Via CBS News, what we should all come to call
The Iraqi Orphanage Nightmare:
Inside the building, a government-run orphanage for
special needs children, the soldiers found more emaciated little
bodies tied to the cribs. They had been kept this way for more than
a month, according to the soldiers called in to rescue the 24 boys.
“I saw children that you could see literally every bone in their
body that were so skinny, they had no energy to move whatsoever, no
expression on their face,” Staff Sgt. Michael Beale said.
“The kids were tied up, naked, covered in their own waste —
feces — and there were three people that were cooking themselves
food, but nothing for the kids,” Lt. Stephen Duperre said….
“I got extremely angry with the caretaker when I got there,”
Capt. Benjamin Morales said. “It took every muscle in my body to
restrain myself from not going after that guy.”…
“I picked him up and then immediately the kid started smiling,
and as I got a little bit closer to the ambulance he just started
laughing. It was almost like he completely understood what was
going on,” Beale said….
Later at the hospital, Lt. Jason Smith brushed teeth and helped
clean up the boys. He and his wife are both special education
teachers, and he was proud to tell her what the soldiers had
done.
“She said that one day was worth my entire deployment,” Smith
said. “It makes the whole thing worthwhile.”
It was even worse than that — this is just an excerpt.
Fortunately, CBS News was there, which means it really happened. Do
read the whole thing, and remember it in the coming days, which
will get worse. Remember.
We here in the fat, relatively happy and somewhat civilized West
take order and minimal humanitarian conduct for granted. But we
forget that just over sixty years ago, Westerners conducted a
Holocaust themselves, and worse, it was by intention, not mere
neglect.
The Bushies, associated neo-cons, and anti-warriors alike
misunderestimated the depths of human depravity when it came
(comes) to Iraq. The Cradle of Civilization refuses to cease making
our jaws drop in uncomprehension.
It was said, and fairly, by our troops in Vietnam that they were
the unwilling doing the unnecessary for the ungrateful. That’s not
the case here. Our troops are willing, doing what is necessary, and
every person of good will toward men is grateful.
“I picked him up and then immediately the kid started
smiling, and as I got a little bit closer to the ambulance he just
started laughing. It was almost like he completely understood what
was going on,” [Sgt.] Beale said.
We all do, Sgt. Beale. We just want to pretend that we don’t,
back here at home. I don’t blame any of us, because it’s only human
to disbelieve in such inhumanity. But I do not see how we can pull
our heroes like you and Stephen Duperre and Benjamin Morales and
Jason Smith away from what is manifestly a sacred mission. I just
don’t.
God bless you all, and Godspeed.
