Ok. Constitutional Law 101. The Geneva Convention, the UN Charter, and the UN Convention Against Torture (http://www.hrweb.org/legal/cat.html) are all TREATIES, ratified by the Senate and signed by the President, and thus are now officially UNITED STATES LAW and not some "optional", "quaint", "advisory" documents that the President follows if it is convenient.
It is now clear, if it were not before, that the Republican principle of "Rule of Law" means what they want it to, no more and no less.
Posted by Anonny at April 28, 2008 11:58 AM“The cumulative effect in my interpretation is to put American troops at risk,” Mr. Wyden said.
Of course.
Do you remember, near the end of Gulf War 1, when the US ground troops invaded Kuwait and southern Iraq? Do you remember all that video of Iraqi troops -- literally over 100,000 of them -- surrendering to US troops?
Why did they surrender? Well, because they knew that they would be treated better as a POW under US care than as a soldier in Hussein's army. And of course, in Gulf War 1 the US honored the letter and spirit of the Geneva Convention in terms of POW treatment.
Those days are gone forever. Never again -- unless BushCo are tried en masse for war crimes -- will enemy soliers surrender en masse voluntarily to the US. Instead they will fight to the death.
Posted by Anonny at April 28, 2008 12:03 PM1. The USA has ALWAYS been a "torture state". The only thing that is different now is that they don't try to hide it.
2. "Why did they surrender? Well, because they knew that they would be treated better as a POW under US care than as a soldier in Hussein's army."
And you know that how? Did someone take a poll or something?
They had lots of reasons for surrendering, I am sure, and I doubt they were anticipating wonderful treatment as POW's.
"And of course, in Gulf War 1 the US honored the letter and spirit of the Geneva Convention in terms of POW treatment."
And you know that how? Evidence, please! Based on some of the U.S.'s other conduct in the so-called "Gulf" war, I don't think that is an assumption you can make (not saying it didn't happen that way, just suggesting that one should not assume anything.
"Never again -- unless BushCo are tried en masse for war crimes -- will enemy soliers surrender en masse voluntarily to the US. Instead they will fight to the death."
EVERY president would have to be tried for war crimes - including Clinton for his crimes against the Iraqi people - if there were real justice. The main difference with BushCo is that they are so in-your-face with their crimes.
Posted by Shirin at April 28, 2008 12:49 PMlike Shirin said.
Oh, and there won't be an election this year.
Not that it matters....the New World Order (check out the back of your dollar bills) plan to turn every factory into a sweatshop and every bit of farmland into a plantation is right on schedule.
Posted by at April 28, 2008 05:12 PMi don't blame you for staying anonymous. i wouldn't want to own that drivel, either.
Posted by Turkana at April 28, 2008 05:29 PMThey had lots of reasons for surrendering, I am sure, and I doubt they were anticipating wonderful treatment as POW's.
Were you old enough to read news during Gulf War 1? I lived in Europe at the time, where the press wasn't so one-sided, and there was a lot of detail provided about the Kuwaiti ground invasion and surrender, including many interviews with the surrendering troops. A big part of the reason for the mass surrender was that the US dropped leaflets for the week before the ground invasion describing in detail how to surrender and how the POWs would be treated. However, even with that you can bet that few would have surrendered if they knew Abu Ghriab was their destination.
And you know that how? Evidence, please! Based on some of the U.S.'s other conduct in the so-called "Gulf" war, I don't think that is an assumption you can make
There were quite a few reports issued after the first Gulf War by Human Rights agencies. The US came under criticism for overstating the accuracy of bombing strikes -- quite a few went off course resulting in thousands dead -- and of course for the slaughter on the "highway of death" north of Kuwait. There were also notes about pre-war propoganda. However, with regard to POW treatment the US received glowing reports.
1. The USA has ALWAYS been a "torture state". The only thing that is different now is that they don't try to hide it.
Yes, there were torture operations in Korea and, to a much greater extent, in Vietnam (Operation Phoenix). And the US supported torture via proxy for most of the 20th century. And of course torture has been a common practice in a lot of the US Jail system over the decades.
However, what happened in Afghanistan, Iraq, and Guatananmo was a whole different story. (And yes, it started in fall 2001 in Afghanistan -- go and read international news articles at that time -- the first HRI and Amnesty complaints were filed at that time.) It was far more widespread and systematic than before. But perhaps the worst was that it was supported by the US intelligencia, starting with Alan Dershowitz's campaign in late 2001 to legalize torture under certain circumstances.
Posted by Anonny at April 28, 2008 09:31 PMDear Anonny,
Yes, despite your rather patronizing question, I was more than sufficiently old in 1991 to follow in great detail - no doubt more detail than you did, since it was deeply personal to me - what happened in Iraq during that period. Moreover, I was and still am not limited to the English-language media, or even the European media for information. In fact, I was and am not even limited to the media for information, since I have local and other personal sources.
My information, in addition to a bit of logical thinking, suggests that the Iraqi soldiers surrendered not because they "knew that they would be treated better as a POW under US care than as a soldier in Hussein's army" - they knew nothing of the sort, leaflets notwithstanding (as if leaflets are some kind of guarantee of something - just ask Iraqis and Palestinians and in particular the Lebanese villagers - women and children and elderly - who were systematically mowed down by Israeli attack helicopters as they tried to evacuate their villages in response to Israeli leaflets how much they trust leaflets from the likes of the USA and its wonderful ally Israel). They surrendered mostly because their army had been routed by the Americans, and based on survival logic plus what they had seen and heard of the fate of their fellow soldiers, most dramatically the ones who had retreated and attempted to make it back home, they believed that at least they had a better chance of not getting mowed down by American fire, or bulldozed alive into a ditch if they surrendered.
"Overstating the accuracy of its bombing strikes" - what an elegant misunderstatement (yeah, I just made up that Bushism-like word)! And did these human rights organizations suggest that systematically destroying most of the electrical production in Iraq was part of the accuracy-overstatement problem? And did they tsk tsk over the fact that the U.S. also somehow managed to miss its targets just enough to destroy most of the water purification and delivery systems (as if knocking out the electricity did not sufficiently cripple water delivery systems, which in most parts of the country depend on pumps)? And what about all those inaccurate bombs that systematically hit sewage processing facilities? What a shame the Americans had such consistently bad aim, and that so many of the bombs that went astray managed to find critical civilian infrastructure to destroy in what looked for all the world like a systematic manner!
The United States has used torture as a punishment and an inducement to population cooperation on an ongoing basis before, during, and between WW I, WW II, Korea, Viet Nam, the cold war, the "Gulf" (so-called) War, and so on and on. Whether it has been more widespread and systematic under the Bush II regime is something we really do not know for sure, though it does appear that way mainly because of the degree to which Bush II torture has been exposed, and the degree to which the Bush regime and its sicko cronies (e.g. the aforementioned Dershowitz sicko) have openly acknowledged and even endorsed it.
(And by the way, Israel, from whom the U.S. takes many of its techniques, legalized torture decades ago - Dershowitz is an unabashed cheer leader for every crime Israel has committed and will ever commit. True, more recently Israel delegalized torture, but that has not stopped them from continuing to routinely torture, including children as young as 11 or 12, and they have been great innovators of techniques that leave no visible physical marks. Torture, by the way, serves mainly not as an "interrogation tool", for which it is notoriously ineffective, but as a means to control a population, as in "do what I say, or this could happen to you".)
Posted by Shirin at April 29, 2008 10:46 PM