THE US, THE UN AND THE IRAQIS THEMSELVES, V. 7.0

It must be extremely difficult to respect the rights of an enemy under the Geneva convention when that enemy neither obeys or is a signator of the Geneva convention. Because an enemy who perpetrates beheadings and other dismemberments in addition to murder of civilians and your buddies does not really qualify for humane treatment, it must nonetheless require enormous self-control to treat them humanely in return.

btw, Many lived a 'safer' life under Saddam than they are now.

And don't forget that we should be held to a different, higher standard than our enemy, right Cyclo?

CI: What a healthy-sounding post. Cathartic really ... except of course that last bit about "'terrorist' heading our government."

JW: I suspect we'll hear a lot more whining and moaning, plus a lot of "we've got to move on" posts like CI's, but with no real intent to "get over it."

Top News

By Will Dunham

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Members of a U.S. special operations task force punched and abused prisoners in Iraq in front of Defense Intelligence Agency agents and then threatened the agents to try to keep them quiet, a document made public on Tuesday stated.

A letter from the head of the DIA to a senior Pentagon intelligence official, which detailed previously unknown incidents of abuse by U.S. forces on prisoners in Iraq, said the agents also saw detainees with burn marks and bruises.

It was written two months after photographs of U.S. soldiers abusing prisoners at Abu Ghraib jail near Baghdad became public, and five months after American commanders in Iraq first learned of the Abu Ghraib abuse.

The Abu Ghraib revelations prompted international outrage and undercut U.S. credibility as it sought to stabilize Iraq amid a bloody insurgency after last year's invasion.

The new revelations of abuses elsewhere were included in a June 25 letter from Navy Vice Admiral Lowell Jacoby, director of the DIA, to Stephen Cambone, undersecretary of defense for intelligence.

The letter was one of numerous U.S. government documents released by the American Civil Liberties Union, which obtained them under the Freedom of Information Act. Other documents depict a split between the Defense Department and the FBI over Pentagon use of harsh interrogation methods on prisoners.

Jacoby wrote that two unidentified DIA agents, who worked as interrogators and debriefers at a detention facility in Baghdad, saw task force officers "punch a prisoner in the face to the point the individual needed medical attention."

Jacoby said that "the debriefer was ordered to leave the room." The date of the incident was not stated.

The DIA personnel also observed "prisoners arriving at the Temporary Detention Facility in Baghdad with burn marks on their backs. Some have bruises, and some have complained of kidney pain," Jacoby wrote. One of the DIA agents took pictures of the injuries and showed them to his supervisor in the task force "who immediately confiscated them," Jacoby wrote.

AGENTS THREATENED

Members of the task force acted against the DIA agents, the letter said, including making unspecified threats, confiscating their vehicle keys, ordering them "not to talk to anyone in the U.S.," and telling them their e-mails were being screened. Continued ...

The letter said task force members also "instructed them (the DIA agents) not to leave the compound without specific permission, even to get a haircut at the PX (store for military personnel)."

The job of the task force was not specified. During the Iraq war, the Pentagon has used several task forces made up of special operations troops and sometimes CIA agents, searching for "high-value" fugitives and weapons of mass destruction.

Jameel Jaffer, an ACLU lawyer, said the documents show an attempt to cover up abuse, noting the threats made to the two DIA agents. Pointing to the account of burns on the backs of some prisoners and bruises, Jaffer added, "By anyone's definition, that suggests that something akin to torture has been going on. This is alarming."

The Pentagon had no immediate comment on the documents.

The Pentagon previously has acknowledged abuse of prisoners in Iraq by special operations troops. Members of an elite Navy SEAL unit were charged in September with abusing prisoners, including one who died in November 2003 after being dropped off at Abu Ghraib with severe head injuries.

A Pentagon report on detainee treatment by special forces in Iraq is due to be made public as early as next month.

© Reuters 2004. All Rights Reserved.

Tico Wrote:

Quote:

And don't forget that we should be held to a different, higher standard than our enemy, right Cyclo?

Yes, we both are and should be held to a higher standard. It's the only thing justifying our invasion of a sovreign country. Are you attempting to be facetious?
...
Cycloptichorn

McGent, Tell that to the Iraqi's that have said as much. You wanna be in Baghdad now? It's safer, you know!

Ticomaya, Nobody can argue with your last paragraph, but we 'is' the original insurgents. It's estimated that we have killed over 15,000 innocent Iraqis thus far. The numbers are gonna increase for every month we are there. At what point does our killing of innocent Iraqi's equal Saddam's tyrany of his own people? At what point does the sacrifice of our American soldiers and treasure become too much?

Saddam's lawyer meeting cancelled
By Jamal Halaby in Amman
December 9, 2004

SADDAM Hussein's first meeting with a defence lawyer was abruptly cancelled today, apparently because of pressure exerted by US authorities on the special Iraqi tribunal trying him, the chief of the former dictator's legal team said.

Ziad al-Khasawneh said in an interview that the Iraqi Bar Association obtained court permission last week for defence team member Khalil al-Duleimi, an Iraqi, to meet with Saddam today.

"But the syndicate called the lawyer earlier today to say the meeting has been indefinitely postponed," said al-Khasawneh, who heads the Jordan-based legal team appointed by Saddam's wife Sajida.

"The abrupt cancellation indicates that there was a last-minute decision to ban the meeting," he said. "That decision appears to have come from the top, neither from the court nor from the Iraqi government because both have no say in front of Iraq's real ruler, the United States of America.

"There was obviously an American veto on the meeting," he added.

Not as much facetious as sardonic, but you get the idea. We should be held to the same standard - when measured against the terrorists, I believe the yardstick should be the same. For instance, we should not suggest it's okay for the terrorists to cut the heads off their hostages because, well after all ... they ARE terrorists, and they were probably raised differently, and it may not be all that bad a thing to cut off someone's head where they come from ... and lets not forget the religious differences on top of the cultural divide. But, by golly, how DARE some US soldiers strip a terrorist naked?

The insurgents/terrorists hide out in mosques and hospitals, they do not wear a uniform, they hide behind women and children, they wave white flags or feign death and then attack the US soldiers. No, our enemy does not abide by the same standards we do, but do not try and tell me that it's okay for them to do so because we don't "understand the mind" of our enemy, or some b/s that holding ourselves to a higher standard is the only thing justifying this war. Don't try and justify the actions of these insurgents/terrorists while criticizing the actions of the US military for doing far less, simply because you feel the US should be held to some mythical standard you feel they should not cross. The standard should be the same for both sides. To hold otherwise is rank duplicity.

Why are we good and they are bad? Because we hold ourselves to a higher standard, a higher standard of both conduct and purpose. They do not. If we were held to the same standard, you would have no moral justification for being upset when they attack and kill our troops, and neither would anyone else; after all, what's the difference if we are the same as them?