2008 Woodie Awards
The darker side of war
Are we providing fodder for the American Stereotype?
Alessa Adamo
Date created: 5/21/04 Section: OPINION
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The prison compound known as Abu Ghraib in Baghdad, Iraq was infamous under the regime of Saddam Hussein as a place of horrible atrocities, torture and murder. A place so despicable that the only way to diminish the evil of the place was to destroy it-instead the American military used it as its own Iraqi detainee center-and the evil lived under a new regime.
More than a year into the war in Iraq, amidst a scandal of Iraqi prisoner abuse by members of the American military that has stunned and angered the world, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld tried to explain to the United States congress how something like this could have happened, and why it took CBS News to inform the nation, including the Congress and the president, of the gravity of the atrocities. There was a sense that no explanation would be sufficient.
Allegedly, certain members of the 800th Military Police Brigade, charged with guarding Iraqi detainees, abused and degraded prisoners over a period of time, unchecked by higher authorities. The alleged abuse was physical and mental-often sexually humiliating, and well documented with photos and video taken by the very guards conducting the abuse. The extent of the abuse was purportedly not made clear up the chain of command until the atrocious perversions were broadcast on national television last week, rocking the country all the way up to the White House.
The pictures told the story that official reports only alluded to, and never fully detailed. Rumsfeld told us more is yet to come out-we have not seen the worst of it.
When I first heard of the accounts of Iraqi prisoner abuse by American military members, I was doubtful, but as more information surfaced I became angry and resentful. As a veteran of the U.S. Air Force, I have served in 2 wars and have made many sacrifices for my country. I have mourned the loss of comrades and the deaths of enemies. I have held back tears-trying not to think of whom I had helped kill each day, as I watched B-52's that I loaded, carpet-bomb a country into near oblivion in Vietnam.
More than a year into the war in Iraq, amidst a scandal of Iraqi prisoner abuse by members of the American military that has stunned and angered the world, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld tried to explain to the United States congress how something like this could have happened, and why it took CBS News to inform the nation, including the Congress and the president, of the gravity of the atrocities. There was a sense that no explanation would be sufficient.
Allegedly, certain members of the 800th Military Police Brigade, charged with guarding Iraqi detainees, abused and degraded prisoners over a period of time, unchecked by higher authorities. The alleged abuse was physical and mental-often sexually humiliating, and well documented with photos and video taken by the very guards conducting the abuse. The extent of the abuse was purportedly not made clear up the chain of command until the atrocious perversions were broadcast on national television last week, rocking the country all the way up to the White House.
The pictures told the story that official reports only alluded to, and never fully detailed. Rumsfeld told us more is yet to come out-we have not seen the worst of it.
When I first heard of the accounts of Iraqi prisoner abuse by American military members, I was doubtful, but as more information surfaced I became angry and resentful. As a veteran of the U.S. Air Force, I have served in 2 wars and have made many sacrifices for my country. I have mourned the loss of comrades and the deaths of enemies. I have held back tears-trying not to think of whom I had helped kill each day, as I watched B-52's that I loaded, carpet-bomb a country into near oblivion in Vietnam.
