You’ve got to hand it to the liberals. Their response to alleged misconduct by American troops at Haditha has been remarkably calm and controlled. Take Democratic National Committee Chairman Howard Dean’s statement: “I’ve resisted pronouncing a sentence before guilt is found. I still have this old-fashioned notion that … we should do our best not to … prejudge jury trials.”

Oh, wait. Sorry. This comment was actually made in 2003, when a reporter asked then-Democratic presidential candidate Howard Dean his preferred punishment for Osama bin Laden.

Dr. Dean’s willingness to give the benefit of the doubt to bin Laden, America’s most wanted terrorist, stands in stark contrast to the way his fellow liberals discuss our Marines at Haditha.

Rep. John Murtha was quick to convict U.S. soldiers of killing “innocent civilians in cold blood,” and asked, “Who covered it up, why did they cover it up, why did they wait so long?” Liberal blogger Arianna Huffington accused U.S. troops of, “killing the wrong people all the time.”

Let’s be clear. There is still much that is unknown about what happened at Haditha. What we do know is that Haditha was a city crawling with insurgents. In a special report by Britain’s Guardian newspaper just three months before the attack, Haditha was described as an “insurgent citadel” where Islamist guerillas were “the sole authority, running the town’s security, administration and communications.”

Tellingly, DVDs of daily beheadings and torture were distributed free on the street. The children preferred them to cartoons.

We also know that on the morning of November 19, 2005, a group of U.S. Marines were passing through the town when one of their vehicles hit an improvised explosive device planted in the road by insurgents. One Marine was killed, his body cut in half.

What is unknown is what happened next. While there have been allegations that the Marines went on a rampage, killing 24 Iraqi civilians, spokesmen for the Marines involved insist they followed the rules of engagement against an enemy that intentionally uses women and children as shields. At this point no one has been charged, and the investigation is ongoing.

To anti-war defeatists, many of whom were quick to extend a presumption of innocence to the likes of Osama Bin Laden and Saddam Hussein, American soldiers are guilty until proven innocent.

It is poignantly ironic that the rights and freedoms American soldiers are so valiantly fighting to establish in Iraq are the very same rights and freedoms exploited and abused by the left to pre-judge and disparage our soldiers, undermining their morale.

In the wake of Haditha, the military has ordered that all troops in Iraq undergo new “core values” training to help them operate more ethically and humanely. But, it insults our troops to imply that they need special courses to remind them not to kill innocent civilians. American soldiers already receive the most rigorous military training in the world. Even more, while Muslim children grow up learning to “kill the infidel,” being an American means growing up understanding that “thou shalt not kill.”

It’s an inconvenient truth for the left that today’s American military is the most humane, disciplined, and well-trained fighting force in recorded history. The vast majority of our troops are models of restraint and compassion. America’s heroes are held to the highest of standards by their superior officers, by their consciences.

Sadly, the public knows few of these heroes. The Media Research Center, in a study of 1,300 reports broadcasts on network news during first nine months of 2005, found only eight stories of heroism, while there were 79 stories on mistakes and misconduct by U.S. troops.

America has always celebrated its war heroes. Names like Grant, Patton, and Sergeant York have been immortalized in our history books, as has the gallantry of American soldiers at places like Gettysburg, Normandy, and Iwo Jima, among others. The courage of these men echoes through eternity.

But do we call them heroes because they were any more merciful than our soldiers today? In 1945, American and British forces carpet bombed Dresden, decimating the city and killing as many as 100,000 German civilians in just two days, even though the German army was virtually defeated at that point.

So, did unjust acts at Dresden affect the righteousness of the larger cause for peace in World War II? To ask is to answer. Even in just wars things sometimes go terribly wrong. We call them the “greatest generation” because they recognized that failure was not an option, that evil understands only defeat.

If the accused soldiers at Haditha are found to have breached protocol and intentionally harmed the civilians they were sent to protect, they will be brought to justice. The United States will not stoop to the level of its enemy.

But the prejudice with which some on the left condemn our soldiers is shameful. Their rush to judgment scandalizes American involvement in Iraq and, more importantly, deflates the morale of our troops.

It may be weeks, perhaps months, before a verdict about Haditha will be rendered. But, until then, shouldn’t we offer our troops the presumption of innocence they deserve? Shouldn’t we, as Howard Dean might instruct, “resist pronouncing a sentence before guilt is found”?

Mr. Bauer is president of American Values and chairman of Campaign for Working Families (www.ouramericanvalues.org).