Why Would a Soldier Want to Harm Anyone?

The Pentagon has discovered that some of its employees are capable of unauthorised democratisation measures and that, as a result of prolonged exposure to violence and danger, "the mental health of soldiers and marines deteriorated significantly".

Soldiers with high levels of anger, or who have experienced high levels of combat, or who "screened positive for a mental health problem" are nearly twice as likely to inflict harm on non-combatants in a non-interrogative situation as those who have low levels of anger, have not experienced high levels of combat, or who screened negative for mental health problems. It is not clear how many of the soldiers being utilised in Afghanistan and Iraq did, in fact, screen positive for mental health problems.

Ewan MacAskill's report displays the Guardian's usual flexible response to the facts by claiming in its first line that the Pentagon's survey finds that "one in 10 of the US soldiers in Iraq mistreats civilians or damages their property". In fact, one in ten is the number of soldiers interviewed who are prepared to admit to mistreating civilians or damaging their property.

Given the general level of intelligence in Washington these days, I suppose it is possible that these tidings came as a surprise.