An American Hero - General Taguba, Author of the Classified Iraqi Prisinor Abuse Report


This is truly an interesting case study in a couple things: 1) how the media ignores something until it becomes official, 2) how the military and administration respond to bad news (deflect, compatmentalize and deny the worst) and; and 3) how in denial the country is about war.

Number one and two should be self-explanatory. On the last point, I've had two people I respect be totally aghast and caught off guard by this. Both had to ask out out whether this was really true, that these were OUR soldiers. This may be because these people have never been arrested, nor been in a barracks or firestation or other bastion of unbridled masculinity. But more likely is that the propaganda we are fed works suprisingly well. Most people simply don't put together the ample evidence of systemic unneccesary and unlawful violence in eery war we've ever engaged in. This is war does to even good-intentioned soldiers - it turns you into an animal who no longer sees humanity in an enemy.

General Taguba (a hero) at his word that the problems are systemic and