Praise for None of Us Were Like This Before
“An important and revealing book. While US officials closed cases on torture and abuse by American soldiers when the investigation reached a dead end, Joshua E. S. Philips didn’t quit. His personal journey and journalistic investigation is a shocking read about a hidden chapter of the U.S. involvement in Iraq and Afghanistan.”
—Deborah Amos, Correspondent for National Public Radio and author of Eclipse of the Sunnis: Power, Exile, and Upheaval in the Middle East
“This book contributes enormously to the struggle to abolish torture in our time by showing how immoral and illegal policies taint institutions that, in every society and for every mission, need the trust and respect of the citizenry to be effective in fighting crime and terrorism.”
—Juan E. Mendez, UN Special Rapporteur on Torture and author of Taking a Stand: The Evolution of Human Rights
“A deeply personal story of a generation of American soldiers plunged into conflict after September 11. Joshua Phillips tells these brave Americans’ stories with compassion and vivid detail. None of Us Were Like This Before reminds us why, on some bedrock issues of American values, there should never be any room for compromise.”
—Senator John F. Kerry
“None of Us Were Like This Before details the wrenching journey that American soldiers and officers faced trying to report and halt abuse and torture during the ‘war on terror.’ The stories contained in this book reveal how brave American service members tried to stop torture and abuse—often at the expense of their careers, and their lives. Their sacrifice, and the losses that they incurred, are absorbed by all of us as a nation.”
—Daniel Ellsberg, Former Defense and State Department official who revealed the Pentagon Papers
“A masterwork of narrative nonfiction.”
—Chris Lombardi, Guernica
“A model of conscientious reporting on a volatile subject…His ethical and compassionate approach is an act of citizenship.”
—Barry Lopez, author of Arctic Dreams and Crossing Open Ground
“This shattering book is a journey into the heart of American darkness. What Joshua Phillips makes shockingly clear is that the misbehavior of some of our best soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan came about because of a failure of military leadership and because political leaders lacked the courage to admit the word ‘torture.’ ”
—Richard Rodriguez, author of Brown: The Last Discovery of America
“The first and best heartbreaking tale not only of the abuses taking place within our military prisons … This outstanding book should provoke urgently needed and highly meaningful conversations about who we are as well as what we thought our military and our political leaders should be. This book is an absolute an eye-opener for anyone who thinks war is ‘over there’ or that the use of torture has no impact on our society.”
—Kristina Brown and Paul Sullivan, Veterans for Common Sense
“A tour de force of investigative journalism, based on interviews with men who had tortured detainees in Iraq, Afghanistan and Guantanamo and with the victims of the same torture, a journey into darkness at noon in America … a vivid account”
—Eamonn McCann, Belfast Telegraph
“[W]hat makes None of Us Were Like This Before such an engaging read, and why there needs to be more attention on the issue of what happens to those who torture when they return, is that the stories are up close and personal…For those who thought that torture and abuse were isolated to Guantánamo Bay, Afghanistan, and Iraq (not counting the CIA’s black sites or extraordinary rendition), think again. It’s coming home.”
—Matthew Alexander, Huffington Post
“The American public and the world have a right to know the truth about the crimes committed under the command and responsibility of the Bush administration… But we will probably need many more books written by investigative journalists like Joshua Phillips until the truth will be fully recovered, and justice will eventually be done.”
—Manfred Nowak, United Nations Special Rapporteur on Torture (2004–2010)
“Phillips shows that the recourse to blaming a ‘few bad apples’ should be recognised as a disgraceful, face-saving fiction.”
—David Simpson, London Review of Books
“There are many things in this book that are fascinating and generally unknown…This book really shows how a situation can drive a unit that has no background at all in torture to start down a very dark road.”
—Darius Rejali, author of Torture and Democracy, naming None of Us Were Like This Before one of the best books on violence for The Browser.
“This is an important book … What a story it is.”
—Faith Middleton, Faith Middleton’s Book Show
“This is an important book showing the damage abuse does to the torturers as well as to their victims … Phillips’s message is that we most need the rules banning torture when we most want to break them.”
—Oliver Bullough, Independent
“A fascinating yet distressing account…Far from neglecting the suffering of the victims, Phillips, through meticulous research, also brings home the full horror of the war crimes inflicted upon the citizens of the occupied nations.”
—Craig Hawes, Gulf News
“The causes and consequences of systematic abuse and torture are all explored by Joshua Phillips through a careful but searing narrative.”
—Dominic Alexander, Counterfire
“One of the long-standing arguments against the use of torture is that it dehumanises the torturers and in turn the country that allows the practice. In the Bush-Cheney era this was considered a naive or old-fashioned view. Joshua Phillips’ book shows that America’s leaders were wrong.”
—National
“I would recommend this very readable book for its eye-opening narrative and its ability to keep you involved until its painful ending, which highlights the fact that wars have victims on both sides.”
—Charikleia Tsatsaroni, Engaging Peace
NONE OF US WERE LIKE THIS BEFORE:
AMERICAN SOLDIERS AND TORTURE
Joshua E. S. Phillips
This paperback edition first published by Verso 2012
First published by Verso 2010
© Joshua E. S. Phillips 2010
Foreword © Jonathan Shay
All rights reserved
The moral rights of the author have been asserted
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Verso is the imprint of New Left Books
eISBN: 978-1-84467-929-4
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
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