Human Rights Watch Reporting New Incidents of Detainee Torture by American Soldiers

[lithuanianmafia]

Originally Posted by Human Rights Watch

U.S. Army troops subjected Iraqi detainees to severe beatings and other torture at a base in central Iraq from 2003 through 2004, often under orders or with the approval of superior officers, according to accounts from soldiers released by Human Rights Watch today.

The new report, “Leadership Failure: Firsthand Accounts of Torture of Iraqi Detainees by the U.S. Army's 82nd Airborne Division,” provides soldiers’ accounts of abuses against detainees committed by troops of the 82nd Airborne stationed at Forward Operating Base Mercury (FOB Mercury), near Fallujah.

Three U.S. army personnel—two sergeants and a captain—describe routine, severe beatings of prisoners and other cruel and inhumane treatment. In one incident, a soldier is alleged to have broken a detainee’s leg with a baseball bat. Detainees were also forced to hold five-gallon jugs of water with their arms outstretched and perform other acts until they passed out. Soldiers also applied chemical substances to detainees’ skin and eyes, and subjected detainees to forced stress positions, sleep deprivation, and extremes of hot and cold. Detainees were also stacked into human pyramids and denied food and water. The soldiers also described abuses they witnessed or participated in at another base in Iraq and during earlier deployments in Afghanistan.

According to the soldiers' accounts, U.S. personnel abused detainees as part of the military interrogation process or merely to “relieve stress.” In numerous cases, they said that abuse was specifically ordered by Military Intelligence personnel before interrogations, and that superior officers within and outside of Military Intelligence knew about the widespread abuse. The accounts show that abuses resulted from civilian and military failures of leadership and confusion about interrogation standards and the application of the Geneva Conventions. They contradict claims by the Bush administration that detainee abuses by U.S. forces abroad have been infrequent, exceptional and unrelated to policy.

“The administration demanded that soldiers extract information from detainees without telling them what was allowed and what was forbidden,” said Tom Malinowski, Washington Director of Human Rights Watch. “Yet when abuses inevitably followed, the leadership blamed the soldiers in the field instead of taking responsibility.”

Soldiers referred to abusive techniques as “smoking” or “****ing” detainees, who are known as “PUCs,” or Persons Under Control. “Smoking a PUC” referred to exhausting detainees with physical exercises (sometimes to the point of unconsciousness) or forcing detainees to hold painful positions. “****ing a PUC” detainees referred to beating or torturing them severely. The soldiers said that Military Intelligence personnel regularly instructed soldiers to “smoke” detainees before interrogations.

One sergeant told Human Rights Watch: “Everyone in camp knew if you wanted to work out your frustration you show up at the PUC tent. In a way it was sport… One day [a sergeant] shows up and tells a PUC to grab a pole. He told him to bend over and broke the guy’s leg with a mini Louisville Slugger, a metal bat.”

The officer who spoke to Human Rights Watch made persistent efforts over 17 months to raise concerns about detainee abuse with his chain of command and to obtain clearer rules on the proper treatment of detainees, but was consistently told to ignore abuses and to “consider your career.” He believes he was not taken seriously until he approached members of Congress to raise his concerns. When the officer made an appointment this month with Senate staff members of Senators John McCain and John Warner, he says his commanding officer denied him a pass to leave his base. The officer was interviewed several days later by investigators with the Army Criminal Investigative Division and Inspector General’s office, and there were reports that the military has launched a formal investigation. Repeated efforts by Human Rights Watch to contact the 82nd Airborne Division regarding the major allegations in the report received no response.

The soldiers’ accounts show widespread confusion among military units about the legal standards applicable to detainees. One of the sergeants quoted in the report described how abuse of detainees was accepted among military units:

“Trends were accepted. Leadership failed to provide clear guidance so we just developed it. They wanted intel [intelligence]. As long as no PUCs came up dead it happened. We heard rumors of PUCs dying so we were careful. We kept it to broken arms and legs and shit.”

The soldiers’ accounts challenge the Bush administration’s claim that military and civilian leadership did not play a role in abuses. The officer quoted in the report told Human Rights Watch that he believes the abuses he witnessed in Iraq and Afghanistan were caused in part by President Bush’s 2002 decision not to apply Geneva Conventions protection to detainees captured in Afghanistan:

“[In Afghanistan,] I thought that the chain on command all the way up to the National Command Authority [President Bush and Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld] had made it a policy that we were going to interrogate these guys harshly. . . . We knew where the Geneva Conventions drew the line, but then you get that confusion when the Sec Def [Secretary of Defense] and the President make that statement [that Geneva did not apply to detainees] . . . . Had I thought we were following the Geneva Conventions as an officer I would have investigated what was clearly a very suspicious situation.”

The officer said that Bush’s decision on Afghanistan affected detention and interrogation policy in Iraq: “None of the unit policies changed. Iraq was cast as part of the War on Terror, not a separate entity in and of itself but a part of a larger war.”

As one sergeant cited in the report, discussing his duty in Iraq, said: “The Geneva Conventions is questionable and we didn’t know we were supposed to be following it. . . . [W]e were never briefed on the Geneva Conventions.”

Human Rights Watch called on the military to conduct a thorough investigation of the abuses described in the report, as well as all other cases of reported abuse. It urged that this investigation not be limited to low-ranking military personnel, as has been the case in previous investigations, but to examine the responsibility throughout the military chain of command.

Human Rights Watch repeated its call for the administration to appoint a special counsel to conduct a widespread criminal investigation of military and civilian personnel, including higher level officials, who may be implicated in detainee abuse in Iraq, Afghanistan or elsewhere.

Human Rights Watch also called on the U.S. Congress to create a special commission, along the lines of the 9/11 commission, to investigate prisoner abuse issues, and to enact proposed legislation prohibiting all forms of detainee treatment and interrogation not specifically authorized by the U.S. Army Field Manual on Intelligence Interrogation and all treatment prohibited by the Convention Against Torture.

“When an experienced Army officer goes out of his way to say something’s systematically wrong, it’s time for the administration and Congress to listen,” Malinowski said. “That means allowing a genuinely independent investigation of the policy decisions that led to the abuse and communicating clear, lawful interrogation rules to the troops on the ground.”

We live in a day and age free of torture and barbarism? Ya right

[Egg Nog]

Wow, it only took one reply before we got a right-winger crying conspiracy

[drakkie]

"USA are the free-est and most humane and democratic country in the world."

Really still believe that propaganda ?

[lithuanianmafia]

Originally Posted by Egg Nog

Wow, it only took one reply before we got a right-winger crying conspiracy

i'm guessin someone replied in my sleep and i missed it? dammit, someone wanna fill me in?

[lithuanianmafia]

Originally Posted by drakkie

"USA are the free-est and most humane and democratic country in the world."

Really still believe that propaganda ?

i truly stopped believing that after stuff like this came out:

[werty]

Originally Posted by lithuanianmafia

i'm guessin someone replied in my sleep and i missed it? dammit, someone wanna fill me in?

Eggnog wanted to show you guys how good he is at insulting me.

Anyways, you guys shouldn't judge an entire country's morals and ethic's on a few corrupt people's actions. Every signle country in this world has criminals, America is no different.

[Clique]

Originally Posted by werty

Eggnog wanted to show you guys how good he is at insulting me.

Anyways, you guys shouldn't judge an entire country's morals and ethic's on a few corrupt people's actions. Every signle country in this world has criminals, America is no different.

yeh but not every country calls it self 'the most educated, democratic country in the world'. most of us judge countries on the actions of their leaders, as bush is a n00b most people hate on america for that reason i think.

[Egg Nog]

Originally Posted by werty

Eggnog wanted to show you guys how good he is at insulting me.

Anyways, you guys shouldn't judge an entire country's morals and ethic's on a few corrupt people's actions. Every signle country in this world has criminals, America is no different.

Okay so you're attacking me now? I didn't call you a 3-year-old or say that you were "on your period" like you did to me. Look, I totally agree with what you say in your post here, and I'm not trying to start a fight. It's just ridiculous that the first thing you mentioned was "conspiracy".

Everybody has their own political positions, I'm not even going there. But it worries me when a news item like this comes up and the first thing I hear is someone suggesting that it might be a conspiracy - I mean, what a horrible thing to say in light of an issue like this. Look at the morons who cried conspiracy after the September 11th bombings - they didn't do anybody any good.

I'm not trying to start a war here, lets both grow up a little shall we?

[Rockefella]

Originally Posted by Egg Nog

Okay so you're attacking me now? Look, I totally agree with what you say in your post here, and I'm not trying to start a fight. It's just ridiculous that the first thing you mentioned was "conspiracy".

No I'm not a 3-year old, and no I'm not "on my period" as you said. Everybody has their own political positions, I'm not even going there. But it worries me when a news item like this comes up and the first thing I hear is someone suggesting that it might be a conspiracy - I mean, what a horrible thing to say in light of an issue like this. Look at the morons who cried conspiracy after the September 11th bombings - they didn't do anybody any good.

I'm not trying to start a war here, lets both grow up a little shall we?

Agreed. There's no need to argue over things like this, but at often times, Republicans find every excuse in the book to put down a theory, or a rumor... containing facts or not.

[Egg Nog]

Originally Posted by Rockefella

Agreed. There's no need to argue over things like this, but at often times, Republicans find every excuse in the book to put down a theory, or a rumor... containing facts or not.

I really don't think it has anything to do with political affiliation when it comes to the morality of it. People on the other end of the spectrum are often just as bad, or worse. It doesn't matter if it's a right-winger saying that the torture didn't happen or if it's a left-winger saying that Bush was responsible for Sept.11th.

It's just utterly ridiculous that any news item would come up and someone would immediately redirect blame before they even knew anything about the situation.

[Rockefella]

Originally Posted by Egg Nog

I really don't think it has anything to do with political affiliation when it comes to the morality of it. People on the other end of the spectrum are often just as bad, or worse. It doesn't matter if it's a right-winger saying that the torture didn't happen or if it's a left-winger saying that Bush was responsible for Sept.11th.

It's just utterly ridiculous that any news item would come up and someone would immediately redirect blame before they even knew anything about the situation.

Yeah.. our side has the Michael Moore's and such.

[werty]

Originally Posted by Egg Nog

Okay so you're attacking me now? I didn't call you a 3-year-old or say that you were "on your period" like you did to me. Look, I totally agree with what you say in your post here, and I'm not trying to start a fight. It's just ridiculous that the first thing you mentioned was "conspiracy".

Everybody has their own political positions, I'm not even going there. But it worries me when a news item like this comes up and the first thing I hear is someone suggesting that it might be a conspiracy - I mean, what a horrible thing to say in light of an issue like this. Look at the morons who cried conspiracy after the September 11th bombings - they didn't do anybody any good.

I'm not trying to start a war here, lets both grow up a little shall we?

Look, I dont want to fight with you either. All I said was "conspriacy????" And you come out labeling me as a "crying right winger". You did start the "fight."
As for me saying "conspiracy?????", keep it in context. I said before that, that i beleived it was very possible for this to have happened, and that does not make me a right winger.

[my porsche]

ok ladies break it up

werty is right, you cant judge an entire country on a few corrupt people's actions, its not like we're going to let them off the hook either, look what hapopened to lyndeieyieie england

its sad that people would torture other people, but making a PRISONER stand naked is NOT torture...correct me if i'm wrong

[Rockefella]

Originally Posted by my porsche

its sad that people would torture other people, but making a PRISONER stand naked is NOT torture...correct me if i'm wrong

Somewhat not necessary but: There was much more than that. Don't want to get into details because what they did was just downright disgusting. Look it up.

[Egg Nog]

Originally Posted by werty

Look, I dont want to fight with you either. All I said was "conspriacy????" And you come out labeling me as a "crying right winger". You did start the "fight."
As for me saying "conspiracy?????", keep it in context. I said before that, that i beleived it was very possible for this to have happened, and that does not make me a right winger.

I said "crying conspiracy" - used this way, the word means "shouting". No tears involved.

Anyways, we've both gone totally overboard on this one. I think we can all basically agree that this is a horrible thing, that it is almost surely not a conspiracy, and that it is definitely not a representation of the USA as a whole.

Deal? I'm cool if you are.

its sad that people would torture other people, but making a PRISONER stand naked is NOT torture...correct me if i'm wrong

I shall correct you, because that is absolutely torture. Not as bad as most probably, but torture is purposely inflicting any form of anguish or pain.