A Tale of Three Stories

One: Via Raw Story, I see that Bruce Willis, “angered by negative portrayals of the Iraq conflict, actor Bruce Willis is to make a pro-war film in which US soldiers will be depicted as brave fighters for freedom and democracy.” Willis is (emphasis mine):

expected to base the film on the writings of the independent blogger Michael Yon, a former special forces green beret who was embedded with Deuce Four and sent regular dispatches about their heroics…

Yon, 41, went to Iraq after a friend from high school, Scott Helveston, a former navy Seal, was hanged from a bridge in Fallujah in an incident that shocked the world. Yon had never blogged before but was the author of Danger Close, a book about his experience as a green beret when he killed a man in a bar-room brawl. He was charged with murder and acquitted on the grounds of self-defence.

Two: At Crooks and Liars, I see the video of what is being described by The Telegraph as “appearing to show security guards in Baghdad randomly shooting Iraqi civilians.”

The video has sparked concern that private security companies, which are not subject to any form of regulation either in Britain or in Iraq, could be responsible for the deaths of hundreds of innocent Iraqis.

The video, which first appeared on a website that has been linked unofficially to Aegis Defence Services, contained four separate clips, in which security guards open fire with automatic rifles at civilian cars. All of the shooting incidents apparently took place on "route Irish", a road that links the airport to Baghdad.

Three: The LA Times reports on the tragic death of Col. Ted Westhusing, one of the Army's leading scholars of military ethics. The Army has ruled his death a suicide.

In e-mails to his family, Westhusing seemed especially upset by one conclusion he had reached: that traditional military values such as duty, honor and country had been replaced by profit motives in Iraq, where the U.S. had come to rely heavily on contractors for jobs once done by the military…

Then, in May, Westhusing received an anonymous four-page letter that contained detailed allegations of wrongdoing by USIS.

The writer accused USIS of deliberately shorting the government on the number of trainers to increase its profit margin. More seriously, the writer detailed two incidents in which USIS contractors allegedly had witnessed or participated in the killing of Iraqis…

Most of the letter is a wrenching account of a struggle for honor in a strange land.

"I cannot support a msn [mission] that leads to corruption, human rights abuse and liars. I am sullied," it says. "I came to serve honorably and feel dishonored.

"Death before being dishonored any more."

(Arthur Silber has much more on this story.)

What’s the connection; what’s the point? Hunter at DailyKos, discussing the “trophy video” mentioned above, notes:

And so the circle -- or spiral -- continues. For those with short memories, it was the alleged misconduct of armed contractors in Iraq that led to the killing and public display of four of them, hanging from a bridge... which led to two separate massive retaliatory assaults against Fallujah... which led to a widespread backlash in Iraq... which led to, among other things, a widened insurgency... which contributed to a situation in Iraq in which armed contractors are necessary for protection of private clients... which led to the alleged misconduct of several of them...

Which leads to what, I wonder?

Iraq is a snake eating its own tail.

I’ve absolutely no doubt that our soldiers are accomplishing lots of good things in Iraq, but I’ve also no doubt that there’s lots of horrible shit going on over there, too, by our own hands. War proponents argue that Iraqis are better off without Saddam Hussein, and I’m sure that’s true. But that really isn’t the question anymore. The question now is whether Iraqis would be better off without us.

Last Monday, Iraqi leaders called for a timetable for the withdrawal of U.S.-led forces. Maybe we ought to listen.