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 Greetings! You are reading an article from The Mudville Gazette. To reach the front page, with all the latest news and views, click the logo above or "main" below. Thanks for stopping by! May 1, 2004 Rooney's Heroes ReduxBy GreyhawkDo you think Andy Rooney already had copies of the photos when he did his bit a couple weeks back? From 60 Minutes II: Frederick told us he will plead not guilty, claiming the way the Army was running the prison led to the abuse of prisoners. The Army, of course, can't comment. This is a benefit the accused have in such matters. But I'll note this: The Army is not in the business of training people to be human. Generally they should have acquired that skill prior to basic training. As did the real hero in this story, the Soldier that did the right thing and turned his fellow Soldiers in. Like the other real heroes in this story, the Army legal folks who are busy investigating and preparing to prosecute this issue. Does anyone out there think 60 Minutes exposed this story? They didn't. (but they want you to think they did.) This was a case of a courageous individual stepping forward and enabling the Army to police itself. But here's a quote from the 60 Minutes II site, accompanying the now infamous photo of the Iraqi prisoner with wires attached: It was this picture, and dozens of others, that prompted an investigation by the U.S. Army. On Tuesday, 60 Minutes II asked Brig. Gen. Mark Kimmitt, deputy director of coalition operations in Iraq, what went wrong. Leaving out an inconvenient fact - that investigation was conducted before 60 minutes ever saw that photo. CBS's could easily have focused the tale on the brave troop who actually broke the story and the earnest Army legal team that pursued it, but they glossed over that, and instead are implying it was their efforts that broke the story. And that leads to coverage like this. At the same time, the fact that US soldiers are employing methods similar to those used by the Nazis in World War II is indicative of a deep-seated state of demoralization and degradation that the occupation has bred within the US military. Finding themselves in a hostile environment with the vast majority of Iraqis opposing the occupation, many American soldiers have come to see the country’s entire population as the enemy. Fed lies about the colonial intervention in Iraq being part of a global “war on terrorism,” some have also assumed a license to torture and humiliate their helpless captives. - From the Teheran Times. Make no mistake - the torturers are responsible for their actions and the consequences of those actions such as the story above. Those in their chain of command with knowledge of the events are equally culpable. And 60 minutes is doing nothing but gleefully fanning flames. What none of them seem to recognize is that doing the right thing is rarely the same as doing the easy thing - or the profitable thing. Kudos to those in the Army who've acted quickly and decisively (thus far) for justice in the matter. But above all, kudos to that GI who had the courage to put a stop to this practice. That, good readers, is a typical American Soldier's behavior. (Note that comments on this and all posts are open and unmoderated, although obscene remarks will be deleted when discovered. No claim is made regarding truth or accuracy of comments, to include identity of the commenter. In all matters the reader is advised to draw his or her own conclusions.) Posted by Greyhawk / May 1, 2004 2:04 AM | Permalink 2 TrackBacksJonah Goldberg touches on something that's bothered me about the release of the photos of our soldiers abusing Iraqi prisoners: It was completely unnecessary. First, the military had already investigated the abuse and brought charges against those invo... Read More There is a conversation going on over at Lt. Smash's place over what to do with the soulless degenerates who abused the Iraqi prisoners in the Abu Ghraib prison in Bhagdad. I cannot fathom what kind of wretched character begets Read More 23 Comments |
November 26, 2010America@war [Greyhawk]
I think anyone who's ever pondered the "comment" option - once only available on blogs and bulletin boards, now ubiquitous on almost any web site - will appreciate this:
The so-called faculty of writing is not so much a faculty of writing as it is a faculty of thinking. When a man says, "I have an idea but I can't express it"; that man hasn't an idea but merely a vague feeling. If a man has a feeling of that kind, and will sit down for a half an hour and persistently try to put into writing what he feels, the probabilities are at least 90 percent that he will either be able to record it, or else realize that he has no idea at all. In either case, he will do himself a benefit. That's wisdom from the past, captured for posterity at the US Naval Institute, shared via the web on the institute's 137th anniversary. From their about page:
"The Naval Institute has three core activities," among them, History and Preservation: The Naval Institute also has recently introduced Americans at War, a living history of Americans at war in their own words and from their own experiences. These 90-second vignettes convey powerful stories of inspiration, pride, and patriotism. Take a look at the collection, and you'll see it's not limited to accounts from those who served on ships at sea, members of the other branches are well-represented. I'm fortunate to have met USNI's Mary Ripley, she's responsible for the institute's oral history program (and she's the daughter of the late John Ripley, whose story is told here). She also deserves much credit for their blog. ("We're not the Navy nor any government agency. Blog and comment freely.") We met at a milblog conference - Mary knew (and I would come to realize) that milbloggers are the 21st-century version of exactly what the US Naval Institute is all about. Once that light bulb came on in my head, I mentioned a vague idea for a project to her - milblogs as the 21st century oral history that they are. "Put that in writing," she said (of course - see first paragraph above!) - and here's part of the result. Shortly after the first tent was pitched by the American military in Iraq a wire was connected to a computer therein, and the internet was available to a generation of Americans at war - many of whom had grown up online. From that point on, at any given moment, somewhere in Iraq a Soldier, Sailor, Airman or Marine was at a keyboard sharing the events of his or her day with the folks back home. While most would simply fire off an email, others took advantage of the (then) relatively new online blogging platforms to post their thoughts and experiences for the entire world to see. The milblog was born - and from that moment to this stories detailing everything from the most mundane aspects of camp life to intense combat action (often described within hours of the event) have been available on the web... And et cetera - but since you're reading this on a milblog, you probably knew that. And you know that milblogs aren't just blogs written by troops at war, that many friends, family members, and supporters likewise documented their story of America at war online in near-real time, as those stories developed. The diversity in membership of that group is broad, the one thing we all have in common is the impulse to make sense of the seemingly senseless, and communicate the tale - for each of us that impulse was strong enough to overcome whatever barriers prevent the vast majority of people from doing the same. Everyone at some point has some vague idea they believe should be shared - we were the people who, from some combination of internal and external urging, found and spent those many half hours persistently trying to write it down. But where will all that be in another 137 years? Or five or ten, for that matter. That's something I've asked myself since at least 2004 - when I wrote this:
Membership in the ghost battalion has grown in the years since, and an ever growing majority of those abandoned-but-still-standing sites are vanishing. Have you checked out Lt Smash's site lately? How about Sgt Hook's? If you're a long-time milblog reader you know the first widely-read milblog from Operation Iraq Freedom and the first widely-read milblog from Afghanistan are both gone from the web. If you're a relative newcomer to this world you may never even have heard of them - or the dozens upon dozens of others who carried forth the standard they set down. If you have a vague notion that something should be done about that, (a notion I've heard expressed more than once...) then you and I and the good folks at the US Naval Institute are in agreement. Preserving the history documented by the milbloggers is just one of the goals of the milblog project, the once-vague idea that we're now making real. And it's a big idea, if I say so myself - too big to explain in one simple blog post, so stand by for more. Likewise, it's too big a task to be accomplished by just one person. So if you're a milblogger (and exactly what is a milblogger? is a topic for much further discussion on its own) I'm asking for your help. All I'll really need is just a little bit (maybe just one or two of those half hours...) of your time, and your willingness to tell the tale. We've already made history, it's time to save it. (More to follow...) Posted 4:02 PM | Permalink |
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The Mudville Gazette is the on-line voice of an American warrior and his wife who stands by him. They prefer to see peaceful change render force of arms unnecessary. Until that day they stand fast with those who struggle for freedom, strike for reason, and pray for a better tomorrow.
 
 
 Furthermore, I will occasionally use satire or parody herein. The bottom line: it's my house. I like having visitors to my house. I hope you are entertained. I fight for your right to free speech, and am thrilled when you exercise said rights here. Comments and e-mails are welcome, but all such communication is to be assumed to be 1)the original work of any who initiate said communication and 2)the property of the Mudville Gazette, with free use granted thereto for publication in electronic or written form. If you do NOT wish to have your message posted, write "CONFIDENTIAL" in the subject line of your email. Original content copyright © 2003 - 2011 by Greyhawk. Fair, not-for-profit use of said material by others is encouraged, as long as acknowledgement and credit is given, to include the url of the original source post. Other arrangements can be made as needed. Contact: greyhawk at mudvillegazette dot com  Tending Distant Far from hearth and home, watching What tales we'll tell When things grim Some distant sunset, vision fading Saluting fallen friends whose names - Greyhawk, Baghdad, December 2004 |
Were not these reservists prison guards in real life back in the states? How much training would the Army have thought they needed?
Oh let's all cry for the poor, mistreated terrorists!
Fuck that. I wish I could have helped. What happened to this scum is far better than what they deserved.
Tim,
You are a moron. What those guards did diminishes the death of every soldier who died in Iraq. They have single handedly done more damage than Al Jazeera and all the anti-war forces across the world could ever accomplish. I would love to see all guards who participated directly in this atrocity shot in public; and every soldier in the chain of command that knew about it and did nothing to stop it court marshaled, put in jail and given a dishonorable discharge. A truly disgusting episode.
ROA
OOPS! That should have been Tom, not Tim.
ROA
Steve,
You are correct at least about some of them.
Who wants to lift the rock the rest of the way and look into tthe American prison system?
We have about 1% of our population in prison. About 5X what the usual first world country has. It is a disgrace. It is the end result of trying to solve our drug problem with jails.
No one wishes to look at the wreckage (guards and inmates) our prisons produce. Which is why prisons ought to be the last resort not the first.
Read here about what some judges have to say:
http://www.judgesagainstthedrugwar.org/results.cfm
an excerpt:
"I concur but write separately to once again express my view that the sentences imposed by the Sentencing Guidelines are often a waste of time and money. The sheer irrationality of the Sentencing Guidelines is graphically demonstrated by this case.
RDA,
Interesting that you object to the degradation of prisoners (rightly so) but make no mention of the fact that this sort of behavior is either tolerated or covered up in nearly every state of the union.
You can start with California.
The rot begins here at home.
It has been going on a very long time. And like the camps in Nazi Germany it has become part of the landscape. Americans are not some kind of supermen. We can succumb to our baser desires and wilful ignorances as much as any other people.
There is one thing lacking that if we can regain it that may yet save us:
Vigilance.
Because eternal vigilance is the price of liberty.
Come on Greyhawk! Your quote about the photos from the 60 Minutes Web page by no means claims 60 Minutes discovered the those soldiers' abominable actions of abuse and more. Only if you are looking for some implication from a bias point of view can you read an implication as you suggest. I think you need a break from these Net wars. Maybe it is getting to you. Defending the military as you do is admirable, but getting caught up in the political wars so as to become unbalanced in your views is a shame.
>>The rot begins here at home.
Too true. More men are raped yearly than women, thanks to our criminal justtice system.
Hey, no big deal, right? They're prisoners, after all.
Pfui,
M. Simon,
Actually, I agree with you that conditions in our prisons are disgusting. The reason I said nothing about that in my response to Tom was that he was referring solely to the mistreatment of Iraqis, which I thought was the subject being discussed.
ROA
Hi.
Yes, we are discussing the mistreatment of Iraqis now.
Let's see how much damage these idiots did.
* What they did was bad in itself.
* It is illegal.
* It undermines the correct stance of the Americans that their soldiers ought not to be tried in politicized international pseudo-courts.
* It is very damaging to the honor of American armed forces and the Coalition in general. (I don't have an attitude that we are at one with the Americans when things go right but not when they go wrong. This is our collective effort, so shaming it shames us all.)
* It paints a big target on the backsides of our women and men at war, if they become prisoners. Remember that Private Lynch got rescued because an Iraqi saw what was being done to her, and decided it was morally wrong and he was going to do something about it. Will the next Private Lynch be rescued? It depends on a perception of morality. Now see those photos again as though it was your own sister subjected to that - because that, and worse, is exactly what those bastards have invited upon our people.
* It gravely harms the wise American policy to encourage the enemy to surrender, by offering good treatment. You have to stick to a policy like that with as few exceptions as possible to get full benefit from it. Making surrenders harder to obtain costs friendly lives.
* It gravely harms the war effort, which hundreds of Americans and others have died for, and which many more have been wounded for, and which is contested right now, precisely over the issue of moral authority.
* It harms the global war on terror, which we must win for our survival as a civilization, and for our nations' sakes.
And all this for essentially no reason. It's not like the Colonel West case, where an officer resorted to the wrong behavior because he was under genuine, intense pressure to protect his men. I can't agree with that, but I can certainly forgive it. An officer morally should be passionate to protect his men. This is nothing like that.
Just incidently, the guards and their general were democrats.
The investigation began in mid-January; those involved were suspended in late February. CBS published the photos in late April, months after the military had handled the issue.
Also note the tone of CBS' coverage: "The Army's to blame!" Never mind that they're punishing those involved, they're to blame.
CBS should be ashamed of themselves for acting as defense attorneys for these creeps, and for handing our enemies a propaganda victory.
Seymour Hersh discusses the investigation, around a report by a General Taguba, here:
http://www.newyorker.com/printable/?fact/040510fa_fact
"...Taguba found that between October and December of 2003 there were numerous instances of “sadistic, blatant, and wanton criminal abuses” at Abu Ghraib. This systematic and illegal abuse of detainees, Taguba reported, was perpetrated by soldiers of the 372nd Military Police Company, and also by members of the American intelligence community..."
As for CBS, I thought they specifically held off at the request of the Pentagon? To me the CBS story was the pictures, not what happened. If there were no pictures the report would have drifted away to nothing, just my opinion of course.
And it is sad to see the Teheran Times be more on the ball that any US media.
2 things. The guards and general were democrats? Pretty stupid walter.
If the 60 Minute story should have concentrated on the brave soldier(s) who revealed the atrocities, what are their names?
Those responsible should be shot. Now how is this going to affect the US soldier held prisoner?
Perhaps we could swap the soldiers being held by the opposition for the guards, with the agreement that they could do whatever they wanted to do with them and we would not complain.
I cannot believe it, the usual American "we are so
evil, of course, our troops would be brutal and
evil" talk. Blame it on the justice system at
home, and the fact you have jails that are not
happy places.
It is so typical, the men responsible for the
treatment of the Iraqi prisoners blame everyone
or anything they can get away with.
I am someone who does not know the rules of the
Geneva convention, but I do know how to figure
out just what would be one of the rules. It does
not take a lot of intelligence to know what they
were doing was against the law, any decent law.
They didn't know the rules, can you believe this?
Well, I think I will run over and torment my
neighbor since I can say, "duh, I didn't know
there was a law that forbids me from smashing
my neighbor"
There are over one hundred thousand troops in
Iraq, these people knew better, behaved like
savages, and they all get stained by the behavior
of so few.
Yup, the evil imperialist America can't seem to
find any decent servicemen/women. Just like in
the Vietnam war. Well, Americans believed Kerry
and Jane then and the Vietnam troops were treated
like they had all committed the crimes Kerry and
jane accused them of, are you going to let this
happen again? Well, America, are you going to
let the liberal party talk you into despising
your forces again? Are you going to be seen by The people of the world who saw this
happen once before and if you think they thought
well of America, think again. Are you going to
blame America for the terrorists attacks? Are
you going to "talk or pay" them into being nice
guys? Is the U.N. going to do any good for the
problem of terrorists? Their corruption is out there in the news, do you not read about their
oil-for-money scheme?
Grow up, the men who did this are at fault, America does not teach this treatment of prisoners
and it is not because America is hated because it
is so evil (Americans are not evil, they are the
people who are trying to rid the world of people
who behave as these ones did)
These men cannot blame anyone but themselves,
they did it, they must pay the price, that is
called justice.
This is a sign that the Iraqis have not done a good job of winning our hearts and minds. They should ask themselves what they did to make us hate them so much that we would do something like this to them. Maybe they should reconsider their policy regarding infidels. This is all their fault for alienating us the way they have been doing for decades now. This is a war against Christians. It is time for the Iraqis to stop occupying our troops lives. No one likes to have their troops occupied and this will only generate hatred and violence toward Muslims everywhere. This incident only proves that the Iraqis have lied to us and do not have good intentions.
Now imagine hearing the above while watching video of Americans burning Arab/Muslim nation flags and yelling "Death to all Muslims!" and then setting fire to pictures of Iraqi tribal leaders while grinning and dancing and celebrating the torture of the "enemy" as though we had just won the lottery.
That is what we hear and see whenever they murder, burn, torture and/or mutilate our troops AND innocent civilians. It is always our fault they did these things to us or to each other. My statement above is no different from what they say and write about us every single day in the Arab/Muslim societies and the media. If you are Arab or Muslim you should know that how you felt reading the statement above is how we feel when Arabs/Muslims make the same absurd statements about us every single day. They say it when they attack us and they say it when they attack each other and all while accepting billions of dollars in financial aid. And we have been seeing this for YEARS now, so don't bother with the occupation excuse. This was going on LONG before we went into to Iraq and is actually a part of the reason we are in Iraq right now.
Much will be made of this all across the globe, so I want point out that this type of thing and much, much worse occurs on a daily basis in other parts of the world and no one is shocked or outraged by it. This is because America, and to a lesser extent the West in general, is always held to a much higher standard than anyone else. These facts, and the fact that it was an American soldier that reported these crimes, is a testament to the high values and ideals that America stands for. This is a very rare thing for the U.S.A. or it would not be the huge and shocking story it is today.
The American people are ashamed of these criminals and what they have done. There is NO excuse for this kind of thing and I will not attempt to make any. Those soldiers are a disgusting and shameful disgrace and they should be prosecuted to the full extent of the law and they will be. We blame ourselves for this and will work to make sure it does not happen again. We will not be blaming anyone else for what our own people have done. We accept responsibility for this. You will not see us naming refugee camps or streets after them in appreciation of the horrendous crimes they have committed. We have too much honor and integrity for that.
*** Please imagine for a moment how differently things could have gone in Falluja if Iraqis had reacted as described in the above paragraph. Think of how many lives, on both sides, could have been saved.***
Too bad the same cannot be said of those that today take such satisfaction and pleasure in expressing anger and outrage over this crime that occurs in other countries on a daily basis without causing even the raising of an eyebrow because no one can reasonably expect them to rise to the high standards of the American people and our men and women in uniform.
I pray that one day the Middle East will progress enough that when a crime of this nature is committed by their people the world will be as shocked and outraged as they are today to hear Americans have committed these horrible crimes. But as it is today, these things and much, much worse, are such a common occurrence in the Middle East that they rarely rate even a mention on the nightly news.
Dude, 60 minutes did break the story! Everything they reported was correct. What do you think journalists mean by breaking the story? It doesn't mean the army knows about it. It means making the public aware of it!This just what the phrase means.
Yes, the abuse and the photos investigated by the army internally before they became public. 60 Minutes never tried to suggest otherwise. But what 60 Minutes 2 did was make the photos public. That's what good journalists do. Make things public knowledge. Things that are compelling and in the public interest. Without their work, the story might never have broken. Get it?
How asinine are the warbloggers today!
How close are the abuse incidents alleged in Iraq to those which Kerry has admitted to committing in Viet Nam? I can't remember the specifics of Kerry's atrocities. Is there a statute of limitations on those crimes? Was there an investigation?
"Just incidently, the guards and their general were democrats."
What is someone PAYING you to post this on every blog you can find? You have 0 evidence of this, as you've admitted to over and over. And yet you state it like it was a plain fact.
For those of you who read milblogs to see what's being said even though you might disagree, I think it is wise to ask is the milblog a set up by the Republicans to diss Kerry or not. This blog has a never ending line of remarks against Kerry, such as made against a normal citizen would probably be actionable defamation. So I tend to think this site is primarily a political tool supporting a proven and on going failure, Bush, for President and doing its best to malign Kerry, a proven war hero.
It is telling that some american service people are criminals, sadists and a discredit to the American military, just what Kerry was trying to warn Congress and the American public about in 1971. Now the soldier(s) who made known the Iraq atrocities are seen and declared heros. Isn't Kerry a hero for standing up for human decency and America's ideals in trying to put a stop to the Vietnam atrocities? I think so, especially since so many of Vietnam era military were and are so strongly against what he did. The truth hurts. You are mad about it. Get over it. If you do you might well see Kerry did the honorable thing and it's dishonorable to ignore American committed atrocities, even criminal and more so to try to hide them.
This O"Neill guy now enlisted to smear Kerry, is nothing but a hired gun. He will twist and wring every fact for its negative impact against Kerry. A man who does not deserve the time of day.
Did Kerry serve in Vietnam? Huh, I didn't know that. Maybe I'll vote for him after all. In fact, Kerry should mention in every campaign speech that he served in a war. He'd probably get more votes if he did.
And thanks Plunge for setting the record straight. I'm so glad to know that the guards and their general weren't actually Democrats. Whew. Elections could've been lost over that one.