When Thomas “it’s-not-too-late-to-win-in-Iraq” Friedman throws in the towel, we know we’re in serious doo doo. And you needn’t be a seer to read between the lines of this story to see that Friedman now considers Iraq to be a lost cause. A lot of readers criticized me when I said we were going to lose Iraq to the theocrats, not the insurgents. If you’re with me today, don’t miss the next-to-last paragraph of this grim column.

Insurgency Out, Anarchy In
By THOMAS L. FRIEDMAN
Published: June 2, 2006

President Bush has told us that the question of whether to withdraw from Iraq is one that his successor will have to deal with — not him. I don’t think so. Mr. Bush is not going to have that luxury of passing Iraq along. You see, the insurgency in Iraq is in its “last throes” — just like Dick Cheney said. Unfortunately, it’s being replaced by anarchy in many neighborhoods — not democracy. And I don’t believe the American people will put up with two and half more years of babysitting anarchy instead of midwifing democracy.

The report that U.S. marines were involved in a massacre of Iraqis in Haditha — which the Pentagon needs to clarify fast — is a tragic reminder that a foreign occupation by U.S. forces can’t go on for years. Most U.S. soldiers in Iraq have done heroic work, but occupations that drag on inevitably lead to Hadithas.

(more…)

A thread in the forum on the 40th anniversary of the Cultural Revolution includes some excellent lnks, one of which led me to an article that has been haunting me this afternoon. We all know the stories, but it’s so easy to forget. And it was a mere forty years ago. It’s absolutely mind-numbing, to think that some of the graying people we pass on the street in Beijing were committing these atrocities so recently, spurred on by the most deranged and irrational regime of the 20th century.

On August 22, 1966, Sha Ping, the principal of Beijing Third Girls Middle School, was beaten to death. After she died, some Red Guard students forced teachers to slap her corpse. Li Peiying, the dean of this school, hanged herself.

On August 22, 1966, Hua Jin, the head of Beijing Eighth Middle School died in the room where she was imprisoned and tortured. After a serious beating, vice principal Han Jiufang developed a bad case of septicemia. The beating left her permanently handicapped. Shen Xianzhe, a teacher of Chinese, committed suicide after a beating.

On August 25, 1966, the students of the Second Middle School attached to Beijing Teachers University beat three people to death on their campus: Jin Zhengyu, a literature teacher; Jiang Peiliang, the secretary of the Communist Party, the highest-ranking cadre at this school; and Fan Ximan, a student’s mother. The principal, Gao Yun, was ordered to stand under the hot sun, while boiling water was poured on him and thumbtacks were stuck in his forehead. Gao came close to dying several times that summer.

Li Jingpo, a custodian in the receptionist office of Beijing Jingshan School who allegedly had “historical problems” was beaten to death by students at this school in August 1966.

At the Middle School attached to Beijing Foreign Language College the Red guard students beat two educators, Chinese teacher Zhang Furen and an administative staff Zhang Fuzhen, to death in the same day

At the Middle School attached to Beijing Teacher’s College, Yu Ruifen, a female biology teacher, was knocked to the ground and beaten in her office. In broad daylight, she was dragged by her legs through the front door and down the steps, her head bumping against the cement; a barrel of boiling water was poured on her. Though she died after approximately two hours of torture, it did not satisfy the students. All other teachers in the “ox-ghost and snake-demon team” were forced to stand around Yu’s corpse and take turns beating her.

In general, the brutality of students in college and in elementary schools was not as severe as in middle schools, but it was nevertheless serious. At Beijing University, hundreds of people in the “labor reform team of ox ghosts and snake demons” were forced to clean the campus with irregularly shaved heads, while wearing boards with their name and title, such as “member of the black gang” or “reactionary academic authority,” around their necks and receiving gratuitous insults from many students who came to “learn revolutionary experiences from Beijing University.” For example, Zhu Guaqian, professor of aesthetics, had his head shaved and then was forced everyday to pick up garbage with other “enemies” in front of the convenience store near the student dormitories. On August 4, when Professor Wu Xinghua of the English Department was cleaning the lawn, some students forced him to drink polluted water from a ditch ontaining waste from a chemical factory near the University. Immediately, he became very sick. That night, at age 44, he died. On August 24, students from the Department of Biology used a copper-buckled leather belt to whip one of their lecturers, Hu Shouwen, at his home. His bloody shirt stuck to his skin, so that his wife had to use warm water to soften the shirt before he could remove it. Hu’s neighbor Chen Xiance, the secretary of the Party for the Department of Chinese Language and Literature, was beaten beside him that day. On September 2, Chen Xiance committed suicide by drinking two bottles of insecticide after suffering a long period of torture, which included being beaten and having an X-shape shaved on his head. On October 9, Shen Naizhang, professor of psychology, committed suicide after suffering humiliations.

All in a day’s work.

I tried to put myself in the minds of the tormentors to see if I could understand how/why they could have done it. This was a futile exercise, and I admit I failed miserably. 70 percent good. Why can’t I see that 70 percent that was so good?