No Need To Grovel

I have had about enough of this self-flagellation in the commons over Abu Ghraib. I don't care how badly these prisoners were abused, we are a better nation and a better society for no other reason than that those who did it are facing punishment, not promotion. There are questions that need to be answered, but to draw a moral equivalency between the U.S. and Saddam's regime, as did Senator Kennedy, is incalculably foolish.

General Taguba, the man tasked with investigating the incidents of abuse, reports that he found no evidence that the behavior captured in the infamous photos were a matter of policy. They were no more than a failure of discipline, instruction and supervision.

The New York Times notes that Taguba did not investigate higher than the commanding general, Brigadier Karpinski and wondered out loud if it is possible the responsibility was higher. The NYT might think that this is a sensible question, but it is only sensible if you know nothing about the military. Karpinski may have failed her command, but unless she set the policy, there was no policy. Taguba seems convinced that she was ignorant of the problems, which is an indictment in and of itself. However, it is improbable that anyone on a higher level of command would have talk to the majors, captains and lieutenants in her command behind her back to enact a "shadow" policy under her nose.

The very fact that these idiots posed for photos of their crimes gives lie to the idea that this was official policy. I have no doubt that Military Intelligence told the guards to "soften them up", but I can't see them adding "by posing them in homo-erotic stances". I'm also confident the MI would have included instructions to "Take pictures of the softening up process and show them to your friends."

I'm also losing patience with international moral posers. These prisoners walked away from their experience. In Syria, Egypt or any number of other middle-eastern lunatocracies, these men would have been humiliated AND murdered.

Left out of this discussion is that these men were rough customers. They were picked up because they were tied to the insurgency that to this day threatens the embryonic democracy in Iraq. Murderers and terrorists deserve little quarter. The mistreatment was disgusting, and certainly no more effective at sweating out information than sleep depravation and "non invasive" methods of getting a guy ready to spill his guts. That said, I'll save my sympathy for the soldiers and civilians murdered by roadside explosives and car bombs, not for these people.

On our worst day the U.S. has infinitely more moral authority than most of our international critics. We will police our own. We will hold those who violate our high standards to test. We have no need to grovel before the international community nor to those who wish to see America humbled either abroad or in our own congress.

Tim McNabb