Untermenschen?

It's not often the far left Lenin's Tomb agrees with the rightwing Daily Telegraph. But when they do, it's worth paying attention, as with the story of Ben Griffin, the former SAS soldier who quit in disgust last June after witnessing the Iraq occupation at first hand.

"As far as the Americans were concerned, the Iraqi people were sub-human, untermenschen. You could almost split the Americans into two groups: ones who were complete crusaders, intent on killing Iraqis, and the others who were in Iraq because the Army was going to pay their college fees. They had no understanding or interest in the Arab culture. The Americans would talk to the Iraqis as if they were stupid and these weren't isolated cases, this was from the top down. There might be one or two enlightened officers who understood the situation a bit better but on the whole that was their general attitude. Their attitude fuelled the insurgency. I think the Iraqis detested them."

I think it's a waste of time to now argue about whether or not the invasion was illegal, or whether there really were WMDs. That's all so much water under the bridge. What matters today is the occupation, and where it's going. America's armed forces seem to be trained exclusively as assault troops, good at blowing stuff up and destroying enemies. What they don't seem to be trained for is the sort of peacekeeping duties Britain has a lot of experience of.

Does's America's political and military leadership realised the mistakes it's making and continue to make? Do they actually care?