Sometimes it takes a small, personal atrocity to galvanize fence-sitters and other indecisive types to oppose a war like the one in Iraq. Initial reports about a possible U.S. atrocity in Iraq might do the trick. Here it is, from today's New York Times:

American military officials announced Tuesday that they were looking into an allegation that American soldiers intentionally killed 11 Iraqi civilians last week.

The inquiry, the second announced in a week, stems from an episode on Wednesday in Ishaqi, a Sunni Arab town north of Baghdad.

American officials initially said that American troops had been fired on from a farmhouse during a raid to capture an insurgent, and that they had returned fire, from the ground and the air, killing four people.

Iraqi police officials immediately rejected that account, saying 11 people had been killed after American soldiers lined up an entire family — from a 75-year-old grandmother to a 6-month-old baby — and shot them.

local police official, Farouq Hussein, told Reuters that all the victims had been shot in the head.

"It's a clear and perfect crime without any doubt," he said.

Lt. Col. Barry Johnson, an American military spokesman, said the military was investigating the episode. "This is not the way we operate," he said. "We take the allegation seriously, and we're working with the Iraqis to determine the facts."