For Bush, the Prison Abuse Scandal Brings His Political War Home

[papau]

Brownstein sees four key political challenges facing President Bush as a result of the controversy : alienating Congress, avoiding accountability, failing to act, and losing Iraq. (MY COMMENT:Can he avoid folks getting the idea that his "oddly passive behavior, for an executive whose chief selling point is his resolve", means he must be replaced?)

http://www.latimes.com/news/politics/columns/la-na-outlook10may10,1,6335452.column

For Bush, the Prison Abuse Scandal Brings His Political War Home

<snip>Failing to act: The heart of Bush's case for reelection is that he is a strong, decisive leader in the war against terrorism. But the prison scandal could reinforce earlier questions about his management style.

Rumsfeld made clear Friday he never briefed Bush about the full magnitude of the scandal. But Pentagon officials have indicated that Rumsfeld informed Bush at least in broad terms about the problem soon after the secretary learned of it in mid-January. There's no indication Bush pressed further; White House officials say the president felt satisfied the Pentagon was investigating.

The president's reaction was similar when he received the famous intelligence briefing on Osama bin Laden in August 2001: He later said he did not seek to meet afterward with the FBI director because he believed the bureau would contact him if it unearthed information he needed to act upon.

All of this is oddly passive behavior for an executive whose chief selling point is his resolve. Like his direction or not, Bush has excelled at defining a clear course for his administration. But his frustration at the explosion of the prison scandal shows the price of most often choosing not to grapple with the details. He's painfully learning that presidents who want to watch only the forest sometimes smack head-on into the trees.

Losing Iraq: Looming far above all these risks to Bush is the threat that the scandal will weaken America's position in Iraq and strengthen fears at home that our effort there is unraveling.


<snip>Most Americans accept Bush's insistence that the U.S. will benefit if we can steer Iraq to democracy and stability. But polls show they are no longer sure he knows how to reach that destination. In this confusing and increasingly inhospitable terrain, the photos from Abu Ghraib are likely to leave more Americans wondering whether we are losing our compass altogether.

[dubyaD40web]

1. On the subject.....

May 10, 2004

A failure of leadership at the highest levels



Around the halls of the Pentagon, a term of caustic derision has emerged for the enlisted soldiers at the heart of the furor over the Abu Ghraib prison scandal: the six morons who lost the war.
Indeed, the damage done to the U.S. military and the nation as a whole by the horrifying photographs of U.S. soldiers abusing Iraqi detainees at the notorious prison is incalculable.

But the folks in the Pentagon are talking about the wrong morons.

There is no excuse for the behavior displayed by soldiers in the now-infamous pictures and an even more damning report by Army Maj. Gen. Antonio Taguba. Every soldier involved should be ashamed.

But while responsibility begins with the six soldiers facing criminal charges, it extends all the way up the chain of command to the highest reaches of the military hierarchy and its civilian leadership.

The entire affair is a failure of leadership from start to finish. From the moment they are captured, prisoners are hooded, shackled and isolated. The message to the troops: Anything goes.

In addition to the scores of prisoners who were humiliated and demeaned, at least 14 have died in custody in Iraq and Afghanistan. The Army has ruled at least two of those homicides. This is not the way a free people keeps its captives or wins the hearts and minds of a suspicious world.

How tragically ironic that the American military, which was welcomed to Baghdad by the euphoric Iraqi people a year ago as a liberating force that ended 30 years of tyranny, would today stand guilty of dehumanizing torture in the same Abu Ghraib prison used by Saddam Hussein’s henchmen.

One can only wonder why the prison wasn’t razed in the wake of the invasion as a symbolic stake through the heart of the Baathist regime.

Army commanders in Iraq bear responsibility for running a prison where there was no legal adviser to the commander, and no ultimate responsibility taken for the care and treatment of the prisoners.

Gen. Richard Myers, chairman of the Joint Chiefs, also shares in the shame. Myers asked “60 Minutes II” to hold off reporting news of the scandal because it could put U.S. troops at risk. But when the report was aired, a week later, Myers still hadn’t read Taguba’s report, which had been completed in March. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld also failed to read the report until after the scandal broke in the media.

By then, of course, it was too late.

Myers, Rumsfeld and their staffs failed to recognize the impact the scandal would have not only in the United States, but around the world.

If their staffs failed to alert Myers and Rumsfeld, shame on them. But shame, too, on the chairman and secretary, who failed to inform even President Bush.

He was left to learn of the explosive scandal from media reports instead of from his own military leaders.

On the battlefield, Myers’ and Rumsfeld’s errors would be called a lack of situational awareness — a failure that amounts to professional negligence.

To date, the Army has moved to court-martial the six soldiers suspected of abusing Iraqi detainees and has reprimanded six others.

Brig. Gen. Janis Karpinski, who commanded the MP brigade that ran Abu Ghraib, has received a letter of admonishment and also faces possible disciplinary action.

That’s good, but not good enough.

This was not just a failure of leadership at the local command level. This was a failure that ran straight to the top. Accountability here is essential — even if that means relieving top leaders from duty in a time of war.


http://armytimes.com/story.php?f=1-292925-2903288.php

[papau]

2. WOW - the editor of the Army Times tells it like it is! :-)

:-)