At The New Yorker, Seymour Hersh writes The "Kill Team" Photographs:
Soldiers relax just after the My Lai Massacre, 1968
Photo by Ron Haeberle
Why photograph atrocities? And why pass them around to buddies back home or fellow soldiers in other units? How could the soldiers’ sense of what is unacceptable be so lost? No outsider can have a complete answer to such a question. As someone who has been writing about war crimes since My Lai, though, I have come to have a personal belief: these soldiers had come to accept the killing of civilians—recklessly, as payback, or just at random—as a facet of modern unconventional warfare. In other words, killing itself, whether in a firefight with the Taliban or in sport with innocent bystanders in a strange land with a strange language and strange customs, has become ordinary. In long, unsuccessful wars, in which the enemy—the people trying to kill you—do not wear uniforms and are seldom seen, soldiers can lose their bearings, moral and otherwise. The consequences of that lost bearing can be hideous. This is part of the toll wars take on the young people we send to fight them for us. The G.I.s in Afghanistan were responsible for their actions, of course. But it must be said that, in some cases, surely, as in Vietnam, the soldiers can also be victims.
The Der Spiegel photographs also help to explain why the American war in Afghanistan can probably never be “won,” in my view, just as we did not win in Vietnam. Terrible things happen in war, and terrible things are happening every day in Afghanistan, as Americans continue to conduct nightly assassination raids and have escalated the number of bombing sorties. There are also reports of suspected Taliban sympathizers we turn over to Afghan police and soldiers being tortured or worse. This will be a long haul; revenge in Afghan society does not have to come immediately. We could end up not knowing who hit us, or why, a decade or two from now.
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At Daily Kos on this date in 2003
So what makes Karimov so freedom loving that he gets to hang out in Bush's club of willing "free" nations?
One word: oil.
Central Asia, especially Uzbekistan, occupies centrality in US foreign policy. The Caspian Basin represents the biggest oil bonanza on earth. This region can alone guarantee US/Western energy security over the next ten to fifteen years and reduce dependency on the Middle East. It is this which drives US policy, taking priority over any other operating commercial consideration.
The US government envisages Uzbekistan as a strategic, long term partner in its ambitions to assert control over Central Asia. This endorsement has increased since 9/11. With the Afghanistan campaign, the US established a military presence, which it retains. Uzbekistan’s proximity to Afghanistan is important to the US. As part of its plans for consolidation in the area, the US wishes to establish a pipeline to carry gas from Turkmenistan and the boarder Caspian Basin through Afghanistan. To aid this, the US administration has enacted bilateral agreements with Karimnov’s regime, with the commitment to provide aid of $100 million. This aid incorporates a military component, with a commitment to further aid to bolster the regime. However, aspects of this bilateral agreement have been kept secret. (Emphases are mine.)
Dealings, arm sales, and oil. W[h]ere have we heard this story before?