Pentagon admits "mishandling" of Koran

So, after the intial calls to burn Newsweek, the truth starts to come out.

Pentagon spokesman Bryan Whitman said that the agency received the ICRC reports but that there is no evidence they alone prompted the new policy. Whitman said the Pentagon has acknowledged cases of unintentional mishandling of the Koran, and he predicted yesterday that a new inquiry into such allegations would probably corroborate more cases.

The committee said the U.S. government responded with "corrective measures" in 2003 and the allegations ceased. In late January 2003, the Defense Department spelled out procedures covering the respectful handling of copies of the Koran. The written guidelines say that only Muslim chaplains or Muslim interpreters could touch the Koran, and they offer instructions on how to do it.

Now what to do with this? First off rather than place all the blame on Newsweek and call them irresponsible since it is obvious the Pentagon knew there were accusations of the Koran being mishandled why not some responsiblity for a change? (edited to make it crystal clear my intention)

Most of the detainees that have stated that they personally witnessed the mishandling of the Koran stated it was prior to when the US government made those "corrective measures" from what I've been able to determine.

Some refreshing honesty would have been:

We are aware there was some "unintentional mishandling" of the Koran though not to the extreme that Newsweek reported. Once this was brought to our attention, we instituted strict corrective measures to make sure the Koran was handled appropriately within the standards of the religion of Islam. The United States, respects the practice of religion by all people and strives to ensure that these rights are protected, even for detainees involve in the War on Terror.

A statement like that would still deny responsibility on it being intentional since there is no proof nor will here probably ever be any that can be proven given the environment in which the accusations were made. Had the soldiers at Abu Ghraib not been stupid enough to photograph themselves and what they were doing, that would have been extremely difficult to prove. Yet a statement like that would serve to show that we here in the US do respect the islamic religion, even for suspected terrorists.

Now to Newsweek given this latest revelation from the Red Cross and the Pentagon. Had their reporters done a thorough job, these reports should have surfaced. Did anyone from Newsweek contact the Red Cross trying to source this story? Had they done so, and had they also included the fact that instructions were given to make sure the Koran was treated respectfully there could have been a different outcome as well.