COUNTERING MILITARY RECRUITMENT
Articles: Military Service: General
Widespread Abuses Cited by Fort Bragg Captain, Two Sergeants
Phillip Lorenz, christian socialist guild, USA Today
October 1, 2005
An incident highlighted the torture of Iraqi prisoners by
American soldiers last week. It points to a widespread problem that
spans beyond a few "bad apples" and encompasses large numbers of
military personnel.
A report compiled by Human Rights Watch includes the accounts
of two sergeants and a captain from the 82nd Airborne Division. This
report describes how U.S. soldiers would beat prisoners, force then
to hold five-gallon jugs of water in their outstretched arms, douse
them with chemicals, and deny them sleep, food and water.
According to one sergeant, the torture was like a game and a
way for soldiers to release their frustrations. "In a way it was
sport. One day ______ shows up and tells a PUC to grab a pole. He
told him to bend over and broke the guy's leg with a mini-Louisville
Slugger, a metal bat." Anything that didn't kill the prisoners was
acceptible. "As long as no PUCs came up dead, it happened," he
said. "We kept it to broken arms and legs."
This report is the first to include a West Point-educated
officer detailing the heinous crimes committed by U.S. soldiers as
being wrong, systemic, and the result of failures in the military
leadership.
This report drove Senator John McCain to propose an amendment
to the defence bill to make interrogation techniques outlined in the
army field manual standard treatment for all detainees in the
Defence Department's custody. Another change he has proposed would
expressly outlaw cruel, inhumane and degrading treatment of everyone
in U.S. custody no matter where they are held.
However, Mr. Bush has blocked any calls for a full, independent
investigation. And Dick Cheney has been lobbying against the measure
proposed by Senator McCain. Though, that is to be expected. This
administration has always found torture permissable. Take Alberto
Gonzales, the Attorney General appointed by Mr. Bush. He wrote a
memo stating that provisions in the Geneva Conventions outlawing
torture were "quaint" and "obsolete".
It's obvious what this administration's priorities are. This
administration would rather see U.S. soldiers get killed in Iraq and
torture Iraqi prisoners than see U.S. soldiers help save lives and
evacuate people during disasters like Hurricane Katrina. It won't be
long until everyone in this administration goes running from the
offices they usurped, fleeing like the gangsters they are.
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