Military Censorship

The top brass in the U.S. army recently tried to censor what their men serving in Iraq could write. It wanted to stop them blogging and demanded to inspect their emails before any email could be sent. This was greeted with justifiable outrage and the brass subsequently backed down to a considerable extent.

There is a good summary of the ins and outs of the issue here. I liked his final paragraph:

"The war against al-Qaida and Islamic fundamentalism is as much a war of ideas as a war to be fought by our military. Right now, even Donald Rumsfeld agrees that fight is being won by al-Qaida.... By imposing these Draconian regulations on its own troops, the Army has taken its best soldiers out of the fight and ceded this ground to the enemy."