I wonder if the soldiers charged with abusing those prisoners will be charged with war crimes?

And how severly were they really abused? Given, our cultures are significantly different - stripping someone naked isn't a big deal to us in America, but to the Muslims it's quite a big deal. I've always thought of torture as inflicting physical pain or maiming.

Sounds to me like there's been quite a coverup going on, and understandably so. But it begs the question of the soldiers involved, "What the hell were you thinking?!"

On a sad sidenote, one of the accused was recently sent home on maternity leave. Getting pregnant in a war zone? Lucy, you got some splainin' to do.

My gut feeling is that the enlisted reservists will get hammored, and the upper chain of command will get a slap on the wrist. The OIC (BG whats-her-name) made the a comment last weekend that she feels the reservists will be made scapegoats out of because, "they're expendable." Ouch. That ain't gonna help the friction between the active duty and part-timers.

Why do libs enjoy tearing down the country?

How would you liked do be jusdeged based on the nightly news.

BTW this was made public back in Jan. and an investigation launched 3 days later. I remember when it happened and new the libs the press would make as much of it as they could. As wrong as what a few soldirs did does not make it right to blow it completely out of proportion. The press this morning was all over the "Arab outrage" Well you know what the Arabs are looking for anything to be outraged over. I am outraged at the Arabs blowing up Israli citizens . I am outraged at honor killing by Arab men. Why is my outrage and the outrage of Millions of Americans not counted? We will not win the hearts and minds of Arabs as they have clearly stated this is a holy war. They will not be happy until we are out of the former Ottoman empire and Israel is gone. Not going to happen so get used to their outrage and match it.

Rumsfeld has been called to testify about the cover up to congress. I wouldn't call it the liberal media over reacting.

AK Kings:

This was awful stuff, but I for one do not fault Bush. No way he knew or should have known about this. Unfortunately, war seems to always bring out the worst in mankind. Maybe because war is the worst thing mankind ever does.

You need to try to get past the liberal bashing. I am a liberal, I am a disabled veteran, and I support our troops 100 percent, and in this case do not fault our President.

Please note that several Republican senators are calling for an investigation - more liberals making something out of nothing?

If it was such a small thing do you think GW would be making television appearance on Iraq media or would be apologizing, or chastising Rumsfeld? It is a huge thing that will hurt us for years to come. But is not a liberal or conservative thing. Not everything is created by the liberal press.

Unfortunately Dave, on a little organic farm somewhere in the Snoqualmie valley... EVERYTHING is a Liberal / Conservative thing!

Do any of you even know why this happens?


Troops actively engaged get someone in their Platoon Killed. A rage stars to build with in the platoon. You see they all have been a group for some time and are close. They have been through a life and death battle and have bonded. This rage continues to build until the Feild commander figures they need to be rotated out to a less hostile environment to cool down a bit. Which usually involves gurading prisoners. These prisoners start acting up or just being difficult in general and the rage that has never been dealt with starts to surface. Then crap like this takes place. It does not justify it but it does put it in a perspective that we cannot see on the sofa here in the US. So before you call them war criminals or judge them too harshly maybe a short walk in their shoes is in order.

Actually King, you're wrong again. Incidents like this demonstrate an abhorrent but sadly natural facet of human behavior. American, Japanese, German, Russian, Arab... whoever, it doesn't really matter. It is a demonstrated fact that a certain amount of sadistic cruelty will inevitably develop when one party (in this case the military prison guards) wields basically absolute power over another. (Iraqi prisoners)

We've all heard the horror stories of atrocities committed at POW camps during WW2 and Vietnam. To a MUCH lesser extent, this is a manifestation of the same basic behavioral characteristic.

Whether the guards were ordered to humiliate the prisoners to "soften them up for interrogation" or not has yet to be proven. IMO, the main issue that proves my above contention is the smile on the female guard's face in the released photos. She obviously takes a certain measure of delight in what she's doing.

If you think about it... who among us wouldn't also find a certain satisfaction in humiliating the "enemy". It's the same instinctual behavior that civillian prison guards must deal with every day.

4salt,

Read the Geneva convention. Nothing against humlitating the enemy. The only violation was the pictures not the act.

The same thing happened in Vietnam and does not happen for the most part in conflicts where our troops do not get killed.

So try another Liberal stab at the cause.

The saying is that power corrupts absolutlely.

Those guards were from a reserve MP unit, not soldiers assigned to the rear from a line unit.

Also, there's more there than just the MPs. I highly suspect that there are some spooks (MI, CIA) involved that were somewhat behind this. Like 4Salt said, "softening them up."

I'm also very curious about what will happen when it goes to trial because, like Elvis said, humiliation isn't really against the Geneva Convention. But, humiliation is a relative and subjective term.

And don't be so sure Bush didn't know. There was a report submitted to Myers and Rummie in December. If Bush truly didn't know and he doesn't fire Rumsfeld, then there's a problem. I think Rumsfeld told him but they tried to keep it low key and hope it would blow over. That's completely understandable in my view. Hell, that's what I'd do. Stuff happens in war. Sometimes you just gotta hope it goes away before anyone finds out.

GH - I understand and bet that GW and Rummy probably did hope that it would all blow over - but it never does. It always seems to work better by getting in front of the story and trying to define the agenda (spin). Again, this is the sort of stuff that happens in war, unintended consequences and all that. Whether it was publicized or not, this kind of activity makes it all the more difficult and dangerous for our troops. Even though I can't blame GW for what the MP's did and I thought it was good that he apologized, I still blame GW for getting us in this mess so that crap like this could happen. And the idea that Rummy (as of yesterday) had not read the 53 page Army report on this blows my mind. I hope Bush does keep him around - he is a millstone that hopefully will sink the Bush campaign.

It's not what I would do in a war time situation but I can see how some would be drawn that way. I see war as I do all things in black and white. If you take up arms against me be prepared to surrender completely or die on the battle feild. I would give no quarter and only accept full surrender. To guard the prisoners I would bring in units designed specifically for this and nothing else .I would also not have them tied to the theater commander.

Iraqi POW\'s


American POW

Looks like Iraqi's have it a lot better...

PM - Can I choose None of the above???

true...

Pmartin,

No matter how American POW's were or are treated, there is no connection between that and what happened to the Iraqi POW's.

Isn't the whole premise of the war that we're better than that? That we are going to remove Saddam and liberate the Iraqis so that they don't have to have stuff like this happen anymore?

I think that premise is BS, but if that's the one we're going to go with, then we have to go with it all the way.

Also, it continues to amuse me that folks keep blaming things on the "liberal" agenda, when the GOP controls the House, Senate, Presidency, and the Supreme Court. What would the GOP do if there weren't any liberals? I suppose go out and find a new enemy to blame everything on.

Uh...wait...that scenario sounds familiar...

Fish on...

Todd

I just saw an interview with the young U.S. military lady that is prominently smiling with both thumbs up in several of the abuse photos...she claims that she was ordered by folks "above here in her chain of command"..."folks" she said, not one...

We'll have to see how that pans out...

"Getting pregnant in a war zone?"

Too bad she wasn't gay.

Ba-dump-dump

...and kid that rush stuff was a gas.

he said they were 'just blowing off steam'.

what a fat bag of ass gas.

So far I'm not convince of any true crime based on the photos i've seen.

Any sex acts have been staged. Very humiliating, but hardly brutal torture.

Now when all the facts come in, there may very well be real physical and sexual abuse that needs to be dealt with. But I've yet to see that evidence.

I've heard a few things so far that lead me to beleive that at least some if not most of these incidents were part of the CIA 'softening' for interrigations.

Supposedly these prisoners are the 'elite' soldiers loyal to Sadaam. The timing of the photos come from the month or so leading up to the capture of Sadaam himself. They were really turning up the heat to catch him, and getting info from prisoners was essential in that process.

I'm not saying what is shown in the pics or all the stories are justified. But I'm not convinced they weren't either. The biggest issue is that someone took pics and sent them around on the internet.

Then the media and polititions were given a free pass to pounce on Bush and Rumsfeild and the war in general. What's truely offensive is the all out political attack. You can't watch the news or listen to polititians without the 'prison abuse' story taking center stage.

But whatis truely sickening is how all these polititians and liberal media outlets barely blinked at the BRUTAL murder of Nick Berg. These terrorists, our true enimies, slowly sawed off this innocent kid's head while he screamed for his life and died gurgling his own blood and screaming like an animal while his killers shouted 'praises to allah' and threatened America and all Americans.

I dare you to watch this video, then see if you still consider the prisoner humiliation to be 'brutal'....

Yeah, it's a weird subject. When we think of torture we always image Rambo movies or something. But the Geneva Convention covers quite a bit of "little" stuff. Keeping in mind the differences in culture, what may be germane to us is quite an outrage to others, and vice versa.

The following is prohibited:

Article 3
1(a) Violence to life and person, in particular murder of all kinds, mutilation, cruel treatment and torture;

1(c) Outrages upon personal dignity, in particular, humiliating and degrading treatment;

Article 13
Prisoners of war must at all times be humanely treated. Any unlawful act or omission by the Detaining Power causing death or seriously endangering the health of a prisoner of war in its custody is prohibited, and will be regarded as a serious breach of the present Convention.

Likewise, prisoners of war must at all times be protected, particularly against acts of violence or intimidation and against insults and public curiosity.

Article 14
Prisoners of war are entitled in all circumstances to respect for their persons and their honour. Women shall be treated with all the regard due to their sex and shall in all cases benefit by treatment as favourable as that granted to men.

Article 17
No physical or mental torture, nor any other form of coercion, may be inflicted on prisoners of war to secure from them information of any kind whatever. Prisoners of war who refuse to answer may not be threatened, insulted, or exposed to any unpleasant or disadvantageous treatment of any kind.