Pictures of American Troops Torturing Iraqi Soldiers

[weed_wizard]

I think this is a disgrace. I mean as if there is not enough bad press about the occupation anyway this does not help at all.Im not going to get all high and mighty and say British soldiers would never do this and im sure the Iraqis have probably done similar things to our boys.But we cant be seen doing things like this,we are ment to be helping this country.And the way the troops were grinning in the pictures was just sickening.One of the soldiers was trying to blame the army for not having any guidelines on how to handle
prisoners of war or not telling him of the guidelines.Well I think its obvious to anyone that all of that going on in the pictures was wrong and if you need some book to tell you otherwise you are unbelievably thick.I still think going to
war was the right thing to do.The way it is panning out is not how anyone had hoped, but we cant turn our backs on the troops now and change our minds wishing we had not gone there.Lets hope this is an isolated incident.

[Eddie Ismail]

and we still wonder why they hate us.
and BTW the same scandal is rocking the british forces http://www.cnn.com/2004/WORLD/meast/04/30/iraq.brit.prisoner.abuse/index.html

[DejaFu]

really wrong

[Gary V.]

Deplorable. I wish I could get my hands on those cowards. They are a disgrace to all who have died over there.

[Tom Servo]

I don't really what to say, it's horrible and shameful, not only to the military, but to humanity.

And I don't mean to sound insensitive, but the General's name is Micheal Jackson. :eek:

[Terry Penrod]

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Even more disturbing than those few photos is the official 53-page U.S. military report just made public that indicates a possibly far wider problem with Iraqi prisoner abuse of all kinds. This essentially admits that the government was/is aware of these despicable, illegal acts and threatens to destroy any goodwill we may have earned through a full year of positive and good efforts to help the Iraqi people in so many ways. It also comes at a critical time when extremist domestic insurgents and fanatical foreign troublemakers are still very active in that country and the temporary controlling council is struggling to define itself, form a new coalition with the broader U.N. community and prepare for the transfer of power in the next few months.

I hope these bad apples realize just how much damage they have already caused and what the potential cost may be. It is very high.

Cheers, Terry

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[Lou Cypher]

I agree with everyone here, if it's true.

Lou :globe:

[Terry Penrod]

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Evidently the accusations are true and just today, there were two more Iraqi prisoner deaths reported.

Here's a quick link to the news story:
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=542&e=12&u=/ap/20040505/ap_on_go_ca_st_pe/us_prisoner_abuse

And here is the key paragrpah that defines the nature of these deaths and what our military is doing about it:

In addition, the deaths of two Iraqi prisoners already have been ruled homicides, the Army said Tuesday. In one case, a soldier was court-martialed, reduced in rank and discharged from the Army. In the other case, a CIA contract interrogator's conduct has been referred to the Justice Department for criminal prosecution, the Army said.


Cheers, Terry

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[Gaim Mastr]

And it keeps getting worse (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A5623-2004May5.html).

Very serious, very public examples of these un-American jerks in US military uniforms !! :mad2:

[DanTheManPR]

And it keeps getting worse.
I can't access that page, it pops up a registration form. Could you quote it?

[Gaim Mastr]

Hmm.. I can't find the story any longer.

But, you can see the gist of it here (http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/901052D2-7E43-49C3-A3F9-B0C3690CF59F.htm).

Caution: above link is to an ultra-biased "news" agency.

[Ravanor]

I found it even more disturbing that people in the backwater town they came from think it's okay. Lynndie England home to be exact.

[RHooks]

I found it even more disturbing that people in the backwater town they came from think it's okay. Lynndie England home to be exact.

I do not condone these soldier's actions and I expect justice to be done. However, where was the press' righteous indignation during the first Gulf War when US POWs were routinely beaten and abused as well as at least one of the women captives raped? While she was already wounded? We also have an airman missing from that conflict that strong evidence shows he was taken captive. Where is he? I doubt he had the chance to die of natural causes in his bed.

The commanding officer of the facility in question had already been relieved of duty and the investigation launched before 60 minutes originally broke this story. There is a lot of political posturing in this as well as the press forcing it's own agenda on the American people and the world at large.

[Terry Penrod]

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Speaking of the ongoing U.S. Army investigation, here is the latest development in the story.

It seems that 42 additional cases of abuse are under review. But these are not about military prisoners. They are about non-military Iraqi citizens and if true, could add a tremendous amount of fuel to the fire of negative press.

Cheers, Terry

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TOP STORIES - REUTERS

Army Probes 42 Cases of Abuse of Iraq Civilians

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. Army is investigating possible abuse by Americans of 42 Iraqi civilians in addition to ongoing probes of abuse of prisoners in Iraq (news - web sites), the Army's top civilian said on Friday.

Les Brownlee, acting secretary of the Army, told the Senate Armed Services Committee (news - web sites) that in addition to 35 investigations of abuse of prisoners, the Army Criminal Investigation Command or individual Army units were investigating "42 other potential cases of misconduct against civilians" that occurred "outside detention facilities."

MORE:

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=564&ncid=564&e=7&u=/nm/20040507/ts_nm/iraq_abuse_civilians_dc_1

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[Gaim Mastr]

I understand what you're saying, RHooks.

But I think that the big difference and deal that the world is focusing on (sometimes overtly, sometimes not), is that the US always claims to treat prisoners of war better than any of our enemies.

Nobody really believed anything Saddam said anyways. So when he claimed POWs were treated fairly, but found out not to be, it really wasn't any kind of a shock or surprise.

This POW stuff in American camps is a shocker to a lot of us. Our politicians decry to the world that we hold the moral high ground. But we can't hold the moral high ground if we're caught rutting around with the pigs, so to speak.

This POW fiasco has lent terrible credence to all the nay-sayers in the Muslim world who've always said that the US leaders aren't any better than Saddam or the rest of them.

Apparently this situation with the Iraqi POWs had been going on for quite a while. And several people high up knew full well about it. Relieving the camp's CO of duty should be only the most basic of first steps. The only way we'll start to clear our names is if everyone directly involved, or knew about it and did nothing, are taken to task by the most severe letter of the law.

Otherwise everyone around the world will always regard what happens as the US not really caring enough. A few sacrificial lambs won't appease me, or many other people.

Remember, there were a lot of people surrendering to US forces in the Iraq wars, Afghan war, Yugoslavia war, etc. because they all believed that they could surrender and be treated fairly.

Near the end of WWII the German soldiers were going FAR out of their way to surrender to US forces. And didn't want to surrender to the Russian forces. Because they knew (or believed) that they would be treated far better by US forces as POWs than the Russians would treat them.

This recent crap only serves to refute all of those beliefs. As such, our enemies will be a lot less likely to surrender. Choosing to fight to the death, rather than being tortured and humiliated, and possibly even killed in US POW camps. Ultimately, this fiasco will almost certainly end up costing many more lives of US servicemen because our enemies will be much less willing to risk surrendering themselves to US "torture camps".

[Terry Penrod]

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I agree 100% GM and most of all want the decision makers and policy makers who knew about these incidents, yet failed to do anything about them prior to extreme media exposure and pressure from the private sector, to be held fully accountable. No more wrist slapping. No more looking the other way. Full and total responsibility for punishable crimes just like any other criminal.

Adding even more validity to this concern -

In another news story posted just yesterday, it was also made perfectly clear that the Red Cross cited and complained about prisoner abuse and other worrisome problems in Irag a LONG time before this present story broke. But their warnings and pleas went completely ignored. This indicates many, many people (at every level) knew these things were happening and that they simply refused to act. Instead, they turned a cold shoulder to the Red Cross and smugly went about their business as usual. Well, now their failure to act has been exposed and we are learning about more and more abuses of every kind.

The situation could get a lot worse too if we as a nation do not stand up and take full responsibility, admit guilt and then make amends immediately. Dragging our feet, covering up details, failing to openly and honestly apologize, and ducking responsibility will NOT cut it this time. We have far too much at stake and can not afford to shrink from the awful truth that we too make serious mistakes and that we really do need to start cleaning up our own act if we ever expect to be trusted by anyone on earth again.

Cheers, Terry

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[Terry Penrod]

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As a quick follow-up to the above news story and comments, here is a link to yet another perplexing article about who knew about these abuses and when.

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=514&e=4&u=/ap/20040507/ap_on_re_mi_ea/iraq_prisoner_abuse

Cheers, Terry

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[Terry Penrod]

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It seems there is no end to this awful story.

Here is the opening part of and a link to yet another news post that squarely places blame on a U.S. general who essentially told his troops to "soften-up" the Iraqi prisoners prior to interrogation.

Just great huh?

Cheers, Terry

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TOP STORIES - AP

General Told MPs to `soften Up' Prisoners

By ROBERT BURNS, AP Military Writer

WASHINGTON - An American general recommended that Army prison guards in Iraq become more involved in "softening up" prisoners for interrogations shortly before abuses occurred at the Abu Ghraib prison last fall, according to an internal report at the heart of the controversy.

It is a role that military police are not trained to perform and are prohibited from doing, the Army says; that led members of Congress to press Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld on Friday, largely unsuccessfully, for details on what role MPs played at the troubled prison.

MORE:

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=514&e=2&u=/ap/20040507/ap_on_go_ca_st_pe/abuse_mps__role

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[Terry Penrod]

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Just in case anyone else is still following this thread, here are a couple more related news stories that were posted today, after Rumsfeld's Congressional testimony on the matter yesterday:

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=514&e=1&u=/ap/20040508/ap_on_go_pr_wh/bush_bleak_week

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=1896&ncid=1896&e=6&u=/nm/20040508/us_nm/iraq_abuse_town_dc

Cheers, Terry

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[Lou Cypher]

Sorry people this not Torture.

Lou :globe:

[SupaTroopa]

Being wrapped in ice and plastic with a battered face and dead is not torture? Being forced to commit sexual acts on another prisoner, in front of a woman of all things? Just wait until the new pictures come out, if you thought these were bad, from what I hear...dogs biting prisoner's testicles etc..,

These soldiers knew about the sexual taboos of the country they were in also, there's no advantages gained by doing that, even if it were acceptable somehow.

We're so bold as to try and dictate to other countries holding our military prisoners not to promote or show hostages on public television because the American military considers it humiliating. We punish other governments for doing that.

Regardless I think the point of all this is, America was always above this, no matter the enemy. We expect our POW's to be treated no differently than anyone else's, and you can't ask for that and do things like this. Human rights and due process are supposed to be the shining pillars of our example. They basically just kissed the lives of any remaining hostages good-bye and sealed the fate of those who will be abducted in the future.

Stupid, ignorant, and not what Americans want to stand for...people need to realize that by the actions of those soldiers they just helped Bin Laden and Co. recruit who knows how many more extremists willing to kill any westerner in their path, among other things.

[Gaim Mastr]

Sorry Lou, but if your idea of torture is limited to images of Rambo II where people are strapped to crudely made electrical racks, then you're oversimplifying the term far beyond what the rest of the civilized world regards prisoner torture to be.

[Mara]

This really disappoints me. Rumsfeld defends U.S. interrogation methods.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/4855930/

[Lou Cypher]

First of all, I don't condone what has happened regarding the prisoners. But I stand by what I said.

Originally posted by Gaim Mastr
Sorry Lou, but if your idea of torture is limited to images of Rambo II where people are strapped to crudely made electrical racks, then you're oversimplifying the term far beyond what the rest of the civilized world regards prisoner torture to be.No Gaim, my idea of Toture is not that simple. Was there Humiliation, yes; Abuse, yes; Degradation, yes; Torture, no. Sen. John McCain recently spoke of the Prison abuse scandel, he himself called it abuse and at no time did he consider it Torture, and if anyone knows what Torture is it would be Sen. John McCain.

Originally posted by SupaTroopa
We're so bold as to try and dictate to other countries holding our military prisoners not to promote or show hostages on public television because the American military considers it humiliating. We punish other governments for doing that.Actually it wasn't the U.S. Government who plastered these pictures all across the media spectrum, it was the Press.

Stupid, ignorant, and not what Americans want to stand for...people need to realize that by the actions of those soldiers they just helped Bin Laden and Co. recruit who knows how many more extremists willing to kill any westerner in their path, among other things.Agreed!

Lou :globe:

[Gaim Mastr]

So being forced to stand in one position on a box with a hood over your head and wires attached to you wouldn't be considered torture ??

Uhh.... I'll stick with YES. :p:

[Lou Cypher]

So being forced to stand in one position on a box with a hood over your head and wires attached to you wouldn't be considered torture ??

Uhh.... I'll stick with YES.First of all we don't know if that photo is genuine, it was reported last night that all of the photo's of British troops abusing prisoners were fakes. There has been alot of fake pictures and videos circulating out there, one of them was of a soldier with two Iraqi children holding a sign, and oridiginally when it hit the papers it said something like "I killed there father and knocked up there mother". Terry Penrod posted it here allready were you could put in your own caption.
As for the photo of the person standing on a box with the hood, and wires attached to his body, was there any electricity to the wires?, we don't know that, is that one a fake too, when was it taken 2 months ago or 2 years ago.
But lets say it happened 2 mounths ago, if the prisoner was standing there as pictured and there was no current going through those wires means he was just a prisoner standing there with a hood, and that would be abuse.

Lou :globe:

[Terry Penrod]

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Now here is a VERY interesting new twist to this whole sordid affair.

The British government claims to have proof positive that the photos of Iraqi prisoner abuse first published in The Daily Mirror were not even taken in Iraq and therefore could not possibly be authentic. They have positively identified the specific truck seen in the pics and they swear it was never in Iraq period.

So what does this indicate if true?

Phony photos created for pure sensationalism and quite possibly a sleazy, little propaganda scam intended to cast allied forces in a very negative light, that's what.

Here is a link to the currently breaking news story:

http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/20040513/ap_on_re_eu/britain_iraq

If this turns out to be verifiable beyond doubt, then at least some of the accusations of abuse are simply NOT true. But there is still too much other evidence that at least some of these things did occur and that is a serious matter. However, the outright fabrication of incriminating evidence by and/or for the media may very well have also occured and I think at this point we should all back waaaaay off of rushing to judgment before all the facts are known.

Cheers, Terry

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[SupaTroopa]

Regardless, even the woman who is on trial admitted "those" photographs were taken in Iraq...the military is not denying the authenticity of those. She was in them! Are taking pictures of naked prisoners and making them pose in homosexual positions tolerable? Absolutely not.

It doesn't matter if it was "torture" by definition or not, it simply was wrong, stupid, harmful, and against everything we are "supposed" to stand for as the world's most powerful country.

I don't expect the soldiers to treat the prisoners like kings, just set a good example...in other words practice what you preach. That's really my only point with what I posted

[Terry Penrod]

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Nobody is questioning that some (possibly many) of the photos are authentic. But at least some of them, including the very first ones published that started the current public outcries were indeed fake.

Here is a link to a follow-up news article wherein the publisher of The Daily Mirror resigned after admitting that he was duped.

http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/20040514/ap_on_re_eu/britain_daily_mirror

And having now seen at least some of the other, assumedly real pics, my impression of many of them is that the soldiers went too far but in most cases were acting a lot more like drunken kids at a frat party than serious torturers. They were being cruel and having fun at the expense of their prisoners. But in many cases I honestly think they were just blowing off steam, caught-up in a stupid, stress relieving, gang mentality - very much like a group of children making fun of weaker kids.

What I have yet to see is anything that proves that they were engaged in systematic, serious torture methods like the ones commonly used by Saddam's regime for decades - let alone outright murder. Now, some of those things may have happened and we will no doubt learn about it in the current and upcoming court martial trials. But to date, I have not seen proof of the more hideous acts that these soldiers have been accused of and in fact deem most of them to be minor infractions compared to the cold blooded beheading of Nicholas Berg or the many personal accounts from former Baath Party prisoners in Iraq.

Stupid and reckless no doubt. Harmful to our cause for sure and against the existing rules governing the human rights and decent treatment of POWs - but not cruel, prolonged, bloodthirsty torture by evil people under the direct orders of even worse commanders. Not at least nearly to the degree that their enemies have demonstrated over and over again and nowhere near as bad as extremist Muslims are trying to fool the world into believing.

So, as I said before, we should all wait for the full and complete facts before rushing to judgment.

Cheers, Terry

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[shanna]

I know I am new here and you all do not know me but I have been talking to my husband and my brother in law and we all think that yes what they did was disgusting and has underminded what we are trying to accomplish over there but also have any of you ever thought that maybe they were told to do that to the prisoners? Just today the news said that those pictures were staged adn they may have been I do n ot know but i do not think those soldiers who are over there giving their lives are un american and you can say whatever you want to me but I just do not. They do need to be punished there is no doubt about that but they are still Americans no matter what. That is very offending especially to those soldiers. My brother in law is leaving Monday morning to go to Iraq and one of my other brother in laws is already there along with most of my male friends. And I am very proud of them. I come from a military background(ARMY) and was even born into the military at Walter Reed Army base in D.C. and half of the men in my family are either in the military or have been there and I KNOW they would never do that UNLESS told to. I know a whole bunch of military guys and they will do what they are told to. You really need to think that. They were told to do whatever it took to get some info out of those Arabs and were probably given some ideas on how to do that. My uncle was in the Gulf War and he knows that they did awful things to our pows. Plus the CIA was helping with the interrogations and you know they have funny ways sometimes of getting people to talk. Just think about it

[Mara]

Hi Shanna, nice to have another female on this board. Keep on posting.

I know a whole bunch of military guys and they will do what they are told to.

My father was in the military as well. 28 years in the Marines and I know what you're saying. There are also a lot of conflicting statements too. I read this just this morning

According to newspaper reports, one of the seven, Spc. Jeremy Sivits, a prison guard who took photographs of abuse at the prison, described soldiers laughing and joking as they beat, stripped and sexually humiliated detainees. He said the mistreatment was not authorized by higher-ups in the chain of command.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/4855930/

True, who knows. There is no source given for that report so it can't be verified. Then there is this statement

The other guards facing charges have said they acted on orders from superiors or from military intelligence, and all six have declared their innocence. from the same article as above.

I tend to believe they were ordered to abuse the prisoners. It's still very bad for us, though, that such orders were ever given.

[DanTheManPR]

Welcome shanna! Good to see we have some new contributing members.

[RHooks]

Buried in today's new, in type so small you would miss it if not wearing your spectacles -

U.S. soldier killed after capture - not killed in action (http://www.cnn.com/2004/US/05/27/iraq.pow/index.html)

Where is the press and Arab world's outrage? Their righteous indignation? Oh, that's right. He's just an American.

Capturing unarmed civilians just trying to earn a buck for their families, mutilating them, beheading them, raping and murdering POWs, flying civilian airliners into non-military targets. Weigh that against making some of the people that commit these acts or help conceal them wear a leash or putting women's underwear on their head.
Yeah, that's the same thing.

[Terry Penrod]

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One statement that was quoted in the local Houston press a few weeks ago after all the hubbub began was by a U.S. born man of direct Iraqi descent who had just returned from a long stint at that prison as an official translator. He was of course sympathetic in a few isolated cases but also said very pointedly that we should all remember exactly who those soldiers are dealing with - "cold blooded murderers in 99% of all cases".

According to him, those same prisoners would have been severely tortured for weeks if not months on end, humilated a thousand times worse and then simply shot in the head and dragged off to an unmarked mass grave in the desert back when Saddam's regime was doing their thing. He claims that even the worst cases of abuse now are like kindergarten compared to what hundreds of thousands of mostly innocent Iraqi people had to endure over the past three decades.

So anyone who thinks that the allies are evil compared to Hussein & company ought to get his head examined - that is after he pulls it out of his butt.

Cheers, Terry

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[Lou Cypher]

A little perspective has been long overdue.

Lou :globe:

[Rattlesnake8]

"Was there Humiliation, yes; Abuse, yes; Degradation, yes; Torture, no."

Humiliation itslelf can be considered torture, as can abuse and degradation. There are different levels of each. You can be mentally abused as well as physically. Being tied to a chair and beaten is torture.. as well as being abuse.

As for the topic, its either true and totally messed up doing that sort of crap to POW's.
Or its all BS and is just anti war propaganda. Chances are it is true, and those responsible should be punished approapriatly. (although i doubt they will).

The only reason to torture a POW is to get info out of them. Now they are being tortured for fun which is what made the Japanese so bad in WW2 and why the whole world got the *****, now American and British troops are doing to same (although not to the same extent).. its really sad. Instead of doing that, shoot them. Don't take away their dignity.

If the enemy did that to your troops, your entire nation would be majorly pissed off. Those responsible need to be punished severly.

[Terry Penrod]

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On the other hand...

Screw them and screw their "dignity".

Many of those bastards are cold-blooded murderers who have attacked their own woman and children in horrific terrorist acts not even intended against military personnel. Others have attacked civilians from a variety of nations - many of whom were in Iraq specifically for humanitarian purposes.

So I don't give a damn about their dignity or their feelings or their rights and wish that more people would get it through their thick skulls that we are fighting some of the sleaziest, most ruthless and most deadly characters who ever lived. They do NOT care if they kill and maim countless more innocent victims in their insane holy quest and frankly they do not deserve our respect or to be treated like formal military troops with full POW status.

For those prisoners who were captured in uniform shortly after the initial invasion and since, they are soldiers and do deserve to be treated humanely under the rules of the Geneva Convention. The rest can rot in a small, dark cell forever as far as I'm concerned and the ONLY purpose they can ever serve mankind from this point forward is as a possible source of info that may lead us to additional terrorist killers just like them.

Cheers, Terry

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[RangerRick]

There is one thing that the press does not mention anywhere and that is what the prisoners do to the guards.

My son has talked to a few soldiers who were there as he is in the National Guard.

How would you like to be spit at in your face, urinated on and have feces thrown at you?

I'm not condoning the actions of the guards, as I think that is not right, and do not accept it, but think about how you would like to have the above done to you. Let's not condemn others when we have not walked in their shoes. Unless you're in that situation, no one knows what they'll do.

[Gaim Mastr]

Let's not condemn others when we have not walked in their shoes. Unless you're in that situation, no one knows what they'll do.

Well based on the conditions you'd mentioned, I have to admit that being a prison guard, I'd want some serious off-the-record payback as well.

*Oops... didn't mean to shatter both of your knees. Now, anyone else wish to toss some crap in my direction ??*


But I don't subscribe to Terry's "let's get in the mud with them" form of action.

If we lower ourselves to treating them like worthless inhuman trash, like they treat us, then we have NO room to preach to the world our 'moral' high ground.

If we treat prisoners, who have never been found guilty via a trial, like worthless trash, then how far along are we to treating random civilians over there like worthless trash.

On the one hand, I feel like we should just systematically round up all troublemakers and put a bullet in their heads. If 20% of the population supports the murder of innocents, then 20% of the population needs to be wiped out.

But on the other hand it's simply bad business to treat them the same way that they treat us. And I'd like to see America survive this whole Iraq fiasco with a little of our global integrity still in tact.

Bush and his cronies have done quite enough to make the rest of the world look upon us with more distain than ever before in the history of our country.

No doubt that the world, including America, has turned a blind eye to the Mid-East for FAR too long, resulting in the cesspool that it's become. And there's no doubt that Iraq needed to be invaded by a Western country. But the way Bush has been leading the task has been nothing short of pitiful.

What bone-head Bush continues to fail to understand is that we're already knee-deep in the same problem that Israel has. We're attempting to fight against the religious beliefs of a people whose faith is as solid as the Pope's. They don’t like non-Muslims. And they continue to base virtually every aspect of their thoughts and lives not on logic, understanding, tolerance or reasoning, but solely on their religious beliefs.

Israel won't find peace with the Palestinians because the Palestinian religious beliefs don't allow for it. And now we face that same problem in Iraq. And we the whole of the world will continue to face that problem throughout the Mid-East until we all unite together to convince the Muslims that they should view their religious leaders just like we view our own…. as people to be laughed at, not taken seriously.

[Terry Penrod]

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That's all good and nice GM but we are not talking about Allied soldiers or private citizens specifically targeting innocent, unarmed people including women and children. That is what THEY are doing all across the planet as we speak and they will strike harder and more often in Iraq, in Europe, in Asia and right here in the USA if we don't do everything in our power (not inclusive of our polite, little wartime playbook) to stop them.

If just one more innocent human life ANYWHERE in the world can be saved from these slithering excuses for human beings by gleaning information from them by outright torture or any other means, I am 100% behind it.

To me it is perfectly clear that we no longer have the luxury of applying peacetime principles or even normal wartime conventions if we expect to catch the masterminds behind what is now an escalating and endless series of bloody attacks. In other words, rigidly upholding lofty ideals at this time is a virtual guarantee that an expanding number of global terrorist organizations (who are very active inside the borders of Iraq and right now planning even more horrendous genocidal attacks on our soil perhaps in a major metropolitan area near you) will be successful.

At this point, it is them or us period.

Cheers, Terry

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[Gaim Mastr]

I think that a lot of the problem has to do with the way some American politicians have relentlessly portrayed the American military as "peace keepers". Sort of like our military are the good guys who will forgive all sins and we just want the fighting and bloodshed to end.

Fact is, the American military isn't much, if any, more 'sweet' to its prisoners than the rest of the world's armies.

During America's fight for independence from Britain it was the Americans who first violated the ages old practice of never intentionally shooting a commanding officer. It went against the British principles of an honorable and a gentleman's war. Not that the British military was all that honorable the way they expanded their empire during the centuries 14 through 18. But it was the Americans who first began to use snipers to pick off British military leaders on the battlefield to degrade the moral of the forces. And it worked.

There shouldn't be any question of the brutal tactics used by the American military while they wiped out the native American Indians and Mexicans.

In WWI and WWII there were plenty of instances where US soldiers executed captured Axis soldiers out of revenge, or just because they couldn't afford to bind their hands and drag them through Europe on their patrols. Of course, the Germans and Japanese were far more brutal in their systematic murdering of innocent civilians.

In Vietnam they would take four VCs up in a chopper to interrogate them. The first one wouldn't talk, so out he went, 500 feet to the ground. The second one wouldn't talk, so out he went. Then they'd just grab and toss the third one without asking any questions at all. By the time they got to the fourth one he was telling them everything. And of course some US soldiers did even worse things to POWs and even civilians in Vietnam. And the South Vietcong were even worse than the Americans when it came to interrogation and murder.

I know that we try to leave our past behind us and improve our humanity in a modern world. But war is hell. When you train and force one person to go out, hunt down and kill other people, you can't expect them to remain absolutely civil all of the time. After all, the US, like every other country, trains military killers, not peace keepers.

And if you take a careful look you'd see that for the most part the US has been the lesser of two evils when it comes to the way militaries treat POWs and civilians.

American Revolution = British worse than Americans
American Territorial Expansion = Americans worse than Indians
WWI = Germans worse than Americans
WWII = Germans & Japanese worse than Americans
Korea = Koreans and Chinese worse than Americans
Vietnam = North Vietcong worse than Americans
Iraq = Iraqis worse than Americans


If there is a crowd of Iraqis screaming negative things at US soldiers, and then several people from that crowd start shooting at the soldiers, and the people without guns in the crowd don't run away, but stand there cheering, then I have no sympathy for any of them and I fully support the US soldiers firing into the crowd. There's no way I'd expect trained soldiers to just sit there being shot at because a few "innocents" are intentionally standing between the enemy and those soldiers.

Despite Bush's incompetent claims we are still at war in Iraq, despite an end to major military operations. And if a person knowingly, intentionally places themselves on a battlefield, and clearly chooses sides with the enemy, then I'm not going to hold US soldiers accountable if some of those unarmed enemies get in the way of US bullets.

And torture on POWs for the sake of gaining information has been used by every military for thousands of years. I think that the biggest mistake of this whole scandal was for the morons in that prison to take pictures and then pass them around like frickin' trading cards. If for no other reason, the guilty soldiers from that prison should be ejected from the military and beaten with crowbars for their sheer stupidity.

[Terry Penrod]

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I know GM and wasn't that just jaw-droppingly stupid of them to take thousands of snapshots and even some videotapes of themselves violating every tenet of the Geneva Convention? Of COURSE they have to be brutal with a brutal killer to get him to give-up sensitive information about his comrades. There is no pleasant way to deal with that situation. Even our best drugs and psychological methods can not always break through the human will to remain silent / keep secrets.

But the main point here is that many of those same prisoners are without question the very same slimebags that planned and executed a series of deadly attacks against both U.S. and allied forces as well as terrorist attacks on civilan targets that have killed and maimed many innocent women and children. More to the point, many of them also have direct ties to terrorist organizations outside Iraq and they are NOT nice guys. Their singular purpose in life right now is to kill us asap (ALL of us) while causing as much chaos and fear as possible to disrupt the peaceful transfer of power to a new Iraqi government that will finally hold free public elections in that country early next year. And as a result, we simply have no choice but to do whatever is necessary to extract vital data from those prisoners and track down their key leaders in Iraq and around the world to further cripple their current ability to strike again.

The bottom-line is that if advanced forms of organized terrorism are successful in Iraq and peace can not be achieved through the formation of a new representative government there and if we can not stem the tide of terrorism on a global scale, then ALL of us can kiss 100% of our freedoms, our chosen lifestyles and quite possibly even our lives goodbye. And, the sad thing about all this is that the above statement is actually quite toned-down. After all, we know that bin Laden and many others are trying everything they possibly can right this very second to attain and use WMD on American soil and in many other countries in Europe, Asia and elsewhere. So we just do not have a choice any more and must allow our soldiers and our intel agencies some pretty wide leeway as far as normal conventions are concerned. That includes the interrogation of "POWs" in Iraq.

It would be nice if we had the option to play fair and keep everyone happy all the time. But the fact that millions of individuals in the USA and many more internationally are upset with the current administration and have a very negative attitude toward America in general right now simply changes nothing. The mission is still highly critical, extremely urgent and it does not give us the luxury of saving face - just lives.

Cheers, Terry

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[Terry Penrod]

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On a slightly more hopeful note related to the imminent transfer of power to the newly formed, interim government in Iraq, today al-Sadr, the leading cleric in that country, endorsed the council and their chosen president who the Bush administration and the U.N. have also approved. So, despite continued scuffles between his al-Mahdi Shiite Muslim Militia and our soldiers, we do have a tentative peace accord in place with this very influencial, widely respected cleric and now he has publically supported the officials who will oversee the crucial transitional period that will begin at the end of this month. That is very good news and (just maybe) we can now start a 30-day countdown to peace - and the beginning of the end of the forced occupation of Iraq.

In the sincere hope that the next 30 days do not see any more escalation of fighting between the occupying forces and native Iraqi insurgents, perhaps this is a sign that the people there are finally beginning to realize that Saddam's oppressive regime is in fact gone for good, that he and his horrible sons will never ever regain power over them and that they can actually look forward to a new, representative government of their own choosing through free and open elections within the coming year. This prospect alone, as it gains footing in their day-to-day reality, must come as a tremendous relief after three decades of life under the thumb of a cruel dictator.

It is ultimately for their sake and the sake of their children that many of our young men and women have died - regardless of any ulterior motives that Bush may have had going in. It is also for the sake of our children that a new era of peace, independence, freedom and prosperity in Iraq that they sacrificed their lives, as a democratic state in the center of the Middle East will be a true revelation that may go a long ways toward finally resolving the age-old conflicts within that region.

This may not impact the Israel - Palestine situation directly but it could have a number of positive effects and serve as an indirect influence on the attitude of Hamas, etc. because they will be able to see for themselves what can happen when freedom reigns over a modern Islamic nation - even one that is so steeped in the traditions of a religious idealogy that currently threatens to pull the civilized world apart. Maybe then, even they and the leaders of Israel can at last sit down to the peace table to forge a lasting and meaningful treaty that they will abide by.

You see, this CAN happen too - if just a handful of the most trusted men on each side genuinely live-up to their word and pass that along to every father, every uncle and every brother who will in turn simply tell their children to remove their pathetically small but lethal suicide bomb vests and stay home that day. The ultimate solution to that entire mess, assuming the above situation can ever come to pass, really is that easy.

Cheers, Terry

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[Gaim Mastr]

Thanks for the news, Terry, and that is good news indeed. :yes:

I agree that once a real democratic government with power and the support of the majority of Iraqis takes hold good things are bound to happen.

Not the least of which is open trade of goods and services with Western and Eastern countries. This will provide for two vital things desperately needed in Iraq right now.... jobs and various forms of entertainment. Without those two things the vastly young male populace has nothing but undirected free time on their hands and a great deal of angst and frustration to go along with it.

Once the commerce starts rolling into the country again, I think we'll see a tremendous shift from crowds of people standing around day after day protesting or rioting against anything and everything under the sun. And once they start feeling prosperity in their lives they'll be far less likely to listen to the rehtoric of evil religious leaders bent on murder and destruction.

[Terry Penrod]

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On a different but still related note, here is a news story about a U.S. general who admits approving certain, harsh interrogation methods on at least two specific prisoners at the Guantanamo Bay facility that are known terrorists. I don't know how everyone else feels about this but as far as I am concerned, we should allow these people the freedom to do ANYTHING necessary to extract vital information from know terrorists in captivity. This info is crucial if we are ever to catch bin Laden & company and it should be harsh to serve as notice that becoming a terrorist and getting caught will in fact carry the most severe consequences imaginable.

Cheers, Terry

************************************************** ********************


White House - AP Cabinet & State


General: Cuba Interrogation Methods OK'd

By JOHN J. LUMPKIN, Associated Press Writer

WASHINGTON - Military intelligence officials at the naval prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, got permission to use intensive interrogation techniques on two prisoners deemed to be important al-Qaida figures, a senior general said Thursday.

Army Gen. James T. Hill, commander of the Miami-based U.S. Southern Command, said the intelligence officials were allowed to choose from among four techniques.

He declined to identify those four techniques, saying terrorists would try to devise defenses against them if he did so. He said they did not involve using dogs to threaten prisoners.

Use of those techniques was at least tacitly approved by Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld. In both cases, interrogators at Guantanamo informed the Pentagon (news - web sites) they wished to use these techniques; Rumsfeld had seven days to veto their use and did not.

Hill said the techniques were consistent with the Geneva Conventions that govern treatment of wartime prisoners, but acknowledged they were controversial within the military. The general declined to say whether some requests to use the techniques were denied.

At issue is how far military interrogators have been authorized to go while questioning prisoners taken in the war on terror. Some critics consider various "stress-and-duress" techniques like long isolation and sleep and sensory deprivation as a form of torture.

At Guantanamo during fall 2002, one of the two prisoners was thought to have ties to the Sept. 11 hijackers, and Hill said he was not providing information to interrogators using standard questioning methods — which largely consist of mind games aimed at persuading someone to talk.

The New York Times previously has identified him as Mohamed al-Qahtani, who was suspected of being a potential 20th hijacker during the attacks.

He was captured during the war in Afghanistan; it was later learned he had also tried to enter the United States in Orlando in August 2001, but was turned away by an immigration agent at the airport. Mohamed Atta, the Sept. 11 ringleader, was in the airport at the same time, senior law enforcement officials have said.

Sometime after January 2003, at least one of the more intensive techniques was employed, Hill said.

"He gave us some pretty good stuff, and continues to do so," he said.

The identity of the second alleged al-Qaida figure was unclear. Hill called him an "al-Qaida operative of high intel value."

About 595 terrorist suspects remain at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. As many as 800 have been held there, but some have been freed or turned over to their home countries.

Hill described the conditions at Guantanamo as humane for the prisoners. But a number of others have come forward suggesting problems:

The general who commanded the Guantanamo Bay prison for seven months in 2002 says he was under constant pressure from military intelligence officers to bend his "by-the-book" rules on how to treat al-Qaida and Taliban suspects. In interviews with The Associated Press, Brig. Gen. Rick Baccus said military intelligence wanted him to make the suspects' lives less comfortable to get them to cooperate with interrogators. Baccus said it generally involved "putting the detainees in isolation, or in different locations."

Some prisoners who have left Guantanamo claim they were beaten.

The Red Cross, whose reports are supposed to be confidential, has criticized the open-ended nature of the detentions at Guantanamo and the Bush administration's decision in 2002 that the Geneva Conventions do not apply to detainees there because the terrorist suspects are not prisoners of war.

A enlisted member of the military police was beaten by four guards while posing as an uncooperative prisoner during a training session at Guantanamo. The guards only stopped when they realized he might be American. Spc. Sean Baker claimed he received a traumatic brain injury that required him to be discharged from the military; a military spokeswoman disputed aspects of his accounts, saying he was discharged for an unrelated medical reason.

Vice Adm. Albert T. Church, the Navy inspector general who visited Guantanamo on May 6 and 7, told reporters on May 12 that he had found conditions to be professional and humane. But he also said his visit was too short to look further into the past for possible abuses.

Church said he found eight "minor infractions." Four involved prison guards, three involved interrogators and one involved a barber who gave a prisoner an "unauthorized haircut" — a Mohawk-style cut.

FROM:

http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/20040603/ap_on_go_ca_st_pe/guantanamo_interrogation_rules_1

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[Gaim Mastr]

Donald Rumsfeld is the guy from the Bush adminstration that I have always liked the most. :yes:

If anyone in this country should be expected to not be a feminized, politically correct, bleeding-heart liberal, it should be the Secretary of State.
:face10: