To be honest, I couldn't finish reading Seymour Hersh's expose in the New Yorker. It's way too depressing.
One thing that does bother me a little is that in the tradition of Watergate, few sources cited in the article are identified by name. Not surprising, given the subject matter, but it does make me a bit uneasy. I'm going to give Hersh and the New Yorker the benefit of the doubt, though, and assume that if they're going to publish accusations like this, then their sources are multiple and significant.
The DOD, of course, put out a standard denial (thanks to Talking Points for the link). It's interesting, though, that although the spokesperson claims that the article is 'filled with error' she only cites one relatively minor point as an obvious error. One would think that if Hersh had truly made some 'dramatically false assertions' she'd have more specific corrections to make than just that one.
I'm not completely naive. I know that gathering intelligence is a hard business. But I think there are some lines a civilized nation should not cross unless under the most extreme of emergencies - and as far as I can tell, Abu Ghriab was not one of them. It wasn't even close.
