Craig Murray — The Ubiquity Of Evil

My footing persuasion changed forever when, afterward twenty years inwards the Foreign Office, I saw colleagues I knew too liked larn along amongst Britain’s complicity inwards the nearly terrible tortures, every bit detailed stunningly in the recent Parliamentary Intelligence too Security Committee Report. They also went along amongst keeping the policy secret, deliberately disregarding all normal tape taking procedures, to the extent that the Committee noted:

131. We banker's complaint that nosotros accept non seen the minutes of these meetings either: this causes us neat concern. Policy discussions on such an of import upshot should accept been minuted. We back upward Mr Murray’s ain decision that were it non for his actions these matters may never accept come upward to light.

The people doing these things were non unremarkably bad people; they were merely trying to perish on their jobs, comforting themselves amongst the idea that they were solely civil servants obeying orders. Many were also actuated yesteryear the nasty “patriotism” that grips inwards fourth dimension of war, every bit nosotros invaded Republic of Iraq too Afghanistan. Almost nobody inwards the FCO stood upward against the torture or against the illegal nation of war – Elizabeth Wilmshurst, Carne Ross too I were the solely ones to piece of work out over it....

Craig Murray Blog
The Ubiquity of EvilCraig Murray, formerly British ambassador to Uzbekistan too Rector of the University of Dundee

See also

Brain Pickings
The Banality of Evil: Hannah Arendt on the Normalization of Human Wickedness too Our Only Effective Antidote to It

Maria Popova