Berg’s father speaks

I am now going off for my very brief summer break. I take with me the words of Michael Berg, father of Nick Berg, the US contractor beheaded on video in Iraq this month by a group believed to be linked to al-Qaida. This is an extract from his message of support for the Stop The War Coalition's demonstration, End the Torture–Bring the Troops Home Now, held in London last week. This was printed in The Guardian on May 21, 2004.

``My son, Nick, was my teacher and my hero. He was the kindest, gentlest man I know; no, the kindest, gentlest human being I have ever known. He quit the Boy Scouts of America because they wanted to teach him to fire a handgun. Nick, too, poured into me the strength I needed, and still need, to tell the world about him.

``People ask me why I focus on putting the blame for my son's tragic and atrocious end on the Bush administration. They ask: ``Don't you blame the five men who killed him?’’ I have answered that I blame them no more or less than the Bush administration, but I am wrong: I am sure, knowing my son, that somewhere during their association with him these men became aware of what an extraordinary man my son was. I take comfort that when they did the awful thing they did, they weren't quite as in to it as they might have been. I am sure that they came to admire him.

``I am sure that the one who wielded the knife felt Nick's breath on his hand and knew that he had a real human being there. I am sure that the others looked into my son's eyes and got at least a glimmer of what the rest of the world sees. And I am sure that these murderers, for just a brief moment, did not like what they were doing.



``George Bush never looked into my son's eyes. George Bush doesn't know my son, and he is the worse for it. George Bush, though a father himself, cannot feel my pain, or that of my family, or of the world that grieves for Nick, because he is a policymaker, and he doesn't have to bear the consequences of his acts.

``George Bush can see neither the heart of Nick nor that of the American people, let alone that of the Iraqi people his policies are killing daily. Donald Rumsfeld said that he took responsibility for the sexual abuse of Iraqi prisoners. How could he take that responsibility when there was no consequence? Nick took the consequences.

``Even more than those murderers who took my son's life, I can't stand those who sit and make policies to end lives and break the lives of the still living.

``Nick was not in the military, but he had the discipline and dedication of a soldier. Nick Berg was in Iraq to help the people without any expectation of personal gain. He was only one man, but through his death he has become many. The truly unselfish spirit of giving your all to do what you know in your own heart is right even when you know it may be dangerous; this spirit has spread among the people who knew Nick, and that group has spread and is spreading all over the world.

``So what were we to do when we in America were attacked on September 11, that infamous day? I say we should have done then what we never did before: stop speaking to the people we labeled our enemies and start listening to them. Stop giving preconditions to our peaceful coexistence on this small planet, and start honoring and respecting every human's need to live free and autonomously, to truly respect the sovereignty of every state. To stop making up rules by which others must live and then separate rules for ourselves.

``George Bush's ineffective leadership is a weapon of mass destruction, and it has allowed a chain reaction of events that led to the unlawful detention of my son which immersed him in a world of escalated violence.

``Were it not for Nick's detention, I would have had him in my arms again. That detention held him in Iraq not only until the atrocities that led to the siege of Fallujah, but also the revelation of the atrocities committed in the jails in Iraq, in retaliation for which my son's wonderful life was put to an end.

``My son's work still goes on. Where there was one peacemaker before, I now see and have heard from thousands of peacemakers. Nick was a man who acted on his beliefs. We, the people of this world, now need to act on our beliefs. We need to let the evildoers on both sides of the Atlantic know that we are fed up with war. We are fed up with the killing and bombing and maiming of innocent people. We are fed up with the lies. Yes, we are fed up with the suicide bombers, and with the failure of the Israelis and Palestinians to find a way to stop killing each other. We are fed up with negotiations and peace conferences that are entered into on both sides with preset conditions that preclude the outcome of peace. We want world peace now.

``Many have offered to pray for Nick and my family. I appreciate their thoughts, but I ask them to include in their prayers a prayer for peace. And I ask them to do more than pray. I ask them to demand peace now.’’

Habitat for Humanity 2004. Last week, Inquirer employees again took time off to help build homes for low-income families in Mandaluyong. We were appropriately attired, of course, when we reported to Habitat to fulfill our date with hammer and saw, spade and hoe, gravel and sand.

This was unlike Habitat 1999 (the year former US Pres. Jimmy Carter came to help build and I got to sit down with and interview him) when the Inquirer built a whole house for a poor family in Cavite. This year, Habitat switched to on-site improvement of homes in congested urban areas. This entailed demolition of decrepit structures and rebuilding on the same sites where the beneficiaries lived.

The beheading

A reader, Ms. Gloria Parillas Earl, sent a letter to the editor (PDI 5/18/04) castigating me for what I said in my column piece (``Taguba’s report on Abu Ghraib’’, PDI 5/13/04) on the abuses--sexual, physical, psychological--committed by U.S. Army personnel against Iraqi detainees at the Abu Ghraib prison.

She asked: ``Where is Doyo’s disgust over the videotaped beheading of Nick Berg, whose passion for helping others got him into Iraq?’’

Another reader who read the letter promptly wrote to me via email and agreed with Ms. Earl on ``my lacking in courage’’ to condemn. He/she said I ``had written fair and balanced columns generally in the past but you seem, to `lose it’ when it pertains to issues about war and social injustice.’’ Too anti-U.S meddling, too pro-poor?

But a reader from San Francisco reacted to Ms. Earl’s letter by questioning Berg’s presence in Iraq. What he said was not very flattering to the dead.

So early and I was spilling my coffee.



I did not get to see the brief and digitized video clip of the beheading on CNN until later and tremble at its impact, that is, after I had masticated the U.S. senate investigation where Maj. Gen. Antonio Taguba, author of the report on the abuses, Defense Undersecretary Stephen Cambone and Lt. Gen. Lance Smith testified. That column was on Taguba’s report, which I had to download from the Internet, not on Berg’s beheading.

Yes, I meant to write about the beheading separately for today, and I planned to search for the clip on the Internet, if it was there at all, hoping I would have the stomach for it. I wanted more details on it. Maybe I’d notice something others didn’t see?

I was castigated too soon. Still, I respect and recognize readers’ impassioned reactions, their feeling strongly about something and making it known. They care.

Now the letter. Ms. Earl wrote: ``Ceres P. Doyo wanted me, an American, to raise hell with our leaders for the `disgusting’ ways a few coalition guards treated their prisoners at Abu Ghraib.’’

Ms. Earl, I never said that. What I said was: ``If I were an American I would be red-faced. If I were an American I would write my very own individual letter of apology to the world, to the people of Iraq and to the detainees in Abu Ghraib prison.’’ If I were…but then I am not.

``As an American,’’ Ms. Earl said, ``I do not apologize for our brave coalition men and women who run where wimps and cowards dare not go to defend the world’s freedom and liberty…’’ She also said, ``I am a Filipino too, but although I was ashamed of the Moros who beheaded the American hostages…I did not ask Doyo to apologize for her Moro countrymen’s barbarism. Neither did I blame the Philippine leaders nor did I ask them to apologize.’’

Did I say, you Americans must apologize? Pres. Bush didn’t have to. But I don’t want to sound facetious. A point I wanted to make in that article was that the men and women who committed the abuses were wearing the American flag, they were there in Iraq, carrying out America’s self-righteous role as, uh, ``constable of the world.’’ They were supposed to be on the moral high ground, to show those of us from backward societies how not to be barbarians and how they would bring about their vision of peace, their Pax Americana.

A preacher preaching love and then rapes a prostitute has more to answer for than a teenager who also commits rape.

When I saw those pictures of naked, abused detainees (many of them may have been terrorists), it was not condemnation that right away rose in my heart. It was the feeling of betrayal, of being let down. Like, how could you, so young, so fresh-faced, be like the terrorists? How could your leaders have missed out on teaching you something so important? You shamed your own people.

A rabid America hater might clap and say, ha, you’re just like your enemy, the terrorists. But this issue is not just about global terrorism. At the bottom line, this is also about having a sense of the worth of every human being, every creature.

These soldiers were being paid by the taxes of toiling American people. Could they not at least have been properly briefed by their seniors about human rights? That was what Taguba’s testimony on the breakdown of discipline was pointing at.

The beheading of Berg, and earlier, the beheading of journalist Pearl, said it loud and clear. The perpetrators were evil personified.

Ms. Earl, you sure would not want your American soldiers to be on the same level with terrorists and bandits. Those ``Moro countrymen’’ of mine you referred to, those who beheaded your fellow Americans, they do not want to be Filipinos. They do not carry my flag. I do not pay my taxes to them. My taxes in fact go to efforts to obliterate their evil, with little left for the most forgotten of this land.

And when, in the past, our own military committed abuses learned from the CIA, sure, I did stick out my own neck many times on many occasions and suffered for it. That was not heroism, that was journalism.

I did not overlook the pain of Ms. Earl’s compatriot, Abu Sayyaf hostage Gracia Burnham (``Gracia on the mystic road of love’’). But in deference to her pain, I chose not to write about how her missionary group was operating here. It had nothing to do with the hostage-taking. In the same way that what Berg was doing in Iraq, his being American or Jewish or caucasian, cannot not justify his beheading.

For those interested, American veteran journalist Alfred W. McCoy, who has written a lot about the Philippines, had an article in the Boston Globe last May 14 titled ``Torture at Abu Ghraib Followed CIA’s Manual.’’

Taguba’s report on Abu Ghraib

I stayed up very late the other night to watch live on CNN the U.S. Senate investigation of the torture committed by U.S. military personnel at the Abu Ghraib prison, with U.S. Army Major General Antonio Taguba, Undersecretary of Defense Stephen Cambone and Lt. Gen. Lance Smith testifying.

Philippines-born Taguba, a true-brown kayumanggi, is the author of the report that details the shameless acts done to Iraqi detainees by members of the 800th MP Brigade assigned in Abu Ghraib. Gen. Taguba reaped a rain of praises for his no-nonsense report and testimony and for calling intentional abuse intentional abuse.

You must have seen those disgusting photographs that came out starting last week, photographs of naked Iraqi detainees being humiliated, tortured, piled one on top of another like carcass. Being photographed and videotaped while in that humiliated state added to the intensity of the torment. The bad news is that there’s more than what we saw in photos.

How could something like this have happened in this day and age? Yes, Saddam Hussein and Adolf Hitler do not have the monopoly of evil. Their evil spirit lives on in some U.S. military personnel. If I were an American, I would be red-faced. If I were an American citizen I would write my very own individual letter of apology to the world, to the people of Iraq and to the detainees in Abu Ghraib prison.

Senators, among them Sen. Hillary Clinton, focused on the acts of humiliation and torture detailed on page 16 and 17 of Taguba’s 53-page report. I later downloaded the report from the Internet. Here are those portions that the world ought to read not only for their shock value but also so that people may be forewarned about more 9/11s. This is the very thing that begets hatred.



Here’s Gen. Taguba reporting: ``I find that the intentional abuse of detainees by military police personnel included the following acts:

a)Punching, slapping, and kicking detainees, jumping on their naked feet; b)Videotaping and photographing naked male and female detainees; c)Forcibly arranging detainees in various sexually explicit positions for photographing; d)Forcing detainees to remove their clothing and keeping them naked for several days at a time; e)Forcing naked male detainees to wear women’s underwear; f)Forcing groups of male detainees to masturbate themselves while being photographed and videotaped; g)Arranging naked male detainees in a pile and then jumping on them; h)Positioning a naked detainee on a MRE Box, with a sandbag on his head, and attaching wire to his fingers, toes and penis to simulate electric torture; i)Writing `I am a Rapest’ (sic) on the leg of a detainee alleged to have forcibly raped a 15-year-old fellow detainee, and then photographing him naked; j)Placing a dog chain or strap around a naked detainee’s neck and having a female soldier pose for a picture; k) A male MP guard having sex with a female detainee; l)Using military working dogs (without muzzles) to intimidate and frighten detainees, and in at least one case, biting and severely injuring a detainee; m) Taking photographs of dead Iraqi detainees.’’

There’s more, like breaking chemical lights and pouring the phosphoric liquid on detainees, sodomizing a detainee with a chemical light and a broom stick, and using military working dogs to frighten and intimidate with threats of attack, and in one instance, to bite a detainee.

These torturers could not even spell the word rapist correctly and they were sent there, to run a prison facility and handle detainees? Taguba’s testimony pointed to this lack of proper training and preparation of personnel. He also told the senate that the cameras used were privately owned. Trip lang nila.

And there was this problem that the detainees concerned could not be classified as prisoners of war (POW) who had specific rights under the articles of the Geneva Conventions. The detainees were mostly captured offenders and suspected terrorists. But POW or not, human beings, terrorists included, have the right to be treated humanely.

Taguba also pointed out that very few, if at all, had read a copy of the Geneva Conventions in that neck of Iraq. What? (Why, I even have a copy of my own. The Red Cross has plenty.)

A big let-down for me—the 800th MP Brigade is under the command of Gen. Janis Karpinski, a woman. One of the six or seven suspected perpetrators of the inhumane acts is a woman-soldier. Oh no.

The 53-year-old Taguba has been made much of especially by the Filipino-American communities and publications in the U.S. since his report came out. Born in Sampaloc in 1950, Taguba’s roots are in Cagayan. The general is the son of World War II veteran Tomas Taguba, survivor of the Bataan Death March and recipient of a Bronze Star and a Prisoner of War medal. The elder Taguba had served in South Korea, Germany and Okinawa, spending many years as a motor-pool sergeant. He rose to the rank of sergeant 1st class before he retired in 1962.

In an article in AsianWeek, writer Bert Eljera says Antonio Taguba was 11 when his family moved to Hawaii. After high school, Taguba enrolled at Idaho State University where he graduated in 1972. He joined the U.S. Army and rose through the ranks. He attended prestigious military training schools. He holds three master’s degrees. He commanded a tank company of a mechanized division in Germany and was a battalion commander and then executive officer of the combined Republic of Korea-U.S. Forces in Korea. Taguba is the second Filipino-American general in the U.S. Army.

It was his mother and his grandmother, Taguba said, who had the most influence on his life.

The vote of the poor (2)

Last week we shared portions of the findings of the research done by the Ateneo University’s Institute of Philippine Culture (IPC) on how the poor view elections and choose their candidates.

IPC’s ``The Vote of the Poor: The Values and Pragmatics of Elections’’ tries to answer the questions: do the poor produce a ``dumb masa’’ vote? What do the poor think of elections? How do they make their choices? How much influence do the media exert on them? What to them are the traits of a true leader?

IPC used focused groups discussions (FGD) as a tool to get to the raw sentiments and perceptions of the subjects.

Here’s more:

The most important sources of influence in the choice of candidates are: media, family, church, political parties, one’s own (sarili lang/walang nakakaimpluwensiya) and surveys.



(In dozens of conferences and forums on all sorts of issues that I’ve attended or covered here and abroad this past decade, the media have always been pointed to as one of the most influential factors in shaping individuals and society. Are schools, churches and families sleeping on the job?)

According to IPC, the mass media appear to play a crucial bridge between the poor’s leadership ideals and the process of choosing candidates. Serious mass media practitioners must consider ways by which their profession can be more effective in playing this all-important role.

To arrive at an informed choice, IPC said, the participants recognize the media as playing a most crucial role. Only among rural participants does the media not figure as the most important source of influence. The family and the church are on top of their list.

While the participants get information from newspapers, radio and TV, the youth also rely on text messages and the Internet. IPC pointed out that across all groups, tsismis (gossip or small talk) figure as a source of information. Discussions (pakikisalamuha) with other people are also deemed important. Urbanites also look to ads, leaflets, campaign streamers to get to know the candidates.

But body language is important too. And here the electronic media has an edge over print. The poor analyze the images projected by candidates via radio or TV to gauge character (ugali). How do the candidates speak and comport themselves?

Rural women look at the candidates’ manner of speaking. Do they ``speak with respect’’? Males also observe the manner of speaking and the face, how the candidates stand or walk and deal with people. Nothing beats a face to face encounter. Urbanites observe these aspects too, plus the candidates’ personal appearance.

Here are some quotes from the FGDs. Sa pananalita malalaman mo kung mabait o magaling. Sa reaksyon niya sa mga tao habang nangangampanya. Physical appearance is a good source for determining behavior.

The youth say they could tell a person’s character by the manner of speaking and responding to questions during a debate. They also study the temper of the candidate. As one young FGD participant said: ``They say liars have unstable eye movements.’’

Despite media’s high ranking, participants still consider the information they get from the media inadequate, particularly in the case of those running for national positions. TV ads are considered unreliable as there is no way to check out the claims.

Election time is a time of confusion, nakakalito. Too many candidates, too many positions to fill. And the information about candidates are not necessarily to be trusted. Maraming paninira ang lumalabas sa mga kandidato, hindi mo alam kung ano ang totoo.

The conduct of elections—whether to be computerized or not, and the validation of registration--has added to the confusion.

As to vote buying and selling, there seems to be a sense that the public ultimately loses if this practice goes on. Hindi tama na mamigay, kasi kapag nanalo, babawiin din ito, baka mas malaki pa. Dai, magkakaigwa nin korapto. Mali, kasi parang binibili ang pagkatao mo.

While a handful will never accept money, most participants say they will accept but still vote for those they like as long as there is no way their votes could be checked.

IPC concluded that, as suggested by the views and opinions expressed by the participants of the study, it is clear that the poor possess a dignified, defensible and rational idea about good leadership. However, the study said, there appears to be a mismatch between the ideals of leadership on one hand, and elections as the mechanism for choosing elected leaders, on the other.

Here is an important lesson that needs to be recognized. If the electoral process is fair and the broader political system is reformed, the poor, despite their poverty—can make good choices. But, as it is, the IPC study pointed out, they can only make good choices based on a flawed system. For our political problems, the voting poor (much used and abused) are not to blame.

I say, blame the miseducated and greedy elite, the unpoor who are in control.

****

My grudging vote. Eight out of 10 people I have asked have not made up their minds on who to vote for on Monday. Or are they just shy about their choices? Grudgingly, I vote on Monday for candidates I hardly care about. But vote I will, hoping my choice for president will grow bigger ears and a bigger heart for the extremely needy, and grow in wisdom and strength in order to right the wrong and be able to pull this country out of the shadows. We must now all pull together or perish.

Bring a list to the polling place. For the senatorial and council slates, list names in alphabetical order to make tallying easy.