File spoon-archives/anarchy-list.archive/anarchy-list_2004/anarchy-list.0404, message 70


From: "Bob Gambs" <goatclan-AT-charter.net>
Subject: Re: yippi yi eh (Saddam is still with the Iraqis)
Date: Fri, 30 Apr 2004 00:20:46 -0500


BTW, anybody planning on doing Indy this year?

Goat
----- Original Message -----
From: "Ali Kazmi" <thekazmis2001-AT-yahoo.com>
To: "dan combs" <dcombs-AT-bloomington.in.us>;
<anarchy-list-AT-lists.village.Virginia.EDU>
Sent: Friday, April 30, 2004 00:09
Subject: RE: yippi yi eh (Saddam is still with the Iraqis)


> --- dan combs <dcombs-AT-bloomington.in.us> wrote:
> >
> > What are you, trolling for bondage kicks?
> >
> > Must be the canuck beer.  That shit packs a wallop,
> > neh?
> >
> >
> > carp
>
> The Canuck Beer does pack a wallop, but have been
> drinking Faxe, brewed in Denmark, 10%, it can drop
> kick a heifer from 60 yards.
>
> I prefer my bondage in person, where is Rosaphila
> these days, BTW?
>
> The CBS article which broke the story (tagged below)
> carried the kicker at the end.
>
> Excerpt
> "Two weeks ago, 60 Minutes II received an appeal from
> the Defense Department, and eventually from the
> Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Gen. Richard
> Myers, to delay this broadcast -- given the danger and
> tension on the ground in Iraq.
> 60 Minutes II decided to honor that request, while
> pressing for the Defense Department to add its
> perspective to the incidents at Abu Ghraib prison.
> This week, with the photos beginning to circulate
> elsewhere, and with other journalists about to publish
> their versions of the story, the Defense Department
> agreed to cooperate in our report."
>
> Basically, CBS decided to suppress the story, and only
> broadcast it when it came out from other sources. And
> it seems that CBS is still sitting on the majority of
> the pictures. If this story hadn't broken elsewhere,
> CBS would have sat on it till after the elections.
>
> The biggest propoganda, or spin as it is now called,
> coup of the Bush regime was the equation of "Support
> our troops" with support the war. If you spoke out
> against the war, you were not "supporting" the troops.
>
>
> The only way the Americans can truly support their
> troops is to bring them back home. Mostly from low
> income families, they are in the army for the meal
> ticket. They are cannon fodder. Disposable instruments
> of the will of leaders hiding in their whitehouses or
> caves. Controlled by lies, fighting to enrich or feed
> the megalomania of their leaders. That is the lot of
> the grunt. Not much has changed since the gladiators
> died for the Cesars amusement. now for an oilman's
> greed.
>
> Pictures, like Faxe Beer, pack quite a wallop. They
> can sway public opinion much more strongly then
> articles and speeches. (Remember the monk setting
> himself on fire, or the viet cong getting his brains
> blown out?) And America needs its opinions swayed. It
> needs reminding where the "Buck Stops".
> I don't think the american public will think less of
> its soldiers if shown these pictures, it is usually a
> tiny minority doing these things, but they may
> question why they are there. And try to bring them
> back.
>
> And the media, which so effectively drummed in the
> "Support your troops = Support the war" message,
> are now conducting political self-censorship. Heard
> Koppel is being pulled off republican local stations.
> What next?
>
> What are you drinking these days?
>
> Cheers.
>
> Ali
>
>
>
> U.S. Soldiers Charged With Abusing Iraqi Prisoners
>
> A 60 Minutes II Special Report
>
> Apr 29, 2004 4:38 am US/Mountain
> NEW YORK (CBS News) Last month, the U.S. Army
> announced 17 soldiers in Iraq, including a brigadier
> general, had been removed from duty after charges of
> mistreating Iraqi prisoners.
>
> But the details of what happened have been kept
> secret, until now.
>
> It turns out photographs surfaced showing American
> soldiers abusing and humiliating Iraqis being held at
> a prison near Baghdad. The Army investigated, and
> issued a scathing report.
>
> Now, an Army general and her command staff may face
> the end of long military careers. And six soldiers are
> facing court martial in Iraq -- and possible prison
> time.
> Correspondent Dan Rather talks to one of those
> soldiers. And, for the first time, 60 Minutes II will
> show some of the pictures that led to the Army
> investigation.
>
> According to the U.S. Army, one Iraqi prisoner was
> told to stand on a box with his head covered, wires
> attached to his hands. He was told that if he fell off
> the box, he would be electrocuted.
>
> It was this picture, and dozens of others, that
> prompted an investigation by the U.S. Army. On
> Tuesday, 60 Minutes II asked Brig. Gen. Mark Kimmitt,
> deputy director of coalition operations in Iraq, what
> went wrong.
>
> "Frankly, I think all of us are disappointed by the
> actions of the few," says Kimmitt. "Every day, we love
> our soldiers, but frankly, some days we're not always
> proud of our soldiers."
>
> For decades under Saddam Hussein, many prisoners who
> were taken to the Abu Ghraib prison never came out. It
> was the centerpiece of Saddam's empire of fear, and
> those prisoners who did make it out told nightmarish
> tales of torture beyond imagining - and executions
> without reason.
>
> 60 Minutes II talked about the prison and shared
> pictures of what Americans did there with two men who
> have extensive interrogation experience: Former Marine
> Lt. Col. Bill Cowan and former CIA Bureau Chief Bob
> Baer.
>
> "I visited Abu Ghraib a couple of days after it was
> liberated. It was the most awful sight I've ever seen.
> I said, 'If there's ever a reason to get rid of Saddam
> Hussein, it's because of Abu Ghraib,'" says Baer.
> "There were bodies that were eaten by dogs, torture.
> You know, electrodes coming out of the walls. It was
> an awful place."
>
> "We went into Iraq to stop things like this from
> happening, and indeed, here they are happening under
> our tutelage," says Cowan.
>
> It was American soldiers serving as military police at
> Abu Ghraib who took these pictures. The investigation
> started when one soldier got them from a friend, and
> gave them to his commanders. 60 Minutes II has a dozen
> of these pictures, and there are many more - pictures
> that show Americans, men and women in military
> uniforms, posing with naked Iraqi prisoners.
>
> There are shots of the prisoners stacked in a pyramid,
> one with a slur written on his skin in English.
>
> In some, the male prisoners are positioned to simulate
> sex with each other. And in most of the pictures, the
> Americans are laughing, posing, pointing, or giving
> the camera a thumbs-up.
>
> 60 Minutes II was only able to contact one of the
> soldiers facing charges. But the Army says they are
> all in Iraq, awaiting court martial.
>
> "What can the Army say specifically to Iraqis and
> others who are going to see this and take it
> personally," Rather asked Kimmitt, in an interview
> conducted by satellite from Baghdad.
>
> "The first thing I'd say is we're appalled as well.
> These are our fellow soldiers. These are the people we
> work with every day, and they represent us. They wear
> the same uniform as us, and they let their fellow
> soldiers down," says Kimmitt.
>
> "Our soldiers could be taken prisoner as well. And we
> expect our soldiers to be treated well by the
> adversary, by the enemy. And if we can't hold
> ourselves up as an example of how to treat people with
> dignity and respect . We can't ask that other nations
> to that to our soldiers as well."
>
> "So what would I tell the people of Iraq? This is
> wrong. This is reprehensible. But this is not
> representative of the 150,000 soldiers that are over
> here," adds Kimmitt. "I'd say the same thing to the
> American people... Don't judge your army based on the
> actions of a few."
>
> One of the soldiers facing court martial is Army
> Reserve Staff Sgt. Chip Frederick.
>
> Frederick is charged with maltreatment for allegedly
> participating in and setting up a photo, and for
> posing in a photograph by sitting on top of a
> detainee. He is charged with an indecent act for
> observing one scene. He is also charged with assault
> for allegedly striking detainees - and ordering
> detainees to strike each other.
>
> 60 Minutes II talked with him by phone from Baghdad,
> where he is awaiting court martial.
>
> Frederick told us he will plead not guilty, claiming
> the way the Army was running the prison led to the
> abuse of prisoners.
>
> "We had no support, no training whatsoever. And I kept
> asking my chain of command for certain things...like
> rules and regulations," says Frederick. "And it just
> wasn't happening."
>
> Six months before he faced a court martial, Frederick
> sent home a video diary of his trip across the
> country. Frederick, a reservist, said he was proud to
> serve in Iraq. He seemed particularly well-suited for
> the job at Abu Ghraib. He's a corrections officer at a
> Virginia prison, whose warden described Frederick to
> us as "one of the best."
>
> Frederick says Americans came into the prison: "We had
> military intelligence, we had all kinds of other
> government agencies, FBI, CIA ... All those that I
> didn't even know or recognize."
>
> Frederick's letters and email messages home also offer
> clues to problems at the prison. He wrote that he was
> helping the interrogators:
>
> "Military intelligence has encouraged and told us
> 'Great job.' "
>
> "They usually don't allow others to watch them
> interrogate. But since they like the way I run the
> prison, they have made an exception."
>
> "We help getting them to talk with the way we handle
> them. ... We've had a very high rate with our style of
> getting them to break. They usually end up breaking
> within hours."
>
> According to the Army's own investigation, that's what
> was happening. The Army found that interrogators asked
> reservists working in the prison to prepare the Iraqi
> detainees, physically and mentally, for questioning.
>
> "What, if any actions, are being taken against the
> interrogators?
>
> "I hope the investigation is including not only the
> people who committed the crimes, but some of the
> people that might have encouraged these crimes as
> well," says Kimmitt. "Because they certainly share
> some level of responsibility as well."
>
> But so far, none of the interrogators at Abu Ghraib
> are facing criminal charges. In fact, a number of them
> are civilians, and military law doesn't apply to them.
>
>
> One of the civilian interrogators at Abu Ghraib was
> questioned by the Army, and he told investigators he
> had "broken several tables during interrogations,
> unintentionally," while trying to "fear up" prisoners.
> He denied hurting anyone.
>
> In our phone conversation, 60 Minutes II asked
> Frederick whether he had seen any prisoners beaten.
>
> "I saw things. We had to use force sometimes to get
> the inmates to cooperate, just like our rules of
> engagement said," says Frederick. "We learned a little
> bit of Arabic, basic commands. And they didn't want to
> listen, so sometimes, you would just give them a
> little nudge or something like that just to get them
> to cooperate so we could get the mission
> accomplished."
>
> Attorney Gary Myers and a judge advocate in Iraq are
> defending Frederick. They say he should never have
> been charged, because of the failure of his commanders
> to provide proper training and standards.
>
> "The elixir of power, the elixir of believing that
> you're helping the CIA, for God's sake, when you're
> from a small town in Virginia, that's intoxicating,"
> says Myers. "And so, good guys sometimes do things
> believing that they are being of assistance and
> helping a just cause. ... And helping people they view
> as important."
>
> Frederick says he didn't see a copy of the Geneva
> Convention rules for handling prisoners of war until
> after he was charged.
>
> The Army investigation confirms that soldiers at Abu
> Ghraib were not trained at all in Geneva Convention
> rules. And most were reservists, part-time soldiers
> who didn't get the kind of specialized prisoner of war
> training given to regular Army members.
>
> Frederick also says there were far too few soldiers
> there for the number of prisoners: "There was, when I
> left, there was over 900. And there was only five
> soldiers, plus two non-commissioned officers, in
> charge for those 900 -- over 900 inmates."
>
> Rather asked Kimmitt about understaffing. "That
> doesn't condone individual acts of criminal behavior
> no matter how tired we are. No matter how stretched we
> are, that doesn't give us license and it doesn't give
> us the authority to break the law," says Kimmitt.
>
> "That may have been a contributing factor, but at the
> end of the day, this is probably more about
> leadership, supervision, setting standards, abiding by
> the Army values and understanding what's right, and
> having the guts to say what's right."
>
> Brig. Gen. Janice Karpinsky ran Abu Ghraib for the
> Army. She was also in charge of three other Army
> prison facilities that housed thousands of Iraqi
> inmates.
>
> The Army investigation determined that her lack of
> leadership and clear standards led to problems system
> wide. Karpinski talked with 60 Minutes' Steve Kroft
> last October at Abu Ghraib, before any of this came
> out.
>
> "This is international standards," said Karpinski.
> "It's the best care available in a prison facility."
>
> But the Army investigation found serious problems
> behind the scenes. The Army has photographs that show
> a detainee with wires attached to his genitals.
> Another shows a dog attacking an Iraqi prisoner.
> Frederick said that dogs were "used for intimidation
> factors."
>
> Part of the Army's own investigation is a statement
> from an Iraqi detainee who charges a translator -
> hired to work at the prison - with raping a male
> juvenile prisoner: "They covered all the doors with
> sheets. I heard the screaming. ...and the female
> soldier was taking pictures."
>
> There is also a picture of an Iraqi man who appears to
> be dead -- and badly beaten.
>
> "It's reprehensible that anybody would be taking a
> picture of that situation," says Kimmitt.
>
> But what about the situation itself?
>
> "I don't know the facts surrounding what caused the
> bruising and the bleeding," says Kimmitt. "If that is
> also one of the charges being brought against the
> soldiers, that too is absolutely unacceptable and
> completely outside of what we expect of our soldiers
> and our guards at the prisons."
>
> Is there any indication that similar actions may have
> happened at other prisons? "I'd like to sit here and
> say that these are the only prisoner abuse cases that
> we're aware of, but we know that there have been some
> other ones since we've been here in Iraq," says
> Kimmitt.
>
> When Saddam ran Abu Ghraib prison, Iraqis were too
> afraid to come ask for information on their family
> members.
>
> When 60 Minutes II was there last month, hundreds had
> gathered outside the gates, worried about what is
> going on inside.
>
> "We will be paid back for this. These people at some
> point will be let out," says Cowan. "Their families
> are gonna know. Their friends are gonna know."
>
> This is a hard story to have to tell when Americans
> are fighting and dying in Iraq. And for Cowan, it's a
> personal issue. His son is an infantry soldier serving
> in Iraq for the last four months.
>
> Rather asked Cowan what he would say to "that person
> who is sitting in their living room and saying, 'I
> wish they wouldn't do this. It's undermining our
> troops and they shouldn't do it.'"
>
> "If we don't tell this story, these kinds of things
> will continue. And we'll end up getting paid back 100
> or 1,000 times over," says Cowan. "Americans want to
> be proud of each and everything that our servicemen
> and women do in Iraq. We wanna be proud. We know
> they're working hard. None of us, now, later, before
> or during this conflict, should wanna let incidents
> like this just pass."
>
> Kimmitt says the Army will not let what happened at
> Abu Ghraib just pass. What does he think is the most
> important thing for Americans to know about what has
> happened?
>
> "I think two things. No. 1, this is a small minority
> of the military, and No. 2, they need to understand
> that is not the Army," says Kimmitt. "The Army is a
> values-based organization. We live by our values. Some
> of our soldiers every day die by our values, and these
> acts that you see in these pictures may reflect the
> actions of individuals, but by God, it doesn't reflect
> my army."
>
> Two weeks ago, 60 Minutes II received an appeal from
> the Defense Department, and eventually from the
> Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Gen. Richard
> Myers, to delay this broadcast -- given the danger and
> tension on the ground in Iraq.
>
> 60 Minutes II decided to honor that request, while
> pressing for the Defense Department to add its
> perspective to the incidents at Abu Ghraib prison.
> This week, with the photos beginning to circulate
> elsewhere, and with other journalists about to publish
> their versions of the story, the Defense Department
> agreed to cooperate in our report.
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
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