Now Defense Contractors Are Lecturing Us On Morality?

[babylonsister]

Now Defense Contractors Are Lecturing Us On Morality?

Posted by Joshua Holland, AlterNet at 9:59 AM on January 20, 2008.


The Washington Post offers us a Very Serious Perspective on the occupation of Iraq, penned by one Nate Slate, a retired Army colonel ...

He Explained Iraq to Me. Now I Have to Explain America.

Not long ago, I finally succeeded in arranging for my Iraqi cultural adviser to move to the safety of the United States. My adviser -- whom I'll call by his tribal name, al-Dulaimi -- helped me navigate the thickets of local culture and politics when I served in Iraq during the first year of the war.

As we drove from the airport down an Oklahoma highway in the darkness, Dulaimi told me that he'd watched the Democratic presidential debates while waiting for his flight out West. "They all talked about leaving Iraq," he said of the candidates. "They're just saying that to get votes, aren't they? They would never do that, would they?"

His plaintive question gave me pause. Of course, Dulaimi wouldn't understand American politics, or the way some Americans would view this war. After all, he had known American soldiers who were selfless and dedicated. Who cherished Army values. Who had committed their lives to each other and this cause.

So it would seem impossible to Dulaimi that the United States might give up. The Americans he knew, the ones he had risked his life (and the lives of his family members) to support, would never "cut and run."

The tag-line's worth noting too:

Nate Slate, a recently retired Army colonel, works for a defense contractor.

So, we've got a militaristic ideologue -- someone who thinks ending a disastrous occupation is "cutting and running" -- but also one with an apparent financial stake in propping up American adventurism. Thank God we have a liberal media that gives him a prime platform from which to disseminate his views.

But that's an aside; what fascinates me is that people -- including DC lawmakers -- will take this rather clunky bit of propaganda seriously. This, after all, is an officer who took advantage of DC's proverbial revolving door and became a "defense contractor," and is now writing about getting one of the very few Iraqis who have gained asylum in the U.S. out of the country. The irony of using this "cultural adviser" as an example of American good will is that he needed to flee his native country because he was marked for death for collaborating with an almost universally loathed occupation force.

more...

http://alternet.org/blogs/peek/74374/#more

[mediaman007]

1. So the guy retires. Does he become productive?

Does he teach? Does he start a business? Nope, he just hops on someone else's coat tails to get a cozy living. I'm in my 39th year of teaching in elementary schools. I think that I've done more for my country than this guy.

[dkf]

2. It goes back to the fact that Iraqis have no faith in their own Government.

The Dems argue that we need the threat of pulling out or they will never get it together.

The Repubs are perfectly happy to stay there and guard the oil and spend every penny we have on defense contractors etc.

[The_Casual_Observer]

3. The narrative of that piece reads like all the other freeper recounts

of spontaneous applause at airports for returning GI's, the dressing down of peace-nicks at the local cafe & so on. One thing is for sure, the actual event never occurred except in the mind of the pysops officer that originally penned it.
"
I'll call by his tribal name, al-Dulaimi" al-doodoo

[Demeter]

4. How Infantile and Dependent of the Iraqi Interpreter.

One would think that a people would want their land free of foreign occupation.