A Prisoner and You Came to Me...

"We do not torture." - George W. Bush

Widespread media reports of prisoner abuse at the Abu Ghraib detention facility in Iraq and elsewhere have raised a firestorm of controversy and protest around the world. The shocking photographs of Iraqi prisoners being abused and humiliated by American soldiers contradicts the U.S. self-portrayal as the liberator of the Iraqi people, and deepens the mistrust and hatred of Americans in the Muslim world.

Iraqi prisoners bound naked at Abu Ghraib prison

Administration officials routinely deny that U.S. forces abuse or torture detainees. When they are confronted with evidence of abuse, the are quick to condemn it, characterizing it as the work of a few bad apples who do not represent the American people. But the abuse of Iraqis has in fact been widespread since the beginning of the U.S. occupation, according to a recent report from the International Red Cross, which has repeatedly protested to U.S. officials about conditions among detainees. Other international human rights organizations have also called attention repeatedly to the appalling conditions of detainees.

The abuses that have come to light at Abu Ghraib and elsewhere are not the doings of a few bad apples. They are in fact widespread and systemic. And this should come as no surprise to anyone. The U.S. soldiers sent to Iraq have been trained by their leaders to brutalize and kill. Their treatment of Iraqi prisoners is perfectly consistent with their mission. They are not liberators but conquerors. The abuse of Iraqi prisoners is yet another instance of the disparity between pronouncements of the U.S. administration and the situation on the ground. Abuse, humiliation, and torture feel the same to the victims, regardless of how they are explained by the high level officials who are ultimately responsible for them.

The revelations of abuses in Iraq should hardly come as a surprise to anyone who considers the plight of the 660 detainees at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, some held for over three years. These prisoners, officially designated as enemy combatants by the U.S., are held in clear violation of international law. Though the U.S. allows no access to them, it is safe to assume that they are subjected to treatment far worse than what has come to light in Iraq. Yet according to the highly regarded international organization Human Rights Watch, at least three of the detainees at Guantanamo Bay are children under age 16, and many more are innocent of any wrongdoing.

It is noteworthy that the conditions to which these prisoners are subjected differ little from conditions in prisons throughout the U.S. According to a New York Times report, “physical and sexual abuse of prisoners, similar to what has been uncovered in Iraq, takes place in American prisons with little public knowledge or concern, according to corrections officials, inmates and human rights advocates.” The report also points out that Lane McCotter, the man who directed the reopening of the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq last year and trained the guards there, resigned under pressure as director of the Utah Department of Corrections in 1997 after an inmate died while shackled to a restraining chair for 16 hours. The inmate, who suffered from schizophrenia, was kept naked throughout his ordeal. McCotter also served as head of corrections in Texas, a state whose prisons were under a federal consent decree during much of the time President Bush was governor because of crowding and violence against inmates.

What is perhaps most troubling about the abuse revelations is how they show the widespread insensitivity among U.S. forces to the culture and values of Islamic people. To force Muslim men to stand naked and humiliated in the presence of women, to coerce them to simulate offensive sexual contact with one another, is a gross insult to their deepest moral principles. It is not hard to understand why the peoples of the Islamic world show little enthusiasm for the values of Western democracies. The now infamous photos from Abu Ghraib show the faces of American soldiers who have long since lost all sense of decency. They show no awareness of the deep shame and humiliation they inflict on their Muslim brothers.

The mistrust and hatred of America in the Islamic world will not be soon overcome. We have inflicted searing wounds that will take a long time to heal. But if we are to find a place to begin, we must consider Jesus’ words: Whatever you do to the least of my brothers, you do to me.

Read more on the war in Iraq.

Manadel al-Jamadi

Listen to a report from National Public Radio (NPR) about how this suspected insurgent died at the hands of U.S. interrogators at the Abu Ghraib prison.

The body of Manadel al-Jamadi after interrogation at the Abu Ghraib prison

Dishonorable Service

July 31, 2006 - Major General Geoffrey Miller, responsible for organizing interrogation centers at Guantanamo Bay, Afghanistan, and Iraq, is awarded the Distinguished Service Medal, the U.S. military's highest noncombat medal.

Editorial from the New York Times

What happens to a general who turns a military detention camp into a center for the torment of prisoners, and then keeps exporting those vile practices to other U.S. prisons until their exposure sickens the world? If the general works under President Bush, he is whitewashed of any blame, protected from even the mildest reprimand, and, finally, retires honorably with the military’s highest noncombat medal pinned to his chest.

By now, we shouldn’t be all that surprised at the treatment of Maj. Gen. Geoffrey D. Miller, the Guantánamo Bay commandant who helped organize interrogation centers in Afghanistan and at Abu Ghraib.

After all, Mr. Bush has promoted the civilians who formulated the policies behind illegal detention and prisoner abuse. And he awarded the highest civilian honor to George Tenet, who either bungled the intelligence on Iraq or helped the White House hype it, and Paul Bremer, whose post-invasion mismanagement helped foment the bloody chaos in Iraq.

But there was something especially appalling about the ceremony on Monday in which General Miller got the Distinguished Service Medal in - of all places - the Pentagon’s Hall of Heroes. The medal is for “exceptionally meritorious service to the government” beyond the performance of duty.

We hope the Pentagon had something in mind beyond putting prisoners into painful positions for hours or threatening them with German shepherds. Surely they were not thinking of naked men in pyramids or posed with electric wires on their genitals.

This sorry tale dishonors the real heroes. If the Pentagon wanted to honor them, it could have chosen the military lawyers who tried to stop the Bush administration from scrapping the Geneva Conventions and trying to put places like Guantánamo Bay beyond the rule of law. Or it could just look to the front line in Iraq, where heroes put their lives on the line every day — and all too often lose them.