Weak. Really Weak.

I've been thinking for a few days I should post something but never got motivated to do it.

This morning I was going through Google News and saw a story on the Abu Ghraib trials. The prosecutor said blah and the
defense attorney, in his opening statement, compared what the guards did to cheerleader pyramids and parent's using leashes on their toddlers. Weak, really really weak. A new illustration for Websters for the definition of lame? Or perhaps incompetance? Wonder where he went to Law School.

What bothers me most about it (besides the abominable behavior) is that there seems to be no command responsibility here. The Pentagon is keeping very quiet about it and no senior officers, hell, officers of any rank, seem to be held responsible. I'm not really surprised that it's Reserve enlisted and NCOs who performed the abuse but it shows a distinct lack of ... hmm, so many words spring to mind, ethics, responsibility, competance, training, command climate, that no officer was aware of what was happening.

So much of the planning and execution seems to be flawed. Of course we can't depend on the media for any factual information which makes it hard to make such a claim (or refute it). Sure the offensive was well planned and brilliantly executed but didn't someone say "what happens then?". Surely someone had to say "what if the Iraqi citizens don't cheer for us and do what we ask them to?". Where was the old, almost retired colonel who was warning them that this could be our generation's Vietnam?