THERE ARE MANY reasons why human beings turn to terrorism, but high among them is humiliation -- humiliation that gives rise to "desperation and uncontrollable rage," in the words of terrorism expert Jessica Stern. In her book "Terror in the Name of God," Stern, who has interviewed many terrorists in her research, writes of how perceived humiliation can "add up to a feeling of nearly unbearable despair and frustration and a willingness on the part of some to do anything -- even commit atrocities -- in the belief that attacking the oppressor will restore their sense of dignity." It is a feeling terrorist leaders know well how to exploit.

This may be particularly true of the Arab world, in which a sense of dignity is so important to cultural well-being. In sexual matters, Muslim societies have a more conservative outlook than most Westerners understand. Modesty and decorum are the rule, and observant Muslims are often shocked and revolted by the blatant public sexuality on display in the West.

Thus, when American values arrive in the form of indecency, sexual sadism, female torturers, biting dogs, beatings, rapes, and even murder of Muslim prisoners, you have a humiliation bomb of an explosive power that is hard to overestimate.

The damage to the United States is incalculable. Some have been comparing these Iraqi prison revelations to My Lai, the atrocity in Vietnam when American soldiers murdered men, women, and children. Seymour Hersh, the journalist who broke the My Lai story more than 30 years ago and has been on the cutting edge of breaking the Abu Ghraib story, says that although My Lai killed more people, what happened in Vietnam was a tactical mistake. Abu Ghraib indicates a strategic mistake. For the effort in Iraq is to win Iraqis, the Arab world, and the world's billion Muslims over to the ideals of Western democracy. This cause has been severely damaged.

It is not the hard-core terrorists who cut off the head of Nicholas Berg that I worry about trying to convince. They are beyond persuasion. It will be the uncommitted Muslims who will decide whether we win or lose the war against Islamic fanaticism. It is those who may no longer think the murder of Berg was entirely unjustified that I worry about, the young men whose thoughts may now be turning toward harming Americans, the woman who may now hide a terrorist. It is the moderate Arab, the reformer who will no longer speak out, that I worry about. And I worry that those Iraqis who were relieved when Saddam Hussein was overthrown will now perceive that America is now the enemy that must now be resisted and expelled. There will be more Muslims around the world now than before who believe that Osama bin Laden is right, and recruiting will soar.

President Bush has said that he is sorry for the "humiliation suffered by the prisoners," but he has presided over a pervasive eroding of liberties. The Pentagon has removed the United States from the international rules. The Geneva Conventions no longer apply, as we have seen in Afghanistan and Guantanamo. The Justice Department has thrown habeas corpus out the window, denying even American citizens their basic legal rights.

Bush in his 2003 State of the Union address spoke of 3,000 foreign suspects, some of whom had been arrested, and others who had "met a different fate. Let's put it this way," he said. "They are no longer a problem." The wink was implicit. Due process and the law are out. Extrajudicial methods are in.

Thus is the tone set; a tone that flows down throughout the justice system, military and civil, a message that filters down the chain of command into the cellblocks of Abu Ghraib. Clearly the young torturers didn't think they were doing wrong. Their souvenir photographs are reminiscent of the smiling lynch mobs who took each other's photographs under the hanging trees of the American South or the German soldiers who took out their cameras when the Jews were being shot in pits. This is what happens when the system allows people to be dehumanized and degraded, when absolute power is unchecked.

Bush said that "there will be a full accounting" for the Iraq atrocities, and show trials are now being set up with maximum publicity. General Antonio Taguba has said the accused soldiers were acting on their own, and indeed, no order from on high will be found to directly implicate those who work in the Pentagon. But his investigation also blamed a "lack of discipline, no training whatsoever, and no supervision" for the crimes of Abu Ghraib. But Bush has made it clear that for those ultimately responsible for these failures there will not be a full accounting.

The war for Iraq may have already been lost by Pentagon incompetence and lack of postwar planning even before these photographs became public. But it is now the greater struggle against terrorism that I worry about, led as we are by ideologues whose willing self-deception has led this country into such peril.

© Copyright 2004 Globe Newspaper Company.

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