Saturday, September 24, 2005

Report: Only 4-10% insurgents foreign. Report: Only 4-10% insurgents foreign [The Raw Story | A rational voice - Alternative news] 6:20:31 PM    comment []

Frist and Torture: What Did He Know and When Did He Know It?. Time magazine yesterday revealed new allegations of systematic abuse of Iraqi detainees made by a “decorated former Captain in the Army’s 82nd Airborne Division.” For months, the Captain says, U.S. soldiers were directed “to conduct daily beatings of prisoners prior to questioning.” In one instance, “a soldier allegedly broke a detainee’s leg with a metal bat.” Other prisoners had “their faces and eyes exposed to burning chemicals.” The Captain revealed this abuse to Human Rights Watch in July 2005. He also reported his charges to “three senior Republican senators,” including Majority Leader Bill Frist and Sen. John McCain. The torture, he said, was due primarily to “chronic confusion over U.S. military detention policies and whether or not the Geneva Convention applied.” On July 27, the same month the Captain came forward, Sen. Frist single-handedly derailed a bipartisan effort — led by Sen. McCain — to clarify rules for the treatment of enemy prisoners at U.S. prison camps. In what news reports at the time described as an “unusual move,” Frist “simply pulled the bill from consideration” before it could be debated. Bill Frist needs to come clean: Was his office told of the [base ']Äúsystematic abuse[base ']Äù in the 82nd Airborne before he torpedoed the new detainee laws? [Think Progress] 6:19:12 PM    comment []

3 in 82nd Airborne Say Beating Iraqi Prisoners Was Routine. Soldiers told a human rights group that members of their battalion in Iraq abused prisoners in 2003 and 2004 to help gather intelligence and to amuse themselves. By ERIC SCHMITT. [NYT > Home Page] 8:28:30 AM    comment []

Saturday, September 24, 2005 For Immediate Release FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE SEPTEMBER 23, 2005 4:31 PM CONTACT: Human Rights Watch (212) 290-4700 New Orleans: Prisoners Abandoned to Floodwaters Officers Deserted a Jail Building, Leaving Inmates Locked in Cells NEW YORK - September 23 - As Hurricane Katrina began pounding New Orleans, the sheriff's department abandoned hundreds of inmates imprisoned in the city[base ']s jail, Human Rights Watch said today. Inmates in Templeman III, one of several buildings in the Orleans Parish Prison compound, reported that as of Monday, August 29, there were no correctional officers in the building, which held more than 600 inmates. These inmates, including some who were locked in ground-floor cells, were not evacuated until Thursday, September 1, four days after flood waters in the jail had reached chest-level. [base "]Of all the nightmares during Hurricane Katrina, this must be one of the worst,[per thou] said Corinne Carey, researcher from Human Rights Watch. [base "]Prisoners were abandoned in their cells without food or water for days as floodwaters rose toward the ceiling.[per thou] http://www.commondreams.org/news2005/0923-01.htm 8:23:09 AM    comment []

Exclusive: Former Head of U.S. Central Command Blasts Administration Over Iraq. American Progress hosted a press roundtable with retired Marine Corps General Joseph Hoar on September 13. Hoar headed U.S. Central Command following Gen. Norman Schwarzkopf, overseeing U.S. forces in the Persian Gulf after the first Iraq war. Gen. Hoar was blistering in his assessment of the current conflict, and the failure of the Bush administration’s civilian leadership to grasp the dynamics on the ground in Iraq. Excerpts follow (or read the full transcript here): Iraq is like our Revolutionary War, except now we’re the British: Well, it[base ']Äôs true [that the two conflicts are alike], but we[base ']Äôre on the wrong side. We[base ']Äôre the Brits. This is part of the hubris of this crowd that would think that in a country where 95 percent of the population was tribal, where it had been under various colonial rules for however long [base ']Äì since the Caliphate I guess [base ']Äì that all of a sudden this thing was going to turn around overnight. By the way, I just finished reading [David] McCullough[base ']Äôs book, 1776. We[base ']Äôre in there. (Laughter.) … Yeah, but we have red coats. Iraq’s political development is essential; the war cannot be won simply by killing more Iraqis: I[base ']Äôm not at all optimistic about the outcome [in Iraq]. I think part of the reason is that our leadership [base ']Äì civilian leadership has got it wrong. Once the government was overthrown, the requirement from there on in was for political leadership; for the politics to take the lead, rather than the military side. … We[base ']Äôve had three successive civilian leaders out there, all of whom in my judgment have been ineffective; one bordering on criminal, but the other two relatively ineffective as well. And as a result, the object out there is to kill more Iraqis. I want to tell you that you cannot win this war by killing Iraqis. Now, that ought to be self-evident, but it apparently is not. As long as Iraq’s insurgents don’t lose, they win: Ho Chi Minh won as long as he didn[base ']Äôt lose, and these guys [Iraqi insurgents] are in the same category. They are on an entirely different track than we are. This is the George Washington plan: don[base ']Äôt get decisively engaged, hang in there, sooner or later events are going to change and the foreign invaders are going to lose. Specific steps to improve the security situation in Iraq: In the list of security things, first of all you have to protect this electoral process that[base ']Äôs ongoing. And then the second priority would be to continue to train Iraqis, but to redouble our efforts and to make sure that they have the appropriate equipment and so forth. Stop conducting search-and-destroy missions out over territory that you[base ']Äôre not going to occupy after you[base ']Äôve carried out these sweeps, and concentrate on the population centers and the political side of things. Iraq will be a terrorist breeding ground in the region for years to come: I want to leave you with something that I think is really important. I was in the Middle East on a trip of five countries this past winter, and in Saudi Arabia there seemed to me to be agreement that, regardless of what happens in Iraq, these jihadis that are now there…, these people are going to be well trained and be out of a job, and they[base ']Äôre going to disperse into the local countries and continue their work. And so it seems to me that the Defense Department not only needs to think about disengaging in Iraq, but to develop the contingency plans if you wind up with a full-scale insurgency in, say, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, or if these people redouble the efforts of Hezbollah and Hamas in Israel. Read the full transcript here. [Think Progress] 8:19:11 AM    comment []

© Copyright 2005 Patricia Thurston.