Committing Crimes for and in Iraq
Way back in the beginning, the American public was comfortable with the concept that in overturning the regime of Saddam Hussein, at least we had ended the barbarism and corruption that the people of Iraq had suffered under.
The corruption that has been exhibited in the scandal of contracting out work in Iraq is pretty well documented. Corruption in gaining access to Iraq's treasures is coming out as well.
Knowing that straight-up official intelligence wouldn't support making war on the country of Iraq, this White House bunch set up its own counter-intelligence operation in the Pentagon.
A Senior Pentagon policy maker created an unofficial "Iraqi intelligence cell" in the summer of 2002 to circumvent the CIA and secretly brief the White House on links between Saddam Hussein and al-Qa'eda, according to the Senate intelligence committee.
The allegations about Douglas Feith, the number three at the Department of Defence, are made in a supplementary annexe of the committee's review of the intelligence leading to war in Iraq, released on Friday.
According to dramatic testimony contained in the annexe, Mr Feith's cell undermined the credibility of CIA judgments on Iraq's alleged al-Qa'eda links within the highest levels of the Bush administration.
By now you're probably cringing with the realization that with these lies, barbarism and corruption are what we've put in place in Iraq, now dominated by rampant violence.
The standards of behavior we thought America practiced were always a source of pride. We believed in giving a good example to the world. We believed in the humane treatment even of prisoners. That was back before Iraq. That was before this cretin in our presidency took away the sources of pride we had always believed in and assumed were practiced in our name.
It gets worse.
Unfortunately, under the guise of extracting important intelligence, our American standards of decency were destroyed by the present administration. From a member of the staff a detention facility in Fallujah, who admits he was directed to torture prisoners, and did, we have another story about the abuses this executive branch is instituting.
Some may suggest there is no reason to revive the story of abuse in Iraq. Rehashing such mistakes will only harm our country, they will say. But history suggests we should examine such missteps carefully. Oppressive prison environments have created some of the most determined opponents. The British learned that lesson from Napoleon, the French from Ho Chi Minh, Europe from Hitler. The world is learning that lesson again from Ayman al-Zawahiri. What will be the legacy of abusive prisons in Iraq?
We have failed to properly address the abuse of Iraqi detainees. Men like me have refused to tell our stories, and our leaders have refused to own up to the myriad mistakes that have been made. But if we fail to address this problem, there can be no hope of success in Iraq. Regardless of how many young Americans we send to war, or how many militia members we kill, or how many Iraqis we train, or how much money we spend on reconstruction, we will not escape the damage we have done to the people of Iraq in our prisons.
It's not bad enough that what we have practiced in Iraq is disgraceful. It's also counterproductive, which has long been known by the intelligence community.
We go from horror story to horror story under this administration. At the very least, it should forever restrain our American public from ever again voting in a group of criminals. It is past time to end their reign of depredations and their violations of basic decency.
The corruption that has been exhibited in the scandal of contracting out work in Iraq is pretty well documented. Corruption in gaining access to Iraq's treasures is coming out as well.
Knowing that straight-up official intelligence wouldn't support making war on the country of Iraq, this White House bunch set up its own counter-intelligence operation in the Pentagon.
A Senior Pentagon policy maker created an unofficial "Iraqi intelligence cell" in the summer of 2002 to circumvent the CIA and secretly brief the White House on links between Saddam Hussein and al-Qa'eda, according to the Senate intelligence committee.
The allegations about Douglas Feith, the number three at the Department of Defence, are made in a supplementary annexe of the committee's review of the intelligence leading to war in Iraq, released on Friday.
According to dramatic testimony contained in the annexe, Mr Feith's cell undermined the credibility of CIA judgments on Iraq's alleged al-Qa'eda links within the highest levels of the Bush administration.
By now you're probably cringing with the realization that with these lies, barbarism and corruption are what we've put in place in Iraq, now dominated by rampant violence.
The standards of behavior we thought America practiced were always a source of pride. We believed in giving a good example to the world. We believed in the humane treatment even of prisoners. That was back before Iraq. That was before this cretin in our presidency took away the sources of pride we had always believed in and assumed were practiced in our name.
It gets worse.
Unfortunately, under the guise of extracting important intelligence, our American standards of decency were destroyed by the present administration. From a member of the staff a detention facility in Fallujah, who admits he was directed to torture prisoners, and did, we have another story about the abuses this executive branch is instituting.
Some may suggest there is no reason to revive the story of abuse in Iraq. Rehashing such mistakes will only harm our country, they will say. But history suggests we should examine such missteps carefully. Oppressive prison environments have created some of the most determined opponents. The British learned that lesson from Napoleon, the French from Ho Chi Minh, Europe from Hitler. The world is learning that lesson again from Ayman al-Zawahiri. What will be the legacy of abusive prisons in Iraq?
We have failed to properly address the abuse of Iraqi detainees. Men like me have refused to tell our stories, and our leaders have refused to own up to the myriad mistakes that have been made. But if we fail to address this problem, there can be no hope of success in Iraq. Regardless of how many young Americans we send to war, or how many militia members we kill, or how many Iraqis we train, or how much money we spend on reconstruction, we will not escape the damage we have done to the people of Iraq in our prisons.
It's not bad enough that what we have practiced in Iraq is disgraceful. It's also counterproductive, which has long been known by the intelligence community.
We go from horror story to horror story under this administration. At the very least, it should forever restrain our American public from ever again voting in a group of criminals. It is past time to end their reign of depredations and their violations of basic decency.
Labels: Dirty Tricks, Iraq War, Pentagon, Torture
posted by Ruth at 1:35 AM
1 Comments:
The only thing the Bush administration did was to shamelessly parade our ongoing crimes to the world.
Our government's complicity in torture and terror is old news to most of the planet. However, a distinction, I think, was usually drawn between the government of the United States and its well-meaning, yet misinformed people.
That distinction does not hold so well now, for it is seen that We the People, even after having the abuse made plain, ratified the horror in 2004.
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