Was the title of one of the segments on "60 Minutes" tonight
http://www.cbsnews.com/...
I didn't see any reference in the Recent Diaries list - this needs a bit more attention. This segment interviewed Joe Darby, the soldier that reported the abuses at Abu Ghraib. It's a disturbing window on ethics and morality, one of too many stories that show what Iraq and the "War on Terror" is doing to the American soul.
more below
Joe Darby was looking for photos of Iraq to send home and was handed CD's of assorted photos - including the now infamous ones.
He was disturbed by what he saw, thought it wrong and tried to do "something."
"I've always had a moral sense of right and wrong. And I knew that you know, friends or not, it had to stop," Darby says.
He made copies and tried to anonymously draw attention to them.
Darby says his unit was close-knit, many of the members coming from similar small town backgrounds.
Still, Darby decided he had to turn in the pictures but he didn't want his friends to know that he had done it.
Asked why it was important to him to remain anonymous, Darby says, "I knew a lot of them wouldn't understand and would view me being a stool pigeon or however, a rat, however you want to put it."
"You knew there would be some kind of investigation?" Cooper asks.
"I knew these people were going to prison," Darby says. And in his opinion, they deserved to go to prison.
His role was apparently kept quiet, but he still feared retribution until those involved were shipped out. But the Army didn't keep it quiet.
But then, while Darby was having lunch in the mess hall watching Donald Rumsfeld testify before Congress about Abu Ghraib, the defense secretary said, "There are many who did their duty professionally and we should mention that as well. First, Specialist Joseph Darby, who alerted appropriate authorities that abuses were occurring."
"I just stopped in mid bite. I was eating and I just stopped. What the hell just happened? Now the anxiety came back. Now, I'm worried," Darby remembers. "Everyone in the unit knew within four hours."
Now, was this REAL praise for someone "doing the right thing" or was it a calculated message - with the intended result?
Someone who did the right thing was ostracized, treated as a "traitor" and can no longer return home. You should follow the link above and read the whole story.
The attitude that less than "appropriate" behavior was somehow acceptable towards prisoners clearly has been embraced all the way up the chain of command. The person that acted morally was in effect punished for doing so. His actions were NOT supported at home.
he didn't get support back home in Cumberland, Md., a military town that felt Darby had betrayed his fellow soldiers.
The commander of the local VFW post, Colin Engelbach, told 60 Minutes what people were calling Darby.
"He was a rat. He was a traitor. He let his unit down. He let his fellow soldiers down and the U.S. military. Basically he was no good," Engelbach says.
Asked if he agrees with that, Engelbach says, "I agree that his actions that he did were no good and borderline traitor, yes."
I have to wonder:
How can ANY American say that this behavior towards prisoners was somehow acceptable or excusable?
What has this nation become?
Where is the "honor" in what happened at AbuGraib?
There are other disturbing incidents - seemingly lost now in time - about what happens to "men of honor"
Remember Captain Ian Fishback?
http://www.washingtonpost.com/...
How about Colonel Ted Westhusing?
http://www.npr.org/...
http://nomoreapples.blogspot.com/...
Our nation should be embarassed and appalled at how we react to those that show REAL honor and morals in doing "what is right" when our own leadership seems intent on doing what is so clearly wrong.