Sy Hersh at Berkeley on Iraq...."we are bombing the hell out of them"

[madfloridian]

http://www.berkeley.edu/news/media/releases/2004/10/11_hersh.shtml

BERKELEY – The Iraq war is not winnable, a secret U.S. military unit has been "disappearing" people since December 2001, and America has no idea how irreparably its torture of Iraqis at Abu Ghraib prison has damaged its image in the Middle East. These were just a few of the grim pronouncements made by Pulitzer Prize–winning investigative reporter Seymour "Sy" Hersh to KQED host Michael Krasny before a Berkeley audience on Friday night (Oct. 8).

The past two years will "go down as one of the classic sort of failures" in history, said the man who has been called the "greatest muckraker of all time" and (paradoxically) the "enfant terrible of journalism for more than 30 years." While Hersh blamed the White House and the Pentagon for the Iraq quagmire and America's besmirched world image, he was stymied by how it all happened. "How could eight or nine neoconservatives come and take charge of this government?" he asked. "They overran the bureaucracy, they overran the Congress, they overran the press, and they overran the military! So you say to yourself, How fragile is this democracy?"

I realized that someone posted this earlier, but it needs to be kept in view. It is horribly sad.

[glitch]

1. this is heartbreaking

"My parents were immigrants," Hersh said. "They came here because America meant something…the Statue of Liberty and all that stuff, because America always was this bastion of morality and integrity and a place for a fresh start. And it's right in front of us, not hidden, that they've taken this away from us."

I wish more Americans would get this.

[madfloridian]

2. It is horribly sad.

And the media is letting them get away with it so far.

[Wind Dancer]

3. Thanks for posting this info!

I have tried to watch all of his speaking engagements since he started this investigation. He is one of my all time favorite investigative journalists - one of the few willing to report facts.

[madfloridian]

4. "He said they just shot them one by one." Iraqi granary guards shot

"They just shot them one by one"

There was more — rumors of atrocities around Iraq that to Hersh brought back memories of My Lai. In the evening's most emotional moment, Hersh talked about a call he had gotten from a first lieutenant in charge of a unit stationed halfway between Baghdad and the Syrian border. His group was bivouacking outside of town in an agricultural area, and had hired 30 or so Iraqis to guard a local granary. A few weeks passed. They got to know the men they hired, and to like them. Then orders came down from Baghdad that the village would be "cleared." Another platoon from the soldier's company came and executed the Iraqi granary guards. All of them.

"He said they just shot them one by one. And his people, and he, and the villagers of course, went nuts," Hersh said quietly. "He was hysterical, totally hysterical. He went to the company captain, who said, 'No, you don't understand, that's a kill. We got 36 insurgents. Don't you read those stories when the Americans say we had a combat maneuver and 15 insurgents were killed?'

"It's shades of Vietnam again, folks: body counts," Hersh continued. "You know what I told him? I said, 'Fella, you blamed the captain, he knows that you think he committed murder, your troops know that their fellow soldiers committed murder. Shut up. Complete your tour. Just shut up! You're going to get a bullet in the back.' And that's where we are in this war."

[Nordic]

5. How did they do it? They caused 9/11, that's how

The more I look at it the more I'm convinced that the neo-cons caused 9/11.

Look at terror attacks throughout recent history. Not one, not ONE has ever had anything close to the sophistication of 9/11. Terrorists are quite happy with crude, messy attacks, car bombs, suicide bombs strapped to whoever, machine gun attacks, bombs in people's SHOES for cryin' out loud .....

9/11 just does NOT fit the M.O. of a terrorist attack.

And who wanted/needed a "Pearl Harbor?"

Who had the motivation?

The only way eight of nine PNACers were able to do what he is decrying is to cause 9/11.

[RebelYell]

6. Kicking this

Support the esteemed Mr. Hersh and buy his book. He's one of the few journalists we've got left that actually deserve the title.

[madfloridian]

7. He is a very angry man on the video....he deserves the title.

I just listened to the whole hour and 20 minutes, and it was quite painful that my country is doing this.

The war is lost, we failed. Simple, clear message. And what we have done will remain in the nightmares of our youth who did it.

[Emboldened Chimp]

8. His book, Chain of Command, lays it out there for all to see...

It's not entirely shocking that 8-9 neocons were able to hijack the government, since Congress essentially ceded it to them with little or no complaint. Add into the mix 9/11 and the subsequent fears of being unpatriotic that come with it, and it's not hard to see at all. We need to vote these bastards out this November.

[RaleighNCDUer]

9. Kick

I'm going to pick up his book right after payday.