at-Largely

Day After "Appeasement" Remark, Ghost of Prescott Bush Hovers Over WH (satire)

Posted by Brad Jacobson

One day after President Bush likened presumptive Democratic nominee Barack Obama to those who appeased Adolph Hitler, the ghost of the president's grandfather, Prescott Bush - in an SS uniform, muttering German and gesticulating angrily - has been hovering high above the White House since dawn.

An anonymous Bush administration staffer said the White House initially believed MoveOn.org, which many administration officials have compared to Hamas, had orchestrated the specter of Bush's grandfather. (Prescott Bush, a true American hero, helped fund Hitler's war machine and, as the BBC revealed last year, co-conspired to overthrow President Roosevelt to create a Nazi-style government in America.) But MoveOn.org spokesman Adam Green denied his organization's involvement, saying, "Dude, if we could do that, we would've done it a long, long time ago. We would've saved a lot of money."

Prescott's ghost has attracted crowds of onlookers who might otherwise have taken the usual long-distance gaze at the White House before moving on to the Capitol's heavily trafficked monuments. One dumbstruck eyewitness, Stanley Huffle, a history professor at American University, said, 'It's as if history and karma have merged."

Around noon, the National Guard attempted to shoot down Prescott's ghost or at least disperse him to a less visible area. But the bullets merely sailed through his shadowy form, only seeming to further inflame his rhetoric. A passing German tourist quoted him as saying, "Our failure to please the fuhrer has led directly to this point in history, where a schwartze might be president, homosexuals can marry in California, and bagels are more commonplace than f***ing Wonder Bread!"

Following yesterday's heated Hardball confrontation between host Chris Matthews and right-wing radio personality Kevin James, James returned to discuss Prescott's ghost with Matthews.

"You see, Chris, like I said yesterday, Obama is an appeaser," began James. "Fine. Whatever," replied Matthews. "Just tell me whose ghost is floating above the White House right now."

"Look, Chris, an appeaser appeases those who make use of appeasement, which leaves us vulnerable to another 9/11-style attack." Matthews repeated, "I've asked you a simple question. Who is hovering sixty feet above our White House, sir?"

"But that's not the point, Chris. Appeasement--" "Listen, you mutant, just answer the question. You don't know. Do you? Do you?" "Of course I do, Chris. It's the, the...ghost of appeasement's past or something."

"Wow. Wow. You really just lucked into that, didn't you? Just stepped right in it."

"If luck means appeasement, then yes."

"You're an idiot. Thanks for coming on."

"Thank you, Chris."

During an impromptu White House press conference, press secretary Dana Perino told reporters, "First, let me start by saying that though some candidates think the afterworld revolves around them, the appearance of Prescott's ghost over the White House has nothing to do with President Bush's speech in the Knesset yesterday."

Veteran White House reporter Helen Thomas replied, "Sure. Pay no attention to the man behind the cloud."

Cross-posted from MediaBloodhound.

Bush "manifesting the Zionist vision"

Posted By Cernig

Yesterday, I wrote that while a by-blow of Bush's Knesset speech may well have been to attack Obama and other Democratic rivals, the main purpose was to give a "wink and a nod" to Israeli hardliners that in the closing days of his presidency they can do no wrong - including attack Iran, should Israel wish to, or scuppering any chance of a Palestinian peace process.

Reports in the Israeli media say that Israel got Bush's message, loud and clear.

"We are on the same page. We both see the threat ... And we both understand that tangible action is required to prevent the Iranians from moving forward on a nuclear weapon," Olmert spokesman Mark Regev said.

Regev described diplomatic efforts so far to exert pressure on Iran as "positive", but added: "It is clearly not sufficient and it's clear that additional steps will have to be taken".

Asked about the option of using military force, Regev said: "Leaders of many countries have talked about many options being on the table and, of course, Israel agrees with that."

Senior officials in Jerusalem said Thursday that Israel is fully satisfied with the results of Bush's visit, including policy on Iran's nuclear program.

"In talks with the president of the United States during his visit it was made clear that Bush's statements on the subject of Iran's nuclear program are fully backed in practice," a senior official said.

One Zionist member of the Knesset even suggested Bush's next job should be to replace Olmert as Israeli PM.

As a former Knesset speaker, MK Reuven Rivlin, put it Thursday, "I wish our leaders would make speeches like this." Rivlin described Bush as "manifesting the Zionist vision."

Contrary to the applause Bush received for his address, the speech by Prime Minister Olmert was less popular and stirred considerable controversy.

Olmert promised that when there is a peace agreement it "will be approved by a large majority in the Knesset and it will be supported by the vast majority of the Israeli public."

Two MKs from the National Union, Zvi Hendel and Uri Ariel, left the plenum in protest, complaining that the event was "used to promote a political agenda that is opposed by most of the Israeli public."
Hendel issued a statement calling on Olmert "to learn from the president of the United States what Zionism is."

MK Aryeh Eldad (National Union) called out during Olmert's speech, "in your dreams."

He later proposed that Bush should replace Olmert.

Olmert mainly drew criticism for parts of his speech concerning the Palestinian peace process, saying that "we will bring before the Knesset an agreement that is based on the vision of two states for two peoples. This agreement will be approved by a large majority in the Knesset and the entire nation." That's when Hendel and Ariel walked out.

Perhaps they should have been more patient. Today Olmert made it clear he wanted no peace process at all, as he denied to Palestinians what Israeli Jews have held themselves had all these years - a right of return.

Six months into negotiations sponsored by Bush in the hope of a deal before he leaves the White House, Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's spokesman used some of the toughest Israeli language yet to insist that President Mahmoud Abbas abandon 60-year-old refugee claims if he wants to establish a Palestinian state.

"This demand, which does not exist under international law, for right of return, is the ultimate deal breaker. You cannot have peace and this demand at the same time," Mark Regev said.

Some 700,000 people, half the Arab population of Palestine in May 1948, fled or were driven from their homes when Israel was created. Letting them and their families live in Israel now would undermine its nature as a Jewish state, Israel argues.

It also disputes the legal basis of the right of the return first set out in a United Nations resolution of December 1948.

There's no doubt in my mind that Bush's speech - which described Israel "the redemption of an ancient promise given to Abraham, Moses, and David - a homeland for the chosen people in Eretz Yisrael," has given Olmert all the political cover he needs to torpedo the Bush administration's own hopes for a deal. Needless to say, Palestinians are not happy.

Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat told Reuters: "He should have told the Israelis that, 1 mile from where he was speaking, there is a nation that has lived in disaster for 60 years. He should have told the Israelis no one can be free at the expense of others. He missed this opportunity and we are disappointed."

...In the Palestinian newspaper al-Ayyam, columnist Samih Shabib wrote: "Bush is blind to the right of return.

"The U.S. administration's attitude towards Israel inherently promotes hostility and deepens hatred towards the United States and its policy. Is this hostility, and its consequences, in America's interest? I don't think so."

You can see why Bush likes to think that diplomacy and negotiation are weak and "appeasing" - he's so bloody bad at them. He's much better at bringing violence and war through tough talk and ill-judged adventures.

All the President's Nazis (real and imagined): An Open Letter to Bush

(cross-posted at Huffington Post)

Dear Mr. Bush,

Your speech on the Knesset floor today was not only a disgrace; it was nothing short of treachery. Worse still, your exploitation of the Holocaust in a country carved out of the wounds of that very crime, in order to strike a low blow at American citizens whose politics differs from your own is unforgivable and unpardonable. Let me remind you, Mr. Bush, of your words today:

"Some seem to believe we should negotiate with terrorists and radicals, as if some ingenious argument will persuade them they have been wrong all along," Bush said at Israel's 60th anniversary celebration in Jerusalem.

"We have heard this foolish delusion before," Bush said in remarks to Israel's parliament, the Knesset. "As Nazi tanks crossed into Poland in 1939, an American senator declared: 'Lord, if only I could have talked to Hitler, all of this might have been avoided.' We have an obligation to call this what it is -- the false comfort of appeasement, which has been repeatedly discredited by history."

Well Mr. Bush, the only thing this comment lacked was a mirror and some historical facts. You want to discuss the crimes of Nazis against my family and millions of other families in Europe during World War II? Let me revive a favorite phrase of yours: Bring. It. On!

The All-American Nazi

Your family's fortune is built on the bones of the very people butchered by the Nazis, my family and the families of those in the Knesset who applauded you today:

WASHINGTON -- President Bush's grandfather was a director of a bank seized by the federal government because of its ties to a German industrialist who helped bankroll Adolf Hitler's rise to power, government documents show.

Prescott Bush was one of seven directors of Union Banking Corp. (search), a New York investment bank owned by a bank controlled by the Thyssen family, according to recently declassified National Archives documents reviewed by The Associated Press.

Fritz Thyssen was an early financial supporter of Hitler, whose Nazi party Thyssen believed was preferable to communism.

--snip--

Both Harrimans and Bush were partners in the New York investment firm of Brown Brothers, Harriman and Co., which handled the financial transactions of the bank as well as other financial dealings with several other companies linked to Bank voor Handel that were confiscated by the U.S. government during World War II.

Union Banking was seized by the government in October 1942 under the Trading with the Enemy Act.

A Wink And A Nod

Posted By Cernig

Today I read Bush's speech at the Knesset and thought "Aye, there's yet another another 'wink and a nod' to Israel for an attack, if they want it."

Some seem to believe we should negotiate with terrorists and radicals, as if some ingenious argument will persuade them they have been wrong all along. We have heard this foolish delusion before. As Nazi tanks crossed into Poland in 1939, an American senator declared: "Lord, if only I could have talked to Hitler, all of this might have been avoided." We have an obligation to call this what it is – the false comfort of appeasement, which has been repeatedly discredited by history.

...America stands with you in breaking up terrorist networks and denying the extremists sanctuary. And America stands with you in firmly opposing Iran's nuclear weapons ambitions. Permitting the world's leading sponsor of terror to possess the world's deadliest weapon would be an unforgivable betrayal of future generations. For the sake of peace, the world must not allow Iran to have a nuclear weapon.

Most American pundits want to see Bush's remarks as an attack on Barrack Obama but folks - it's not always about your country and your political races. For one thing, as Brian Katulis adroitly notes, if negotiating is appeasement then the Bush administration has done an awful lot of appeasement itself over the last seven years. And Brian doesn't even mention working with Sunni Awakening members in Iraq who not too long ago were terrorists attacking US forces! For another, if Bush's remarks were really intended to help John McCain, the latter wouldn't go shooting himself in the foot like this:

“Yes, there have been appeasers in the past, and the president is exactly right, and one of them is Neville Chamberlain,'’ Mr. McCain told reporters on his campaign bus after a speech in Columbus, Ohio. “I believe that it’s not an accident that our hostages came home from Iran when President Reagan was president of the United States. He didn’t sit down in a negotiation with the religious extremists in Iran, he made it very clear that those hostages were coming home.'’

Need I say that "Iran-Contra" and "appeasement" really do belong in the same sentence together?

No, (probably) even Bush's speechwriters aren't so crass as to make such a blindingly partisan move in the American electoral race when their dummy is acting as Head of State of both Democratic and Republican Americans at a major international event. We need to look beyond purely domestic motivations - and we'll find them in the aspirations and dreams of the neoconservative lobby and their Very Serious Person enablers in the media.

Yesterday, University of Columbia journalsim Professor Todd Gitlin had a very timely post at Talking Points Memo which, I think, points to Bush's real agenda.

I'm attending Shimon Peres' President's Conference on the occasion of the 60th anniversary of the State of Israel... for two days now, so many speakers have been preoccupied with Iran, and talking rather casually about the prospect of a preventive strike.

The sense of threat here is vivid, it is deeply felt, it is completely comprehensible, and it rises occasionally, or more than occasionally, to a well-nigh hysterical pitch--so much so that the Amerian strategist Edward Luttwak arose Monday night at a banquet at Peres' house to warn assembled luminaries against fearing annihilation at the hands of an Ahmadinejad who, after all, was not Hitler but Mussolini, and an inept one at that. It is not lost on any Israeli that Ahmadinejad, in his usual delicate manner, last week called Israel a "stinking corpse."

Weirdly, at a Wednesday afternoon workshop, the selfsame Luttwak declared that Iran's reformers would actually welcome a sharp outsider's attack on their nuclear facilities. No other panelist disputed his suggestion, which was greeted with much applause from a largely Israeli audience.

Which explains Bush's thinly-veiled threats of regime change in his speech.

After Luttwak's proclamation, and a game but much less applauded attempt by UCLA Professor Steven L. Spiegel to speak up for an alliance-negotiation approach to Iran instead of a mlitary attack, the session moderator, Israel's former ambassador to the US, Itamar Rabinovitch, somehow intimated--I'm sorry I didn't take down his exact words--that Israel's government would put it to Bush that if he didn't take action, Israel would.

Just outside the hall, I ran into a friend, also a liberal Jew, who had attended the same session, wasn't sitting with me but heard the same implicit threat. Alarmed (can one be too alarmed about such matters?), and assuming that Rabinovitch would be well informed, we checked out our dire impression with a sober, well-connected European official. This person isn't quite sure what's up against Iran but also worries that such an attack might be in the offing even if no government in Europe would be onboard.

And veteran British political reform campaigner Anthony Barnett adds in comments to Gitlin's post:

I have heard the same concerns in London. The 'urgency' is that the Russians are providing significant ground-to-air systems which apparently are likely to be operational by September and could be relatively effective given the distances and the need for more than one strike and therefore the lack of surprise. It seems that the Bush administration is regarded as too weak and the US military too opposed for an American strike to be considered - so it has to be an Israeli one permitted by Washington over the summer.

Bush, in his speech to the Knesset, signalled clearly that his administration will quietly support Israel if it decided to take direct action against Iran - as it did recently against Syria. It's worth noting that any Israeli attack on Iran would almost certainly have to transit Iraqi airspace.

Germany Declines To Copy Rice's NSC "Failure"

Posted By Cernig

How long do you think America's reputation will take to recover from the Bush administration's ineptness?

Germany's foreign minister has rejected plans by Chancellor Angela Merkel's party to set up a U.S.-style National Security Council to oversee foreign policy, saying the body proved a failure in the run-up to the Iraq war.

Frank-Walter Steinmeier said in a speech in Berlin on Monday that the U.S. NSC, which was run by Condoleezza Rice when the United States launched its invasion of Iraq, had "suppressed all counterarguments" to the war in 2003.

"This cannot be the model for us," said Steinmeier, a member of the centre-left Social Democrats, who under former chancellor Gerhard Schroeder staunchly opposed the Iraq war.

Decades, that's how long. For as long as the U.S. is in Iraq, and a while after that, America's reputation will be that of the superpower that started a war by fixing the intelligence around the policy, just because it could.

Our beloved leader... not really...

With 80%+ of the US public not much liking our leader, Bush has found love in the arms of a foreign nation, Israel... nope, not hardly.  In Jerusalem, over 14,000 police officers have to guard Bush from the public.  Yes, one city has to basically empty out its police stations so that the most unpopular leader in the history of the United States can make a cameo to spin the "we come in peace" version of reality.  Maybe Bush should go to where he is most at home - Saudi Arabia.

Pakistan goes political kaboom...

This is looking worse and worse:

"Pakistan's six-week-old coalition is unraveling because of a dispute over whether to remove President Pervez Musharraf, undermining efforts to rein in surging food prices and maintain stability.    

Nine ministers from Nawaz Sharif's party withdrew from the cabinet today after the former Prime Minister failed to win the reinstatement of justices who might force Musharraf's ouster. Sharif's senior coalition partner, Asif Ali Zardari, favors leaving the former army general as president while stripping away powers he seized during eight years of military rule.    

The stalemate has hampered government efforts to control inflation, which jumped last month to its highest rate in at least 25 years, and to ensure food for the poorer half of Pakistan's 160 million people. The struggle between Sharif's Pakistan Muslim League and Zardari's Pakistan Peoples Party is helping Musharraf regain influence after his supporters lost half of their National Assembly seats in the February election.    

``The country is on the brink of a social upheaval because of food prices and the fact that people are struggling to survive,'' said Ishtiaq Ahmed, a political scientist at Quaid-i- Azam University in Islamabad. The division ``strengthens the hand'' of Musharraf's camp, ``which keeps power through a strategy of divide and rule,'' Ahmed said."

The good news is in this mess (if such a mess can have good news) is that at least in Pakistan someone  is willing to fight for the people. In the US, extremely high gas prices have made Congress stand up and...  and... and ... engage in bipartisan finger-pointing. 

Oh, and the firing of justices in Pakistan? Well that too appears to be part of someone in Pakistan fighting for the people. In the US, the firing of US Attorneys who would not engage in political prosecutions (and the retaining of US Attorneys who did) has gotten Congress to... to... write more letters demanding answers.

Yes,  in a third-world country - falling apart and infested with terrorists of the actual al Qaeda variety - government officials of two parties whose leaders have either been assassinated or have had an assassination attempt on their life still seem to be fighting for the people.

The bad news is that with this much instability and with Bush throwing nuclear-war hopes toward Iran, the failed war on terror will implode into an all out free-for all. If only we had a Congress who might stop funding the Iraq war and actually have some concern for our national security. 

Freedom is on the farce!

Just Another Militia

Posted By Cernig

Would anyone like to speculate how long the newly-agreed truce between Maliki and Sadr will last?

Not Long. Especially given this video to inflame tempers. The London Times describes it:

A humvee military vehicle idles on a broad avenue as an Iraqi army soldier walks nonchalantly past without so much as a glance at the body slung across the bonnet.

The dead man’s trousers have been pulled down to his ankles, exposing white underwear below a torn T-shirt drenched in blood from wounds to his chest and side.

Behind is a second Humvee with another body sprawled over the front, arms and legs outstretched. On his white shirt, a large bloodstain indicates the wound that may have killed him. A soldier sitting on the roof dangles his legs over the windscreen and seems to prod the corpse’s stomach with his boot.

As the vehicles roll slowly forward, the tooting of car horns rises to a crescendo in apparent celebration of victory in battle and the sound of whooping and gunshots can be heard.

A police officer in a blue uniform drives alongside, smiling as the Humvees are waved forward by a pedestrian in civilian clothes and head towards two large arches that span the road. The bodies are being paraded like prize stags after a hunt.

The film, which appears to have been made with a mobile phone, was passed to The Sunday Times by a senior official close to Moqtada al-Sadr, the radical Shi’ite cleric who leads the Mahdi Army militia.

The official said it had come from Basra and showed the bodies of two Mahdi fighters who died after the Iraqi army launched an offensive in the southern port city in March with the aim of liberating it from the grip of warring militias.

There was no way to corroborate the official’s information or to identify the dead men as Mahdi fighters, but the vehicles bear Iraqi army markings and the arches glimpsed in the film resemble a Basra landmark.

It doesn't take much brights to correctly predict Sadrist reactions:

Mahdi sources said the parading of corpses would increase distrust of Nouri al-Maliki, the prime minister, and his army, which is largely trained and supported by the United States.

“The Mahdi will not surrender its weapons to such an army,” said one commander. “They say we are outlaws but this video just goes to prove that Maliki’s forces are nothing more than a militia. They will never take Sadr City unless they wipe out each and every one of us.”

...An Iraqi lawyer who has advised Maliki’s government said the two videos showed soldiers and police in serious breach of the law. “Desecrating a corpse is prohibited in law, even if he had been the worst criminal on earth,” said Maen Zaki, a former member of a government committee that handled legal issues arising from operations to restore order in Baghdad.

I suspect that the video is genuine and that the perpetrators are members of the ISCI's Badr Brigade which was largely folded into the Iraqi Army so that it could be re-defined as not a militia anymore. It's worth putting the blood-feud between the Sadrists and the Badrists into a wider historical context here, and as James Glantz points out, the new book by veteran UK reporter Patrick Cockburn does just that:

In late March, Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki threw nearly 40,000 Iraqi Army and police forces, backed by American air support, into an assault on the southern city of Basra, figuring it would take him a few days to smash the Shiite militias in control of many of the city’s neighborhoods. Instead, the Mahdi Army, the militia led by Moktada, initially fought the government to a standstill.

There was probably not a single adult Iraqi who missed the strong historical resonances of that confrontation, and few Americans who did catch them. Understandably so: not even a Trivial Pursuit champion is likely to know that it was Moktada’s father-in-law, Muhammad Baqir al-Sadr, who formed a Shiite religious party called Dawa, or “the Call,” under the nose of Iraq’s last king. Dawa not only outlasted the king, who met a bloody end in 1958, but became so influential that it threatened the regime of a later Iraqi head of state named Saddam Hussein.

...For Prime Minister Maliki, one positive outcome of his inconclusive assault on the Mahdi Army in Basra is that the Islamic Supreme Council of Iraq, a crucial part of his coalition that is led by another noted Shiite family, the Hakims, has warmed to him considerably after years of regarding him warily.

That isolated fact means little until you know that during years of exile in Tehran, Damascus and elsewhere, the Hakims continually accused Muhammad Sadiq al-Sadr of being a collaborator with the Hussein regime. The rivalry between the Hakims and the Sadrs has never died, and in Iraq it won’t soon be forgotten. The prime minister may have depicted the operation in Basra as purely a matter of clearing armed bandits from the streets. But the fact remains that whoever those gunmen were, they withdrew only when Moktada ordered them to.

Red Alert - While you were counting polls...

My good friend and former CIA spook Phil Giraldi has some disturbing news in the American Conservative:

"There is considerable speculation and buzz in Washington today suggesting that the National Security Council has agreed in principle to proceed with plans to attack an Iranian al-Qods-run camp that is believed to be training Iraqi militants.  The camp that will be targeted is one of several located near Tehran. Secretary of Defense Robert Gates was the only senior official urging delay in taking any offensive action.  The decision to go ahead with plans to attack Iran is the direct result of concerns being expressed over the deteriorating situation in Lebanon, where Iranian ally Hezbollah appears to have gained the upper hand against government forces and might be able to dominate the fractious political situation.  The White House contacted the Iranian government directly yesterday through a channel provided by the leadership of the Kurdish region in Iraq, which has traditionally had close ties to Tehran.

<snip>

It is to be presumed that the attack will be as “pinpoint” and limited as possible, intended to target only al-Qods and avoid civilian casualties.  The decision to proceed with plans for an attack is not final.  The President will still have to give the order to launch after all preparations are made."

I have said this before and I will say it again. I am convinced that the Cheney-side of the Bush-Cheney administration will take a scorchand burn policy on their way out. They know a Democrat will take the White House, so I suspect strongly that sometime after the November election, but before the new President is sworn in, this bunch will launch a hit on Iran and leave the mess for the new administration. If we only had a Congress who could decide on matters of war... oh well.

Yes, We Do Body Counts

Posted By Cernig

Over at Salon today there's a disturbing story of the kind of hyperkinetic and ultimately harmful counter-insurgency tactics which are being driven by a top-down demand for results in Iraq. The article explores the events surrounding the murder of an Iraqi farmer by a U.S. sniper team and relates it to pressure for body counts by commanders who then walk away untouched by the legal fallout of their subordinates' actions.

A review of thousands of pages of documents from the legal proceedings obtained by Salon shows that in the months prior to [the Iraqi farmer, Genei Nesir Khudair al-Janabi]’s death, the young snipers, already frustrated by guerrilla tactics, were pressed to their physical limits and pushed by officers to stretch the bounds of the laws of war in order to increase the enemy body count. When the United States wallowed in Vietnam’s counterinsurgency quagmire decades ago, the same pressure placed on soldiers resulted in some of the worst atrocities of that war.[…]

The pressure from above for more bodies was also toxic in Iraq, where the isolated, outnumbered and outgunned snipers of the 1st Battalion had to make split-second life-or-death decisions. When those decisions landed them in a military court, it was the lowest-ranking soldiers, not the brass, who paid the price, and a sergeant who said he was pushed into taking a fatal shot who wound up with a long prison sentence. It was battalion commander Lt. Col Robert Balcavage, who pushed for a higher body count, who initiated the prosecution of three of the battalion’s snipers.

The original article is several pages long and bears reading carefully. Matt Duss at The Wonk Room observes:

I think we’ve seen this “dead bodies=success” mentality bleed out into pro-war blogs as well, where the numbers of insurgent dead are credulously relayed and uncritically reported as progress, irrespective of the collateral damage incurred in those deaths and of the galvanizing effects that this has on support for insurgency. (Of course, if you’re someone who believes that trying not to create more insurgents is irrelevant to the task of counterinsurgency, then no big deal. I suppose one could always apply the Bush Doctrine on the ground in Iraq, and justify the murder of Genei Nesir Khudair al-Janabi on the theory that he might, one day, have joined the insurgency. But then you’d have to kill his son, and then all his friends, too. Nice war we’ve got going here, huh?)

The murder of Genei Nesir Khudair al-Janabi, and the atmosphere in which it occurred, is reminiscent of the Abu Ghraib abuses. In both cases, a high-pressure environment, hazy rules of engagement, and pressure from above to produce usable intelligence/dead “insurgents” led to atrocity. In both cases, the lowest men down were punished for carrying out the directives of their commanders (and Commander-in-Chief), while those commanders were left untouched.

It appears that the Vietnamization of the military is inevitable whenever the officer corps is decimated by principled junior officers quitting after multiple stressful tours, leaving too many tough guy/big ego/inferiority complex guys in command who are unfit for leading COIN operations. The moral is to not get into wars of choice in the first place, but the damage may take a generation to repair.