5/19/2008
Hersh: Chain of Command
Seymour M. Hersh: Chain of Command
Paperback: 404 pages
Publisher: Penguin 2005
ISBN: 0-141-02088-1
Legendary The New Yorker investigative journalist Seymour Hersh is a mastermind in mapping trail of events: from cabinet meetings of foreign policy decision making elites into practices on the ground by political blue collar workers - soldiers.
From the White house to the infamous Abu Ghraib, Hersh shows how the Bush Administration turned the United States, victor of the Cold War and the leader of the Free World, into a, if not the, pre-eminent human rights violator. Apart from the mishandling of the unnecessary Iraq war, Hersh remembers to remind us also of the "other war", Afghanistan:
Seymour M. Hersh: Chain of CommandPaperback: 404 pages
Publisher: Penguin 2005
ISBN: 0-141-02088-1
Legendary The New Yorker investigative journalist Seymour Hersh is a mastermind in mapping trail of events: from cabinet meetings of foreign policy decision making elites into practices on the ground by political blue collar workers - soldiers.
From the White house to the infamous Abu Ghraib, Hersh shows how the Bush Administration turned the United States, victor of the Cold War and the leader of the Free World, into a, if not the, pre-eminent human rights violator. Apart from the mishandling of the unnecessary Iraq war, Hersh remembers to remind us also of the "other war", Afghanistan:
"The U.N. worker added that among Afghans President Karzai was perceived as "a weak leader with very little street credibility." He told me that, again and again, when he met with village elders as part of his work, "the old people say, 'Hamid is good man. He doesn't kill people. He doesn't steal things. He doesn't sell drugs. How could you possibly think he could be a leader of Afghanistan?'" p. 161
The world, without a doubt is a, dangerous place. Afghanistan is not a mess that will be solved easily. However, pre-emptive interventions, especially when they fail, create a more dangerous world - (political) freedom is a process, not an endgoal. But, then again, we have we been here before... Iraq is not the first American (human rights) debacle Hersh has reported to the wider public. On November 12, 1969 Hersh broke the story of the My Lai massacre (Pinkville) in the Vietnam War.
Second Opinion: Michael Ignatieff / The New York Times
¶ 5/19/2008 07:07:00 ip. Second Opinion: Michael Ignatieff / The New York Times
