Conflict Map: Nobel eMuseum

Conflict Map

This is staggering. What a terrible view of humanity. North America & Australia/NZ are almost uniquely quiet.

Hersh: Copper Green -- the special access program that went sour at Al Ghraib

The New Yorker

The roots of the Abu Ghraib prison scandal lie not in the criminal inclinations of a few Army reservists but in a decision, approved last year by Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, to expand a highly secret operation, which had been focussed on the hunt for Al Qaeda, to the interrogation of prisoners in Iraq. Rumsfeld’s decision embittered the American intelligence community, damaged the effectiveness of élite combat units, and hurt America’s prospects in the war on terror.

According to interviews with several past and present American intelligence officials, the Pentagon’s operation, known inside the intelligence community by several code words, including Copper Green, encouraged physical coercion and sexual humiliation of Iraqi prisoners in an effort to generate more intelligence about the growing insurgency in Iraq. A senior C.I.A. official, in confirming the details of this account last week, said that the operation stemmed from Rumsfeld’s long-standing desire to wrest control of America’s clandestine and paramilitary operations from the C.I.A.

... Cambone then made another crucial decision, the former intelligence official told me: not only would he bring the SAP’s rules into the prisons; he would bring some of the Army military-intelligence officers working inside the Iraqi prisons under the SAP’sauspices. “So here are fundamentally good soldiers— military-intelligence guys—being told that no rules apply,” the former official, who has extensive knowledge of the special-access programs, added. “And, as far as they’re concerned, this is a covert operation, and it’s to be kept within Defense Department channels.”

The military-police prison guards, the former official said, included “recycled hillbillies from Cumberland, Maryland.” He was referring to members of the 372nd Military Police Company. Seven members of the company are now facing charges for their role in the abuse at Abu Ghraib. “How are these guys from Cumberland going to know anything? The Army Reserve doesn’t know what it’s doing.”

... The only difficulty, the former official added, is that, “as soon as you enlarge the secret program beyond the oversight capability of experienced people, you lose control. We’ve never had a case where a special-access program went sour—and this goes back to the Cold War.”

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Hersh's contacts are presumably among those who are embittered. Hersh points the finger directly at Rumsfeld, and indirectly at Bush. Hersh also connects Rumsfeld & Cambone to William "Islam is Satan" Boykin.

There are many puzzling aspects of this case that have not yet been reported. There's a lot of work to do for any journalists who still care for the truth.

PS. The New Yorker's web pages have a curious behavior. When one copies and pastes text, letters are missing. I've not seen this anywhere else -- I wonder if it's done to discourage blogging. Using OS X print preview one can copy and paste without losing any letters.

DeLong: The Reign of George the Feckless

Doesn't Anybody Read Max Weber Anymore?: Archive Entry From Brad DeLong's Webjournal

Things that were known in the reign of Anne the Protestant should not be forgotten in the reign of George the Feckless.

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The reign of George the Feckless. I like that.

The Soviets had Pravda, the GOP has it all

Salon.com Books | The mighty windbags

The mighty windbags
Thirty years ago, conservatives embarked on a plan to subvert journalism and skew America to the right. They succeeded beyond their wildest dreams.
By David Brock

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Salon excerpts sections from David Brock's book. He's the "journalist who came in from the Right". My own reading is identical. What annoys me is how the New York Times and The Economist bought into this propaganda. Gore was savaged by the Right, but it was the craven incompetence of mainstream, respected, journalists that won the day for Bush. Whether through laziness, greed, incompetence, or corruption, journalists who knew better stayed quiet. I don't blame Limbaugh for spreading lies, I blame Safire and the NYT Editorial page for not exposing the lies.

I confess wondered about Hilary's "Vast Right Wing Conspiracy". I thought she was making excuses. I'm sorry Hillary, you were right.

The billionaires of the extreme right have seized control of American dialog. We need the billionaires of the rational middle to step down from Olympus and balance the rabid right.

Kaplan too is done with Bush

The Buck Stops … Where? - Stop blaming your henchmen, Mr. President. By Fred Kaplan

In the two years since the Pentagon's first attack plan, Zarqawi has been linked not just to Berg's execution but, according to NBC, 700 other killings in Iraq. If Bush had carried out that attack back in June 2002, the killings might not have happened. More: The case for war (as the White House feared) might not have seemed so compelling. Indeed, the war itself might not have happened.

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Another one turns against Bush.

The other heroes: those who refuse orders to do evil, those who intervene

The New York Times > International > Psychology: Pressure to Go Along With Abuse Is Strong, but Some Soldiers Find Strength to Refuse

Pressure to Go Along With Abuse Is Strong, but Some Soldiers Find Strength to Refuse
By ANAHAD O'CONNOR
Published: May 14, 2004
The images of prisoner abuse still trickling out of Iraq show a side of human behavior that psychologists have sought to understand for decades. But the murky reports of a handful of soldiers who refused to take part bring to light a behavior psychologists find even more puzzling: disobedience.

Buried in his report earlier this year on Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq, Maj. Gen. Antonio M. Taguba praised the actions of three men who tried to stop the mistreatment of Iraqi detainees. They are nowhere to be seen in the portraits of brutality that have touched off outrage around the world.

Although details of their actions are sketchy, it is known that one soldier, Lt. David O. Sutton, put an end to one incident and alerted his commanders. William J. Kimbro, a Navy dog handler, 'refused to participate in improper interrogations despite significant pressure' from military intelligence, according to the report. And Specialist Joseph M. Darby gave military police the evidence that sounded the alarm...

...The power to resist coercion reflects what psychologists call internal locus of control, or the ability to determine one's own destiny. People at the other end of the scale, with external locus of control, are more heavily influenced by authority figures. They prefer to put their fate in the hands of others.

"If they fail a test, it's the teacher's fault; if they do poorly at a job, it's the boss's fault," said Dr. Thomas Ollendick, a professor of psychology at Virginia Tech. "They put the blame for everything outside of themselves. They are high in conformity because they believe someone else in charge."

The average person, research shows, falls somewhere in the middle of the scale. People who voluntarily enlist in the military, knowing they will take orders, Dr. Ollendick suggested, may be more likely to conform. "These are people who are being told what to do," he said. "The ones who are conforming from the outset feel they can't change the system they're in. Those who blow the whistle can go above the situation and survive. They can basically endure whatever negative consequences might come from their actions."

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Six years ago three heroes of the My Lai massacre were finally honored. Perhaps 30 years from now these three will be honored. They are true heroes.

Friedman: Finally gives up on Bush altogether

The New York Times > Opinion > Op-Ed Columnist: Dancing Alone

My mistake was thinking that the Bush team believed it, too. I thought the administration would have to do the right things in Iraq — from prewar planning and putting in enough troops to dismissing the secretary of defense for incompetence — because surely this was the most important thing for the president and the country. But I was wrong. There is something even more important to the Bush crowd than getting Iraq right, and that's getting re-elected and staying loyal to the conservative base to do so.

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Next the Economist will admit it made a terrible mistake. They've been coming close to an apology ...

Medal winners

INTEL DUMP

While leading his platoon north on Highway 1 toward Ad Diwaniyah, Chontosh's platoon moved into a coordinated ambush of mortars, rocket propelled grenades and automatic weapons fire. With coalitions tanks blocking the road ahead, he realized his platoon was caught in a kill zone.

He had his driver move the vehicle through a breach along his flank, where he was immediately taken under fire from an entrenched machine gun. Without hesitation, Chontosh ordered the driver to advanced directly at the enemy position enabling his .50 caliber machine gunner to silence the enemy.

He then directed his driver into the enemy trench, where he exited his vehicle and began to clear the trench with an M16A2 service rifle and 9 millimeter pistol. His ammunition depleted, Chontosh, with complete disregard for his safety, twice picked up discarded enemy rifles and continued his ferocious attack.

When a Marine following him found an enemy rocket propelled grenade launcher, Chontosh used it to destroy yet another group of enemy soldiers.

When his audacious attack ended, he had cleared over 200 meters of the enemy trench, killing more than 20 enemy soldiers and wounding several others.

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Two football fields. I can't imagine what this guy is like in person. There are more awards described in the same posting.

National electronic Library for Health - United Kindgom

National electronic Library for Health

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This looks potentially interesting. I don't think we have anything quite like it in the US.

BBC NEWS | Americas | CIA interrogations 'too brutal' -- The Joy of Torture

BBC NEWS | Americas | CIA interrogations 'too brutal'

Current CIA officers are said to be worried that public outrage at the treatment of detainees in Iraq might lead to a closer examination of their treatment of al-Qaeda prisoners.

'Some people involved in this have been concerned for quite a while that eventually there would be a new president, or the mood in the country would change, and they would be held accountable,' one was quoted as saying.

'Now that's happening faster than anybody expected.'

The whereabouts of high-level al-Qaeda detainees is a closely guarded secret, and human rights groups have been denied access to the prisoners.

Officials say some have been send abroad.

'There was a debate after 9/11 about how to make people disappear,' a former intelligence official told the paper.

The government was advised that if the CIA was considering procedures which violated the Geneva Convention or US laws prohibiting torture and degrading treatment, it would not be held responsible if it could be argued that the detainees were in the custody of another country.

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Maybe Sadaam could get a job with the new improved CIA. Maybe this is why Tenet can't be fired, he has dangerous "goods" on Bush. Rumsfeld's job security might come from the same place.

How very charming. Maybe we can be a bit more humble about our moral superiority now? Does anyone still ever say "it can't happen hear" when they read of the rise of the Nazi party? Imagine what we'll do when terrorists devastate a major city.

Servicing and refurbishing defective complex consumer devices: is it cost-effective any longer?

Macintouch: Apple Technical Support Issues

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I too have experienced a replacement device that was "non-functional out of box" -- aka DOA. In my case I returned a working 9 month old iPod with a one hour maximal battery life and received a refurbished device with a dead firewire port. Apple's somewhat dysfunctional AppleCare service didn't help.

Of course I'm mad at Apple. There are too many stories of this problem for it to be pure coincidence. I think this is the same story as the refurbished laptops Apple sells on its web site, which Macintouch has noted are often trouble prone.

I suspect Apple has contracted out device service and refurbishment, and that there are significant economic penalties for doing too good a job servicing devices. The combination of outsourcing, then providing perverse incentives without honorable oversight, has caused worse problems than defective replacement iPods.

Apple, however, while no saint, is probably not the worst service department in the world. I've heard similar tales about Canon digital cameras. I wonder if modern consumer electronic devices are becoming too complex to service cost-effectively. They are difficult to fully evaluate, so even if a primary defect is fixed a secondary defect may be missed. They are too complex to easily disassemble, so repair may induce new problems. Hardware is increasingly coming to resemble software; it's well known that fixing a software bug is a risky and complex business.

Maybe we need to move to more of a classic "insurance" system to deal with expensive high tech devices that die quickly.

A better system might guarantee replacement of a defective device with a brand new device for about 3 months. After that one would receive a credit for the depreciated value of the device that could be applied to purchase of a brand new device. The rate of depreciation might depend on how much one pays for insurance. There might be business opportunities here for an insurance company that's ready to take this on.

Science fiction idea: we all get stupider because ...

"The Cookie Monster" by Vernor Vinge is an online short story that's up for a Hugo award. I had to read it, thought it kept me up late. Vinge is one of the smartest and deepest thinkers I know of.

There's an insider aside in the story. One of his characters recites a list of some of the most interesting "simulation" science fiction -- stories that explore the absurd and ridiculous idea that entities just like us would be living in a simulation (the Matrix popularized this theme.) Typically these simulations have odd properties that give them away -- such as a universe that's empty except for single sentient species.

That led me to think of a variant theme. In this theme the protagonists is reviewing data indicating not only a rising incidence of autism, but also increasingly stupid political leaders that are being consistently reelected -- irregardless of performance. She (of course) plots the data against population and notices a disturbing trend -- average world IQ is becoming inversely correlated to population. It's as though aggregate global sentience were limited by the processing capacity of a single incomprehensibly powerful computer, and population growth had run up against the limits of the machine. She begins to discover domains where contrained processing capability is causing the simulation to break down. Either population will crash or the simulation will end. Which will it be? As she begins to communicate her fears she disappears from the (short) story.

Science fiction is harmless fun, even though it's prone to silliness.

The corporation as psychopath

Economist.com | Face value

Unlike much of the soggy thinking peddled by too many anti-globalisers, “The Corporation” is a surprisingly rational and coherent attack on capitalism's most important institution...

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My Canopy Economics post connects with this. Corporations do behave like entities with their own self interestes. So do bureaucracies and other bounded collections of interacting humans. Understanding the relationships & interactions between these "meta-entities" is key to understanding Canopy Economics. (Shades of psychohistory! :-).

The Economist article is actually pretty weak in a fashion that's increasingly common in that once formidable publication. After conceding that the thesis of "corporation as psychopath" is surprisingly persuasive, the article concludes with a sniffy dismissal of the idea because "state bureaucracies are worse". The two statements are, of course, not mutually exclusive -- but the editor couldn't allow the article to conclude -- "corporations are psychopathic, but we don't know of a better alternative". Alas, the Economist is now what it once was.

Update 10/2/2010: The Economist review is now inaccessible, but it's reprinted here and I've copied it below. The 2004 book is still available on Amazon.

To the anti-globalisers, the corporation is a devilish instrument of environmental destruction, class oppression and imperial conquest. But is it also pathologically insane? That is the provocative conclusion of an award-winning documentary film, called "The Corporation", coming soon to a cinema near you. People on both sides of the globalisation debate should pay attention. Unlike much of the soggy thinking peddled by too many anti-globalisers, "The Corporation" is a surprisingly rational and coherent attack on capitalism's most important institution.

It begins with a potted history of the company's legal form in America, noting the key 19th-century legal innovation that led to treating companies as persons under law. By bestowing on them the rights and protections that people enjoy, this legal innovation gave the company the freedom to flourish. So if the corporation is a person, ask the film's three Canadian co-creators, Mark Achbar, Joel Bakan and Jennifer Abbott, what sort of person is it?

The answer, elicited over two-and-a-half hours of interviews with left-wing intellectuals, right-wing captains of industry, economists, psychologists and philosophers, is that the corporation is a psychopath. Like all psychopaths, the firm is singularly self-interested: its purpose is to create wealth for its shareholders. And, like all psychopaths, the firm is irresponsible, because it puts others at risk to satisfy its profit-maximising goal, harming employees and customers, and damaging the environment. The corporation manipulates everything. It is grandiose, always insisting that it is the best, or number one. It has no empathy, refuses to accept responsibility for its actions and feels no remorse. It relates to others only superficially, via make-believe versions of itself manufactured by public-relations consultants and marketing men. In short, if the metaphor of the firm as person is a valid one, then the corporation is clinically insane.

There is a tendency among anti-globalisers to demonise captains of industry. But according to "The Corporation", the problem with companies does not lie with the people who run them. Sir Mark Moody-Stuart, a former boss of Shell, comes across in the film as a sympathetic and human character. At one point, he and his wife greet protesters camped on the front lawn of their English cottage with offers of a cup of tea and apologies for the lack of soya milk for the vegans among them. The film gives Sam Gibara, boss of Goodyear, time to air his opinions, which are given a reasonably neutral edit. Ray Anderson, boss of Interface (which claims, with psychopathic grandiosity, to be the world's largest commercial carpetmaker) is given the hero treatment. Having experienced an "epiphany" about the destructive and unsustainable nature of modern capitalism, Mr Anderson has donned the preacher's cloth to spread the religion of environmental sustainability among his peers.

The main message of the film is that, through their psychopathic pursuit of profit, firms make good people do bad things. Lucy Hughes of Initiative Media, an advertising consultancy, is shown musing about the ethics of designing marketing strategies that exploit the tendency of children to nag parents to buy things, before comforting herself with the thought that she is merely performing her proper role in society. Mark Barry, a "competitive intelligence professional", disguises himself as a headhunter to extract information for his corporate clients from rivals, while telling the camera that he would never behave so deceitfully in his private life. Human values and morality survive the onslaught of corporate pathology only via a carefully cultivated schizophrenia: the tobacco boss goes home, hugs his kids and feels a little less bad about spreading cancer. Company executives and foot soldiers alike will identify instantly with this analysis, because it is accurate. But it is also incomplete.

The greater insanity

Although the moviemakers claim ownership of the company-as-psychopath idea, it predates them by a century, and rightfully belongs, in its full form, to Max Weber, the German sociologist. For Weber, the key form of social organisation defining the modern age was bureaucracy. Bureaucracies have flourished because their efficient and rational division and application of labour is powerful. But a cost attends this power. As cogs in a larger, purposeful machine, people become alienated from the traditional morals that guide human relationships as they pursue the goal of the collective organisation. There is, in Weber's famous phrase, a "parcelling-out of the soul".

For Weber, the greater potential tyranny lay not with the economic bureaucracies of capitalism, but the state bureaucracies of socialism. The psychopathic national socialism of Nazi Germany, communism of Stalinist Soviet rule and fascism of imperial Japan (whose oppressive bureaucratic machinery has survived well into the modern era) surely bear Weber out. Infinitely more powerful than firms and far less accountable for its actions, the modern state has the capacity to behave even in evolved western democracies as a more dangerous psychopath than any corporation can ever hope to become: witness the environmental destruction wreaked by Japan's construction ministry.

The makers of "The Corporation" counter that the state was not the subject of their film. Fair point. But they have done more than produce a thought-provoking account of the firm. Their film also invites its audience to weigh up the benefits of privatisation versus public ownership. It dwells on the familiar problem of the corporate corruption of politics and regulatory agencies that weakens public oversight of privately owned firms charged with delivering public goods. But that is only half the story. The film has nothing to say about the immense damage that can also flow from state ownership. Instead, there is a misty-eyed alignment of the state with the public interest. Run that one past the people of, say, North Korea.

The Washington Post digs deep into the CIA and military prisoner facilities.

Secret World of U.S. Interrogation (washingtonpost.com)

All told, more than 9,000 people are held by U.S. authorities overseas, according to Pentagon figures and estimates by intelligence experts, the vast majority under military control. The detainees have no conventional legal rights: no access to a lawyer; no chance for an impartial hearing; and, at least in the case of prisoners held in cellblock 1A at Abu Ghraib, no apparent guarantee of humane treatment accorded prisoners of war under the Geneva Conventions or civilians in U.S. jails.

Although some of those held by the military in Iraq, Afghanistan and Guantanamo have had visits by the International Committee of the Red Cross, some of the CIA's detainees have, in effect, disappeared, according to interviews with former and current national security officials and to the Army's report of abuses at Abu Ghraib.

The CIA's "ghost detainees," as they were called by members of the 800th MP Brigade, were routinely held by the soldier-guards at Abu Ghraib "without accounting for them, knowing their identities, or even the reason for their detention," the report says. These phantom captives were "moved around within the facility to hide them" from Red Cross teams, a tactic that was "deceptive, contrary to Army doctrine, and in violation of international law."

CIA employees are under investigation by the Justice Department and the CIA inspector general's office in connection with the death of three captives in the past six months, two who died while under interrogation in Iraq, and a third who was being questioned by a CIA contract interrogator in Afghanistan. A CIA spokesman said the hiding of detainees was inappropriate. He declined to comment further.

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I still expect that most of this will be tragically forgotten, but the Washington Post is doing a great job of journalism. They may be compensating for neglecting to cover the early story.

The connection between these practices, and abuses that are common in American jails, has not yet been fully drawn.

Hersh's 2nd article on Al Ghraib

The New Yorker: Fact Seymour Hersh May 17th

Moving up the ladder ...