Carpe Datum

How to Support the Troops

As Atrios says, "Who woke the Post?" They are starting to do some genuine reporting on Iraq (as opposed to simply reprinting various pre-packaged news stories from propaganda arms of the executive branch or using Chalabi types as anonymous sources), and they are starting to write some editorials that sound like common sense. Take this one from Fred Hiatt. Where the hell has this guy been in the last 18 months?

Generals who should be leading troops and debating tactics are instead huddling with lawyers and testifying to Congress. NATO countries that might have supported a larger role for the alliance in Iraq after June 30 now have to be persuaded not to pull out altogether. American soldiers in Iraq shoulder an ever greater burden of suspicion, and Iraqis who might have wanted to cooperate have to think twice, and then twice more. [...]

By now you'd have to have your own head in a bag to believe that a few badly trained reservists are at the core of this scandal. The Pentagon has acknowledged that 37 prisoners have died in U.S. custody across Iraq and Afghanistan, and at least 10 of the deaths were homicides by Americans. Even more frightening, none of these deaths seemed to have sparked serious investigations before publicity forced the military to confront the issue.

The International Committee of the Red Cross, we now know, has been regularly bringing evidence of ill-treatment to U.S. officials in Iraq, and was regularly rebuffed until the photos were released. In cases of people deemed to have intelligence value, the ICRC found that harsh treatment was "systematic." Even for ordinary prisoners, ill-treatment was "frequent." It "went beyond exceptional cases and might be considered as a practice tolerated by the CF [coalition forces]."

You have to wonder why this didn't become a story until the photos were released. I mean, what happened to investigative journalism? This stuff has been known about for a long time, we are now discovering. People released from Guantanamo and Iraqis released from their own local prisons during the war have been saying this kind of stuff is going on all along. Why wasn't this front-page news?

One reason is that the media feels intimidated by this administration and by the legions of right wing nutjobs who lob death threats at anyone who dares to criticize the Bush administration. Another is they feel is it somehow patriotic to support an awful leader during wartime. Well, you know what? It is exactly these true patriots who should be concerned about the damage Bush is doing to America. It's the people who preach about how we should all support the troops.

Of all the missed opportunities since Baghdad fell, surely this is one of the most heartbreaking. Iraqi detainees might have been going home to their families and saying, as German POWs did so many decades ago, that these American soldiers are for real, that they treated us humanely -- that maybe they mean what they say about liberation, not occupation. Instead, the United States is reduced to pleading that it's not as bad as al Qaeda and obfuscating the reality that policies adopted in the White House helped lead to this breakdown of law and discipline.

Bush could have responded differently. He could have embraced the heroes such as Spec. Joseph Darby, who sounded the alarm; William J. Kimbro, the Navy dog handler who refused to sic his dogs on prisoners; Maj. Gen. Antonio M. Taguba, who wrote an honest report. He could have apologized to the people of Iraq, appointed an investigator from outside the chain of command, pledged to abide by the Geneva Conventions. Instead, he opted for a Nixonian strategy of damage containment, and a summer of piecemeal disclosure.

Who pays the price for the president's dishonesty? Soldiers such as Maj. Gen. Peter Chiarelli and his troops, who, as The Post's Scott Wilson reported last week, are out in Baghdad's slums, fighting insurgents one hour and fixing sewers the next. The prison scandal and the administration's failed response haven't doomed those efforts, but they've lengthened the odds. They've given aid and comfort to the enemy.

I support the troops. I have all along, and that means that I opposed this pointless nonsense from the beginning, and I continue to oppose it. It means I will vote against Bush in November, even though it won't make a difference in my stupid red state. I will support John Kerry, because he will have the credibility and the intellectual capacity to steer us on a better course in Iraq (we could hardly be doing any worse over there), and he will reverse cuts in funding to VA hospitals, cuts in hazard pay for troops, etc. He won't sacrifice that kind of money to fund more tax cuts for people who just plain don't need them.

I wonder how many CEO's say they support the troops and support America but don't pay taxes because their companies are based offshore? It's like the whole "taking responsibility" thing. It is one thing to say you support the troops or to say you take full responsibility for something. It is another to actually walk the walk. These guys are all talk. Disgusting and shameful.

Posted by Observer at May 31, 2004 01:07 PM