this is actually an admirable use of military force, to save people from torture and execution. it is revealing that it was an operation of the british, who, unlike the u.s., don't seem to have a taste for torture in their own right. indeed, the "rogue" police etc whom the brits attacked were just doing what the u.s. has done all over the world. understand, however, that it is state power that makes such activities possible, though of course we immediately start hearing about the "infiltration" of the police by "militias and organized crime." it doesn't really occur to anyone that the police, the militias, and organized crime are simply identical, a mistake which keeps us funding and urging the iraqi state entities forward, even while we define the enemy as precisely the people running the government at every level.