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Review
'Was THE book about what we are actually having to live with now.' --Adam Philips
'This book provides a devastating insight not only into what happened at Abu Ghraib, but in Iraq in general.' --The Independent on Sunday
'This book provides a devastating insight not only into what happened at Abu Ghraib, but in Iraq in general.' --The Independent on Sunday
The Guardian
'an extraordinary book...Although Gourevitch lets the soldiers speak for themselves, his few analytical forays are invaluable.'
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2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Standard Operatiing Procedure - a tragedy of errors,
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This review is from: Standard Operating Procedure: A War Story (Hardcover)
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American journalist Philip Gourevitch documents the combination of bureaucracy, a lack of resources, ignorance and revenge provided the ideal conditions to produce a barbaric regime for the interrogation of prisoners.
The slow descent into barbarity relies as much on good people being prepared to do nothing as much as the acts of the main protagonists. If Gourevitch has any fault in this work, it is that he fails to find anyone guilty at all, since the blame is spread widely and thinly like peanut butter in a sandwich.
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Depressing, but insightful,
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This review is from: Standard Operating Procedure: A War Story (Hardcover)
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There are many theories as to how men become monsters in times of war.
This is not a theory, it is about reality. Depressingly, it only occasionally hints at the humanity of some officers, and shows how history will record the last decade of operations in Iraq as a dark corner of humanity. We will not be seen as brutal fascists of bygone eras, but just ordinary men, evolving psychologically into a state none of us should aspire to. Men who want to destroy other people mentally rather than physically. Ultimately, I'm left wondering who oversees the overseers and how could this awful state of affairs arise? Washington should take this book to heart and learn the lessons contained within.
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Iraq Stripped,
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This review is from: Standard Operating Procedure: A War Story (Hardcover)
Customer review from the Amazon Vine™ Programme (What's this?)
This book follows the story of the scandal that emerged following Gulf War 2 of the US treatment of prisoners in Iraq. We finally find out what exactly led to the outcry over Abu Ghraib prison.
We already know that the war was instigated to remove Saddam but also that the US, and her allies, had no actual plan in place for what followed. There was no plan for how the country would be run after "victory" was declared. Policy appeared to be made either on the hoof, by well meaning but incompetent functionaries with no clue on putting systems in place or by ideologically motivated people with little regard for the Iraqi people. The war was supposed to be about "freeing" the Iraqi people and instilling "democracy" in the Middle East. What the people ended up with was a new dictatorship that removed their rights, ruled with no regard to international or even US law and with no understanding of Arab culture. Here we find that what led to the scandal at Abu Ghraib came about because no one would listen to people with experience in running prisons. They had the people set things up but then removed them before they could train the staff effectively. They brought in reservists with no experience of running a modern prison. Policing was done by squaddies who had no idea about modern policing methods. If they ran into trouble then they arrested everyone in the area, there was no thought as to who was guilty or involved. Instead of using a fishing line they used trawl nets. They ended up with over crowded prisons full of people who shouldn't have been there and with no real records of what people had been arrested for. The system was now run by a woman who had led the torture of prisoners captured in Afghanistan - she'd won medals for this. So the culture she instilled in those under her command. What made it worse was that the culture was encouraged by senior people in the civil administration in Washington. You really need to read this to discover what our governments are doing in our name. This is what the "War on Terror" has brought us to - illeagal torture, rendition and the suspension of international law.
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