A VERY SERIOUS LOOKHEART OF DARKNESS ---HEART OF ABU GHRAIB?

A Group Called Kurtz?

"They called me up so fast and didn't teach me anything. So that's why I decided to sodomize somebody with a fluorescent rod, nobody told me not to."

"I just wanted to fuck my friend in the ass. What's wrong with that? Consenting adults, man."

"I let my pet pit bull practice biting on a real person. Nobody told me not to."

This is a line of reasoning we are supposed to buy here. There is a clear line between stripping somebody naked under supervision and taking the pictures we are seeing. I find it impossible to believe that somebody actually authorized sodomy or loosing the dogs. I also refuse to believe that some sort of wink and nod didn't encourage it.

What we may have is a decent into depravity. Many novels have been written about this, the most well known being Joseph Conrad's "Heart of Darkness", the novel that was the basis for "Apocalypse Now".

Colonel Kurtz (the Brando character)was the best of the best. A paragon of virtue and dedication. When sent "up river" (the prison system in Iraq?)he descended into a world of slaughter, murder, and a psychotic state. Yet the people involved with him claimed that "Kurtz had enlarged his mind and cannot be subjected to the same moral judgments as normal people." Kurtz establishes himself as a god with the natives and goes on brutal raids in the surrounding territory in search of trophy. The collection of severed heads adorning the fence posts around the station, placed there by his native army, attests to his "methods".

The "trophies" here are the pictures and videos.

Who might be the "Kurtz" of Abu Ghraib? The Left would have us believe it is Rumsfeld or the Joint Chiefs. I doubt it. I think we will find our Kurtz much closer to the prison. Lack of authority? A deliberate setting loose of untrained people after giving them vague orders? The little smile when somebody went "a little too far"? And another pat on the back when they went further?

It won't be easy to find our Kurtz here. Rest assured there is one.

Or, we could have a group called Kurtz.