Posted by Pinky.

A lot of times the media talks about paramilitary death squads and torture centers as if they exist within a historical vaccuum. They just "are" - they are not discussed in terms of how they come into being - who orders their formation and why, how they are funded, who comprises their membership, and so on. So it is very important to watch and discuss reports like the following one, which was produced by the Guardian UK and BBC Arabic and just released today. In this report we learn how U.S. leaders created a system of torture and murder within the larger framework of occupation in post-invasion Iraq.

Watch the video (length: 51 minutes) at the Guardian website.

mmm - I'm sure many people will be interested in this report primarily because U.S. Secretary of State Donald Rumsfeld and General David Petraeus (the 'stars' of this report, so to speak) happen to be very famous people. But to me actually individuals are often the most easily interchangeable parts within these kinds of horror stories...

Anyone familiar with the history of U.S.-style terror - against the peoples of Vietnam, Honduras, Guatemala, El Salvador, [...complete your own list here...], and of course we must include Native Americans on this list as well - will be left to wonder if any of these war crimes will ever be punished.

Side note: Much of the information in the Guardian/BBC report would probably never have been researched, let alone made available to the public at all, had it not been for Bradley Manning and Wikileaks. For exposing the truth Bradley Manning is now in a U.S. prison.

~pinky