LAT: Revised Army Rules to Prohibit Torture

[RamboLiberal]

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-torture6sep06,0,7581942.story?coll=la-home-headlines

Bowing to critics of its tough interrogation policies, the Pentagon is issuing a new Army field manual that provides Geneva Convention protections for all detainees and eliminates a secret list of interrogation tactics.

The manual, set for release today, also reverses an earlier decision to maintain two interrogation standards — one for traditional prisoners of war and another for "unlawful combatants" captured during a conflict but not affiliated with a nation's military force. It will ban the use of such controversial methods as forcing prisoners to endure long periods of solitary confinement, using military dogs to threaten prisoners, putting hoods over inmates' heads and strapping detainees to boards and dunking them in water to simulate drowning, defense officials said.

The manual and its related policy directives — the legal framework for interrogations — originally were to be released in the spring. But when State Department officials and Republican senators on the Armed Services Committee raised objections, they were pulled back.

The Pentagon's decision to drop the objectionable provisions appears to mark a victory for advocates of closer U.S. adherence to the protections of the Geneva Convention, an international agreement on the treatment of prisoners and others during wartime. Human rights groups said they planned to study the manual carefully to see what parts of the international treaty it included and what it left out.

"If the new field manual embraces the Geneva Convention, it is an important return to the rule of law," said Jumana Musa, an advocacy director for Amnesty International. "It is an important public statement."

[Cobalt-60]

1. Its Rubbish

They'll be right back to the Gestapo rules one minute after the election.

[IntravenousDemilo]

2. The reason it's taken them so long to come up with this manual is that

they wrote it with their fingers crossed. Maybe it mentions exceptions to the Geneva Convention protections that they'd prefer to keep, like "We won't do any of that torture stuff -- oh yeah, except for the electrodes on the testicles. We like that one."

[rodeodance]

3. It is stunning that it took the US 4 years to get to this place--at least

agree in print.

[lebkuchen]

4. Amazing that tortured hadn't been prohibited originally.

After all, our troops were sent to Iraq to bring them democracy, not torture, or so the Bushies told us. But Bush's torture policy explains why we don't have control of Iraq, or Afghanistan for that matter.

[gratuitous]

5. So the military will now follow our highest laws?

Real big of them. I suppose they're waiting for a pat on the head for publicly declaring to agree to follow laws they have to follow anyway. "You really gonna pay your taxes, Mr. Capone?" "Don't be an idiot. I just said I was gonna pay my taxes. Anyone who writes a check to the IRS is gonna get whacked. Capisce?"

[alfredo]

6. They'll outsource it to the CIA or Blackwater.

[Spazito]

7. The KEY statement in this "new" field manual is this, imo....

the application of the Geneva Conventions "as interpreted by US law" which, we know, was interpreted by Gonzales when he was the White House's top lawyer:

http://msnbc.msn.com/id/4999148/site/newsweek/

So, imo, there really is NO concrete change from what was being done before this "new" manual came out.