Hackworth on Abu Ghraib
In 1951 in Korea, I was told by my commanding officer to kill four POWs and refused his direct order. I well remembered the Nazi generals’ sorry rationale for their despicable conduct: “We were just following orders.” I would get booted out of the Army before I went that route.
In 1965 in Vietnam, I saw a very connected intelligence captain torturing a POW with a field-telephone wire attached to his testicles and decided my personal belief system outweighed his father’s four stars. When I told him I’d shoot him if he didn’t cease and desist, the atrocity came to a screeching halt…
“The bedrock truth about the abuses at Abu Ghraib prison is that they were so easily preventable,” adds SFTT (Soldiers for the Truth) Vice President Roger Charles, who researched this story for CBS News. “But that prevention required a recognition that the top people in the 800th were ill-prepared, incompetent and uncaring.”
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Comments
adam greenberg
May 12, 2004
12:21 am
actually let’s face it – human nature! If you were shooting at me night after night, and I had you captive – I would torture you. Revenge is one of the human race’s most basic reactions and frankly in this case justified – when the arab world apologizes for 911, then maybe I will support apologizing for abu prison
acg
Brad
May 12, 2004
1:54 pm
Your exactly right. It’s down to basic fight fire with fire in situations where the enemy would do much worse to you. The only difference between us and them is that we (United States Armed Services) have people from all sides scrutinizing our every move, and plaster those moves that don’t seem in line with a “civilized society” all over the front pages of the news paper to create ratings and drama. My motto – If your not cheating your not trying. And it’s only cheating if you get caught. Hell, the Ratical Muslims of this world are nothing but cheaters when it comes to the poker game of war. So, my advice to the hacks that post this crap is to shut up, take note, and live peacfefully in this “civilized” society that allows you to write for a paycheck at the expense of others lives. And when our military has an ace up it’s sleeve, I expect them to use it against these low lifes.
james
May 12, 2004
7:39 pm
One of the justifications for this war is to bring democracy and freedom to Iraq. so therefore if it is not acceptable at our prisons in the states, then it should not be acceptable at Abu Graihb. Also there were never any good links to 9/11 and Iraq. I believe that most if not all those involved in the attack carried Saudi Passports.
Jason Lefkowitz
May 12, 2004
11:11 pm
“It’s down to basic fight fire with fire in situations where the enemy would do much worse to you.”
As I noted in another thread, the Taguba Report found that 60% or more of the detainees in Abu Ghraib were Iraqis who had been mistakenly picked up. The prison bureaucracy wasn’t letting these people out, even after they were identified as not being a threat to US troops.
We as Westerners fall into al Qaeda’s trap when we lump all Iraqis, or all Arabs, together as “the Enemy”. If we lock up and humiliate hundreds of innocent Iraqis — the Iraqis we were told we came to liberate! — are we not just priming them for the terrorists’ recruiting message that America hates them just for being Muslim? Wouldn’t you be open to such a message if you, an innocent citizen, were grabbed from your everyday life by foreign soldiers and thrown into a jail where no laws applied, and from which there was no way out?
“[W]hen our military has an ace up it’s sleeve, I expect them to use it against these low lifes.”
These “low lifes” being the people of Iraq. Right? Because they weren’t making distinctions at Abu Ghraib.
jlyzaka
December 2, 2008
8:51 pm
Henry wouldspeak hot little girl this story, then swims away. Vanessa pinching her, then would.
jlyzaka
December 2, 2008
8:52 pm
Henry wouldspeak hot little girl this story, then swims away. Vanessa pinching her, then would.