More proof of the lack of morals of this enemy

John Podhoretz:

THE horrific deaths of two American servicemen kidnapped in Iraq on Friday may bring the war into a new phase - and force politicians, media stars and Americans generally to put real meaning behind the meaningless guarantee that "we all support the troops."

Previous American kidnap victims have been unarmed civilians - contractors and journalists who were not trained to kill. The decision to snatch soldiers changes things, which was almost surely the point. Privates Thomas Tucker and Kristian Menchaca, may God protect their souls, were taken from a checkpoint they were manning; one of their comrades in arms, David Babineau, was killed during the assault.

It's one thing to plant improvised explosive devices that wound and kill our armed forces. That kind of attack is what makes this a war. The insurgents can't fight us head on, so they use quick and dirty methods of assault.

But the kidnapping and apparent torture/murder of Privates Tucker and Menchaca may represent a new strategy. If similar kidnap efforts are successful, if this event was not a fluke but an ambitious new tactic to throw Coalition forces off-balance, then things are going to change in Iraq.

Al-Qaeda-in-Iraq likely hopes to make service personnel believe themselves at risk of death by torture from any band of Iraqis they encounter - so that they'll act differently: cautious, suspicious, with the hypervigilance of someone in the midst of a battle. If it works, civilians who mean our armed forces no harm may find themselves shot or killed by mistake as a result of the hair-trigger posture our forces will have to assume to keep themselves safe.

Could anyone blame them?

The answer, of course, is yes. If this is a new strategy, it exists not only to terrorize American and Coalition forces but also to divide them from Iraqis - to sow fear and hostility that will go both ways, to cause an upsurge in resentment and anger toward U.S. forces.

Here at home, we know there is a very serious constituency for stories about Americans committing massacres against Iraqis - from news magazines that print unconfirmed accounts and run them as gospel to congressmen like John Murtha who feel free to say that servicemen and women as yet charged with no offense in the Haditha incident committed murder "in cold blood."

Until now, it has been possible for Murtha and others to say their consuming interest in the alleged misconduct of U.S. forces is a fearless effort to get at the truth of what is going on in Iraq. They claim to speak on behalf of the servicemen and women who are, they believe, fighting in a pointless and useless war.

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Will this increasingly passionate refusal to draw distinctions between the actions of Americans at arms and the behavior of Islamofascist monsters continue?

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The "moral equivalence" issue is one of bad faith used as another argument in favor of losing a war they want to lose. Those who compare hazing and naked pyramids at Abu Ghraid to the inhumanity of this enemy have a moral compass that is greatly in need of correction for deviancy. These killings tell who our enemy is and what he wants to do to everyone of us and what he would do if our troops were not fighting to stop him.