Abuse Tied To Policy Shift

[UpInArms]

http://www.ctnow.com/news/custom/topnews/hc-iraq0510.artmay10,1,3442571.story?coll=hc-headlines-topnews

(free registration or try www.bugmenot.com )

BAGHDAD -- In the fall of 2003, U.S. officials watched anxiously as a potent guerrilla resistance rose across broad swaths of northern and central Iraq. Fearful of reprisals, Iraqis shrank from collaborating with an occupation authority that appeared powerless to reverse the tide of violence and lawlessness.

Less than two weeks after a truck bomb demolished U.N. headquarters in Baghdad Aug. 19, Maj. Gen. Geoffrey Miller arrived in Baghdad from Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, where he was warden of the U.S. detention facility for suspected terrorists. Miller's mission in Iraq signaled new zeal to organize an intelligence network that could hit back at the insurgents, but through unorthodox means.

"He came up there and told me he was going to `Gitmoize' the detention operation," turning it into a hub of interrogation, said Brig. Gen. Janis Karpinski, then commander of the military prison system in Iraq. "But the difference is, in Guantanamo Bay there isn't a war going on outside the wall."

The worsening war outside the walls of the U.S. prison system in Iraq had a direct bearing on the abuses that have occurred inside the facilities, according to Iraqi and American sources. Through the summer and fall of 2003, when detainees at Abu Ghraib prison suffered mistreatment now notorious throughout the world, the security situation in Iraq and the treatment of Iraqi prisoners ran parallel courses, both downward.

<snip>

About the end of August, U.S. officials disclosed that they were recruiting a new domestic intelligence service from former agents of Hussein's intelligence organization, the Mukhabarat.

...more...

[seemslikeadream]

1. war criminals

U.S. President George W. Bush said if the prisoners are not treated humanely as is required by the Geneva Convention they will dealt with harshly.

"If not, the people who mistreat the prisoners will be

treated as war criminals," he said Sunday morning.

http://www.upi.com/view.cfm?StoryID=20030323-055213-8026r



bartcop

[Gothmog]

2. This is not a case of a few bad apples

The torture in the pictures was not a couple of isolated incidents but was part of a systemic pattern of torture to get information. Bush and company wanted to stop the uprisings and attacks and thought that if they could just find the 5.000 insurgents, all would be okay. It appears that it was more than 5,000 insurgents and the torture used has increased the number greatly.

Bush and Rummy are directly responsible for the torture.

[Tellurian]

3. Soundbyte headline...

as Bush and Rumy slink back under their rock!