The True Ugliness of Abu Ghraib
Robert Ribciuc
Issue date: 5/27/04 Section: Perspectives
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That I should be the one to pick up this topic in the ChiBus is a dubious distinction to our ability here at the GSB to see beyond our everyday lives, grades, internships and parties. After all, as a non-citizen, non-everything to the U.S., I don't get a vote. And let me say this up front, I firmly believe Abu Ghraib is all about votes. What happened there arose from the desperation of an administration no longer sure it will win the reelection in November. And if for none of its many other failings, then for this latest, abject one, you who DO get a vote should think twice before re-investing it in the Bush "righteousness."
Let me present you with a couple of facts.
Fact No.1. The highest-ranking officers at Abu Ghraib knew exactly and specifically endorsed what was going on. Believing anything else would disqualify anyone from intelligent life form status.
The evidence is not in how widespread the abject acts themselves were. It is in how abundant, and in how flaunting, the hard evidence of the facts is. Does this strike you as logical? It's one thing to accept that we had some abject human beings among the guards at Abu Ghraib. Great as the U.S. military is, the law of large numbers will guarantee a few such aberrations slipped into the military's ranks. But abject criminals who mass-produce evidence likely to make them court-martial candidates? Who record on camera their eligibility as "justifiable" targets for beheadings-loving insurgents? Who insist on taking hundreds of pictures and keeping them where they can all be found? No. Even assuming seriously deranged psyches, what remains true of most criminals is that deep at heart they are cowards. The perpetrators at Abu Ghraib were too many, and too oblivious to any fear of punishment. That would make for too many exceptionally fear-impervious criminals somehow all landing in the ranks of the Abu Ghraib unit. No. These people were not even dreaming of ever being caught, or of these pictures ever making it to a TV screen. Not only must the guards have known that superiors were supporting their acts, they must have been specifically asked to produce lots of "data." Somebody needed compelling evidence of just what awaits you if you are a non-cooperating Iraqi prisoner.
Let me present you with a couple of facts.
Fact No.1. The highest-ranking officers at Abu Ghraib knew exactly and specifically endorsed what was going on. Believing anything else would disqualify anyone from intelligent life form status.
The evidence is not in how widespread the abject acts themselves were. It is in how abundant, and in how flaunting, the hard evidence of the facts is. Does this strike you as logical? It's one thing to accept that we had some abject human beings among the guards at Abu Ghraib. Great as the U.S. military is, the law of large numbers will guarantee a few such aberrations slipped into the military's ranks. But abject criminals who mass-produce evidence likely to make them court-martial candidates? Who record on camera their eligibility as "justifiable" targets for beheadings-loving insurgents? Who insist on taking hundreds of pictures and keeping them where they can all be found? No. Even assuming seriously deranged psyches, what remains true of most criminals is that deep at heart they are cowards. The perpetrators at Abu Ghraib were too many, and too oblivious to any fear of punishment. That would make for too many exceptionally fear-impervious criminals somehow all landing in the ranks of the Abu Ghraib unit. No. These people were not even dreaming of ever being caught, or of these pictures ever making it to a TV screen. Not only must the guards have known that superiors were supporting their acts, they must have been specifically asked to produce lots of "data." Somebody needed compelling evidence of just what awaits you if you are a non-cooperating Iraqi prisoner.