New pictures of torture in Iraq....
New pictures of torture in Iraq....
I just read about it on yahoo. There are 1600+ photos and I'll post parts of the article in a second. I don't know my take on all this...It is a WAR, and not all information should be public knowledge. They are doing things to people who are killing our men. Those guys blow up buses, buildings, roads, brutalize others...now for information and to break them down and make them want to stop our guys are taking it to them. BY ANY MEANS NECESSARY... Releasing those photos may have also endangered our own troops. The guy on the television showing all the pictures is aiding in the death of our guys. We are outraging their people even more, which has lead to a beheading in the last few days. Sweep it under the rug...It is war...we aren't over there being shot at, so we don't need to every little piece of information that is going on. If you had bombs going off while you were driving down the road, you were shot at, you would want to hurt the guy doing it as well most likely.
The other side of me says...when we do this, it makes us look just like them. Do we want that? How are we any different? Our killing of their soldiers was reported to be through major abuse and what not over a few days. At least the beheading was a quick death. It was more of a political ploy or scare tactic to get to the PUBLIC of our country so our views would change and be against our own people.
I really think you should read this entire section. I will bold the sentence at the end...I really like it. It shows that people that saw it can make it sound worse than it was, etc as a political ploy to help themselves...
Anyway some info about the new pictures:
House and Senate members saw photos and video Wednesday of Iraqi corpses, military dogs menacing cowering Iraqi prisoners, Iraqi women forced to expose themselves and other sexual abuses.
Some lawmakers said the pictures included forced homosexual sex; others said the quality of the photos were too poor to discern what was happening.
The 1,600-plus photos, which included scenes of abuse mixed in with travelogue-type snapshots, were in addition to those that already surfaced publicly depicting abuse and sexual humiliation at Abu Ghraib prison near Baghdad. The photos have created international condemnation and threatened to undermine U.S. military and rebuilding efforts in Iraq.
Lawmakers said the new photos showed small groups of soldiers — fewer than a dozen — abusing the prisoners. Many of the soldiers' faces were already familiar from photos published worldwide. It wasn't clear whether all the abuse took place at Abu Ghraib or at other locations, they said.
The photos were seized from service members and included many shots unrelated to the investigation, such as pictures of historic sites. Some photos showed what appeared to be soldiers having sex. Because of the vast number of photos — and members coming and going — not all saw the same slides, and impressions varied.
"I saw cruel, sadistic torture," said Rep. Jane Harman, D-Calif., who added that some of the images were of male prisoners masturbating. She said she saw a man hitting himself against a wall as though to knock himself unconscious.
Sen. Ben Nelson, D-Neb., said he did not see acts of violence, but what appeared to be "results of acts of violence."
He said he saw people in body bags and a person with a face "virtually gone." He saw "people being stitched up above the eyebrow apparently unconscious."
Rep. Gary Ackerman, D-N.Y., said, "There were people who were forced to have sex with each other."
Rep. Trent Franks, R-Ariz., said, "There were some pictures where it looked like a prisoner was sodomizing himself" with an object. He said blood was visible in the photograph.
But House Majority Leader Tom DeLay, R-Texas, said he thought "some people are overreacting."
"The people who are against the war are using this to their political ends," he said.
The other side of me says...when we do this, it makes us look just like them. Do we want that? How are we any different? Our killing of their soldiers was reported to be through major abuse and what not over a few days. At least the beheading was a quick death. It was more of a political ploy or scare tactic to get to the PUBLIC of our country so our views would change and be against our own people.
I really think you should read this entire section. I will bold the sentence at the end...I really like it. It shows that people that saw it can make it sound worse than it was, etc as a political ploy to help themselves...
Anyway some info about the new pictures:
House and Senate members saw photos and video Wednesday of Iraqi corpses, military dogs menacing cowering Iraqi prisoners, Iraqi women forced to expose themselves and other sexual abuses.
Some lawmakers said the pictures included forced homosexual sex; others said the quality of the photos were too poor to discern what was happening.
The 1,600-plus photos, which included scenes of abuse mixed in with travelogue-type snapshots, were in addition to those that already surfaced publicly depicting abuse and sexual humiliation at Abu Ghraib prison near Baghdad. The photos have created international condemnation and threatened to undermine U.S. military and rebuilding efforts in Iraq.
Lawmakers said the new photos showed small groups of soldiers — fewer than a dozen — abusing the prisoners. Many of the soldiers' faces were already familiar from photos published worldwide. It wasn't clear whether all the abuse took place at Abu Ghraib or at other locations, they said.
The photos were seized from service members and included many shots unrelated to the investigation, such as pictures of historic sites. Some photos showed what appeared to be soldiers having sex. Because of the vast number of photos — and members coming and going — not all saw the same slides, and impressions varied.
"I saw cruel, sadistic torture," said Rep. Jane Harman, D-Calif., who added that some of the images were of male prisoners masturbating. She said she saw a man hitting himself against a wall as though to knock himself unconscious.
Sen. Ben Nelson, D-Neb., said he did not see acts of violence, but what appeared to be "results of acts of violence."
He said he saw people in body bags and a person with a face "virtually gone." He saw "people being stitched up above the eyebrow apparently unconscious."
Rep. Gary Ackerman, D-N.Y., said, "There were people who were forced to have sex with each other."
Rep. Trent Franks, R-Ariz., said, "There were some pictures where it looked like a prisoner was sodomizing himself" with an object. He said blood was visible in the photograph.
But House Majority Leader Tom DeLay, R-Texas, said he thought "some people are overreacting."
"The people who are against the war are using this to their political ends," he said.