Reply #60: Clark on Gonzales

[HCE SuiGeneris]

Instead of attacking each other here, would it not be more effective to get this information out to the people?

GEN. WESLEY CLARK: Well, I’d like to see what the evidence is against Rumsfeld. I do know this, that there was a lot of pressure put on the men and women in uniform to come up with intelligence. I remember -- I think it was either General Sanchez or General Abizaid, who stated that we don't need more troops -- this is the fall of 2003 -- we just need better information. Well, to me, that was immediate code words that we were really trying to soak these people for information.

And it's only a short step from there to all the kinds of mistreatment that occur at places like Abu Ghraib. So we know that Al Gonzales wrote a couple of really -- or authored, or his people authored and he approved, a couple of outrageous memos that attempted to define torture as deliberately inflicted pain, the equivalent of the loss of a major bodily organ or limb, which is -- it's not an adequate definition of torture. And we know that he authorized, to some degree, some coercive methods, which we have -- and we know President Bush himself accepted implicitly in a signing statement to a 2005 act on military detainees that he would use whatever methods were appropriate or necessary. So there's been some official condoning of these actions.

I think it's a violation of international law and a violation of American law and a violation of the principles of good government in America. There have always been evidences of mistreatment of prisoners. Every army has probably done it in history. But our country hasn't ever done it as a matter of deliberate policy. George Washington told his soldiers, when they captured the Hessians and the men wanted to run them through, because the Hessians were brutal and ruthless, he said, “No, treat them well.” He said, “They'll join our side.” And many of them did. It was a smart policy, not only the right thing to do, but a smart policy to treat the enemy well. We’ve made countless enemies in that part of the world by the way we've treated people and disregarded them. It's bad, bad policy.

http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=07/03/02/1440234