US military Blames Blackwater for Iraq Shooting: Report
"It was obviously excessive, it was obviously wrong," the official told the newspaper.
"The civilians that were fired upon, they didn't have any weapons to fire back at them. And none of the IP (Iraqi police) or any of the local security forces fired back at them," he said.
In reports after the incident, Blackwater executives insisted their teams had come under fire in Baghdad's Nisour Square.
But according to US military officials cited in the Congress report, Blackwater's teams, contracted to protect US State Department diplomats and other officials in Iraq, behaved like impervious "cowboys" in Iraq.
"They tend to overreact to a lot of things," the US military official told the Washington Post. "When it comes to shooting and firing, they tend to shoot quicker than others," he said.
The official added that Blackwater has resisted sharing information with the US military on the incident, and prevented military officials from contacting company managers in Baghdad.
On Thursday the US Federal Bureau of Investigation took over the State Department's investigation into Blackwater, as US lawmakers voted to make private security firms in Iraq subject to action in US courts.
Up until now the legal status of the contractors, of which Blackwater is the largest, has been unclear and untested