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The Insufferable Silence
By Anthony Wade
www.OpEdNews.com
How much is enough America? How much is enough
before we stand up collectively and say, “No more”. America has
become sedated, tranquilized by a corporate media that keeps the
truth from coming to light on an everyday basis. Anesthetized to the
point that when the vilest acts perpetrated in the war on terror are
being carried out by us, we just flip the channel to see if we can
see who is left on American Idol. What has happened to our
collective conscience when in latter day America we spend more time
worrying about the freak show that is the Jackson trial then what
atrocities are being committed in our name.
That is right America; this war is fought in
your name, my name, and the names of every other citizen who resides
in this country. Do you even remember why? Do you care anymore? Tens
of thousands of people have died, over 1,600 of our own and do you
even remember why? Does their blood scream out to you, as it does to
me, as an American, as a Christian, as a human?
If not, then maybe the latest story out of
Afghanistan will shake our collective conscience. You remember
Afghanistan don’t you? That was where this great war started. We
were told it was where the big bad guy, bin Laden was. As it turns
out, as soon as we had him surrounded, we let him go. We continued
though to bulldoze through the country and install our puppet
government in the name of democracy. The reality was a little more
stark, as this resulted in the return of Afghanistan is the world’s
chief supplier of heroin. That aside, we were told that Afghanistan
was a great example of the success of the war on terror. The real
terror however, has been going on after the great victories.
As reported this week, on Friday, there was
another incident of prisoner abuse that resulted in the deaths of
two suspects. These reports usually break on Friday, so the media
can ignore them and then switch subjects come Monday. Just another
shot of anesthesia for the American populace. The deaths are not
only disgusting, but they now represent what we have become, what
our legacy is.
Mr. Dilawar was a quiet man with a wife and
daughter who was simply in the wrong place at the wrong time. The
place was Afghanistan and the time was during the Bush Wars. Driving
his taxi past a base used by American troops, Camp Salerno, which
had been the target of a rocket attack that morning; was his
undoing. In a land dominated by an unrelenting foreign power, us,
Mr. Dilawar was promptly picked up for interrogation. His crime was
DWA, driving while Afghani. Mr. Dilawar was not an imposing man,
standing only at 5 foot nine inches and weighing 122 pounds. That
mattered not to his captors, us, who immediately labeled him as
non-compliant. Apparently non-compliant is not a label you want in a
U.S. prison in Afghanistan.
His torture started with over 100 strikes to
his legs in a 24 hours period, while he was shackled standing up.
Three days later, he began his fourth interrogation. His hands were
slapped back up every time they fell below his head. They were
falling of course because of the beatings and shackled positions he
had been forced to endure for the past three days. He was violently
shoved against a wall multiple times, because he could not sit in a
chair as instructed by his tormentors, us. Of course he could not
sit because of the state of his legs, battered over 100 times in a
day. After 15 minutes of this, he was so weak he could not get up so
they stood him up. It was then that the Sergeant stepped back and
kicked him fiercely in the groin. Seemingly unsatisfied by this
“interrogation”, the Sergeant then instructed them to leave the
battered Mr. Dilawar chained to the ceiling with a black hood over
his head.
Soon, he was crying out for mercy when his
captors investigated. He said he needed to see a doctor because of
his legs. The attending MP said he was ok and just trying to get out
of his restraints. The next morning began his final interrogation.
Mr. Dilawar was incoherent. The treatment was similar. He was beaten
some more, choked with his black hood, and all in the name of you an
I. By that time the next day, God had granted Mr. Dilawar the peace
his captors, us, refused to give him for so many days. There was
zero intelligence gathered and it appears the man had done nothing
wrong.
The autopsy confirmed that death was cause by
the blunt trauma to his legs which in the word of one of the
coroners, were basically pulpified. Did you get that America? They
beat this 122 pound man in his legs so badly that the tissue turned
into pulp. The coroner compared the injuries to someone getting run
over by a bus.
Mr. Dilawar was one of two murdered prisoners
from that prison at that time. I will not review the horrific
details of the other, except to say that it is no less violent and
no less despicable. Most of the troops working there had decided
that Dilawar was innocent before the final interrogation that took
his life. They killed him anyway. They killed him in your name. They
killed him in my name. By God, they killed him in Christ’s name and
that is what has to stop.
George Bush goes to great lengths to tell us
about his Christianity. Some say it is what clinched the last
election for him. Jesus Christ is the Prince of Peace, not war. I
have read the Bible and did not come across the word pulpify. There
is nothing Christian about this war. Yet Pastors all over this
country support this man and his policies of death and torture. It
has to stop.
We were told that these wars are to protect us.
Bush has done a masterful job of connecting two countries that have
little to do with terror and making them the central point for his
wars. The only thing that made Afghanistan central to terror was
Osama bin Laden and he has not been there since we first got there
and let him escape. Iraq had nothing to do with it at all and
thousands have died because of nothing. In your name.
How much will be enough for you? Monday will
bring a new day and a new opportunity for the media to ignore this
story, which should be the only story. There will be a new witness
in the Jackson fiasco. There will be more developments in the
nuclear showdown in the Senate. Even if they manage to get around to
it, will they simply tell us more fairy tales of bad apples? How
many Lyndie England’s will it take to make you say no more? How many
more Charles Graner’s will it take to break through this silence?
How many more before we all realize it is not a couple of bad apples
but the farmer that is to blame. When you draft memos designed to
render the Geneva Convention “quaint”, you are the root cause of the
bad apples. When you outsource torture you are the primary cause of
the bad apples. When you invade countries that have nothing to do
with terrorism and ally with countries that support it, you are the
only cause of the bad apples. You are the bad apple.
Bush will continue to make grand speeches that
defy the very facts that are occurring every day. His media machine
will support it, and keep giving you the sedatives you are used to.
Somewhere in a poor country that we have annihilated though, someone
else will be killed in your name. They will be killed in my name.
Where is the outrage? Why is there nothing but silence?
Will there be any outrage for a country that
pretends to act in the cause of morality but behaves with no
morality guiding it? Will there be any outrage for a President that
claims to talk to God and then perpetrates such blinding evil upon
mankind? Will there be any outrage that our media has sold us out?
Will there be any outrage for Mr. Dilawar, a
122 pound innocent taxi driver from Afghanistan, murdered in your
name, for the cause of freedom. Or will there just be more of this
insufferable silence.
Anthony Wade, a
contributing writer to
opednews.com, is dedicated to educating the populace to the lies
and abuses of the government. He is a 37-year-old independent writer
from New York with political commentary articles seen on multiple
websites. A Christian progressive and professional Rehabilitation
Counselor working with the poor and disabled, Mr. Wade believes that
you can have faith and hold elected officials accountable for lies
and excess.
Anthony Wade’s
Archive:
http://www.opednews.com/archiveswadeanthony.htm
Email
Anthony:
takebacktheus@gmail.com
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