Equivocation

The convictions of enlisted persons for crimes committed during this war continue to draw notice to equivocations made by President Bush. Sgt. Michael Smith is the latest in a line of lower ranking folks guilty of carrying out this administration's work. There's a huge void between those being convicted at the bottom and the president at the top, but I don't need to start from the bottom and go up. The courts martial are doing that, and the press is covering it sufficiently.

Enlisted folk, and even staff officers have very little say in how the big picture of this war is played out. To blame them and prosecute them for these acts, and then use their convictions as examples of how our heart is in the right place... how our mission is still a noble, justified one, is, to quote Everett Ulysses McGill, "the acme of foolishness."

Blaming those at the bottom is like blaming your runny nose for the flu. They are a symptom, not the cause of our problems. Granted, one bad apple, reproduced on every front page in every language around the world represents the one "aw shit" that wipes out a thousand "atta boys," but these so-called "isolated incidents" of the rotten few are no more than symptoms of the greater ills that the president's equivocations belie. I'm not saying there aren't some bad people out there who make things worse for everyone - there are, but many of the people being convicted honestly believe they're doing their jobs. With all of the equivocation, it's no wonder the job isn't so easy to figure out.

Equivocation #1: self-evident, inalienable rights - by most accounts, these words mean rights granted to all humans. We even occasionally call them civil rights, as in, the rights civil people expect to have and extend to each other. But according to the president, even American citizens held at Gitmo no longer have these rights. Let alone foreign prisoners being held there. We're not even talking about the speedy trial, representation, being charged rights of accused criminals that come later in the Bill of Rights here, we're talking basic human rights straight out of the Preamble. These are basic rights of all humans, regardless of their citizenship. We claim as a nation that we believe in this concept, but our president's equivocation of these words suggests otherwise. According to him, and the actions he endorses, some humans are less than others and are not entitled to the basic rights of humans this nation was founded upon.

#2: the Geneva Convention - prisoners at Gitmo and at other prisons are not given the rights guaranteed prisoners of war under this agreement. Who cares right? They're terrorists. (a continuation of the "lesser human" theory) But this means the enemy no longer has to extend this courtesy to our soldiers either, nor to our journalists, missionaries, contractors or other citizens. Let alone all the innocent Muslims rounded up and shipped off from their families because some informant was paid cash and threatened to give up their names. This particular equivocation is proof positive that Americans are NOT safer as a result of this war and its fallout. We're targets. But the worst part of this equivocation is its connection to the next by virtue of the presidential definition of prisoners of war. The president says these prisoners are NOT prisoners of war.

#3: Global War on Terrorism - if prisoners rounded up in this war are not prisoners of war, then it's not a war. If we are at war, and terrorists are the enemy, then captured enemies are prisoners of war. We can't have it both ways. This is equivocation defined... and biting the tail that's wagging the dog. We need to make up our minds and decide who the enemy really is and whether or not we can wage war if there is no enemy defined. Speaking of defining the enemy...

#4: The enemy are people who hate freedom - according to this equivocation, the enemy is the president and congress who, in the name of this war, which isn't a war, and the Patriot Act, and a violation of FISA rules, have shredded some basic freedoms we used to cherish, even take for granted in this country. Illegal search and seizure... not being held unless charged with a crime... the right to representation and a speedy trial? These are all time honored, codified freedoms we as a nation hold sacred. Yet in the name of this war, they've been taken away from not just the foreign humans (who aren't entitled to the rights of humans) at Gitmo and God knows what other "black sites," but from American citizens who love the country and have no ties to any terrorists. The ENEMY hates freedom? By their own actions, this administration hates at least some parts of freedom as well. Demanding millions of random records from Google is in no way "loving freedom." It's walking all over the smoking carcass of it.

Decorated and respected Marine Colonel Joe Dowdy was relieved of his command because of miscalculations on the part of war planners. He refused to sacrifice his men's safety for speed - speed that, as it turned out, wasn't even remotely necessary in the initial charge on Baghdad. His unit satisfactorily completed its mission, and Baghdad fell as planned, but he was fired for allowing his men the time to properly prepare. Dowdy didn't screw up, the war planners did, but Dowdy was blamed, tried, kicked out of an otherwise exemplary career after 24 good years. (http://djnoronha.com/archives/old_site_versions/articles/2004-04-05-Men_or_Mission.php)

Reservist CW2 Daniel Birt was court martialed for scrounging parts from abandoned vehicles in order to meet convoy deadlines. His commander, Major Cathy Klaus was relieved of duty. Around the same time, 23 other reservists, who had learned from Birt and Klaus's lesson, and refused to take unsafe vehicles on a convoy, faced charges as well for NOT doing what Birt and Klaus were charged for DOING. Birt's discharge was waived (and he was sent back to Iraq) but the charges remained.
(http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,141299,00.html) (huh, yeah, I read FoxNews!)

In every one of these situations, the system that instills the sense of duty that led to these decisions never got questioned. The absence of clear objectives was never a mitigating circumstance. Those dealing with the scraps of jumbled policy were found to blame. The charges stopped at the unit commander level. These are top down problems, not bottom up. These actions don't drive the CinC. He drives them.

There are unlimited stories from faithful troops of interrogators abusing, if not terrorizing prisoners and asking guards to help them. The president's people have admitted to sending prisoners off to countries where not only is prisoner abuse condoned, it's endorsed. Given all of this conflicting information from above, what's a 20-something enlisted troop surrounded by frightened, disgruntled middle-eastern prisoners who don't speak the language supposed to think or do?

The trickle down theory is definitely proving successful. The equivocation is trickling down. The mixed message is trickling down. The lack of clear objectives is trickling down, and the blame is trickling down. Why do the people at the bottom of the chain have to keep answering for the guys at the top? When will we start holding the commanders, including the Commander in Chief as accountable as we are the peons at the bottom of the heap? Speaking of accountability - a word this administration uses very liberally - when will it apply to them?