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June 21, 2004 - Subscribe - Contact Us - Rate Card - Place an Ad Valley&State Backpage O&E Sports Archives Classifieds Faith&Beliefs Obituaries Revels May 27, 2004 Intent on war The abuse and torture, and now even the murder, of prisoners by American military personnel for and at the direction of intelligence personnel is not an aberration. It is not limited to Saddam Hussein's prison of choice; it is not limited to George Bush's target of choice; and it is not limited to the war on terror. It is the way this country's national security agencies do business around the world. American military and intelligence advisors have long provided training and equipment to other countries for interrogating or punishing rebels and dissidents. Those thus abused and tortured have often emerged to lead or influence governments hostile to the United States. Business-as-usual military and intelligence agents and "out-sourced" contractors believed that standard practices of abuse and torture in Iraq would remain secret or, at worst, rumored. What has been revealed reflects, not an inappropriate lapse, but an arrogant miscalculation. Those who acted barbarously did so as a matter of professional practice and, on that basis, assumed that their barbaric conduct would remain out of sight and thus without consequence to American interests. The pictures make one thing clear: those involved in the mistreatment of prisoners accepted and enjoyed their work. Bush has made clear not only the usual tolerance of customary brutality allowed by previous presidents, but also an exceptional willingness to encourage it as part of the war on terrorism. His signals are clear. He continues to defy international law and to deny basic rights under American law to prisoners sent to Guantanamo, picked so that the rule of any law would not apply. He continues to argue that executive acts which he declares related to an undeclared and undefined war against terrorism are not judicially reviewable so that he can operate outside the law. He thus signals military and intelligence personnel that rough stuff is part and parcel of the war on terrorism, and that the usual legal, ethical, and humane restraints do not operate. His policy is simply reverse terrorism. Although I am a Vietnam veteran who first supported and then opposed the war, I have neither celebrated nor condemned those who did not serve in that conflict. But I have watched the Bush administration with growing apprehension. It has attacked Democratic veterans like Max Cleland and John Kerry, who served with distinction. It has also ignored or attacked Republican veterans like Colin Powell and John McCain, both of whom also served with distinction. While these men served heroically in combat, Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz, Feith, and many other senior administration officials avoided combat or ducked duty altogether. I conclude that this reflects a psychodynamic of a dangerous kind. They are too late to prove their manhood, they cannot prove it by denigrating men of courage and conviction, and they should not require us to pay the price of their mid-life crises. Michael L. Hays Ashland DailyTidings.com Home Page Valley&State | Backpage | O&E | Sports | Archives | Weather | Classifieds Columnists | Faith&Beliefs | Obituaries | Revels | Subscribe | Contact Us Copyright 2004 Ashland Daily Tidings and Ottaway Newspapers All Rights Reserved Click Here Site Search: .:Advertisements:. RESOURCES - Mail Tribune News - ODOT Road Cams