Military Personnel: Don't Read This!

[soundfury]

http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,634638,00.html

It's not exactly every day that the Pentagon warns military personnel to stay away from Fox News. But that's exactly what some hopeful soul at the Department of Defense instructed, in a memo intended to forbid Pentagon staff reading a copy of the Taguba report detailing abuse of detainees at prisons in Iraq that had been posted at the Fox News web site.

The memo also contained four tips on how to plug the leaks of explosive prison-abuse tales. The first is "NOT to go to Fox News to read or obtain a copy" of the Taguba report. The American official in Baghdad received the email on Friday from the Office of the Secretary of Defense's Policy team, marked to "MAL POL ALL POLICY," with a note telling employees that those who have read the Taguba report on the web should "CALL POLICY IT SECURITY IMMEDIATELY!"

[JoFerret]

1. Tar baby Brer Rabbit to Brer Fox

...don't throw me into the bramble bush.

[saigon68]

2. NEOCON JCS CHAIRMAN MERCENARY ENABLER

MEYERS AS OFFENSIVE LINEMAN FOR NEOCON CORPORATIONS



WITHOUT A STRONG LAPDOG RUNNING INTERFERENCE
THERE WOULD BE NO BROWN AND ROOT RECEIVING BILLIONS
Of TAXPAYER $$$$$ TO “RECONSTRUCT IRAQ”




There would be no BLACKWATER USA to have its private MERCENARY ARMY flying its
own PRIVATE MERCENARY AIR FORCE




to do WHATEVER under the sun it does..




THERE WOULD BE NO MERCENARY THUGS ACTING LIKE RAMBO WITHOUT THIS
PATHETIC LITTLE MAN

[steely]

4. It's like watching a movie...

...to see this happen in my lifetime - my country. Mind boggling.

Saigon68 - dude, your comments are the best.

[saigon68]

15. Welcome to DU Steely

Jump right in ----we have some NeoCon butt to kick :-) :-)

[RUMMYisFROSTED]

48. "Talk to the hand, not to the face."

[MissMarple]

62. Hi, sweetheart.

God bless. :D

And oddly enough, I'd like to kick some neocon butt myself. And not figuratively, which is a preferred method.

[Occulus]

53. Scary, isn't it?

I grew up during the end of the Cold War; I remember well the anti-communist rhetoric, but deep down I never understood. I always felt that the threat from communism was less than any of our policy makers believed; as it later was revealed, there was reason for concern from both sides, but it never needed to be escalated to the point that we were on the brink of nuclear war.

Even then, I knew we had rights in this nation and I knew those rights could never be revoked. I understood well the implications of the Amendments; even at the age of twelve I understood that the right to own a gun was the ultimate check and balance. I knew, even then, that here, the people were and are sovereign.

The nation I see today is a pale shadow of that former, happier time. There was and is no real reason for that to have changed. Nonetheless, our rights are slowly being scaled back. Historically speaking, when that does happen to a nation, it is a long time indeed before the pendulum swings back into the favor of the people.

I fear what could happen to this nation by November. I quake at what could come after.

[veracity]

24. Link to Meyers playing card.....

The Meyers card is only one card in the Loaded Deck.. which has all the players in this terrible game...

http://cards.tvnewslies.org

Check out the thumbnails.....

[bolokshi]

56. WTF!!!!

WOW!! this is what we are up against.

[maddezmom]

3. looking for the leak.....................

SUMMARY
Fox News and other media outlets are distributing the Tugabe report (spelling is approximate for reasons which will become obvious momentarily). Someone has given the news media classified information and they are distributing it. THE INFORMATION CONTAINED IN THIS REPORT IS CLASSIFIED. ALL ISD CUSTOMERS SHOULD:

1) NOT GO TO FOX NEWS TO READ OR OBTAIN A COPY
2) NOT comment on this to anyone, friends, family etc.
3) NOT delete the file if you receive it via e-mail, but
4) CALL THE ISD HELPDESK AT 602-2627 IMMEDIATELY

This leakage will be investigated for criminal prosecution. If you don't have the document and have never had legitimate access, please do not complicate the investigative processes by seeking information. Again, THE INFORMATION CONTAINED IN THIS REPORT IS CLASSIFIED; DO NOT GO TO FOX NEWS TO READ OR OBTAIN A COPY.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

more worried about the leaker than the crimes of abuse and torture. :(

[yardwork]

5. It's official. The Pentagon top brass have lost their minds.

This is beyond bizarre.

[LittleApple81]

7. The same person who made Halliburton to stop GIs from using the internet?

n/t

[Skittles]

9. they are out of spin and out of control

it is indeed a sad spectacle.

[bearfan454]

52. Yes indeed,

It is.

[MissMarple]

63. If Robert E. Lee had gone with the North, this would be a different U.S.

The military can be another part of the balance.

[Just Me]

8. Now, why on earth would neocons be less concerned about torture,

,...than their own power?

Ahem,...

:puke:

[2Design]

21. just as rumsfeld is only concerned that there were cameras and internet an

he is not concerned about the torture......just those damn digital cameras.

[Jackpine Radical]

50. I just gotta assume that this is all tongue-in-cheek,

kinda like the Brer Rabbit/briar patch quote above.

This from www.uncle_remus.com?

[thecrow]

58. Is this supposed to scare off those who have downloaded it?

..... like every self respecting American who wanted to know just WTF was in the report?
Or is it just the military who's not supposed to be curious?:crazy:

[peacetalksforall]

6. This must be the weirdest order to come from that pit.

Usually, everything they do is so transparent.

I don't get it.

What is the benefit to them? Is it just to attempt to isolate internal leakers?

Is this called Shock and Awe II? Or Shock and Awe in reverse?

Or is it Boomerang Shock and Awe?

[Dhalgren]

41. I think it is "Shock and AWE, SHIT!!!"

[Occulus]

54. LOL

[fearnobush]

10. Does this mean its ok to go to an other Media outlet?

Or is it because only Fox news is allowed to have extra access?

[TacticalPeek]

22. Or, get Faux out of the way of impending natsec investigation/prosecution

Just like the bully boys to bluff a 'secrets' case. But since it reported illegalities, that makes it against reg to classify it in the first place.

The report:

http://sftt.org/article05052004a.html

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/4894001


Perhaps this needs to be mirrored around?

[CharlesGroce]

11. That picture

is revolting, absolutely vile. It makes me turn red in the face.

This is what we've come to in this country.

[rocktivity]

12. I don't get it.

If Fox has the report on their site, why don't they just ask them to get rid of it? They're not the only place you can download it from. Are they trying to protect Fox in some way? Doesn't this amount to tampering with evidence?

:headbang:
rocknation

[maddezmom]

18. Fox viewers= sheep of the repug party

I know you know this, but the fact that the Pentagon sent a memo is frightening....do they feel they are losing their base????

[Just Me]

51. Yup. Their "base" watches ONLY faux news. They don't want the info

getting out to their "base". That is the only guesstimate I can figure.

[Mayberry Machiavelli]

27. It's out on multiple sites already. I guess the brass figure their

obedient RW minions only get their information from Faux like Cheney tells them to do... only, just not this time please!

It's already been on MSNBC, The Smoking Gun, and I'm sure many others by now. I'm sure Faux, being pawns of shrubco, would never have posted this if they were the only ones in possession. (Pentagon probably wouldn't even have had to ASK them.) But once it's out, they have no reason to block it on their own site.

And that, my friends, is the beauty of the internet. This report now exists on about a billion hard drives, including my own.

[KittyWampus]

38. Fox News Is The ONLY NEWS OUR TROOPS GET!!!

[oneighty]

13. God Damn

The INTERNET and the sneaky little spy cameras!

Hee Hee!

The information highway gonna have to be silenced. Hee Hee!

180

[punpirate]

14. How interesting...

... guess who the Undersecretary of Defense for Policy is?

One Douglas J. Feith, chief rabid right-wing attack dog.

He'd certainly have an interest in keeping this one hidden, since his direction helped create the situation.

Eventually, the stink is going to rise to his level, and there's probably a directive from him to push intelligence-gathering to the max.

Why are these guys so damned obvious about their CYA tactics?

[truthisfreedom]

16. bizarre. this couldn't get more screwed up,

could it?

[Deere_John]

17. The Onion must be closing down....

...I mean, after stuff like this, what's the point?

[burrowowl]

32. Welcome to DU, Deere John!

The Onion must be having a very difficult time trying to out-satirize this maladministration.

[Vitruvius]

19. The Pentagon will be searching hard drives to find the patriot who leaked

the data; the files are big enough that they would have been stored as "temp" files on the hard drives -- even if the individual did not deliberately save a copy on the HDD to make multiple CD disks.

BUT -- if tens of thousands of people in the military access the materials, there will be tens of thousands of hard drives with recoverable files containing the data. With no way to tell which computer was used by the patriot who leaked the data. Hence the "don't look at this" order.

Anybody who calls security & admits having looked at the material will be put on the list of suspects.

Now then, "deleted" files can usually be recovered -- as can "deleted" e-mails to reporters. Because the info remains on the hard drive until OVERWRITTEN -- either by subsequent data or by use of an overwrite utility.

Whoever leaked it had better (a) delete all temp files from their hard drives, plus any e-mail messages, plus the log file associated with their e-mail program, then (b) use a hard drive utility to OVERWRITE the empty space ("free space") on their hard drives. Run the overwrite utility at least five times to make the data nonrecoverable even if the hard drive is physically dissected.

I would then run a disk optimizing program that defragments all files and consolidates them in one big block to make the HDD run faster. Then run the overwrite program again on the free space.

Note also that defragging the hard drive is something you should do every so often anyway. And if you ever handle proprietary (let alone classified) data, running an overwrite program every-so-often on the free space is an excellent security precaution; there's risk and no benefit to leaving confidential data on your hard drive once you are no longer using it.

Vitruvius

P.S: A quick Google will find numerous freeware overwrite utilities (freeware = no paper trail). But do NOT do this from the office computer -- or they'll catch you at the firewall.

And remember -- DENY-DENY-DENY. Even if they claim they found some suggestive file fragments on your HDD, for all they know, somebody used your machine to look at the report on the Internet...

[saigon68]

20. Excellent advice

The military is trying to cover up a stinking DUNG HEAP by sprinkling a few ROSE PETALS on it. LOL

[spotbird]

37. Your's is a great public service.

Let's just hope that the patriot knows how to do all that.

[NYC]

23. Taguba Report available here:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/4894001/

[leQ]

29. that's only the summary... where is the full report at?

n/t

[Mayberry Machiavelli]

31. DU, at your service! .PDF file links

http://www.foxnews.com/projects/pdf/prisoner_abuse_pentagon.pdf
http://www.thesmokinggun.com/archive/0505041torture1.html

[soundfury]

25. HereÕs what I want to knowÉ

There is the story about the officer being responsible for getting these photos out. Then IÕve heard about these photos being posted at porn web sites and thatÕs how they got out.

Now we have proof of a cover up from the very top.

Somehow these photos got out without the consent of the military.

Does this mean that the officer who gave the photos anonymously to a higher ranking officer is untrue?

[Mayberry Machiavelli]

33. The photos were sent by an enlisted soldier (non-officer) up the

chain of command. He (Darby) did not leak them to the press that I am aware of, but they did make their way there somehow (not clear).

A separate issue is the very revealing leaked report from Major General Taguba investigating the prisoner abuse issue which this thread concerns. This was leaked to the press somehow. It's not clear to me who leaked it and who received and reported on it first. No doubt the leaker is subject to legal sanctions. It would not surprise me at all if the leaker is unknown to the reporters, as it is easy enough to send things through the web and email in a way difficult to trace.

I'm sure Rummy's got the boys in the crime lab working in shifts on it though! (Big Lebowski joke)

[soundfury]

36. I'm sure Rummy's got the boys in the crime lab working in shifts

No doubt, LOL!!! Thank God for the internet.

[Citizen Daryl]

26. Nice if they were as interested in finding out who outed Plame. n/t

[jdj]

40. They totally BURIED Joe Wilson this week. Coincidence?

I've been wondering about this for a while. I know Sy Hersh and CBS covered this, but was this a complete accident that Wilson's book publicity started just before this came out. I bet it has pretty well devastated the attention to his book "The Politics of Truth". Now it's all about the politics of torture.

[BrotherBuzz]

28. Hey, just a hair brained idea but....

do you suppose some people in the Pentagon want the servicemen to read and discuss it?

An email to Pentagon staff marked "URGENT IT (Information Technology) BULLETIN: Taguba Report" orders employees not to read or download the Taguba report at Fox News, on the grounds that the document is classified. It also orders them not to discuss the matter with friends or family members. The emailed memo was leaked to TIME by a senior U.S. civilian official in Baghdad, who did not hide his disdain for the "factotums" in the Pentagon. "I do wonder how incredibly stupid some people in the Pentagon are," he emailed TIME. "Not only are they drawing everyone's attention to the report Ñ and where it can be seen Ñ but attempting to muzzle people never works."

I can't think of a faster way to get everyone in Iraq (well the entire armed services) educated in a real hurry. Bush* et al is in a world of hurt.

[Mayberry Machiavelli]

34. Um, no. The military doesn't operate that way. It's just the usual

stupidity. EOM

[DavidFL]

35. Yes, that's what I have been thinking as well...

it seems like some members of the military saw an opportunity here and are turning on the neocons because a lot of what has been leaked implicates key neocons in this administration in actively planning and implementing what are essentially war crimes.

[thecrow]

59. Maybe the version on FAUX ....

was edited somehow.
..... ya think?
:crazy:

[Citizen Daryl]

30. PDF Version of the Report Here

http://www.npr.org/iraq/2004/prison_abuse_report.pdf

[starroute]

39. Classifying the report may itself have been illegal

See this thread from a couple of days ago:
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=102&topic_id=534091

"By classifying an explosive report on the torture of Iraqi prisoners as 'Secret,' the Pentagon may have violated official secrecy policies, which prohibit the use of classification to conceal illegal activities."

[Dhalgren]

43. BINGO!!!

[SoCalDem]

42. Fox is piped in to the military..almost intravenously...

Radios all tuned to Rush & Sean.. They have them addicted to llies, and NOW they are supposed to go cold turkey???

[icymist]

44. I smell a rat! When the Pentagon issues orders not to read what's

in the media? Could it be that they want the rest of us TO read it? Something weird going on here.

[cosmicone]

45. I agree -- it is fishy!

I think the real message is, "Read it and don't do what the whistleblowers did and destroy all photos, videos and e-mails."

Using patriotism and soldiers' loyalty to keep the chimp getting bananas!

[soundfury]

46. kick for Monday

[shamanstar]

47. do not go to fox (ie go to fox)

sounds like they are trying to say "do not go to fox news to read the report" in an attempt to get people to go to fox news for the skewed version of the report? is this just me being paranoid?

[Tinoire]

60. No... It's them in a panic not even taking the time to see how

"subtle" they're being. Fox has what, an extract? The Executive Summary with names and details blocked out I bet... Big deal...

I thought the same thing... they're trying to "herd" them to Fox so that Fox can put the appropriate spin on it.

[dubyaD40web]

49. "Military Personnel: Don't Read This!"

LOL

[PaDUer]

55. They're looking for

scapegoats.

[JohnOneillsMemory]

57. Midway airport: Big USO and the Fox newstand crawler was off today.

I flew through Midway airport in Chicago on Saturday. The main food court has a big newspaper, books, and food corner store with Fox News on two screens and a big neon crawler around the ceiling with Fox headlines scrolling in 12" letters.

When I returned through Midway today (Monday) I noticed that the hated neon crawler had been shut off.

I wonder if it is because there is a big USO at Midway with lots of service people going through. Hmmmm...

[jmowreader]

61. And now everyone's going to do it!

As the late sage Sam Kinison observed, "I didn't even wanna until you told me I couldn't!"

And such it is with the Taguba report--90 percent of the Army had probably read it before they said not to, and now the whole Army has.

Smart move, guys.