The Hot Air Force discovers war crimes

By Robert Jackson
International Law Correspondent

WHOOP-WHOOP-WHOOP!  Assuming you remembered to check the batteries for Shavuot, that siren you hear is your irony alarm shrieking over today's editorial in The Washington Post, where Editorial Page Editor, Hot Air Force Generalissimo Freddie Hiatt '76, today issued a stirring condemnation of – wait for it, war crimes!

Before we get to the war crimes he's inveighing against, let's remind new Spy readers of our long-time coverage of the 101.1st Hot Air Force, that steadfast Washington band of pundits, neocons, academics, and radio talk show hosts who bravely sent other people's children to fight the war in Iraq, whilst they stayed behind in their D.C. bunkers to provide the intellectual firepower so critical to the, um, victory they achieved.

No armchair warrior beat the tom-toms harder than Generalissimo Freddie, who, among others who supposedly knew better, was crucial to lending an air of intellectual legitimacy to what was nothing more than a ridiculous neocon wet dream.  Not only did we squander thousands of lives and trillions of dollars on a fantasy, but along the way, thanks to evil civilian and inept military leadership, we committed the various deeds that Freddie is so upset about when they are perpetrated by a black man in Chad.

What did evil war criminal Hissàne Habré do that so justified his conviction on war crimes charges, according to the Generalissimo?  Well, he's responsible for “unspeakable brutalities during his reign from 1982 to 1990, including torture, arbitrary arrests and forced disappearances of political opponents.”

Wow, that sounds pretty bad.  That's why we're sure Freddie is calling for the prosecution of among others George Bush, Dick Cheney, and Don Rumsfeld for torture, arbitrary detentions, and indeed the deaths of detainees at Bagram and Abu Ghraib, right?

It won't be necessary here to exhume the entire record of vile acts committed by the Bush Administration, although tortures such as waterboarding and anal rape by turkey baster ought to get each of them 20 years in chokey in The Hague.  Then there was the arbitrary detention, usually accompanied by torture, of poor sods who had been sold to U.S. troops or agents by local kidnappers.  They tried to drop American citizens down the well of indefinite solitary confinement without trial too, but that was a bridge too far even for Bush's Supreme Court.  Those interested in the sordid details can consult Jane Mayer's conclusive work, The Dark Side.  Start on page 242 and keep going until you retch.

So turn off the alarm and wait for the stirring condemnation of war crimes committed by Gen. Hiatt's Iraq war buddies.  Let us know when you see it.