What perfect timing. Just as the U.S. ends its war in Iraq, not with a bang but a whimper. Bye bye Big Lie. Bye bye Shock and Awe. Bye bye mass murder. Bye bye Abu Ghraib.
In a junkyard near Baghdad, somebody came across the true horror of Haditha.
The 400 pages of interrogations, once closely guarded as secrets of war, were supposed to have been destroyed as the last American troops prepare to leave Iraq. Instead, they were discovered along with reams of other classified documents, including military maps showing helicopter routes and radar capabilities, by a reporter for The New York Times at a junkyard outside Baghdad. An attendant was burning them as fuel to cook a dinner of smoked carp.
The documents — many marked secret — form part of the military’s internal investigation, and confirm much of what happened at Haditha, a Euphrates River town where Marines killed 24 Iraqis, including a 76-year-old man in a wheelchair, women and children, some just toddlers.
To remind us that not ONE of the U.S. soldiers responsible has been convicted. And that just like the war criminals Bush, Cheney, and Blair they all got away.
With only a few regrets.
While in a court room at Fort Meade, a young gay soldier named Bradley Manning faces life imprisonment, after months of being tortured by his own country.
For the crime of telling the truth, and embarrassing the powerful.
It's disgusting, it's obscene, but I did like this:
Edward T. Hall III, 25, one of the founding members of the Occupy Wall Street movement, and several of his supporters sat in the seats behind Manning.
Manning "sent ripples of truth around the world an those created tsunamis of movements," Hall said in an interview. "He empowered us."
Just like he helped empower the Arab Spring by revealing the lies and the moral corruption of the region's rulers.
And I also liked how after Manning's lawyer was quoted as saying that his young client was "almost gone" after so many months of psychological torture.
Graham Nash, the legendary singer from the 70s, and James Raymond, the son of David Crosby, wrote this song for Bradley:
Damn the Big Lie. The truth will set us free.
Arrest the real war criminals.
Free Bradley Manning...
A bloody useless waste.....makes me want to go down to Washington and crack Bush over the head with a bitumen-encrusted fist.
ReplyDeleteThey are monsters who have lowered themselves beyond all redemption.
ReplyDeleteBut there is no God and Cheney will die in his sleep.
signed,
thwaperino
hi Way Way Up...I must say I've been quite horrified to see how many Americans who should know better are trying to turn that bloody debacle into victory. When it was a disaster from start to finish. It destroyed the only secular country in the region, replaced it with a theocratic Shia regime, prevented the West from properly rebuilding Afghanistan, revived a moribund Al Qaeda, brought terrorism to Europe and other places, killed and maimed more than 100-thousand people, and left Iran as the regional superpower by removing its most determined enemy. Yes Saddam Hussein was a bastard, but removing him wasn't worth all that, and the only thing Bush and Cheney wanted was oil. Yup, as I said. A tragedy from start to finish...
ReplyDeletehi Thwaperino... The other day the Prime Minister Maliki defined himself as a Shia first and an Iraqi second, so I fear that the carnage isn't over.
ReplyDeleteSo yes, there is no God and all the monsters will die in their sleep...