More Abu Ghraib Stories
Here’s a trio of stories about the Abu Ghraib abuses. From Rolling Stone: The secret file of Abu Ghraib. From the Sunday Herald (of somewhere in Scotland; apologies to my ancestors in Callender for being so vague on things Scottish): Iraq’s child prisoners. And from Newsweek: A battle over blame.
There’s not too much that’s new here, if you’ve been following the story. The Rolling Stone piece talks about the additional detail available in the full Taguba report, while the Sunday Herald repeats the stories about child abuse, with a little more on where UNICEF stands on things. The Newsweek piece is news to me; it predicts that the commission Rumsfeld picked to investigate the Abu Ghraib abuses is going to come down pretty hard on the senior Pentagon leadership, including Rumsfeld.
There’s been a lot of talk in certain webloggish circles about the failure of anyone at the Democratic convention to mention the Abu Ghraib abuses. I guess the strategists decided it had the potential to backfire. It wouldn’t have matched the upbeat mood they were going for, and it would have worked against the “we support the military, and won’t hesitate to blow people up when it’s in the national interest” storyline they were pushing.
So they tacitly agreed to join the Republicans in looking the other way. Like a lot of Americans, probably, they chose to avoid the implications of what the Abu Ghraib abuses say about who we are, what we’ve done, and where we’re headed. So go ahead and read the articles linked to above. Or don’t. But if you choose not to, don’t kid yourself. The rest of the world doesn’t have the same incentive to ignore the story. They’re hanging on every word.
Do you hear that sound? That’s the dim, distant echo of our national honor.
August 3rd, 2004 at 8:19 am
Instead of looking at it as an avoidance of the Abu Ghraib abuses, why can’t people approach it as a country that is trying to now move forward from the anger and outrage that accompanied the revealing of these terrible acts? At what point can we put the whip down that people have been self-flagellating themselves with, and start move on to more constructive actions? The bright light is on this issue. Investigations have been done and are continuing, people have been brought to justice and/or accountability and more are to come. The Administration and the country has taken a significant shake-up in terms of self-image and world opinion. The speed or current extent of these actions may not be good enough for some people, but that’s another issue.
The good that should be focused on is that these kinds of reckless abuses are being stopped and participants are being dealt with, and we as a country are re-establishing what our expectations are for the way prisoners are to be treated.
But there are people who prefer to stick to the “we are so bad, look how very bad we are” dialogue, like an endless tape loop. It’s time to move forward from this.
August 3rd, 2004 at 8:53 am
Um, because “the country,” or at least the leadership that created the conditions that led to these abuses, isn’t trying to move forward. They’re trying to retain power, to deny responsibility, which will ultimately make for more, and worse, Abu Ghraibs. We will be able to move on to constructive actions at precisely that point at which those truly responsible for this are held accountable. And I see no evidence to suggest that we’re there yet.
These calls for us to just close the book on Abu Ghraib and move on began almost immediately after the first word of the abuses came out. We shifted seamlessly from “nothing to see here” to “hm; I guess there _was_ something to see here; too bad a few bad apples made a bad name for all those good people just doing their jobs, but in the interest of being constructive and positive it’s time we dropped it.”
Here’s a quote from the Rolling Stone piece:
[begin quote]
Maj. Gen. Geoffrey Miller, who is now in charge of all military prisons in Iraq, was dispatched to Abu Ghraib by Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld last August. In a report marked secret, Miller recommended that military police at the prison be “actively engaged in setting the conditions for successful exploitation of the internees.” After his plan was adopted, guards began depriving prisoners of sleep and food, subjecting them to painful “stress positions” and terrorizing them with dogs. A former Army intelligence officer tells Rolling Stone that the intent of Miller’s report was clear to everyone involved: “It means treat the detainees like shit until they will sell their mother for a blanket, some food without bugs in it and some sleep.”
[end quote]
So, the high-ranking guy who was sent in by Rumsfeld to overhaul the prison system immediately before the abuses began is the same guy who was put in charge of all prisons in Iraq immediately after the scandal broke. Yeah, that sounds like just the right guy to help us move forward. He certainly has an incentive in helping to close the books on it, doesn’t he?
And I can see where people like you and me have an incentive to do so, too. But just because ignoring Abu Ghraib would ease our colllective conscience doesn’t mean we have the right to sweep it under the rug. And that’s what I interpret your call for closure to amount to: sweeping it under the rug, and letting the perpetrators get away with it.
August 3rd, 2004 at 9:28 am
There’s a difference between ignoring/dropping things or trying to forget it ever happened, and taking the lessons learned (and continuing to bring those directly accountable to justice) and trying to move on with what needs to be done, both from the perspective of how to correct the way POW’s and/or detainees are handled, and the bigger picture of stabilizing Iraq itself.
My point is clearly the latter.
August 3rd, 2004 at 10:11 am
I’m basically okay with everything you said in your original comment up to the last paragraph. There, though, you wrote:
[begin quotation]
But there are people who prefer to stick to the “we are so bad, look how very bad we are” dialogue, like an endless tape loop. It’s time to move forward from this.
[end quotation]
I guess it wasn’t really fair of me to interpret this as a call to sweep things under the rug, since one could instead interpret it as, “okay; yes, it was awful, but let’s take the awful part as a given at this point and move on to making sure General Miller, Rumsfeld, and Bush get their comeuppance.” If that was the point you were trying to make, then my apologies. But clearly there are others in this debate (not necessarily you) who are making an argument that sounds very much like yours, but which has as its endpoint the notion that by putting a few privates and noncoms on trial we’ve effectively dealt with this, and can now close the issue and leave the generals and their civilian overseers unpunished. And, not surprisingly, the people who seem most committed to that argument are none other than the generals and their civilian overseers (and their die-hard supporters).
So I think we may well be arguing past each other here. I think it’s possible that I’m objecting to others (not you) who make similar-sounding arguments to yours. And you’re objecting to others (not me) who make similar-sounding arguments to mine.
Or not. We could also either or both of us be exactly the sort of bastards the other is arguing against. But anyway, as usual, thanks for your insights on the subject. I appreciate your willingness to provide them.
August 4th, 2004 at 7:20 am
Before you can move forward, you need to do a full and public accounting of what happened and accept full responsibility for it. THEN you can move forward.
If you don’t do the first bit first, then you are not “moving forward”, you are “covering up”. And that’s what we in the rest of the world are seeing you do right now. On this, and on many other issues.
I’ve said this before, but I will say it again. When you in the US lost your free press, you lost all but the appearance of a democracy. To restore your democracy, you must first restore your free press. And I think that will be a long road.
“The test of democracy is freedom of criticism.” – David Ben-Gurion
August 4th, 2004 at 10:23 am
John, you are correct. I’m not talking about ignoring/denying the problem, but instead, moving beyond the “gawking” stage of the endless parade of stories that abuses have occurred, continue the investigations and trials that are ongoing, but also taking these lessons learned and refocusing on the “Iraq stability” big picture.
To me, it’s the whole “forest for the trees” concept that some of the Left get trapped in as part of their single-minded obsession with ousting Bush. The endless loop of more of the same stories of abuse, at some point, stops serving any real purpose toward resolutions other than sating the blood lust of Bush-haters who want to make as many simplistic direct connections as possible to perceived Bush atrocities.
AnoCan, I honestly feel that there is no sense in me even debating your opinion. Anyone who will assume as a given that the US has no free press is not going to be open to any realistic discussion.
August 4th, 2004 at 7:44 pm
The Herald is from Glasgow.
August 4th, 2004 at 9:50 pm
Oh, hey; thanks for the info.
August 5th, 2004 at 6:40 am
I’m wide open to realistic discussion. Please, Craig, prove me wrong. Show me a persistent thread of mainstream media criticism of your president’s actions.
I live Canada, and I watch the exact same TV that you do. I also watch Australia, Canadian, and British global news and documentaries, which are mainstream in those countries but are not available to the masses in the US. They are the ones asking the tough questions. US media is not. They have rolled over.
Craig, I think this is a situation where an outsider can have the clearer view of the picture. You want some “realistic discussion”? Try watching some foreign news and documentaries. They ask tough questions and look beyond simply two-dimensional jingoism.
Here, ask yourself this — why is a hack like Michael Moore breaking stories in 2004 that the media should have been breaking since 2001?
Don’t write me off in a blanket statement, Craig, refute me with facts! That’s how a realistic discussion — and a free press — is supposed to operate.
And if you’re not willing to do that, then at least consider that I may have a perspective that you don’t.
August 5th, 2004 at 7:45 am
Here, I’ll even start off our discussion by backing up my claim with references. Don’t these seem like the basis for a reasonable discussion?
http://mediamatters.org/items/200408020002
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/london/3223780.stm
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/3864301.stm
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/2904073.stm
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/2959833.stm
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/3134836.stm
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/3081006.stm
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/2796769.stm
http://www.abc.net.au/7.30/content/2004/s1034471.htm
http://www.abc.net.au/lateline/s798349.htm
http://www.abc.net.au/news/newsitems/200302/s778706.htm
http://www.abc.net.au/news/newsitems/200304/s839894.htm
http://www.abc.net.au/news/newsitems/200306/s876811.htm
http://www.bestkungfu.com/index.php?p=101
http://www.cbc.ca/news/iraq/issues_analysis/wmd_testoftime.html
http://www.cbc.ca/story/world/national/2004/01/26/kay040126.html
http://www.commondreams.org/headlines04/0719-02.htm
http://www.cyberjournalist.org.in/estate.html
http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=04/01/14/1555223
http://www.gseis.ucla.edu/faculty/kellner/papers/mediapropaganda.htm
http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,2763,1078652,00.html
http://www.ipsnews.net/interna.asp?idnews=24387
http://www.theglobalist.com/DBWeb/StoryId.aspx?StoryId=3085
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/ArticleNews/TPPrint/LAC/20040619/BKMASS19/TPEntertainment/
http://www.workingforchange.com/article.cfm?ItemID=14579
http://www.worldrevolution.org/article/871
And the best for last:
http://www.cbc.ca/story/world/national/2004/01/28/kay_testifies040128.html
http://www.journalism.co.uk/news/story576.html
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article6435.htm
http://www.cbc.ca/deadlineiraq/
The last link is the most important. You *have* to see this documentary, Craig. It will be on cable in the US on Discovery at the end of this month. Here are airing times:
http://dtc.discovery.com/schedule/episode.jsp?episode=0&cpi=108408&gid=0&channel=DTC
John, this might be worth a front page plug on lies. If you haven’t seen the documentary, it’s simply awesome. It’s not a commercial hypefest, it’s a professional public television documentary.
– AnoCan
August 5th, 2004 at 3:13 pm
I guess all that I can say in return is that I could link to the web sites of all the major US media outlets (ABC, NBC, CBS CNN, MSNBC, Time, Newsweek, USAToday, etc.) and refer you to their archives for all the pre-war and war coverage up to date. It will be filled with references to UN Inspection teams not finding WMD evidence (even with US intelligence assistance), commentary on the compelling, circumstancial evidence that was still without any “smoking guns”, daily reports of how the war battles were or weren’t going well (depending on what day it was), regular reports of war dead, both combatants and civilians, and so on and so on.
I myself watched a wide angle view of the toppling of Saddam’s statue (on FOX News no less) that showed a very small collection of celebrants in a big empty square. It was quite obviously not a massive outpouring of joyfulness.
Most fair-minded people who actually pay attention to the news with any degree of regularity will admit that the reporting on the difficulties of the war’s progress as well as critiques and questions regarding pre-war justifications could readily be found in both the electronic and print mainstream media, has been, and still is, a regular presence within the US. Now some extreme-minded people will argue, I suppose, that since the headlines don’t all literally scream BUSH LIED, BUSH IS A FASCIST, THE WAR IS ILLEGAL, IMPEACH BUSH, that it means that the media isn’t telling the “truth” about what is happening. But then, those people are too far gone to talk to rationally.
Not much of what you posted wasn’t readily available and communicated by some or all of the media sources I listed, at one time or another. (And really, you should use sources other than the BBC and Guardian as stalwart bastions of “truth”, since they have had their own integrity proven false on several occasions).
And so, in summary, if that is your best shot to support the theory that there is no free press in the US, I suggest you either go back to the drawing board or consider tempering your theory with a little reality.
August 19th, 2004 at 6:37 am
If you are willing to keep an open mind to the possibility that living outside of the US may provide me with a insight that is less accesible to those inside of the US, here is the strongest argument that I can make:
The Problem of the Media: U.S. Communication Politics in the Twenty-First Century
by Robert W. McChesney
ISBN 1583671056
I encourage you to read it.
August 19th, 2004 at 11:15 am
http://www.stateofthenewsmedia.org/narrative_overview_eight.asp?media=1
“Those who would manipulate the press and public appear to be gaining leverage over the journalists who cover them. Several factors point in this direction. One is simple supply and demand. As more outlets compete for their information, it becomes a seller’s market for information. Another is workload. The content analysis of the 24-hour-news outlets suggests that their stories contain fewer sources. The increased leverage enjoyed by news sources has already encouraged a new kind of checkbook journalism, as seen in the television networks efforts to try to get interviews with Michael Jackson and Jessica Lynch, the soldier whose treatment while in captivity in Iraq was exaggerated in many accounts.”