May 4, 2012
Panetta tells troops misconduct hurts morale, mission
"The enemy may be losing on the battlefield in Afghanistan, but he is trying to win the public relations war with the help of misconduct among a few U.S. military personnel, Defense Secretary Leon Panetta told soldiers Friday."
"These days, it takes only seconds -- seconds -- for a picture, a photo to suddenly become an international headline. And those headlines can impact the mission that we are engaged in," Panetta said.
"It can put your fellow service members at risk. It can hurt morale. It can damage our standing in the world and they can cost lives."
A report issued this week by the Pentagon noted several "significant shocks" in Afghanistan from October to March, including the release of a video of U.S. Marines urinating on corpses, the inadvertent burning of religious materials by U.S. personnel and the alleged killing of 17 civilians by a lone U.S. soldier.
Afghan President Hamid Karzai last month condemned photos of U.S. soldiers posing with bodies of suspected insurgents.
Karzai, who described the images as "inhumane and provocative," said "the only way to put an end to such painful experiences" was to end the presence of foreign forces in Afghanistan."
Panetta tells troops misconduct hurts morale, mission - CNN
