this, the body, covered me," says Sgrena. "He pushed me down in the car. And I was asking, 'Why?' Nicola doesn’t say, he doesn’t speak it, doesn’t say nothing."

She says she heard Calipari's last breath: "I realized that Nicola was dead, without saying anything, nothing, no word, nothing at all."

What did happen? It appears the Italians had come across a checkpoint set up by the 1st Battalion, 69th Infantry Regiment of the New York National Guard. The guardsmen had been in Iraq eight months, and one of their specialties was roadblock security. But it was a rainy night and two battalion soldiers had been killed by a bomb in the same area two days before.

The Italian government says the Americans should’ve been prepared for Sgrena’s approach, because they say U.S. commanders were informed about the rescue mission in advance. Sgrena told 60 Minutes Wednesday that at one point, her driver was on the phone updating their progress to Italian and American officers at the airport.

The Army has finished an investigation, but the report isn’t expected until the end of the week. The Pentagon declined to talk with 60 Minutes Wednesday, but the Army issued this statement on the night of the shooting: “Vehicle traveling at high speed refused to stop at a check point.” [The soldiers] “attempted to warn the driver to stop by hand and arm signals, flashing white lights, and firing warning shots…when the driver didn’t stop the soldiers shot into the engine block which stopped the vehicle.”

"I think that is a lie," says Sgrena.

"Let's take this piece by piece," says Pelley. "Vehicle was speeding."

"No," says Sgrena.

"Attempted to warn the driver by hand signals," says Pelley.

"No," says Sgrena.

"Arm signals. Flashing white lights," says Pelley. "Firing warning shots."

"Nothing at all," says Sgrena.

"What you’re saying in this interview is that none of those things happened?" asks Pelley.

"Nothing. No," says Sgrena. "I'm sure."

Checkpoints are a dangerous fact of life in Iraq. U.S. soldiers have been killed by bombers at checkpoints, and innocent Iraqis have been shot while approaching them.

60 Minutes Wednesday wanted to better understand what happens in these shootings, so it turned to a Marine, former Capt. Nathaniel Fick, who has a lot of experience with checkpoints in Iraq.

"They're snap judgments [whether to fire or not]," says Fick. "You make these decisions and you hope at the end that you’ve made more right than wrong."

"Did your Marines ever kill anyone at a checkpoint that in hindsight they didn't have to kill?" asks Pelley.

"There was one case when we did kill someone at a checkpoint," says Fick. "And the hindsight question is hard. We determined that there were no bombs in the car. No weapons in the car. And the other men in the car said that they didn't know why they'd charged at us. They [the survivors] were scared and disoriented and confused. So in hindsight, was it a mistake? I think it was. Given what I knew at the time, would I make the same decision? I think I would."

Fick has written a book, "One Bullet Away: The Making of a Marine Officer," about what he learned in Iraq. The book will be published this fall. He told Pelley he learned the hard way that standard checkpoint tactics don’t work.

"The hand and arm signals are hard to see, they’re hard to interpret. The warning shots are difficult to see, almost impossible to see in daylight," says Fick. "Almost impossible to hear in a speeding car at a long distance. Usually, the last resort for us was attempting to fire into the engine block."

"Attempting?" asks Pelley.

"Almost impossible to do. A lot of that is Hollywood fantasy," says Fick. "I had a platoon that included many Marine snipers who are some of the best marksmen in the world. And they couldn't do it consistently."

Fick told 60 Minutes Wednesday that after struggling with the Pentagon’s checkpoint procedures, he improvised; he stole an Iraqi stop sign.

"And at every checkpoint we set up after that, we put the stop sign down the road near the wire, and it was hugely successful," says Fick. "[It] worked very well."

This month, after several surgeries and three weeks in the hospital, Sgrena went back to her office for the first time. The reporter who refused to cry for her captors took cover behind her husband as she walked in to meet the friends that she feared she would never see again.

The Berlusconi government has kept troops in Iraq, despite polls that show about 70 percent of Italians oppose their presence.

Throughout Sgrena’s kidnapping, Berlusconi refused to consider pulling out. But after the American shooting, the Italian government says it’s looking at a schedule for doing just that.