Propaganda & Mass Persuasion: Abu Ghraib

Thursday, May 03, 2012

Abu Ghraib

Last week in class, i was absolutely shocked and highly informed about the treatment of the prisoners at  Abu Gharib prison back in 2003. I remember seeing a magazine about the story when i was about 12 years not understanding what has gone on. The whole torture case was handled way out of hand in my defense and the some of the soldiers abused their power to a large extent. The soldiers claimed in their jurisdiction that they were "getting information" out of the prisoners when in reality all they were doing is just humiliating them.


According to an article pertaining to Abu Gharib "Detainees continue to report suffering extreme heat while housed in tents; insufficient water; inadequate washing facilities; open trenches for toilets; no change of clothes, even after two months' detention," Amnesty said. Some of these prisoners died from excess torture and many of these prisoners escaped the prison compound. The soldiers followed through with the tortures because they were given orders from Cpl Charles Granger. The soldiers universally replied in the interviews that they followed through with said actions because that they were told that things were different in wartime and they were told to do anything to get any information out of the prisoners.
Granger was sentenced in 2005 for 10 years for being the mastermind of all the torture and humiliation plots towards the prisoners. These acts were but not limited to human pyramid stacking, knocking out a detainee, and taking photographs in facility were photos were not supposed to be taken.

On June 13th, prisoners fought back at US troops by throwing bricks and other clutter and as a result one prisoner was killed by US fire. Abu Gharib is heavily feared prison. According to an article from Reuters, "Amnesty has said thousands are held in prisons run by U.S. troops. They include Abu Ghraib, one the most feared jails under Saddam, and Camp Cropper near Baghdad's airport."




Some may say that such an event like this could've been used as propaganda to vote President Bush out of office to not get elected for a 2nd term. I believe if this was used a tool and tactic by John Kerry to use against Bush, Bush could've lost the 2004 election. What disturbs me most about this whole story is how these soldiers took pictures of the events and how they thought it was funny to pose in front of dead corpses and give the "thumbs up" sign is just completely inhumane and unprofessional and the explanations they give to justify their actions are just laughable saying "I do it because i didn't know what else to do."













http://www.commondreams.org/headlines03/0723-01.htm

http://www.newyorker.com/archive/2004/05/10/040510fa_fact

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