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GQ: 'The Rumsfeld Pentagon mixed religion and war'
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U.S. soldiers pray in Iraq. GQ releases Bible-verse 'adorned' war briefing covers.
Pentagon briefings during the U.S.-Iraq war during the time of Donald Rumsfeld included cover sheets that "juxtaposed war images with inspirational Bible quotes," according to a GQ magazine online report.
The GQ story includes a slide show with a series of photos and Bible verses. One "top secret" cover shows photos of soldiers praying and in action on the sands of Iraq and overlaid with the Isaiah 5:28 verse: “Their arrows are sharp, all their bows are strung; their horses’ hoofs seem like flint, their chariot wheels are like a whirlwind.”
GQ's online presentation, which included the homepage teaser headline: "Bush's Bible Briefings," states that the "never-before-seen documents" were delivered by "Rumsfeld himself to the White House, where they were read by the man who, just after September 11, referred to America's war on terror as a 'crusade.'"
Another, showing a tank at sunset, had this verse from Ephesians 6:13, “Therefore put on the full armor of God, so that when the day of evil comes, you may be able to stand your ground, and after you have done everything, to stand.”
The online presentation is accompanied by the article, "And He Shall Be Judged," in which author Robert Draper makes the claim that a group of former Rumsfeld administrators are a "new group of critics" and are "suddenly speaking out for the first time."
Words of Mass Distribution?
This mixing of Crusades-like messaging with war imagery, which until now has not been revealed, had become routine. - Robert Draper
In a N.Y. Times report, a former Pentagon staffer questions GQ's claims. Lawrence Di Rita, the Pentagon spokesman during Mr. Rumsfeld’s time as secretary of defense, said that he had no recollection of the biblical briefs, but that he doubted the famously acerbic and sometimes cranky secretary would have tolerated them for long, much less shared them with Mr. Bush, the N.Y. Times reports.
“The suggestion that Rumsfeld would have used these reports to somehow curry favor over at the White House is pretty laughable,” Mr. Di Rita said. “He bristled anytime people put quotes or something extraneous on the reports he wanted to read.”
The cover sheets were thought up by a general who worked on the Joint Staff, and they replaced humorous covers that had been created in the prelude to the war, according to the GQ article.
More articles by Alex Murashko can be found at LA Church & State Examiner.
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