Another Rumsfeld blunder

Abu Ghraib was a shameful episode and Don Rumsfeld, true to obstinate form, never seemed to grasp quite how much damage it had done America. But what is equally revealing is the careless way that Rumsfeld disclosed the name of the whistle blower, Joe Darby.

Dabry recounted the story in the Sunday Times:

"Five weeks later I was sitting in the dining facility in Camp Anaconda in Iraq when a press conference came on that was the live feed from the congregational hearings about Abu Ghraib. There was an announcement that secretary Rumsfeld was thanking me for turning in the photos and allowing the investigation to go forward – thanking me by name. I was eating with four soldiers and I just stopped mid-bite. One of the guys looked across and said, “Darb, we need to leave”, and so we put our trays up and walked out. Within 72 hours everyone in my unit and my home town knew I’d been the one to turn them in.

My wife had known the night I turned them in that I was doing something and people were going to be arrested, but she found out with the rest of the country. She took emergency leave of absence from work and tried to escape to her sister’s house. Her sister’s house was spray-painted with “Iraq” all over it – spelt “Iroc”.

I received a letter from Rumsfeld saying he had no malicious intent and was only doing it to praise me, but I find it hard to believe the secretary of defence of the United States had no idea about the star witness from a criminal case being anonymous.”