Our Abu Ghraib

Nine Eleven "changed everything" has become a popular saying among some. In fact, nothing has changed since 1775. The imperialist mindset remains unchanged. The then founders killed the Native American Indians and believed that they are giving themselves a free America. The current (hopefully outgoing) President shamelessly apologized to a powerless King, instead to the victims. Their pain is only compounded when the President distances himself with the rhetoric that the Nazi-like behavior was merely the "wrongdoing of a few". Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, however, indicates that the terrorism of torture was cleared with lawyers.

The popular press joins the imperial masters in debating pictures, prison guards and chain of command. The attacker's perspective is inundated while the victims' perspective is completely blotted out. They do not understand, no tragedy can ever be understood without the victims' perspective. 

Brigadier General Janis Leigh Karpinski, a New Yorker of Jewish background on the fast track, who guarded their Abu Ghraib, was replaced with the Major General Geoffrey Miller, the commander in charge of the prison at Guantanamo, the outlaw land where no law holds. One can soar high or dive deep to imagine the possible improvements that the Guantanamo chief may have now brought to Abu Ghraib! 

The very little that we now know about Guantanamo and by extension it's Commander in charge, Miller is through the interviews given by the "Tipton Three" of UK (Shafiq Rasul, Ruhal Ahmed and Asif Iqbal) to Guardian Newspaper . They all survived three months of solitary confinement for acts they did not commit. The Guardian reports Ahmed saying "all the time I was kneeling with a guy standing on the backs of my legs and another holding a gun to my head." The Tipton Three are yet to have the privilege of getting a simple five letter "sorry" from neither Bush, Blair or other government agencies responsible for Camp X-Ray.

Another Abu Ghraib that is yet to be discovered is within and amidst us. America's patronage to the pornographic "industry" made it one of the most profitable businesses with domestic annual revenue of $12 billion. The glamour of defense industry lures growing minds and turns them into the likes of Brigadier General Kapinski who said, "I think what attracted me originally was that the Army offered the opportunities to do all the exciting things I could never do as a school teacher or in any other capacity." What better excitement than brutalizing Muslims, especially getting Muslim women raped!

The end products of glamorizing sex and violence are the likes of Lynndie England, Charles Grainer, Steven Stefanowicz, John Israel (prison guards at Abu Ghraib), George Bush, Dick Cheney, Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz, Daniel Pipes, and others, such as the infamous young men of Columbine. With the blooming industries of pornography, gambling, drugs and violence, our homemade Abu Ghraib will unfold itself sooner or later.

The discourse that is equally important if not more, is to genuinely explore the deep rooted causes for such inhumane behavior by the soldiers and the leaders of the USA.

The rare courageous journalist, Seymour Hersh reports in a recent piece in New Yorker that Mr. Rumsfeld chafed over what he saw as the reluctance of senior Pentagon generals and admirals to act aggressively. By mid-2002, he and his senior aides were exchanging secret memorandums on modifying the culture of the military leaders and finding ways to encourage them "to take greater risks." One memo spoke derisively of the generals in the Pentagon, and said, "Our prerequisite of perfection for 'actionable intelligence' has paralyzed us. We must accept that we may have to take action before every question can be answered." 

In stark contrast to Hersh is a Lt. Gen. William Boykin , an evangelical Christian (under review) for saying "his God was superior to that of the Muslims", is now also linked to the abuses of detainees in Iraq.

Islamophobia today is as much a reality as anti-Semitism was during the Nazi Germany. Assimilated Muslims in the Yugoslavia were made to drop their pants (Muslims were identified by their circumcision) and the Muslim women in France are made to reveal their hair, both to prove their patriotism. The West is rarely content with the Muslims.

The founding leadership of America killed Native American Indians and later generations thrived on plantations manned by African slaves, and the current leadership also wants to assure an equal place in history. They shamelessly articulate to convince the citizenry that smaller nukes that can actually be used and are better than the big ones that cannot be used. Simple Economics 101. 

Talking of economy, our Defense Department finds itself helpless in spite of a budget six times bigger ($400 billion) than the budget of education department ($70 billion). They award millions of dollars worth of contracts to private contractors run by former government (defense department) employees who then become 'interrogators' at places like Abu Ghraib. 

Titan Corporation is one such organization. It is based out of San Diego with approximately 12,000 employees and annual sales of approximately $2.0 billion, with 95 percent of its revenues coming from U.S. government defense contracts. Their clientele includes the Department of Homeland Security, the Department of Defense and all branches of the armed services. Their A to Z product line includes products such as "Advanced Training Solutions", "Affordable Weapon", to a X-Craft. 

Steven Stefanowicz of Titan Corporation is an alleged "interrogator" of Abu Ghraib. The ex-generals and colonels who started Titan perhaps trained him. The Titan, that could either be as the Titanic (in size) or the other Titan whose ideological white supremacist doctrine was that all civilization was created by the "white" race, led in particular by the "Nordic" race and that the civilizations of Greece and Rome declined due to mixture with the African and Middle-Eastern slaves. Therefore, Stefanowicz may have believed that the Abu Ghraib enslaved prisoners must be treated as such. Urinating at and keeping human beings in a leash can be done only with such twisted titanic beliefs. Christian extremism has once again interpreted a la Hitler. 

Unlike those who seemingly enjoyed torture, rape and sodomy, a courageous young man (a.k.a. whistleblower) from within, Army Specialist Joseph Darby slipped an anonymous note under the door of his commander. His simple and quiet act has become the single biggest reason to expose the heinous acts of US soldiers at Abu Ghraib. Joseph Darby is a hero to some but not to all. In the land of the free, his wife now fears retaliation for a noble act of her honest husband! 

Darby and other such courageous people prove that actions that are genuine and sincere do make a difference. The commanders can only perpetuate death and destruction with their new smaller but more lethal toys, also known as nukes. 

The Army and War Colleges must remember the words of Margaret Mead who once said, "I have spent most of my life studying the lives of other peoples -- faraway peoples -- so that Americans might better understand themselves." 

It is time that "everyone" in America follows the advice of Margaret Mead, else we will soon find ourselves in our own Abu Ghraib.

Shakeel Syed is a freelance writer and lives in California.