dude's Blog

Illegal search and seizure commonplace

2006-02-05T05:44:18Z

And the returning soldier had this all too common review of the notorious night raids:

"We did hit the wrong house quite often," he says. "We had these overhead maps, satellite maps, and when you're on the street in the middle of the night, it's hard to find the right house. In those instances, we'd say, 'Sorry,' and give 'em a card with a phone number to call the Army and we'd pay for the damages."

"Other patrols found illegal weapons on these raids, but Rodgers's never did."

So, smashing up random houses in the night, arresting a fair number of non-combatants, and taking over people's homes for long term bases-- All things that got Americans killing troops of what was at the time their own government. And American's are a hell of a lot more alien and offensive to Iraqi's than British were to white Americans. Just a pinch of perspective...

Humiliation habit haunts us.

2006-02-05T05:42:08Z

The general turned himself in to try and free his sons. He walked into custody. He was cooperative initially, but his interrogators wanted more, so they escalate:

"In an interrogation that could be witnessed by the entire detainee population, Mowhoush was put into an undescribed "stress position" that caused the other detainees to stand "with heads bowed and solemn looks on their faces," said the document." The prisoners' response to the general's humiliation was of profound humiliation and solidarity. As the individual was debased the group was unifed in opposition.

If you listen to the complaints of Muslims from London, to Israel, to Iraq, and throughout the Islamic world, you will find a constant preoccupation with humiliation. Everyone can relate to humiliation, but it has a special intensity among Muslims. Humiliation on the street, at checkpoints, etc. It keeps blood boiling and conflicts escalating.

So to use humiliation as a cornerstone of our presence in Iraq, is mind bogglingly stupid and counter indicated. To have it promulgated as official policy for detentions and interrogations is mad. It's not simply a betrayal of our national principles, on a practical level it makes things worse. From a cynical perspective one could argue that using humiliating techniques or the threat thereof might help to break key individuals in private (or not), but public, collective humiliation galvanizes and inspires resistance to the death. When our probelm is the proliferation of people willing and eager to die in their fight against us this is a nakedly self destructive strategy.

After the general was humiliated publicly, "He did not deny he was behind the attacks as he had denied previously, he simply said because I had humiliated him, he would not be able to stop the attacks." The implication is that the general could have stopped attacks had he not been humiliated, but since his dignity had been so debased he would rather die than cooperate. Sadly, Americans obliged. Humiliating the general rather than negotiating with him as a leader and as a father led to the loss of operational intelligence, endangered our troops, and strengthened the insurgency.

A powerful sense of humiliation is almost always cited as a key motivation by suicide bombers. In this case it turned a potentially cooperative secular Iraqi into someone willing to die in opposition in order to protect his sense of dignity. While we should not shrink from taking strong stands that might offend, and while our interrogators should have a range of options available to them, that a policy of humiliation has become so integral in our operations around the world is not only a crying shame but a cause for alarm. There is no doubt that our systematic humiliation of Muslims and secular nationalists alike is generating armies of life long enemies of the United States. It is unprincipled, unnecessary, and every day makes us less secure.

The Rove Scandal as microcosm of the Iraq failure

2006-02-05T05:34:39Z

By revealing Plame’s identity as with the Iraq war, Whitehouse and GOP officials have lied to and manipulated the American public with the end result that American patriots are being hurt. In the first case the Wilson’s have been slandered and their careers disrupted when they have given a lifetime of dangerous and difficult service to their country, and in Iraq American service men and women continue to die and suffer wounds in a war initiated on the falsehoods Wilson sought to expose. Both revealing Plame’s identity and the Iraq war have made the United States less safe, one by directly compromising the ability of our nation’s intelligence services to protect us from the threat of a terrorist attack using WMDs, and the other by creating a no-win bloody conflict that has created the best terrorist training ground where there was none before. The Bush presidency has failed to capture the main enemies of America, has created countless new ones, and routinely casts American patriots who oppose their reckless and self-serving actions as traitors.

Joe Wilson, unlike any of his critics, stood personally and directly between Saddam Hussein and Americans in danger when in his capacity as Ambassador to Iraq at the outset of the Gulf War he offered his life to protect others. He was a proven bipartisan who has understandably drifted away from the party that continues to savage him and his wife. While claiming the mantle of goodness the Bush presidency continues to do as much or more harm to our country and our people as to our true enemies. On the broadest level, that is what the Rove scandal signifies.

Welcome to Dudeland

2006-02-05T05:15:28Z

it's me