Monday, May 03, 2004
The British torture photos might be fakes
As this article discusses. I can see motivations among those who want to undermine the Iraq coalition for making such fakes. It's like attack ads that prove later to be false. Most never see the retraction, and one can be DAMN sure Al-Jazeera won't shout from the rooftops that the British photos were fakes.
I just wish the American photos were fakes, too, though clearly they aren't (soldiers at the prisons admitted as much). That is personally embarassing to me. I do a passable job of defending the Iraq war among Europeans who are almost universally against it. I don't argue it on typical grounds, and so they often don't have typical answers. I can't respond to the allegations of torture, though, because what was done was so clearly wrong.
I find it interesting that one of the accused works as a prison guard stateside (doesn't say good things about the state of American prisons, but heck, we already knew that was the case in our overcrowded prisons). Likewise, I find it UNCONSCIONABLE that some of them tried to defend themselves by claiming they never saw any Geneva convention text. Dammit, this isn't trying to screw some insurance company for a bunch of money after an accident. Why do you have to be told NOT to torture the prisoners in your care????
A lot of people in the Middle East hate America, and Americans. Now, they have photos that prove (at least in their minds) that we hate them, too.
I find also find worrisome allegations that the wing where these abuses occurred were managed by America's intelligence operations. That starts to make it sound like that kind of pressure was official policy.
As this article discusses. I can see motivations among those who want to undermine the Iraq coalition for making such fakes. It's like attack ads that prove later to be false. Most never see the retraction, and one can be DAMN sure Al-Jazeera won't shout from the rooftops that the British photos were fakes.
I just wish the American photos were fakes, too, though clearly they aren't (soldiers at the prisons admitted as much). That is personally embarassing to me. I do a passable job of defending the Iraq war among Europeans who are almost universally against it. I don't argue it on typical grounds, and so they often don't have typical answers. I can't respond to the allegations of torture, though, because what was done was so clearly wrong.
I find it interesting that one of the accused works as a prison guard stateside (doesn't say good things about the state of American prisons, but heck, we already knew that was the case in our overcrowded prisons). Likewise, I find it UNCONSCIONABLE that some of them tried to defend themselves by claiming they never saw any Geneva convention text. Dammit, this isn't trying to screw some insurance company for a bunch of money after an accident. Why do you have to be told NOT to torture the prisoners in your care????
A lot of people in the Middle East hate America, and Americans. Now, they have photos that prove (at least in their minds) that we hate them, too.
I find also find worrisome allegations that the wing where these abuses occurred were managed by America's intelligence operations. That starts to make it sound like that kind of pressure was official policy.
