Quote:
Originally posted by Gattigap
No, really. When you write "The value of the goal notwithstanding, honor means something," I know you're talking about Bush's veracity in his public statements.
To me, the concept of honor also includes stuff like the treatment of prisoners. I can't remember if you're one of the "shit happens in war" guys or not, and if so, whether the prospect of our keeping interrogation facilities in Eastern Europe so that our CIA, military staff, and civilian contractors can do in our name the handy stuff that they can't in, say, Topeka, at least inspires a mild sense of irony.
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I've yet to see any of this progress beyond "anonymous sources say . . ." Abu Graihb? Sicko individuals, not national policy. Do some people end up getting tortured in any war? Sure. We send marginally sane people with weapons and training into situations in which we cannot supervise them. It's gonna happen. We should fight to stop it whenever we can. But the distance between what's been shown, and what you think Bush is responsible for, is vast.
In WWI, it's estimated that we summarily executed tens of thousands of German prisoners of war. I remember, as a kid, sitting by a fire and listening to the old coot who lived down by the dump talk about how his unit was so pissed after losing half its men that they took several hundred prisoners and fried them in a barn in France. I know that shit goes on all the time. I remember getting high with my friends as they came back from Nam, listening to them talk about hosing entire villages.
It sucks. We need to stop it when we can. But, as you say, that IS war.
(ETA: Gone.)
