There's two sides to the story'

Sojourner · Post by **Sojourner** » Tue May 04, 2004 11:38 pm

Originally posted by RandomThug
I guess my perception of the pictures really doesnt matter heh... I guess your right. Honor would be something that I would cling to and something like that would bug me... I guess its just hard for me to sometimes gather how they would react, me being such a non traveled person. I didn't even consider the clothes thing... well if it really is that big of a thing to them well that would definitly piss them off.

Oh, you have no idea! Let's put it this way, Iraqis have been quoted in the media as saying they preferred Saddam's beatings!

Originally posted by Chanak
Everyone involved in the abuse of prisoners should face courts martial. For those involved "outside" of the UCMJ (i.e. civilians), they should be tried as war criminals. I don't doubt one moment that the enlisted soldiers involved in this received orders to treat the prisoners the way that they did. However, we shall see that the enlisted soldiers will take the fall for these crimes, and the ones responsible higher up of course will never face the music.

You got that straight! Unfortunately, the most that'll ever happen to the contractors involved is that they'll be fired and maybe even black-listed.

Weasel · Post by **Weasel** » Tue May 04, 2004 11:52 pm

Since my temper has calmed somewhat..

To go into a country where the whole population has been for 10 or more years told the US is the reason your children are dying, not my big palaces, ...and then commit crimes like this!

Wiping these fools out of the gene pool would IMHO be the best thing for the whole world. They are a danger to the US and should be eliminated...not putting on uniforms and "protecting" us in the US. Where as I believe in the death penalty for the dangerous in the civilian population, joining the armed services should not give this animals more rights.

Now to this junk..

"Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld said he will take "all measures necessary" to ensure that abuse of detainees such as what a Pentagon report says took place at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq "does not happen again." Rumsfeld said six separate investigations and assessments of the situation have been launched since January ."

Waste a couple of minutes...

SINCE JANUARY!!!

Did the republican party lose it **** mind! Did they think this junk wouldn't come back to haunt them??

fable · Post by **fable** » Wed May 05, 2004 6:39 am

Re: Since my temper has calmed somewhat..

Originally posted by Weasel
SINCE JANUARY!!! Did the republican party lose it **** mind! Did they think this junk wouldn't come back to haunt them??

They are cynical enough (and perhaps, rightly so) to believe in the Bread & Circus Theory of Ancient Rome: give your people enough money for necessities and entertainment (luxuries), and they'll ignore any major problems which don't affect them directly. I'm afraid politicians in general tend to be very jaundiced about the value of human life, but this administration's single-minded drive for oil reserves strikes me as morally appalling and extremely short-sighted.

And now, they seem to think that Bush can address the MidEastern public via TV, and convince them that the US is "good" and "honorable," after seeing all those images (taken, btw, at a prison which was notorious for torture during Sadam's regime). As one Saudi Arabian newspaper editor put it today, "It'll go down like water on a desert. Ten minutes of a speech isn't going to make the slightest dent in Arab public opinion after everything else."

EDIT: I have to say, sending the former commander of the Guantanamo Bay facility (where prisoners are regularly shackled, hooded, and denied their basic rights) to take over this Iraqi prison's administration is another extraordinary example of Dubya's insensitivity. If that doesn't fuel hatred, what will?

RandomThug · Post by **RandomThug** » Wed May 05, 2004 8:43 am

@Fable, give them all herpes.

I have to try to laugh cause well yeah.

Sojourner · Post by **Sojourner** » Wed May 05, 2004 11:39 am

Re: Re: Since my temper has calmed somewhat..

Originally posted by fable
EDIT: I have to say, sending the former commander of the Guantanamo Bay facility (where prisoners are regularly shackled, hooded, and denied their basic rights) to take over this Iraqi prison's administration is another extraordinary example of Dubya's insensitivity. If that doesn't fuel hatred, what will?

Obviously, the Shrub failed Diplomacy 101.

fable · Post by **fable** » Wed May 05, 2004 1:10 pm

Re: Re: Re: Since my temper has calmed somewhat..

Originally posted by Sojourner
Obviously, the Shrub failed Diplomacy 101.

I didn't think things could get worse, but Bush never even bothered to apologize during his 10-minute interview/speech on the two Arab networks. He merely stated 1) Americans find this kind of behavior abhorrent, and 2) in a democracy, things like this can happen.

It was an amazingly bad performance.

Weasel · Post by **Weasel** » Wed May 05, 2004 1:26 pm

Re: Re: Since my temper has calmed somewhat..

Originally posted by fable
Ten minutes of a speech isn't going to make the slightest dent in Arab public opinion after everything else."

Ten minutes versus ten years....what a bunch of fools in Washington. Powell better jump ship or my opinion of him is gone as well. (Please stay on board Ashcroft, dance with Rice..go down with the boat!)

Dottie · Post by **Dottie** » Wed May 05, 2004 7:39 pm

Here is a slideshow about the Stanford prison experiment. If you dont already know what it is you should take a look.

http://www.prisonexp.org/slide-2.htm

Now, the persons recruited to be guards in this study was taken directly from their safe and comfortable homes, they were not a part of an invading force wich have already suffered casualties as well as being subject to a large amount of war propaganda.

The behaviour of the guards at Abu Ghraib is not suprising at all. It will develop naturally in such enviroments. Obviously the guilty guards should be punished, but of more importance is the fact that the major fault is that Bush & Co dont seem to realize this was a predictable effect of occupying iraq.

Labeling the perpetrators evil isnt enough, there should always be proactive meassures in similar situations and not to realize this is a safe sign you should stay out of politics and warmongering.

Sojourner · Post by **Sojourner** » Wed May 05, 2004 10:25 pm

That may be part of it, Dottie, but as pointed out in MG Taguba's report,

The report continued, “Contrary to the findings of MG Ryder’s report, I find that personnel assigned to the 372nd MP Company, 800th MP Brigade were directed to change facility procedures to ‘set the conditions’ for MI interrogations.” Army intelligence officers, C.I.A. agents, and private contractors “actively requested that MP guards set physical and mental conditions for favorable interrogation of witnesses.”

Weasel · Post by **Weasel** » Wed May 05, 2004 11:46 pm

Thanks for that link Sojourner.

As I sit here and think (something Weasel can and does do

) I wonder...

"I questioned some of the things that I saw . . ."

And decided to take some great pictures to show the folks back home the ‘Great job’ we're doing.

"“I’m going to drag every involved intelligence officer and civilian contractor I can find into court,” he said. “Do you really believe the Army relieved a general officer because of six soldiers? Not a chance.”"

I can only hope Gary Myers does.

fable · Post by **fable** » Thu May 06, 2004 6:57 am

Harrowing stuff. I wonder how much of that New Yorker piece will actually be placed before the public, which in general can't deal with any information that isn't accompanied by captioned cartoons and three acts of entertainment?

-I just noticed that the extremely conservative Washington Post (not that any newspaper left in the US is anything to the left of moderate, thanks to all of 'em being bought out under relaxed media monopoly laws) has put up new photos of torture. It appears that these were circulating on CDs among troops returning home who had served at the prison--along with camel rides, bazaar shots, minarets, etc. I think the most chilling thing to me isn't the content of the images themselves, as the sheer *ordinariness* implied by the troops distributing pictures of the torture they inflicted alongside standard tourist stuff.

The only good thing to come out of this is that Rumsfeld's been hoisted publically by his own petard. Thanks to a leaked, detailed report, it's clear now Rumsfeld knew about the torture sessions and photos two months ago. He did nothing, and informed nobody--not even Bush.

Bush doesn't believe that anybody needs to know save himself, so Rumsfeld has broken one of Dubya's cardinal rules: don't embarass the chief. In a way, though, this is as disgusting as the rest of the whole affair, since Bush was nowhere near this level of anger about the torture, itself. His own personal attachment to the White House has finally stirred his emotions.

Tom2 · Post by **Tom2** » Thu May 06, 2004 11:33 am

Hi dottie

Good to see you back. Are you going to hang around?

By the way I agree. Put people in that kind of circumstance and often you will get abuse. That is why strict rules are necessary to enforce decent treatment. With the benefit of 20/20 hindsight it seems that declaring that the Geneva convention doesn't apply might have been, on further reflection, a hasty move.

As for winning the hearts and minds of the Iraqi people ehm...

"A lack of proper screening also meant that many innocent Iraqis were wrongly being detained indefinitely, it seemed, in some cases. The Taguba study noted that more than sixty per cent of the civilian inmates at Abu Ghraib were deemed not to be a threat to society, which should have enabled them to be released."

Well this won't help either.

But all that said. If the US courts can take action and a thorough investigation lifting the lid on MI takes place - the US will to my mind be on its way to redemption. I think this administration is a bunch of bad apples - but it is just one administration. But the guilty needs to be found - and I don't mean the 6 soldiers. That is my view but many have just had their hatred of the US confirmed.

Moonbiter · Post by **Moonbiter** » Thu May 06, 2004 11:49 am

Since I'm The Bookie, what does anyone think the odds are for an American military or political person ever standing trial for war crimes in Haag?

Tom2 · Post by **Tom2** » Thu May 06, 2004 11:57 am

1 to 1000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000

Weasel · Post by **Weasel** » Thu May 06, 2004 1:26 pm

Originally posted by fable

The only good thing to come out of this is that Rumsfeld's been hoisted publically by his own petard. Thanks to a leaked, detailed report, it's clear now Rumsfeld knew about the torture sessions and photos two months ago.

The sad part, on 9/11 Rumsfeld was the only one of Bush's Men who didn't run to ground.

Bush hide in a plane...

**** went to the bunker...

Still I believe he must go. His failure is this **** is too much.

RandomThug · Post by **RandomThug** » Thu May 06, 2004 1:33 pm

With this Administration we will never see an American for war crimes... perhaps another but doubt still. We're not wrong you see, were not.

sigh

fable · Post by **fable** » Thu May 06, 2004 2:22 pm

Associated Press, May 6th, this afternoon:

WASHINGTON (May 6) - President Bush apologized Thursday for the abuse and humiliation of Iraqi prisoners by U.S. soldiers, saying the scenes of mistreatment had made Americans ''sick to our stomachs.''

A day after he stopped short of apologizing, Bush told Jordan's King Abdullah II: ''I was sorry for the humiliation suffered by the Iraqi prisoners and the humiliation suffered by their families.

The administration obviously regards the Middle East as an area of great importance. I mean, I get that Dubya doesn't understand the strength that derives from admitting one's failings, but why didn't they have somebody explain to him the importance of public contrition in these cultures? Even an undergrad in cultural studies would have been able to point this out to him and his. But then, this hasn't exactly been a keynote of the Bush administration, has it? They obviously missed taking Understanding the Cultures You Invade 101.

VonDondu · Post by **VonDondu** » Thu May 06, 2004 4:59 pm

Originally posted by fable
I get that Dubya doesn't understand the strength that derives from admitting one's failings, but why didn't they have somebody explain to him the importance of public contrition in these cultures? Even an undergrad in cultural studies would have been able to point this out to him and his. But then, this hasn't exactly been a keynote of the Bush administration, has it? They obviously missed taking Understanding the Cultures You Invade 101.

Bush despises "intellectuals", and he has no interest in understanding other cultures or, for that matter, knowing anything he doesn't think he needs to know. Which brings me to the next point...

Originally posted by fable
The only good thing to come out of this is that Rumsfeld's been hoisted publically by his own petard. Thanks to a leaked, detailed report, it's clear now Rumsfeld knew about the torture sessions and photos two months ago. He did nothing, and informed nobody--not even Bush. Bush doesn't believe that anybody needs to know save himself, so Rumsfeld has broken one of Dubya's cardinal rules: don't embarass the chief. In a way, though, this is as disgusting as the rest of the whole affair, since Bush was nowhere near this level of anger about the torture, itself...

It's more complicated than that. Bush is upset because the public has found out about the torture (not the torture itself). Since he now thinks that there's a problem--namely, this fiasco will hurt his chances for reelection--he is upset because no one told him about the danger of public disclosure earlier. But there's more to it than that. Bush doesn't want to know anything he doesn't need to know. If the public had not found out about the torture, then he would not have wanted to know anything about it, since there wouldn't have been a problem as far as he was concerned.

It's funny how Bush misuses the word "elite". Rich, powerful people who operate in the power broker class are not "elites"; so-called "intellectuals" (regardless of income) who critique society or who simply have a different political philosophy than the ruling class are the "elites". Hence, Bush talks about the "cultural elite" or the "intellectual elite" rather than the "economic elite" or the "political elite".

In any case, it's time to close this subject now, since Bush has spoken. The atrocities committed by American forces do not reflect the nature of the American people, and that's not the way we do things in America. Therefore, America is not responsible for the atrocities, and there's no need for us to apologize. Besides, Saddam Hussein was responsible for a lot of torture, too, so you need to look at all of this in context. Now let's get back to talking about freedom and democracy. Aren't the Iraqi people better off than they used to be? I mean, there might be some torture and rape, but at least there aren't any more mass graves (that the public knows about).

fable · Post by **fable** » Thu May 06, 2004 8:10 pm

Originally posted by VonDondu
But there's more to it than that. Bush doesn't want to know anything he doesn't need to know. If the public had not found out about the torture, then he would not have wanted to know anything about it, since there wouldn't have been a problem as far as he was concerned.

Good point. But unless I mistake your meaning, I think you're missing something, as well. Namely, that for all Bush's mediocrity, he hates appearing to be out of the loop or out of control--so I think he really, truly, wanted to know (at least in some basic sense) what was going on. That doesn't mean he would have taken any action. In fact, I'm sure he wouldn't have gotten involved, because he's too dumb to handle details. But he's canny enough in a political sense to see how something like this will look in an election year, and getting reelected is the only passion that Bush truly seems to feel.

Gwalchmai · Post by **Gwalchmai** » Thu May 06, 2004 10:06 pm

I liked Kerry's comment while he was stumping today, "As President, I will not be the last one to know!"