FaultLine, re: "Nuts to these jailer jerks. They really screwed up."
Yes, but did they "screw up" by abusing prisoners or was it mostly the getting caught thing that was the screw up?
The level of "disgust" for their actions by some on this thread, by Bush, by Kerry and by the military generals is somewhat surprising. How come we never asked ourselves why those we caught seemed to "sing like birds?" Do they have a change of heart when we catch them so that they become newly aligned with our interests, do we use chemical persuasion, or do they sing like birds because they're trying to aviod physical or mental pain from our interrogation techniques or those of our proxies?
The military never fully reveals what they're doing to make those prisoners talk but, unless my memory is faulty, some of the newly disgusted on this thread were gleefully talking about how if our prisoners didn't talk we'd just send them to places like Egypt or Jordan where "they know how to make them talk." At that time I guess it was ok to subject our prisoners to extreme physical torture as long as we had someone else to do the job? It's the elephant in the room and we just didn't care until the ugly pictures came out and we got caught.
The "jailer jerks" did screw up by getting caught, but the ones that may have really screwed up might be those that have the control of the facility. Even if they didn't encourage and condone torture, the maxim that "absolute power corrupts absolutely" should hold a clue as to why many prison guards, left unchecked, almost ALWAYS abuse prisoners. Those in charge of such conditions must have known that. The question is, therefor, whether those in control were criminally negligent or whether they actually fostered that kind of abusive climate in order to get information from the prisoners.
As for me; if I thought a prison guard was sure that the lives of his buddies were hanging in the balance and he tortured a prisoner to get information that might help them, I'd call that one of the costs of war and punish him lightly. I can honestly say, however, that even under those circumtances I don't believe I'd have done it myself; it's just too much memory to have to live with for an increased chance of living.
By the way, I went through a "special processing" when I turned myself in after taking a two week "leave extension" that the army considered AWOL. A lot of the guys were there for more serious military crimes. Part of the "processing" involved entering a basement with about 12 MPs and 8-10 naked men sitting at attention on benches. Most of them were blubbering and sobbing with running noses and tear-wet faces.
Two more naked guys were in a pushup position with their fingers resting on a ledge about 6 inches off the floor. They were quivering with the effort of staying in that position and whenever one went to the floor the MPs would start screaming at him and throw him headfirst into the wall until he got back in position.
All the guards had batons and they'd sneak in behind the seated prisoners and crack them down beside them on the bench making a rifle-shot noise, while screaming in their ears. When I rotated to the bench I could hear them beating the living shit out of one the guys who came in behind me but I couldn't see it because we were faced into the wall.
Every one of those MPs was a sadist. No one but a sadist would have done that kind of duty. I know the army knew it was going on because I went AWOL from there the next weekend and when I turned myself in a second time on the following Monday the Sergeant Major in charge asked to see me. He ASKED me if I'd gone through "special processing" and when I told him I had he said I was the first one he'd ever had voluntarily come back after going through the process.
I actually got lucky with that guy. He liked me and when I told him to just ship me out to Vietnam and I'd do fine, he looked me in the eyes and said, "I think you will." He got me out that same day without more "processing" and without another article 15.
I read later that the place finally got busted when some congressman's kid was getting beaten and his buddy got out earlier and called the congressman. The congressman had enough pull to get someone down there and they caught them in the act.
The thing is that these guys were doing some rough things to their own countrymen. There are always people like that and they tend to gravitate to positions where they can satisfy their sadistic tendencies. It's no surprise that it happened in Iraq; the only question is whether it was militarily sanctioned or whether they were mavericks. |
