Who is in charge?
Contribution by Mike Walker, Col. USMC (retired)
All,
This week we liberated a number of prisoners from a Taliban prison camp.
Why is this story not being pushed and pushed very, very hard?
Where are the pictures of the prisoners in shackles?
Where is the video tour of the prison compound?
Where are the first-hand accounts of life in prison under the Taliban?
We have suffered greatly as a result of Abu Ghraib. I know this first hand because 3d CAG was given the job of repairing the relationship with the Iraqi people who lived in and around Abu Ghraib as well as the Iraqis waiting outside the wire to visit the internees.
We were told to clean up someone else's mess. So be it. The Marines went in and did a great job but as the old saying goes an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.
Abu Ghraib has always been played as the "true face" of how the "infidel crusaders" treat Muslims. It has hurt us badly. Now we have been given a great tool to undermine this propaganda. Let us show once again the "true face" of the Taliban and al Qaeda. This is the "ounce of prevention" for winning hearts and minds sitting in our lap.
Is anyone in the chain of command going to exploit this?
Has the USG/DoD/DoS put together a package on this that average Americans can see on the internet?
At the very least, it should be documented and presented to the troops going over to Afghanistan so they can see the real face of the enemy and have one more reason packed in their seabags as to why our mission is both right and just.
Every time we fail to do the right thing in these cases, we undermine our cause both home and abroad. We won in Iraq by being smarter and better than al Qaeda in Iraq et al. This is a real opportunity to be smarter and better than the Taliban.
Semper Fi,
Mike
