Reflections on the "New American" Revolution
Friday, August 05, 2005
Bush "increasingly embattled in defence of his dirty war"
The Pentagon has appealed against a federal judge's ruling to make public 87 photographs and four videos from Abu Ghraib depicting "rape and murder", according to a senator who has seen them. Meanwhile, the Pentagon has quashed the recommendation of military investigators looking into FBI reports of torture at Guantánamo that its commander, Maj Gen Geoffrey Miller, be reprimanded for dereliction of duty.
Last month, three top military attorneys from the judge advocate generals for the army, air force and marines testified before the Senate that they had objected from the start to the new abusive techniques of interrogation of prisoners. One memo revealed by Maj Gen Jack Rives, deputy judge advocate general of the air force, said: "Several of the more extreme interrogation techniques, on their face, amount to violations of domestic criminal law."
In response, three Republican senators have proposed legislation that would in effect abolish Bush's dirty war. Their bill would prohibit "cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment" of detainees, hiding prisoners from the Red Cross, and from using methods not authorised by the army field manual. One of these senators, John McCain, himself a prisoner of war in Vietnam, released a letter signed by more than a dozen retired senior military generals and admirals as well as prisoners of war. It said: "The abuse of prisoners hurts America's cause in the war on terror, endangers US service members who might be captured by the enemy, and is anathema to the values Americans have held dear for generations."
Cheney interceded to attempt to force the senators to withdraw, claiming they are hurting the "war on terrorism", but they have refused. McCain declared that the debate was not about the terrorists, saying: "It's not about who they are. It's about who we are."
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