ABU GHRAIB PRISONERS PACKED IN ICE WATER-FILLED GARBAGE CANS AND SENT INTO SHOCK

[babylonsister]

ABU GHRAIB PRISONERS PACKED IN ICE WATER-FILLED GARBAGE CANS AND SENT INTO SHOCK, MILITARY POLICE SAY
Submitted by davidswanson on Mon, 2008-03-17 16:26.

By Sherwood Ross


Muslim prisoners held in Iraq’s Abu Ghraib prison were submerged in water-filled garbage cans with ice or put naked under cold showers in near-freezing rooms until they went into shock, Sgt. Javal Davis, who served with the 372nd Military Police Company there, has told a national magazine.

Davis, from the Roselle, N.J., area, said while stationed at the prison he also saw an incinerator with “bones in it” that he believed to be a crematorium and said some prisoners were starved prior to their interrogation.

Another soldier that had been stationed at Abu Ghraib, M.P. Sabrina Harman---who gained dubious fame for making a thumbs-up sign posing over the body of a prisoner she believed tortured to death---said the U.S. had imprisoned “women and children” on Tier 1B, including one child was as young as ten.

“Like a number of the other kids and of the women there, he was being held as a pawn in the military’s effort to capture or break his father,” write co-authors Philip Gourevitch and Errol Morris in the March 24th issue of The New Yorker magazine, which describes Abu Ghraib in a 14-page article titled “Exposure.”

They assert “the abuse of prisoners at Abu Ghraib was de facto United States policy. The authorization of torture and the decriminalization of cruel, inhuman, and degrading treatment of captives in wartime have been among the defining legacies of the current Administration.”
They add that the rules of interrogation that produced the abuses documented in the prison ”were the direct expression of the hostility toward international law and military doctrine that was found in the White House, the Vice-President’s office, and at the highest levels of the Justice and Defense Departments.” (President Bush has insisted “We do not torture,” The Associated Press reported on November 7, 2005.)

more...

http://www.afterdowningstreet.org/node/31874

[SoFlaJet]

1. Fucking sickening

man this administration was the worst thing I've ever seen in my lifetime

[JerseygirlCT]

8. Well put

I can't think of anything else to add.

[htuttle]

2. Bones in an incinerator?

Well, damn. The no-crematorium-yet clause was the last thing keeping Godwin's law from becoming completely obsolete...

[bobthedrummer]

42. yep.

[Recursion]

57. Shit went down that none of us who were there like thinking about

And I wasn't ever even near Abu Ghraib.

Worst thing I saw was a decade-old mass grave of 200 or so Iraqis. We were going to take it to the media as evidence of Saddam's atrocities until word came down that they had been killed on the "highway of death" in the first Gulf War, by us. That find made it into the memory hole PDQ.

[yardwork]

78. I'm so sorry for what you have experienced.

It is our country's responsibility to take care of our soldiers and conduct war according to the conventions and international laws. You should never have been put in this position. As a citizen, I personally failed you, and so did every other citizen.

I am sorry.

[TheWatcher]

59. We're The Nazis Now.

[Jackpine Radical]

74. Godwin's Law fulfilled once again--and never more appropriately.

I'm sickened, I want to crawl out of my skin. To coin a phrase, "God damn America!"

[BonnieJW]

77. No, Bush damned America.

He damned our country the day the supreme court appointed him president. We will carry this horrible mark against us for generations. I like to think there is a special place in hell waiting for bush, cheney and all their minions.

[bdamomma]

82. we certainly are and the longer that this filthy administration stays

in abuse of power, it will be all of us to pay for their crimes.

[The Stranger]

3. Where did we end up on the thread about supporting troops and atrocities?

When people say they "support the troops," how is something like this left out of the dialogue?

[Sal Minella]

6. If the troops hadn't been sent over there under false pretenses, they wouldn't have been doing this.

[The Stranger]

10. I don't think that they can claim they were fooled into torturing people.

Whether or not there were weapons of mass destruction in Iraq played no part in their torturing someone.

[Sal Minella]

33. If I were watching my buddies being blown to pieces day after day and helpless to stop it, you damn

well bet I'd torture those people, especially if my superiors had made it clear that orders to torture ("we were told to soften them up") were coming from higher up in the command.

You may be a person of moral qualities far superior to mine, but if I were in an alien country where my superiors expected/ordered me to torture people who were blowing up my buddies -- I would just do it, and I probably wouldn't ask very many questions, and I would probably decide to just worry later about getting PTSD about whether or not it was the "right" thing to do.

And I don't expect the average foot soldier to be all that much different from me. And I consider myself a very moral human being, as it happens.

If the fake WMD evidence hadn't been all hyped up, we wouldn't have troops in Iraq in the first place.

[The Stranger]

34. As I read your post, I actually can't fucking believe what I am reading.

You call yourself an "Idealist Hippie," and a "very moral human being," yet you would "damn well bet you'd torture those people"?

Are you fucking kidding me? I can't believe my fucking computer screen.

[TommyO]

41. A "very moral human being" would refuse to follow illegal orders.

[Two Americas]

54. a very moral human being

A very moral human being would have dropped everything the moment they heard of this years ago, went on strike, done everything possible to resist this government, put everything at risk and set an example of courage for those around them.

We are the ones with the power to stop this. We didn't. We would not put our own ease and comfort at any risk. Yet we point our fingers at others who had no control over their own lives, did not have the benefit of education and political background and information that we have, who were under extreme duress, and risked court martial is they disobeyed.

[The Stranger]

71. No, that really isn't going to cut it. Someone who lives their shitty day-to-day life hating the

war and someone who else who tortures another human being -- inflicting wanton pain in various preconceived ways on them and hearing them cry out in pain and continuing to do so -- THOSE TWO PEOPLE ARE NOT IN ANY WAY MORALLY EQUIVALENT.

AND "FOLLOWING ORDERS" IS NEVER -- AND I MEAN NEVER -- GOING TO BE A LEGITIMATE EXCUSE FOR INFLICTING TORTURE ON ANOTHER HUMAN BEING.

You have this backwards: Anyone inflicting torture needs to know that they will not escape justice for what they have done. Ever.

Let them be warned.

[Two Americas]

73. didn't say they were equivalent

What degree of separation earns one immunity? Have we no responsibility? No power?

We hear the cries. We know. We go on with our lives.

Aren't we all "following orders" one way or another?

[JAbuchan08]

89. your logic is the same (or similar) to the logic which allows Mukasey

to refuse to say waterboarding is torture because he doesn't want to put CIA officers in legal jeaprody for what they were "under-orders" to do.

Where does it stop? Do we let the president of the hook because America is under threat of terrorism and we don't want to punish him for doing what he "thought was right?"

Where does it stop?

[Two Americas]

91. no, I am saying the reverse

Suggesting that we look at what more we can do to stop it is not in any way letting anyone off the hook.

[JAbuchan08]

92. I understand now, but you seemed to make your argument in support

of Liberal Hippie, and that bothered me somewhat.

I guess I got a little bit confused, but there is a difference between not doing anything to stop it and actively participating in it.

[Two Americas]

97. how I read it

I think what Liberal Hippie is saying is that none of us can know with certainty what we would do in any situation. We of course want to believe we would know what we would do. What we need to focus on is that we do not want to put people into these situations, and the domination and cruelty and rationalizations of which torture is an extreme example are pervasive throughout our culture. I think we are all responsible to some extent for creating, or accepting, or participating in the context within which these horrors are occurring. This has nothing to do with holding those directly responsible accountable, nor with excusing anyone's behavior. However, if one looks around the "homefront" with any sort of clarity and honesty, it should come as no surprise to find out that the most horrific things are being done in our names. The torture and abuse in Iraq are entirely consistent with the morals and ethics of our society as played out in our every day lives.

People right here, every day, argue for "working within the system" and for being patient and for not getting "too radical" or rocking the boat too much. That plays a role, that contributes and supports the climate that is leading to abominations and horrors. People here contribute to the general atmosphere of indifference and cruelty, of justifications and rationalizations, of anger and hatred that has seized the public imagination.

We are in a very dark place. All of us. We need to face that truth.

[Cronopio]

94. "Yet we point our fingers at others who had no control over their own lives."

They had the choice of working at Wendy's or becoming part of a fascist regime for money. Not a good choice, but it is inarguably and irrefutably a choice.

You *always* have the choice to say "no" to corruption. You don't to be Rambo to do it - in fact it helps the rationality process if you're not. Gandhi had the choice to pack a gun for personal protection, and Jesus had a choice at Gethsemane, and they accepted the cost of making the right choice.

The military drones at Abu Ghraib think they made their victims pay the cost of their wrong decisions, but they're still over there, vastly outnumbered and surrounded by their victims. Their ill-informed confidence doesn't have long in that situation.

[Two Americas]

98. we don't

We don't say "no." Not in any ways that cost us anything or put us at any risk or are effective. I agree that we make choices, but we are way, way over to the side of individualism today. Personal choices are important, but not when they take the place of community and solidarity and collective action. Ironically, I believe that our over-emphasis on individualism and personal choices has had the exact opposite effect - it has made us less independent, more compliant, and more subject to pressure to conform.

Without community individualism cannot exist, otherwise the ultimate expression of individualism would be to be cut off from all others and stranded on a remote island. That is isolation and alienation, not individualism, and alienated and isolated people are more likely, not less likely, to be manipulated and swept along by pressure to conform and fit in and they actually have less autonomy.

Notice how the more individualistic we are, the more "self-actualized," the more we worship "personal responsibility" the more people are acting, speaking and thinking the same way? True personal responsibility, true individualism, true autonomy can only be realized within a strong community.

[Cronopio]

103. *I* do.

"We don't say "no." Not in any ways that cost us anything or put us at any risk or are effective."

Simply denying the resources of your time and energy is effective. Giving up your American citizenship would incur costs, but would be very effective in denying the murder apparatus (as opposed to the defensive apparatus) within our military your tax dollars. If you can't reform the system, starve it. Not to say that's an option for everybody, but it's one example. You do what you can, as an individual and along with other like-minded individuals.

"Personal choices are important, but not when they take the place of community and solidarity and collective action."

Community and solidarity and collective action are just as corruptible as individuals. Nazism started as populist campaign, so did Bolshevism, and both were corrupted as they gained collective power. Ayn Rand saw the corruption of the Bolshevists in her early years and went over to the opposite extreme. As Buddhism has said for centuries (along with Aristotle), the solution lies between the extremes.

"Without community individualism cannot exist."

The clear corollary is that without individuals, community can't exist, just social chaos. I see it (your mileage may vary) as a mathematical identity: individual welfare == collective welfare. Much of the evil committed in human history has been the result of people and organizations trying to negate or marginalize one side of the identity or the other, but it is always ultimate the work of individuals seeking to aggrandize their individual welfare using the collective system. Unenlightened, exclusive individuality is the problem, but that doesn't mean that individuality in general is the problem or that marginalized individuality is the solution. Individuality that understands the individual == collective identity is the solution.

That leads to the uncomfortable yet unavoidable conclusion that individuals can't be coerced to that understanding - each individual has to bring themselves around to it. The solution is in the fact that, given time and a lack of collective coercion, nearly all individuals come around to that same understanding of the identity simply by working out the problems inherent in individual existence. The individual is unavoidably dependent on others, but individuals use communal systems to escape individual constraints and responsibilities.

Communal systems, in and of themselves, don't protect themselves from being exploited in this way, and in fact, eventually make exploitation seem necessary the more they are subverted by exploitative individuals. Individuals are always constrained by the limitations of their individuality, and that's why the solution can only come from individuals realizing these facts and refusing the opportunity to get by on exploitation for the common benefit. Even if the subverted collective doesn't share that motivation yet.

True community comes from uncoerced individuality and supports non-coercion, fascism and repression comes from coerced individuality and inflicts coercion on others. True community can only be guaranteed by enlightened, uncoerced individuals.

"True personal responsibility, true individualism, true autonomy can only be realized within a strong community."

It helps, but true individualism always pre-dates strong communities, and strong communities are completely dependent on them. True individuals must also exist, and have also existed, in weak communities. The community is always dependent because it's an abstraction created by individuals.

[Two Americas]

108. thanks

Thanks for explaining.

You and I live in different realities.

"Not to say that's an option for everybody, but it's one example. You do what you can, as an individual and along with other like-minded individuals."

That sounds like how we should while away our time while the Titanic sinks.

[Cronopio]

119. You can, but I won't do that.

I'll be one of the nutcases leaving the party while the drinks are still being served and the music is still playing to take their chances on the cold Atlantic in one of the lifeboats. With other like-minded individuals.

Sorry that seems to be such an unreasonable reality to you.

[Pastiche423]

49. Un-fucking-believable

That is probably the sickiest thing I have read in the six years I been at DU.

There are no words for the disgust I feel.

On edit: Typo due to my rage reading the above post.

[bobthedrummer]

51. amajdfjuhgedfhdcjhgaxcx ious x, that's all I can say Pastiche423

DU 2008-it's like Ann Coulter is here 24/7
:puke: :argh:

[Pastiche423]

52. I had just finished watching

Iraq for Sale when I clicked on this thread.

There. Are. No. Words.

[Usrename]

62. The science says that he is absolutely correct.

You should google the Stanford prison experiments. The poster that you take exception to is correct.

[Pastiche423]

84. This poster was not talking about an experiment

Re-read what she said.

[mmonk]

50. Many of these people were swept up in sweeps.

Most were not charged with anything. Most weren't insurgents and the insurgency largely followed this prison scandal, but wasn't big before. Bad command. Civilized countries manage to follow basic international law and the Geneva Convention as well as the basics set up at the Nuremberg trials. It's not real hard avoiding setting up torture and murder camps. And torture has been the defining mark of darkness and depravity in history.

[KansDem]

69. Jimmy Carter, the International Red Cross, and Army Intelligence has stated...

...that 70-90% of detainees are being held by mistake.

Military officials estimate more than 60,000 Iraqis have been arrested and detained since the U.S. invasion and returned GI’s interviewed by The Nation (July 30) said “the majority of detainees they encountered were either innocent or guilty of only minor infractions.” Army Reserve Specialist Aidan Delgado, 25, of Sarasota, Fla., of the 320th Military Police Company, said, “I read these rap sheets on all the prisoners at Abu Ghraib and what they were there for. I look down this roster and see petty theft, public drunkenness, forged coalition documents.” Delgado added, “These aren’t terrorists. These aren’t our enemies. They’re just ordinary people, and we’re treating them harshly.” Even U.S. intelligence officers admitted to the Red Cross 70 to 90 percent of Abu Ghraib detainees are being held by mistake. Again, the same pattern of criminal conduct by the Bush regime.

Global Research

Frankly, I believe these sources over what the Fuck in the White House says...

[Two Americas]

53. excruciatingly honest

Most would. History is full of examples, and studies done on the subject have supported this as well. Few are honest enough to face that, let alone say it.

We must hold those in power responsible. Once we have rolled over, ignored the warning signs, placed our faith in false and delusional hopes, it is already too late. And we have an "opposition" Congress this very moment that is still rolling over, and no shortage of apologists for and defenders of that Congress here.

The corrupt system turns people bad. Bad people are not ruining the system. And we all are guilty of supporting the system one way or another, if even by our reluctance to challenge it. Efforts at fixing social problems by improving individuals - which is what modern liberalism has become - will never work. We improve the individual by improving society, and we so that through collective political action, not individual preferences or lifestyle choices.

Again and again we liberals go for the consolation prize in politics — being “right.” Being right, rather than effective, is causing lives to be lost and people to suffer. We can no longer afford the luxury of personal preference liberalism in lieu of real politics.

[Cronopio]

90. "The corrupt system turns people bad. Bad people are not ruining the system."

The system *is* the individual choices of people, whether those choices are pressured or not.

The real truth is far harsher and more excruciating than you're seeing; that the Nuremberg Defense does not negate the fact of free will. All morality and civil society is based on the idea that everyone is responsible for their own choices. When that idea is compromised in social structures such as military and corporate hierarchies, inevitably you have to choose whether you're going to rationalize becoming an amoral and uncivil animal to adapt.

The problem with that choice is that adopting an animal perspective kills rationality - it's an anti-rational act. Without rationality you have increasing chaos. "I was just following orders" and "Anyone else would sell out too" just feeds the fire when you're dealing with the vengeance of a father of a child you've killed by adapting.

Google the term "adaptive suicide" and you'll find out more about what I'm talking about. It's a concept that describes the dominant mindset in America today, and the karma this country is foolishly bringing on itself.

The only solution is embodied in the word "no", and accepting the costs of doing the right thing. Because, unlike the American soldiers adapting to hell, you understand that the alternatives are far more costly - for yourself and everyone else.

It's the animals that know which situations to adapt to and which to avoid that stand the best chance of continuing their genetic line.

[Two Americas]

93. disagree

It is pure libertarianism and the peculiar modern right wing concept of individualism to see society as merely the aggregate of personal choices. We will never be able to turn things around or form an effective opposition to the right wing so long as we embrace their core "personal responsibility" approach to social problems.

Personal responsibility and individualism - true responsibility and individualism - are not contradictory to collective action, nor to taking responsibility to and for the community.

I agree that we need to say "no" - all of us. Saying "no" to the system and to the tyranny of the few anywhere is saying "no" everywhere. We also need to say "no" together, and not think that an individual "no" is the end of our responsibility.

"All morality and civil society is based on the idea that everyone is responsible for their own choices."

Yes, according to the right wing propaganda over the last 30 years or more.

All morality and civil society is based on the idea that everyone is responsible for and to each other. We are social beings. We all go together or we do not go at all. This does not negate personal responsibility, it raises it to a much higher plane.

[Cronopio]

101. So you believe libertarian and right-wing propaganda?

They see the world as the aggregate of personal opportunities, not responsibilities. If you believe their words as read you wouldn't know this, but even a cursory understanding of the actions of Newt Gingrich, Tom DeLay, and George W. Bush should be enough to convince anyone that they are not about the aggregate of personal choices, just *their* choice over yours and mine.

What I am talking about is the polar opposite of what they really believe.

"We also need to say "no" together, and not think that an individual "no" is the end of our responsibility."

Where does saying "no" together start? And if no one else says "no" along with you, what are you left with?

There's no way around it. You can't wait for the collective to allow you to do what needs to be done by you, or to endorse what you do. You either do it as an individual, and do your best to inspire others to do the same, or you sell out the significance of your individuality to "go with the flow". The flow is going the wrong way right now, especially if you're a soldier in Iraq.

"Yes, according to the right wing propaganda over the last 30 years or more."

The difference is that, when they say it, it's propaganda. When *I* say it, it's the truth.

"We are social beings."

So are wolves, but they also know when and how to operate alone. That's how they survive. Lemmings don't, and that's why they don't survive.

"We all go together or we do not go at all."

Totally disagreed. Not going at all is never an option. You go regardless, or give up any pretension of devotion to moral principles you have. Your dedication to the right principles should be the thing that determines your willingness to work with others (whether they believe in the same principles or not), not the feeling of futility in being outnumbered. Even though numbers are needed, "doing what needs to be done" on an individual level can't be a numbers game.

People and societies are fickle, changeable entities, but principles aren't. That's why dedication to non-destructive principles are a much more stable foundation of human interaction than the alternatives.

"This does not negate personal responsibility, it raises it to a much higher plane."

Personal responsibility is a choice, not a plane. You either live according to the principle or you don't. The fact that it works better than the alternatives is its own best rationale.

[Two Americas]

110. individualism

You are talking about individualism. The fact that you see your individualism as principled, and the individualism of the right wingers as unprincipled, does not change that.

I have no issue with your individualism, so long as it is not used to preclude consideration of any other approach.

[Cronopio]

118. I'm talking about two types of individualism. Coercive and non-coercive.

Mine is obviously non-coercive, so it *mandates* consideration of all other approaches.

Saying that the Abu Ghraib torturers didn't have an alternative is denying the existence of another approach - saying "no" and possibly being court martialled. Punished by the enablers in their units in all likelihood. I am saying that they had an alternative, therefore a choice, therefore personal responsibility.

[Two Americas]

122. great insight

Yes, I see what you mean now. Coercive and non-coercive individualism - good distinction and well said.

I would contend that the best way to achieve the non-coercive individualism, the most certain and reliable way, is within a community - with cooperation and understanding and agreement and consensus.

I am not denying that anyone has or had alternatives. I am denying that we are islands unto ourselves, and I am also denying that individualistic personal "choice" is very reliable. Without community, without recognizing that we are social beings, no morality makes any sense. If you are marooned on a desert island and cut off from human contact, the most important moral principles - how we treat others, our compassion and empathy for others, and our responsibility to others - all become irrelevant.

[Nostradammit]

56. ...

:puke:

There is something broken inside of you.

Seriously.

[TheMadMonk]

99. This is for all those who replied to this post.

• Which of you stood by and did nothing when the school bully plied his "trade"?
  
• Which of you, yourselves, heaped a little scorn or verbal abuse on the "victims" in your school, in order to fit in?
  
• Who participated in all those petty little cruelties, that proved you weren't the "littlest monkey"?
  • The shoulder bump that spilled someone's books or lunch tray?
    
  • The spitwad to the back of the head?
    
  • The shout from the bus window?
    
  • The hair pull?
    
  • The trip?
• Who did not go to the teachers with the truth?
  
• Who still does not report what they have seen today in the workplace?

"Not me" is the only morally correct answer to these questions and a thousand more like them. And yet this world holds very few people who can honestly answer thus.

There but for the grace of whatever deities there might be, goes virtually each and every one of us.

The sad facts are, that in war, some significant number of soldiers will take babies by the heels and dash their brains out against the nearest rock, or at least care not for the child's injuries whilst they pursue their intent to rape the child's mother. They WILL RAPE. They WILL take vengeance on the nearest perceived enemy. They WILL loot and steal. They will HATE; they will TORTURE; and they will KILL.

The numbers who actively do these things might be small, just as the number of bullies in any given school is a small, but virtually every one around them is complicit, because they did nothing to stop it.

We can speak out from behind the safe anonymity of our computer screens and declare what is the right thing to do, to lash out at those who have the courage to declare their "weakness" in what would be an intolerable position.

But how many of us would truly have the moral strength to refuse to participate in acts that they know absolutely are wrong? Even in the general population, that number is less than half. In a body of soldiers, who are chosen, not for their ability to think for themselves and make choices, but to do what they are told, ("Shut up and soldier, soldier!") that number will be far fewer, and in wartime, fewer still, as such "troublemakers" weed themselves out by coming forward.


"The Nuremberg defense" is not permitted, because it is every man's lot to make the correct moral choices. It is not permitted, because in a world that tries to lift war to a higher level by prosecuting "War Crimes" the winners would have no choice but to prosecute their own high command and political leadership.

By making each and every soldier responsible for his own personal actions, the winning leadership can "insulate" themselves by deciding when to stop asking questions. And it further insulates them, by making it impossible for the soldiers who do their dirty work, to come forward without bringing harm upon their own heads. And in most societies, Western ones in particular, once you have declared yourself to be a criminal, then anything else you have to say becomes largely irrelevant.

Conquest and survival. Those are the only two issues that matter in war. Wrapping it in moralistic BS doesn't make war better, it makes it worse, because it makes it "acceptable" for those on the "right side".

If we really wanted to bring the practice of war to a screeching halt, then the Nuremberg defense should absolutely be permitted, with each and every illegal order followed to it's originator. However, such a defense should be tightly circumscribed, and only allowed for acts which are performed as a result of direct orders and declared policies.

[Sal Minella]

102. Congratulations on thinking so clearly and writing so lucidly.

I wasn't going to try to answer, but your post says it all.

When the congresspersons had their closed showing soon after the Abu Ghraib photos were released, one of the congressmen said afterward, "How did those people get in our Army?" and it broke my heart.

We are all "those people." The Milgram experiment http://www.new-life.net/milgram.htm showed how unwilling people generally are to contravene authority, and the "teachers" in the Milgram experiment weren't even living under threat of court-martial for insubordination.

I mentioned "seeing friends blown to bits" not as a justification for seeking revenge, but as a brutalizing, dehumanizing experience that I would expect would obliterate a person's ability to judge "Is this right or wrong?"

I think it's a terrible injustice to our soldiers to pretend that each soldier is free to function as an autonomous behavioral unit.

[Two Americas]

105. brilliant

Thank you so much for this powerful post. You said what I was trying to say and did so very coherently and effectively.

[Cronopio]

113. There but for the grace ...

""Not me" is the only morally correct answer to these questions and a thousand more like them. And yet this world holds very few people who can honestly answer thus.

There but for the grace of whatever deities there might be, goes virtually each and every one of us."

Agreed 100% with that. Where I disagree is when people don't make a distinction between "what is" and "what works".

Identifying the problem in a situation like the Iraq War is the easy part. Identifying the solution is where you start learning who really agrees with you and who doesn't. Having said that ...

"We can speak out from behind the safe anonymity of our computer screens and declare what is the right thing to do, to lash out at those who have the courage to declare their "weakness" in what would be an intolerable position."

Neither you or I know anything about the people who sat in front of the computer screen when they read your words, but any aspersion that some of them wouldn't be able to do more than you or I is unfounded. Assertions prefaced by "It's easy for us to ..." often end in those aspersions.

What I do know is that there is no "we" involved. Some will speak out the same way online and in person. Some will one day and won't the next, for temporary and trivial reasons.

I also know that no one who hasn't faced that situation knows how they'll react when it's a reality. It's obvious you agree with this. But if a person who speaks out against violence ends up having to shoot someone in self-defense, it doesn't negate the truth of their sentiment against violence, even if the sentiment was expressed in a relatively safe situation.

That's the reason we want to keep as many of us as possible as safe as possible. Just because it's easy doesn't mean it's wrong or misguided. Situations that involve excessive stress and imminent danger are usually more clearly understood from a distance.

"If we really wanted to bring the practice of war to a screeching halt, then the Nuremberg defense should absolutely be permitted, with each and every illegal order followed to it's originator."

The originator is the one who committed the deed, not the one who thought it up or ordered it. Your solution would only leave the apparatus intact to choose new, and most likely equally corrupt, leadership.

"However, such a defense should be tightly circumscribed, and only allowed for acts which are performed as a result of direct orders and declared policies."

That's not a very tight circumscription. Every defendant in the Nuremberg trials would have been exonerated by that argument, because the true leadership had already committed suicide. Even Hitler, had he survived, would have had someone to point a finger at.

Exonerating criminals is exactly *not* the way to prevent future wars or violence.

[TheMadMonk]

124. Excuse me, but the leadership of the winning side ALWAYS exonerates itself.

If Abu Grahib was investigated the way it should have been, Bush and Cheney would have been led from the Whitehouse in chains. There would have been empty slot in the chain of command all the way to the Pentagon. Churchill (and others) would have been jailed over Dresden.

I have a real problem with people like you who declare themselves different to other human beings when faced with the truth of human behaviour. We can be both the best and the worst, and there is no telling what any one of us will be unless we've been there ourselves.

YOU are as much WE as anyone else until and unless you demonstrate differently. It is exactly as you say, we all know the right answers from a distance. Get up close and personal and then tell me what your answer is.


The Nuremberg defense, not for exoneration, but for mitigation, must be permitted, else we learn far too late the atrocities WE committed, in prosecuting OUR victory over the "fores of evil".

[The Stranger]

116. That is utter and complete bullshit. Standing aside from the schoolhouse bully IS NOT TORTURING AS

AN ADULT.

If you feel guilty about something you did, that is not my fucking problem.

My conscience -- and my sense of what is moral behavior when it comes to torture -- shall remain clear.

[TheMadMonk]

123. And you conveniently ignore the rest.

When you are the bully. When you aid and abet him by keeping quiet.

It is exactly the same thing. the milgram experiment demonstrates this. http://www.new-life.net/milgram.htm. As does the McDonalds strip search case that was discussed here a month or so ago. 60% of people will do reprehensible things, simply because someone in authority desires it. And soldiers are chosen at least in part for their ability/willingness to follow orders without question.

I would add the Stanford prison experiment to the list as an example of exactly how easy it is for perfectly ordinary human beings to descend into the type of depravity that typified Abu Grahib. And Auschwitz. And many other places just like them.

Your conscience is what it is. But unless you have already confronted such a situation and faced it down, you DO NOT know what you would do. But if you as a child let the bully do his thing unmolested and unreported then odds are, you WOULD do exactly as Lindy England did in her situation. Or at the very least look the other way while one of your platoon mates do.

By what criterion do you declare yourself superior to the ordinary people of Cambodia, of Uganda, of the Balkans, of Palestine and Israel, of dozens of other countries about the world where atrocity is not the exception?

[uppityperson]

104. War is Hell but that is not an excuse.

[CatWoman]

106. and I consider you a fucking monster

a hideous fucking monster.

[uppityperson]

109. War is hell. I would like to say I wouldn't do any of that.

Actually I know I would not be in the situation to have to decide whether or not to. No way. I think that poster is saying "if I was". I think that poster is also saying "war is hell" and never to be entered into lightly because people do hellish things. Search doesn't show me a monster, though in that situation, doing horrific things, yes, would be.

[Sal Minella]

112. Thank you.

The military training is INTENDED to crush a large part of a person's humanity and instill the "follow orders" mindset, and then if your commanding officer tells you your job is to "soften up" the prisoners, and you know the boss of your boss's boss is the Commander in Chief in DC.... and you've heard about people being court-martialed for not following orders.....

I think watching your friends being blown up around you would be such a brutalizing experience it would just OBLITERATE any remaining natural tendency to think, "Is what I am doing right or wrong?"

In that position, I believe I would just NOT THINK at all, I would just be rendered incapable of judgment, and would just mechanically DO WHAT I WAS TOLD WITHOUT THINKING, and that's what I meant in Post #33. Military people are taught to follow orders without thinking. So I would be a good soldier. A bad human being, maybe, but I wouldn't have time to worry about that while being a good soldier.

Military training and experience can make perfectly normal, moral people capable of doing monstrous things, yes, that's what I meant.

[Dukkha]

111. if your buddies don't want to be blown up then they shouldn't be there

they are the violent oppressors in a brutal illegal occupation where they torture rape and pillage innocent people

[sammythecat]

120. I suppose it's impossible for anyone to confidently

predict how they'd behave in extreme conditions. With all sincerity, I hope you are underestimating yourself. Remember, in My Lai, in the middle of that savagery and murder, there were some heroes, and they were Americans. Try to at least give yourself the benefit of doubt. It's one thing to snap in the midst of rage, pull the trigger and kill someone. It's another to deliberately and maliciously, over a period of time, inflict torture on a terrified prisoner. That is just monstrous. The worst that I can even imagine right now.

[Sal Minella]

125. The point I was trying to make (and obviously failed miserably) is, the American soldier in these

circumstances is himself/herself being treated in a grotesquely inhumane manner -- being EXPECTED to torture another human being in the course of a normal day's employment??? What? Yes indeed, the President of the United States expects you worker/soldiers at Abu Ghraib to carry out your "job duties" as ordered and you will be court-martialed if you don't.

Only Lt. Calley was sentenced following the horrors of My Lai, as though he alone was responsible for the massacres. Did the orders to wipe out those villagers originate with Lt. Calley?

What became of people higher up the chain of command who WERE responsible for the massacres? They placidly went on to honorable retirements at full pensions, I presume. I'm sure the lesson of this is not lost on today's soldiers. In order to function, the military system has to make its people mindless enough to follow any orders given by "superiors." A soldier who won't follow orders is considered by the military to be a failure as a soldier and will be duly punished by the military authorities.

Lt. Calley was sentenced to life, and he actually served 3-1/2 years of house arrest in his quarters at Fort Benning (http://www.answers.com/topic/william-calley).

Calley said Captain Ernest Medina gave the orders to kill the 500 villagers -- but Medina was tried and acquitted. So nobody was ultimately held accountable for the horrors of My Lai.

I feel that the soldiers who are required to inflict torture as part of their "normal" job duties are being tortured themselves, deprived of the ability to behave in a normal human manner. They are deprived of the opportunity and ability to even think "Am I doing something wrong?"


I would not, could not, "deliberately and maliciously" inflict any kind of torture on any person, unless I was tortured into it myself. That's what I was trying to say, and failed to get it said until this post.

Edit: grammar.

[AikidoSoul]

87. When the Germans committed

atrocities there were many that followed orders and participated. These people were prosecutable in front of an international court of law.

I'm appalled by your willingness to go along and follow illegal orders. Torturing any human being is pure evil -- no matter what the circumstances.

[housewolf]

4. Weep

:cry: :cry: :cry: :cry: :cry: :cry: :cry: :cry: :cry: :cry: :cry: :cry: :cry: :cry: :cry: :cry: :cry: :cry: :cry: :cry: :cry: :cry: :cry: :cry: :cry: :cry: :cry: :cry: :cry: :cry: :cry: :cry: :cry: :cry: :cry: :cry: :cry: :cry: :cry: :cry:

[atreides1]

5. Josef Mengele would be proud

I guess this shows that some of the SS stationed at Abu Ghraib did read their history of Dr. Death's experiments!

[Cronopio]

83. Mengele is a choirboy compared to the pseudo-humans who committed and condoned these acts. nt

[bobthedrummer]

7. "CIA Detainee Torture, Memory Loss, and the Bush Administration's Falsification of History"

archived leveymg thread started 12-13-2007

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389x2462592

[peacetalksforall]

9. Remember the outrage when some started parallelling some of the Nazi

tactics with ours? Did it start with yanking people off the street and out of their homes? Did it continue with denyting them the honor of being charged? Did it proceed to denying them legal representation? Did it include denying them the opportunity to 'make a call'? Did it continue with ghettos and curfews? Did it get worse with creating ratting apparatus? Did it continue with black shirts instead of brown shirts?

Let me count the ways. I never heard about the Nazis freezing people in plastic bags.

If I were a member of the group of people who were targeted seventy years ago, I would want nothing to do with this takeover of human beings or provide support and approval for it - in any act, in any form.

[Disturbed]

12. "We don't torture." GW Bush

Change the words & it's alright. Enhanced Interrogation is ok with most Americans. Those Terrorists
don't deserve humane treatment seems to be the mindset of most American citizens. Most of the members of Congress were alright with Enhanced Interrogation. Most supported the use of the Busholini authorized
methods. They still do.

The CIA sources described a list of six "Enhanced Interrogation Techniques" instituted in mid-March 2002 and used, they said, on a dozen top al Qaeda targets incarcerated in isolation at secret locations on military bases in regions from Asia to Eastern Europe. According to the sources, only a handful of CIA interrogators are trained and authorized to use the techniques:

1. The Attention Grab: The interrogator forcefully grabs the shirt front of the prisoner and shakes him.

2. Attention Slap: An open-handed slap aimed at causing pain and triggering fear.

3. The Belly Slap: A hard open-handed slap to the stomach. The aim is to cause pain, but not internal injury. Doctors consulted advised against using a punch, which could cause lasting internal damage.

4. Long Time Standing: This technique is described as among the most effective. Prisoners are forced to stand, handcuffed and with their feet shackled to an eye bolt in the floor for more than 40 hours. Exhaustion and sleep deprivation are effective in yielding confessions.

5. The Cold Cell: The prisoner is left to stand naked in a cell kept near 50 degrees. Throughout the time in the cell the prisoner is doused with cold water.

6. Water Boarding: The prisoner is bound to an inclined board, feet raised and head slightly below the feet. Cellophane is wrapped over the prisoner's face and water is poured over him. Unavoidably, the gag reflex kicks in and a terrifying fear of drowning leads to almost instant pleas to bring the treatment to a halt.

http://abcnews.go.com/WNT/Investigation/story?id=1322866

[bobthedrummer]

14. "In Contravention of Conventional Wisdom: CIA 'no touch' torture"

active Editorials and Other Articles thread started 1-24-2008
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=103x333974

[hootinholler]

21. Which one is the make them wear their own shit for a few days?

Just wondering because this photo doesn't seem to fit in those categories.



Then there's the christmas tree guy, complete with wires, the iconic image of the Abu Ghraib torture.

I could go on with the naked pyramids, the dogs, the corpses with strangulation marks...

-Hoot

[Hydra]

19. I remember the outrage because I was exposed to it

Whenever I drew parallels to Nazi behavior.

I was told by some insanely naive people that "I don't see gas chambers, ovens, or six million dead."

Well, we have over 1 million dead, 4+ million displaced, who knows how many tortured, and now ovens and freezing water trash cans.

When will it be bad enough that we call it what it is- Genocide?

[HuffleClaw]

27. i expect this freezing torture was modelled directly from the well-documented nazi 'experiments'

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nazi_human_experimentation#Freezing_experiments


horrifying.

[jmowreader]

28. Not sure if they had plastic bags in the Nazi era...

but they DID freeze people.

http://www.remember.org/educate/medexp.html

There were, apparently, two aims here: to see how long it would take to freeze someone to death, and to learn to revive a freezing victim. This one actually made some sort of bizarre sense: the German Army was fighting in Russia, where probably as many German Army soldiers died from temperature as from gunfire.

Still fucked up, though, as with everything Mengele thought up.

And you know what? They even used ice--JUST like the Abu Ghraib people did!

[Lydia Leftcoast]

29. The Nazis didn't have plastic bags, but they did "experiment" with

throwing concentration camp prisoners into tubs of icy water. Their stated purpose was to find out how long a shipwrecked sailor could survive in cold water.

[TheLastMohican]

100. Yeah, I remember reading about it somewhere

They poured the freezing water over the captured Soviet general Karbyshev in -30 Celcius.
The general turned into a slab of ice within 10 minutes.

[Indenturedebtor]

32. Yeah I agree

"If I were a member of the group of people who were targeted seventy years ago, I would want nothing to do with this takeover of human beings or provide support and approval for it - in any act, in any form."

As a demographic the only group in Murika who voted for GW less in 2000 and 2004 was African Americans.

-------

How sick can you get? Try these fuckers in the Hague. Seriously. This is disgusting.

[libodem]

11. Mr. Bush must be so proud

Mr.Cheney must be ecstatic and sexually aroused. These sick monsters need to be tried at the Hague.

[MrSlayer]

13. That is straight up Nazi shit right there.

That's the kind of shit they used to do. Sick.

[Rex]

15. George Bush, Dick Cheney, you fucking suck. This is all your fault.

You two assholes go around and keep lying to everyone that 'we don't torture'. Just admit to the truth you fuckers. Jesus on a Junebug! Fucking fuck fuck fuck!

Didn't think I could get any more angry today. Better watch my blood pressure.

[Baby Snooks]

46. What about Congress?

Congress under the leadership of Nancy Pelosi in particular has continued funding all of this. Congress could have and should have just shut down the entire government in order to stop it.

But heaven forbid Madame Speaker might not have tea if it were all dumped in Boston Harbor.

[tuckessee]

64. It's all Bill Clinton's fault.

Er, no wait, it's Reagan's fault. Or Bush.

Anything to avoid putting blame on the actual torturers themselves

[Orwellian_Ghost]

16. K&R

...

http://www.af.mil/news/story.asp?id=123087033

The Empire is showing it's true colors.

[bobthedrummer]

17. USAF Air University Air War College page link-relevant to OP

"Psychological Operations"
http://www.au.af.mil/info-ops/psyops.htm

[bdamomma]

85. that says it all.

not related to this forum, but that slogan says it all, "Above All"

this is becoming a class war.

[pleah]

18. ....

:cry:

[AzDar]

20. Words. Fail.

:nuke:

[malaise]

22. You mean they were tortured under the orders of

George Bush right?

[babylonsister]

25. I think yes; they haven't been punished for their actions, so the

admin must condone them.

[Solly Mack]

23. and yet....

Who's still President?

[WinkyDink]

24. Grampa Prescott would be so proud.

[Prophet 451]

26. jesus fuck

Fucking georgeo scumbags. This is, just.... I don't have the fucking words.

[tabasco]

30. Fucking MPs.

I hated them when I was in the Army and I hate them even more now.

Goddamn worthless pieces of shit.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

31. Okay, Dems, if you don't have the guts to impeach, then the new Dem president

should order the arrest of the whole Bush cabal and ship them to the Hague on the next plane for war crimes trials.

[Lars39]

35. I was right...there was a crematorium.

Fuckin nazis. :grr:

[bobthedrummer]

36. "We don't torture..."

"a few bad apples...the fog of war...We don't torture..."

"John Yoo, the author of the infamous August 1, 2002 'torture memo' that formed the legal basis for so-called 'enhanced' interrogation techniques against high-level terrorist detainees, used a statute governing health benefits when he provided the White House with a legal opinion defining torture, according to a former Justice Department official..."

so goes the lead to the article below
"Twisting Health Language for Torture" by Jason Leopold (2-16-2008 Consortium News)

http://www.consortiumnews.com/2008/021508a.html

John Yoo profile (Right Web)

http://rightweb.irc-online.org/profile/4637

"Prisoner Abuse: Patterns From The Past" The National Sercurity Archive-Electronic Briefing Book 122

http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB122/index.htm

"We don't torture..."

[democrank]

37. I can`t even find any words....

~PEACE~

[panzerfaust]

38. Can I use the "F" word NOW!?

Benny, Frank, and Adolf must be soooo proud: Their countries lost, but their values survived.

God Bless America.

[LaurenG]

39. OMG

Who the hell thinks up such horrible things to do to other human beings. I can't wrap my mind around this. :cry:

[bluesmail]

40. unbelieveable. K & R

how perverted, just sickens my being, sickens. On edit, I can't finish beyond the headline and a couple of sentences. My mind won't go there.

[peacetalksforall]

43. I think Americans hate Jesus Christ. The image in the photos

repeatedly shows us a crucifix image - arms outstretched, limp torso, knees caving from the weakened weight. I saw all these still photos, but everything we get is so dis-jointed. We payt attention to one crime over another in the morning, something else is posted in the afternoon. We spend up to a week or ten days as a crime is unraveling. It's like they are pieces of clothing in a washing machine - tumbling, disappearing, jumping up front. Crimes, crimes every day all day long for seven years - no breaks. Crimes of our leaders and all their supporters. Our dishonorable brass, reverends, so-called journalists and news directors, lobbyists, death pushers.

Well, see Taxi to the Dark Side. Sleep it off. Get ready for the next atrocity.

Think Christ - crucifix. Something very sick.

Blessed be the peacemakers. Let the leaders cease making our kids do what they order and imply. By transference, deductions, silent approvals. Watch the lowest level kids go to jail. It's so smart - so much approval from the higher ups.

Pummel a man to death at the knees.

Christ crucified. Where are the people faithful to peace, love, honor, integrity?

We are inundated by shirt and tie country club criminals some dressed in suits others in metallic uniforms. Doing their thing on humanity.

[lonestarnot]

44. Anyone want to challenge bushitler is a hitler now?

I didn't think so, but was wondering anyway.

[Baby Snooks]

45. And Pelosi still stays impeachment is off the table...

Nancy Pelosi is as evil as Bush and is as complicit. The Democrats do not walk their talk. They have other priorities. Taking back the Congress. Gaining control of the White House. But who will be held accountable for all of this? When will they be held accountable for all of this? By whom will they be held accountable for all of this?

This administration should be tried by an international court for war crimes. Along with the majority of our Congress. Starting with Nancy Pelosi. Who says none of this matters. Who says impeachment is off the table. The first step towards prosecution of war crimes would be impeachment. Even if the House rejected it. It would be there.

Apparently some Democrats agree with the likes of Madeline Albright and Nancy Pelosi. That somehow it is all worth it. It is not.

[redstate_democrat]

61. It isn't.

The Democratic party has failed in this regard. If there ever was a president and vice president who could be impeached and convicted, it's these two guys. They have done nothing but break the fucking law since the day of the 2000 election. Our candidates need to be talking about all of this. But, more importantly, there should have been impeachment proceedings long ago. I know Cynthia McKinney presented articles of impeachment on her last day in Congress. They sure got rid of her, didn't they. Shame. It's all politics with them. These people are getting away with freezing human beings in trashcans. I don't understand HOW these people have been allowed to commit mass murder and NOT ONE gotdamn politician in Washington has the COURAGE to do something beyond running his/her mouth about it. Why not charge the whole lot of them? What the hell else can they loose by doing so? I feel like perhaps these politicians have been blackmailed or threatened with charges from the DOJ. There can't be any other reason to explain the complicity in this disaster.

[opihimoimoi]

47. Dr Stanley Milgram was right....peeps told to do bad shit will fucking do it...all 65% and more.

[tuckessee]

48. What's scary is how eagerly and happily

....America's Hometown Heroes did these things.

Of course, they wouldn't do these things to their fellow Americans, now would they?

[Zhade]

55. “bones in it” - okay, NOW can we call them Nazis???

I can't say what's on my mind. It would get me arrested!

[baby_mouse]

58. I've run out of "aaaargh."

I know I should be disgusted but I'm just sort of numb with the whole thing.

[better tomorrow]

60. this will be the second "Holocaust"....

Bush's Grandfather, Prescott, participated in the original one by funding it through Pfizer....

[Echo In Light]

63. "Humanity is a virus with shoes." - Bill Hicks

[liberal4truth]

65. Just wait until it happens here in the US.....

what goes around...... And just wait until they use the new "ray-gun" the army has ready to bake protesters on US soil. Thanks for nothng *, you @&& !!

[marmar]

66. This country is run by Stalin-esque sadists.....

.... And they call Saddam a psycho?

[Echo In Light]

70. Projection: imputing to others that which you unconsciously harbor

[FourScore]

67. Thank you for posting this, babylonsister.

Terrible. Just terrible.

k&r

[DesertRat]

68. Oh my God

[B3Nut]

72. Un. Fucking. Real.

I have no words. If the next President doesn't have this cabal arrested, America is over. Hell, it's pretty much over already anyway.

[bobthedrummer]

75. "ARTICHOKE is the Agency cryptonym for the study and/or use of 'special'

interrogation methods and techniques. These 'special' interrogation methods have been known to include the use of drugs and chemicals, hypnosis, and 'total isolation' a form of psychological harassment."

So begins an internal CIA memo dated January 31, 1975 about Project ARTICHOKE, one of many US mind control programs that morphed into the torture network system utilized by the criminal Bush administration.

This memo is available as a pdf retained by The National Security Archive as Electronic Briefing Book 54.
This memo references many other programs, individuals, and the death of Frank Olson.

It supports the truth that not only does the US torture, but that there is quite a history of research and experimentation to developing effective torture methods and torturers that began in the 1950's as mind control projects.

The National Security Archive Electronic Briefing Book 54 (pdf)
"Memorandum For The Record Subject: Project ARTICHOKE"
http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB54/st02.pdf

[sce56]

76. Can we send this to Nancy and ask her if it would be okay to now Impeach The MF's

The depth of their crimes is unbelievably deep

[Q3JR4]

86. Good look with that,

the last email I sent to the Speaker of the House bounced.

Q3JR4.

[NickMorgan]

79. This is why democrats cannot afford to be spineless anymore

We need a president who stands up to the abusers of power with courage and confidence, not one who caves to their fear-pressed agenda without even reading the intelligence documents!

[OwnedByFerrets]

80. When will the shills in the whitehouse press corp

ask Monkeyboy outright about these atrocities and demand answers. When will they stand up and have some fucking balls. When will answers be DEMANDED???????

[bdamomma]

81. this is all being done in our names.

Watch Taxi to the Darkside, and spread it around to show others what is being done in our name.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BYu4QnZaOd0

[Q3JR4]

88. The real question we need to ask

ourselves is what are we going to do about it?

We can all be armchair activists and scream for some kind of justice, or we can get off our tails and do something about it. We can write letters to the editor spreading the news to our fellow citizens who are usually too busy consuming news in sound bites given by the media. We can call talk shows and make our voices heard on radios and televisions across the nation. We can take to the streets and resurrect the time honored tradition of civil disobedience....and beyond if the situation warrants it.

We've squandered the voice given to us by activists of long ago, shall we start to take it back?

Q3JR4.

[Orwellian_Ghost]

117. There it is

Do something folks.

Join myself & others in the streets instead of just honking your horns in approval.

Please post your small but very important bit as an OP.

[philly_bob]

95. Tears in my eyes. /nt

[librechik]

96. sorry, can't pay attention cuz Obama's preacher said God Damn the US

and he needs to get thrown under the bus

[spanone]

107. shame shame shame

[madeline_con]

114. Kids jailed with parents, too.

Pic here. Scroll down...

http://www.capitolcrime.com/world.html

[samplegirl]

115. Limbaugh called this a college prank

[bobthedrummer]

121. .

[LynnTheDem]

126. When the Geneva Conventions are ignored against US POWs...

NOT ONE FUCKING WORD, AMERICA!

You set the "standard" of treatment for all...including Americans.