Abu Ghraib Prison (AP)
BAGHDAD, Iraq (AP) – The prisoner abuse scandal has so tarnished the Army’s 800th Military Police Brigade that soldiers slated to receive an Army Bronze Star medal have been dropped from the list, the brigade’s commander, Brig. Gen. Janis Karpinski, said Sunday.
“The vast majority of fine, outstanding soldiers in the brigade are paying dearly,” Karpinski told The Associated Press in an e-mail.
After the Army started its investigation into abuse of Iraqi prisoners at the Abu Ghraib penitentiary, “many, many” of the soldiers’ recommendations for the Army medal were downgraded, said Karpinski, whose 2,800-member brigade operated 12 U.S. prisons and detention camps across Iraq, including the sprawling Abu Ghraib facility west of Baghdad.
The Bronze Star denotes heroism, outstanding achievement or meritorious service.
An Army report into the abuses at the prison, written by Maj. Gen. Antonio Taguba, faulted Karpinski and other commanders in the brigade and its subordinate battalions, saying leaders paid too little attention to the prison’s day-to-day operations. Previous abuses of prisoners or lapses at the prison went unpunished or unheeded, the report found.
Note the difference between the above story
The report commends two individual soldiers and a sailor for either halting abuse at Abu Ghraib or refusing to participate.
and the case of Dr. William Sampson in Saudi Arabia
“My principle torturer was a man named Ibrahim Al Dali who was promoted from captain to major as a result of his torturing me and getting me to confess,” says Sampson.
The difference?
“I know the members of (the Saudi) government are hypocrites. I know the members of their government are liars, and therefore I do not expect anything better from them than that. I do not expect anything other than them to continue playing their hypocritical games.”
No one expects it of the United States.
UPDATE: Drudge reports that a furious President Bush has demanded to see all prisoner abuse photos and videos
A furious President Bush has demanded to see all photos and videos showing abuse of Iraq detainees, a senior White House source said late Sunday.
“The president was blindsided by the first TV images, he will not be blindsided again,” the source, who demanded anonymity, explained to the DRUDGE REPORT.
The president has instructed Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld to present him with him all known images that could further deepen the crises.
This all reminds me of some of the initial controversy surrounding Islam Unveiled. When I argued that Western values and the values of Islamic Extremists are fundamentally different, the most common answer was not a refutation of that point but rather an irrelevant game of “gotcha” proving Western Civilization does not always live up to its professed values. As Senator Lieberman pointed out “I cannot help but say, however, that those who were responsible for killing 3,000 Americans on September 11th, 2001, never apologized,” and that four Americans in Fallujah who were “murdered and burned and humiliated … never received an apology from anybody.”