A new article by NEWSWEEK’s Michael Hirsh, “Truth About Torture”, is bound to make your blood boil. It confirms what we have all long suspected: that the use of torture by the military in Afghanistan and Iraq has been more widespread than those in charge have let on, that soldiers are still in the dark about what the policy of the DoD really is and that Donald Rumsfeld has been lying about it all.
NEWSWEEK has obtained corroboration for Fishback’s central point in the Army’s own files. According to papers released by the Defense Department in September in response to a lawsuit by the American Civil Liberties Union, supporting documents for an inspector-general probe in July 2004 show that abuses were much more widespread than the Army acknowledged. In one IG document, an Army sergeant testifies that putting detainees in stressful positions and pouring water on them “seemed to be something all interrogators” in the Fourth Infantry Division were doing.
Fishback, headlined by NEWSWEEK as a “courageous soldier” and “plainly a very brave man. Crazy brave, even” sounded the alarm on the systemic torture he witnessed and participated in by contacting Senator John McCain and Human Rights Watch after several attempts to contact the Pentagon failed to garner a response.
McCain, of course, is one of the authors of an amendment attached to the latest defense appropriations bill to prohibit the use of torture – an amendment that had caused Bush to threaten to veto the bill with Cheney and CIA head Porter Goss backing his opposition by proposing a waiver: “…with respect to clandestine counterterrorism operations conducted abroad, with respect to terrorists who are not citizens of the United States, that are carried out by an element of the United States government other than the Department of Defense. . . if the president determines that such operations are vital to the protection of the United States or its citizens from terrorist attack.”
That’s a helluva lot of power to give to a miserable failure of a war president.
McCain is defiant and he’s not alone:
“We aren’t going to allow any weakening of language,” McCain told NEWSWEEK. If the present bill is vetoed or watered down, he adds, “we will certainly put it on another piece of legislation. I think we could get 90 votes tomorrow.” Even at senior levels of the Pentagon, some officials are uneasy about the administration’s opposition to the McCain amendment. “The uniformed military is appalled by Cheney’s stand,” says a Pentagon official who would talk only if he were not identified.
It’s up to the Republicans in congress now to prove whether they are purveyors of torture or not and whether they will allow their leaders in the WH to define them and the US as such in the eyes of the world.
The Repubs in congress have to decide if they favor a democraticform of government or if they choose the tyrannical approach to government favored by the players in the Bush regime.
If they side with Democracy, they’ll vigorously oppose the use of torture in all it’s forms. If they side with the anti-democracy megalomaniacs who’ve hijacked the government,their barbarism will spur a revolution that will not be long in coming to America.
As Huey Long famously said; “When fascism comes to America it will be wrapped in an American flag”. I would add that it is creatures like Cheney and his pals who will be the ones carrying this dishonored flag with it’s disgraceful toxic burden and spreading it throughout the land.
“The uniformed military is appalled by Cheney’s stand,” says a Pentagon official who would talk only if he were not identified.” Compliments the post about N.C. military poll re: ever declining support for Bush.
Here’s some more fascism coming at us wrapped in an american flag- the NYT editorial in Monday’s edition addressing the House of Representatives proposed amendment to the Patriot Act adding 41 more “crimes” eligible to the already 20 eligible for the death penalty: http://www.nytimes.com
the second paragraph in the excerpt below is most harrowing-(as an example-many folks contribute to non-violent sustainability oriented projects all over the globe- judgment about those contributions could be manipulated/misconstrued based on political bias at any given moment)
‘The House’s Abuse of Patriotism’
excerpt:
“The radical amendment was slapped through by the Republican leadership without serious debate. The Justice Department has endorsed the House measure, and Representative James Sensenbrenner Jr., the Judiciary Committee chairman, who is ever on the side of more government power over the individual, is promising to fight hard for the death penalty provisions.
There are now 20 terrorism-related crimes eligible for capital punishment, and the House measure would add 41 more. These would make it easier for prosecutors to win a death sentence in cases where a defendant had no intent to kill – for example, if a defendant gave financial support to an umbrella organization without realizing that some of its adherents might eventually commit violence.
Any move to weaken the American jury system in the name of fighting terrorism is particularly egregious. But the House voted to allow a federal trial to have fewer than 12 jurors if the judge finds “good cause” to do so, even if the defense objects. Under current law, a life sentence is automatically ordered when juries become hung on deciding the capital punishment question. But the House would have a prosecutor try again – a license for jury-shopping for death – even though federal juries already exclude opponents of capital punishment.”
Whenever we assume the worst, we are proven correct.
Lesson? With this administration, always assume the worst.
I wonder if the Bushniks are trying to legalize torture in order to protect themselves retroactively from prosecution for crimes they have ALREADY committed? They could be worried about ending up in a courtroom in the Hague someday….
were mixed together it equaled The United States is ProTorture. It is a different world now. The world rules spoken and unspoken which have taken years to create have been destroyed by an ignorant, pathetic, unpatriotic asshole and he did it in just 5 years. The Nightmare continues. Will it ever stop? I knew when we lost last Nov it was going to be bad…but I don’t think any of us could have predicted this.
“The uniformed military is appalled by Cheney’s stand,”
Thank the gods. I think I will sleep better tonight knowing that opposition to monster Cheney is getting stronger.
In one way this is comforting.
In another way Who Cares?
I have relatives who were appalled by the Einsatzkommando groups operating in the Soviet Union when they were serving with the Wehrmacht. They too went up the chain of command and were told to mind their own business. Which they then did as little gute Soldaten.
Hiding outrage behind a blind quote?
Spare me.
Thank you for your comment. I do actually share your skepticism. However, aren’t we at a point of desperation where scraps of growing opposition, even though anonymous-to-avoid-retribution, are welcome?
is a courageous act, and the bravery of those who dare to do so, and some who even oppose the practice itself, cannot be over-emphasized.
However, it is the practice itself, not paper declarations of laws, that defines the US, and the defining is done not by Republicans or Democrats, but by the victims, their families and friends and neighbors.
Opposing torture?!!!
Women’s reproductive rights?!!!
Great arguments for the 19th Century but for 2005, the rest of the civilized world looks on the USA with wonder and amazement.
by “civilized world” I include Americans in the opposition and every compassionate person on earth.
Earlier tonight I saw the Australian Broadcasting Corporation’s Four Corners program on the remaining Australian detainee at Guantanamo, David Hicks. Full transcript here.
Amongst the interesting details it contains is the suggestion that David Hicks has been singled out for continued detention and prosecution as the token white man:
Focussing back on the torture allegations, the report claims that David Hicks was rendered from captivity aboard a US ship to be tortured by US forces in Afghanistan or Pakistan, and then returned to the ship:
For me, the scandal is doubled: the US is torturing a naive young man who was in the wrong place at the wrong time, and is scarcely a terrorist, and the Australian Government has not had the courage of the British Government to demand that its nationals get a fair trail or are repatriated.
Fair trial. [Note to self: proofread the preview properly!]
I have worried about him a lot too. They can’t smear this guy though, he one of their own. He is a huge Christian, prays all the time and carries a copy of the Constitution in his front pocket. He is the perfect soldier also. He did what a soldier is told he “must” do. He spent 17 months following the chain of command asking the questions that he needed answered and he came away with nothing. Soldiers are taught to solve work problems by beginning with the commander over them and if it isn’t resolved you go one step up and one step up and one step up…Ian took every single step and documented it all. That is why I have been so concerned about him, he is very very dangerous to Rummy as far as documentation of the his entire chain of command being unable to give him the ground rules on how detainees are supposed to be handled and torture was taking place when he distinctly heard Rummy and television tell this nation that we were following the Geneva Convention in Iraq. As an officer also, he has refused to give up the names of soldiers under his rank who gave information under his guidance to Human Rights Watch about the torture they were compelled to participate in. He has been heavily grilled too to give up “the bad apples” and as their Command he refuses and he is protecting those who need protected because they didn’t have the orders that they needed or the clarification that was asked for by him! He is a true soldier and a true Commander and if he doesn’t make 4 star someday after these scumbags go down there isn’t a God!