"Here ... comes ... that famous General Taguba—of the Taguba report!" Rumsfeld declared, in a mocking voice. The meeting was attended by Paul Wolfowitz, Rumsfeld’s deputy; Stephen Cambone, the Under-Secretary of Defense for Intelligence; General Richard Myers, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff (J.C.S.); and General Peter Schoomaker, the Army chief of staff, along with Craddock and other officials. Taguba, describing the moment nearly three years later, said, sadly, "I thought they wanted to know. I assumed they wanted to know. I was ignorant of the setting." In the meeting, the officials professed ignorance about Abu Ghraib. "Could you tell us what happened?" Wolfowitz asked. Someone else asked, "Is it abuse or torture?” At that point, Taguba recalled, "I described a naked detainee lying on the wet floor, handcuffed, with an interrogator shoving things up his rectum, and said, 'That's not abuse. That's torture.' There was quiet."

What is the official Pentagon line about Rumsfeld's alleged ignorance of the evidence months after he was given it? According to this spokesman in the NYT yesterday:

Lawrence Di Rita, a former top aide to Mr. Rumsfeld, said Mr. Rumsfeld had not viewed the photographs because he had been advised by lawyers that doing so "could materially affect the ongoing criminal investigation." He said Mr. Rumsfeld finally looked at the pictures the day before his Congressional testimony, the same day he was briefed by General Taguba.

So you're secretary of defense and have been informed that your troops have grotesquely violated the Geneva Conventions - on tape and JPGs - and you decide you don't want to look into it for months because you don't want to jeopardize the investigation? Are we really supposed to believe this? Now look at who Sy Hersh's source is: not an anonymous leaker, but a general of impeccable integrity and credibility whom the Pentagon had itself relied on to do the investigation. It doesn't get more damning than this.]]>