Torture in Iraq- Beyond Abu Gahraib

[NikoFoxFire]

IRAQ
Torture and ill-treatment of security suspects in Iraq has not been confined to U.S.-run detention sites there. Human Rights Watch investigations, published in January 2005, found that the Iraqi authorities, in particular the Ministry of Interior, practiced torture and ill-treatment of detainees, denial of access by families and lawyers to detainees, improper treatment of detained children, and abysmal conditions in pre-trial detention facilities. Persons tortured or mistreated have inadequate access to health care and no realistic avenue for legal redress. With rare exception, the Iraqi authorities have failed to investigate and punish officials responsible for violations. International police advisers, primarily U.S. citizens funded by the Untied States, have turned a blind eye to these rampant abuses.

Between July and October 2004, Human Rights Watch interviewed ninety former and current detainees, of whom seventy-two alleged they had been tortured or ill-treated in detention. Among them were national security suspects, including insurgents, and suspected common criminals accused of serious offenses including terrorism, abduction, money laundering, drug trafficking and acts of sabotage. Methods of torture cited by detainees, principally at the hands of the Ministry of Interior’s specialized police agencies, included: routine beatings to the body using a variety of implements such as cables, hosepipes and metal rods; kicking, slapping and punching; prolonged suspension from the wrists with the hands tied behind the back; electric shocks to sensitive parts of the body, including the earlobes and genitals; and being kept blindfolded and/or handcuffed continuously for several days. In several of the cases investigated by Human Rights Watch, detainees suffered what may be permanent physical disability.

Many detainees reported that police interrogators made them sign statements without being informed of the content or having the opportunity to read them beforehand. They frequently reported that they were forced to sign or fingerprint such statements while blindfolded, often at the end of interrogation sessions during which they were physically abused. Officials at detention facilities routinely denied relatives and defense counsel access to detainees.
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http://hrw.org/english/docs/2005/04/27/china10549.htm
After reading some pro-torture posts, I felt a touch sickened and searched a little to find this. There. Torture, inherently pointless by nature, is nothing but cruel and malicious sadism. American military leaders should categorically ban its usage, if not for moral reasons, then for the reason that its ineffective. Security at the price of humanity? No thanks. I'll take my chances

 

[Joejojoba111]

Damn people are going to have to get with it, things are different now. It's like plaid, torture is back baby, well open and admitted torture. Just like plaid it never went away, just lurked at the back of the closet where people didn't see it. LSD, 60's wonder drug, was tested to treat schizophrenia (they're hallucinating, maybe Acid will make them normal!) and the CIA put high hopes in it loosening prisoners lips. Lol it did, but they didn't get quality info!

The funniest part is the incompetence of the torturers, lol. The quality of info from Gitmo is near zero, because if they had a guy who didn't know anything they kept pushing. Result was you got all sort of unbelievably good intel, these people knew lieutenants and plots and they met Bin Laden daily. Lol people describing the questioning sessions make it clear the whole torture system is malfunctional, they show pictures and ask you over and over if you met the guy until you say 'yes', then get another picture. What a waste of time. If you're going to torture at least do it properly.

 

[Rebar]

Same as Iran, same as Syria, Lybia, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, UAE... see where this is going? Unless you're willing to address ALL of them, then don't pick just on Iraq.

 

[Cool Hand Luke 22:36]

The funniest part is the incompetence of the torturers, lol. The quality of info from Gitmo is near zero, because...

You are trying to transfer reports of torture in Iraqi-run facilities to Gitmo? I'm afraid that dog just don't hunt. The only place where evidence of torture at Guantanamo has ever been found is at the Democratic Underground forum.

Funny how the average Guantanamo Bay detainee gains weight during their stay and leaves with their teeth fixed up nice.

They practice their own form of torture at the DU Forum: Liberal group-think.

 

[Joejojoba111]

Using the term loosely, because it's really just 1 large grey area. Sort of Geneva Convention stuff on one end, and summary execution on the other, with anything in the middle being shades of grey.

All that matters is that torture now has wide-spread acceptance, and endorsement from a very major power and a lot of small ones, so it's going to be prominent for a while. So they might as well do it properly. And there's no need to do it all the time, sometimes switch it up, bribery here, leniency there, and there's a high rate of wrong guys being nabbed, so a mechanism to account for possibility of error may come in handy.

I say it's better to get it out in the open and flesh out some sound policy, instead of leaving it ambiguous and murky, where half-assed former civilian guards in Iraq use fragments of interrogation techniques they picked up somewhere, without any real knowledge what they're doing. What type of continues using R2I techniques After the prisoner spiled all he knew?

 

[GT]

"shades of grey" yeah sure, whatever.
Sounds like liberal talking points to me.

So where are the "Human Rights Watch" (sic) interviews with all the people Saddam messed with? Oh yeah, they are all dead and buried in mass graves; no interviews there.

Guess things are getting better when the "tortured" can lawyer up and get some "international human rights organization" lobbying on their behalf.

Welcome to representative democracy. It isn't always representative and it isn't always democracy but it is infinitely better than the alternative and getting better on a daily basis.

So let's lighten up here on these guys (who are getting blown up on a daily basis, not sitting around online BSing) and let "Human Rights Watch" and the other socialist organizations do all the complaining


G

 

[GoRon]

There has been no torture at Gitmo.

I question calling the abuse at Abu Ghraib torture. I think abuse is a more accurate term.

I am tortured listining to the whiners about how horrible we are.

 

[gc70]

Torture has been around as long as there have been people and will be around until we are all gone.

My leftist-liberal son is totally against any form of "torture" -even extending the definition to not treating people nicely. When I asked him if he would physically harm a person who had abducted and hidden his infant daughter to obtain information to rescue her, he said "absolutely" but that it would not be right and he would not feel good about it.

 

[Art Eatman]

I've read a fair number of the articles about the events at Abu Ghraib prison. The behavior hasn't struck me as appropriate, but insofar as "torture", it seems to have been on a common level with fraternity "hell week" hazing.

Actually, some of the "hell week" events here, there, and yonder around various universities seems to have been more harsh...

Art

 

[jefnvk]

I question calling the abuse at Abu Ghraib torture. I think abuse is a more accurate term.

A big +1 on that and Art.

I'll get around to helping to crack down on US torture, when all these groups start protesting about contractor's heads being lopped off.

 

[Preacherman]

And since when has Human Rights Watch ever been known as an impartial, fair, balanced reporter of facts?

 

[javafiend]

Same as Iran, same as Syria, Lybia, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, UAE... see where this is going? Unless you're willing to address ALL of them, then don't pick just on Iraq.

My tax dollars do not fund torture in Libya. That's the difference. As US citizens, we have an obligation to ensure that torture and other crimes are not committed in our name.

You are trying to transfer reports of torture in Iraqi-run facilities to Gitmo? I'm afraid that dog just don't hunt. The only place where evidence of torture at Guantanamo has ever been found is at the Democratic Underground forum.

There's plenty of evidence to be found in declassified US government documents. http://www.aclu.org/torturefoia/released/120704.html

All that matters is that torture now has wide-spread acceptance,

Wrong. Torture is illegal under US law, as even Alberto Gonzales recognizes.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A19264-2005Jan18.html

So where are the "Human Rights Watch" (sic) interviews with all the people Saddam messed with?

They were documenting the massive violations of human rights by Saddam's regime.
http://www.answers.com/topic/human-rights-in-saddam-s-iraq

By the way, while Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International were documenting Saddam's crimes, the Reagan Administration renewed ties with Baghdad, provided intelligence and aid to Iraq, and sent a high-level presidential envoy named Donald Rumsfeld to shake hands with Saddam (20 December 1983).
http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB82/press.htm

There has been no torture at Gitmo.

"Torture" was the term employed by FBI agents in Gitmo in their memos back to headquarters.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A14936-2004Dec20.html

The behavior hasn't struck me as appropriate, but insofar as "torture", it seems to have been on a common level with fraternity "hell week" hazing.

Oh really? Sticking lit cigarettes in the ears of detainees? Unleashing German shepherds against naked unarmed prisoners? Beating detainees to death? Ramming lightsticks up their asses? All just a bit of frat house hazing, eh?

Torture has been around as long as there have been people and will be around until we are all gone.

Translation: "Everyone does it, so it's OK." Nope, it's not OK. It is inhumane, illegal, disgraceful, and counterproductive. It does not make our country safer.

And since when has Human Rights Watch ever been known as an impartial, fair, balanced reporter of facts?

Human Rights Watch is an international non-governmental organization (NGO) founded under the name Helsinki Watch in 1978 to monitor the Soviet Union's obligations to comply with the Helsinki Accords.

 

[Rebar]

My tax dollars do not fund torture in Libya. That's the difference.

The difference is, by only looking at Iraq, it gives the isamofacists a huge propaganda tool to drum up more recruits and funds. By addressing the issue as a regional problem, it addresses more of the problem while undercutting the insurgents.

 

[coylh]

I think this issue of torture is a simple one: just follow the golden rule. If we would feel wronged seeing an ass shot of 6 captured marines posed in a circle jerk, it's surely wrong to do that to people we suspect of being the enemy.

 

[Blackburn]

Oh really? Sticking lit cigarettes in the ears of detainees? Unleashing German shepherds against naked unarmed prisoners? Beating detainees to death? Ramming lightsticks up their asses? All just a bit of frat house hazing, eh?

I've been asking that same question, but that's where people here suddenly start practicing "selective comprehension".

It's like talking to DUers about Kerry actually having lost...

All I can say is that I hope I never end up being "hazed" like you guys think is normal, because if I am, the people who try to do it to me WILL die slowly and in excrutiating pain.

 

[javafiend]

The difference is, by only looking at Iraq...

No one suggests that we should look only at Iraq or the US. We should apply the same ethical standards government behavior regardless of which "team" they are on.

When the US government engages in torture, it makes it that much harder to address the subject of human rights in Libya, Cuba, etc. It allows repressive governments the world over to fall back on the easy excuse that since the leader of the Free World engages in torture, then they can, too. "Everybody does it, so that makes it OK."

"If we can't hold ourselves up as an example of how to treat people with dignity and respect, we can't ask that other nations do that to our soldiers."
-- Brig. Gen. Mark Kimm

According to the Pentagon, U.S. military personnel abused Iraqi detainees "by stripping them of their clothing, beating them and shocking them with a blasting device." http://www.palgrave-usa.com/blog/blogindex.aspx?archive=4&author=bovard

You can gussy it up and whitewash it all you want to, but if that isn't torture, then nothing is.

 

[Preacherman]

Human Rights Watch is an international non-governmental organization (NGO) founded under the name Helsinki Watch in 1978 to monitor the Soviet Union's obligations to comply with the Helsinki Accords.

Javafiend, I know what HRW is, and where and when it began - but that doesn't answer my original question:

And since when has Human Rights Watch ever been known as an impartial, fair, balanced reporter of facts?

HRW does not have a good reputation for impartiality, to put it mildly. Their beginnings may have been noble and pure, but their subsequent development has not adhered to the same standard, IMHO.

 

[javafiend]

HRW does not have a good reputation for impartiality, to put it mildly.

Please explain.

(BTW, thanks for letting this thread continue. There are very few places on the web where intelligent respectful debate can flourish.)

 

[Waitone]

Let's just say I'm remain skeptical of any "Human Rights" blissninny group because they without exception have other elements of their agenda that brings into doubt their committment to their stated concerns.

Human Rights Watch is no exception.

http://discoverthenetwork.com/groupProfile.asp?grpid=6258

I particularly like the bio on Aryeh Neier, one of the founders

Aryeh Neier spent 12 years as executive director of Human Rights Watch, and prior to that 15 years working for the American Civil Liberties Union, eight of them as its national director. Born in Nazi Germany, he became a refugee at any early age. He has been a frequent contributor to the New York Review of Books and a columnist for the ultra-Leftist Nation magazine. Neier is currently President of George Soros' Open Society Institute and of the Soros foundations.

And its funding

HRW has received funding from: the Ahmanson Foundation; the Carnegie Corporation of New York; the Ford Foundation; the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation; the John D. & Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation; the Open Society Institute; the David and Lucile Packard Foundation; the Righteous Persons Foundation; the Rockefeller Brothers Fund; and the Rockefeller Foundation.

 

[GoRon]

I personally do not have a problem with watch dog groups monitoring our treatment of prisoners. Limited access is ok with me.

What I don't like is the bias that these groups operate from. They seem to be run by and staffed with the "blame America first" crowd.

There also seems to be a lack of proportion. Some how our alleged mistreatment of prisoners becomes the moral equivalent of the Castro/Hussein/Stalin regimes.

 

[Arc-Lite]

Again some good points by most, on a subject that comes up, every few months. Same good points same dribble. Torture being commited by air head scum bags, for the sake or torture, without a point... should and does find its day in the courts. Now just a simple question...Your no longer on the net, in the comforts of your chair, your in a HOT war zone, where death is an every day event.... IF without doubt, you had someone, who had information that would save the life of the men and women of your country...just what would be acceptable, to obtain this data ? Put some reality into this question, what would YOU do !!!!

 

[Rebar]

It allows repressive governments the world over to fall back on the easy excuse that since the leader of the Free World engages in torture, then they can, too.

That's exactly why the issue needs to be put into the proper perspective and context.

The MSM concentrates on and blows way out of proportion a few minor incidents when we are at fault. Meanwhile, other governments that, as a matter of state policy, engages in the routine torture and extra-judical killings of their citizens, are ignored.

Example, the Abu Gahraib incident has been front page news for over a year. The entire world thinks we're barbarous people, because the unending press coverage over a few rogue soldiers, who have been punished.

Meanwhile, what no one knows about is that China has been executing thousands and tens of thousands, even prisoners of conscience and petty criminals:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/asia-pacific/1425570.stm

and those guards are getting shiny new medals. The other middle eastern countrys are the same, if not to the same scale.

Because every misdeed of ours is cause for endless frenzied media coverage, the world thinks we're the worst barbarians ever, when in fact, if the stories were put into the proper perspective, we're the most civilized.

No one is excusing what the guards did. But we're not serving the public good by making a mountain out of a molehill either.

 

[gc70]

Torture has been around as long as there have been people and will be around until we are all gone.

Translation: "Everyone does it, so it's OK."

Thank you, javafiend, but I am quite capable of expressing myself without your assistance.
However, for anyone who did not understand my point, here is the simple version:

• Torture is a fact of history and human nature and will not cease as a result of wishful thinking.

(No opinion on the morality of torture is expressed or implied by this statement).​

 

[Flyboy]

Funny Thing About Torture...

...it don't work.

Joejojoba11 correctly pointed out that the value of the intel we get from these guys is dubious at best, because the detainees make things up. That's always true of torture, be it physical, mental, or psychological.

The human mind is a truly amazing thing, and can survive amazing and terrible situations. The method of that survival, though, is not always (or even usually) through brute strength. Rather, the brain uses various defense mechanisms. Anybody who's had Psychology 101 will remember reaction formation, projection, denial, and other such classics.

In the case of torture, the mind's "problem" is shock or pain. This is, of course, the entire point of the method of interrogation: to put the brain in such distress that it can't cope, and thereby "break" the subject. Note that I said it was about putting the brain in distress, not the body. Physical pain is one way (the oldest, and most crude) of creating that distress. More modern methods use psychological tortures that inflict far more damage or distress to the psyche than physical methods. The important thing here is to shock the psyche.

This is why we've used some of the methods we've used in Iraq (et al.). The Muslim culture, by and large, treats sex as taboo. In fact, it is highly likely that, unless he's a doctor (or such), a Muslim man will never see another man naked. In our culture, it's not uncommon at all--go to the gym, and you'll probably see two or three in the locker room. Consequently, what we think of as "frathouse hazing" is actually terribly shocking to devout Muslims. This is why "honor killings" exist: their belief system is such that sexual impropriety is a fate worse than death to (some of) them. That's precisely why we use these methods: to inflict great shock to their minds. Ergo, though we don't see it as that bad, it does still qualify as torture: you have to consider the action in context, and in light of its effect on the victim. Think about it: would you give up your country's military secrets because somebody made you play naked Twister? Didn't think so. Our culture has rendered that particular form of persuasion useless. To an Iraqi, though, that situation would be terribly shocking, and devastating to his worldview; it would turn everything he knows and believes upside-down, and cause great trauma to his psyche. Again, that's why we do it: to cause that trauma.

That ought to take care of the "this isn't torture" argument. There's another point to consider here, too: that intelligence-gathering methods don't work. Remember that bit about defense mechanisms, and how the brain copes with hardships? Well, here's where it gets interesting. When the subject is subjected to trauma, his natural reaction is to make the trauma stop. This is a basic survival mechanism, and it applies to physical trauma as well as mental or psychological distress. The mind engages any of various defense mechanisms to attempt to protect itself from further harm. In the case of an interrogation, the goal of the interrogator is clear: he wants information. He even states--in word and action--that if he doesn't get information, he'll continue to traumatize the subject; as that is the stick, he also offers as the carrot the promise of no trauma if the subject cooperates. Again, this is pretty much the definition of hard interrogation. The subject, then, is clear on how he can make the pain stop: give the interrogator information.

This is where things get tricky: if the interrogator doesn't believe the subject, or continues to push for more information, the subject will be forced to make a decision: continue to say "I don't know," and thus continue to endure the pain, or make the pain stop, by giving the interrogator what he wants. In this case, if the brain perceives that the only way to make the pain stop is by giving information, and the pain is sufficiently intense, it will give information, even when it has no information to give. This is most emphatically not lying; lying is when you tell a falsehood with knowledge of its falsity. In this case, the brain will invent information, using cues given by the interrogator to make it more plausible, and will convince itself of the truth of its inventions! The subject will be absolutely convinced of the truth of his statements, fully able to pass a polygraph or other examination; he will, in effect, create a new reality so that he can deliver the goods that will get him out of the hot seat.

Unfortunately for the intelligence community, this bogus information will be indistinguishable from truth, at least in a vacuum. Corroboration with other sources can help to establish the veracity of the intel, but the subject himself is compromised, and his interrogator won't be able to tell when it happened. Further, the subject will be permanently compromised: any future information from him will be delivered in the shadow of that psychological break, so his brain may act proactively to appear to cooperate (with invented-but-believed stories) so as to forestall future trauma. Not only do we end up with bad intel (at an unknown point in the process), we also destroy the value of any other factual information he might have, because we just can't count on it.

This has turned out to be a good bit longer than I intended, but I think it's relevant. The methods we're using in Iraq (and other places), because of the context in which they're used (Muslim society), do indeed rise to the level of torture. That is morally indefensible, particularly when we claim to be there to "help," and to "free them from tyranny." Further, consider that many of our detainees--a substantial majority, according to General Taguba, who ran the show for a while--have no intelligence value whatsoever; they were detained because they were in the wrong place at the wrong time, or because a neighbor reported them fraudulently (to curry favor with us, as retributution against the neighbor, or other reasons), among other things. They are innocent of wrongdoing. To subject innocents to such methods--not even as punishment after a trial, but as pretrial interrogation--is an anathema to everything this country stands for. It was no less than Benjamin Franklin who opined "that it is better [one hundred] guilty Persons should escape than that one innocent Person should suffer." And, after we've engaged in the indefensible, and thoroughly sold out our most basic principles, what do we have to show for our efforts? A pile of intel that may or may not be good, and a collection of prisoners whom we can't trust for future intelligence.

Sorry, I can't get behind that.

 

[CleverName]

Flyboy -

Amen. Said exactly what I want to say better than I could have ever put it.