READ AND WEEP

Here’s Sy Hersh’s latest account of what went wrong at Abu Ghraib. The truly horrifying thing is that the worst is yet to come. The photos we have seen are, apparently, benign compared to what we have not yet seen. I am sorry I cannot be more upbeat. But nothing that the enemy could dream up could have done us more harm in the eyes of the world than what some in U.S. uniform have done to the United States’ credibility and honor. We have no option but to withstand it and carry on. We owe that to the Iraqi people, to the world and to ourselves and our own security. But the damage is immeasurable; and, ultimately, the president must take responsibility. You could feel the psychological barometric pressure drop this weekend in Washington. Maybe the rest of the country won’t react the same way. Or maybe there will be a time-lag in which the country as a whole realizes it has lost confidence in this administration as profoundly as Washington now has. But every time I try to think of a way in which this is not catastrophic to the cause of democracy and peace in the Middle East, I come undone.