Washington -- The Army's Inspector General reported Thursday that 94 incidents of confirmed or possible detainee abuse had occurred in U.S. prison facilities throughout Iraq and Afghanistan, but it added that the incidents did not result from "systemic" problems, even though a months-long inspection found soldiers were inadequately trained and lacked proper supervision and clear orders.
The report by Lt. Gen. Paul Mikolashek, presented to the Senate Armed Services Committee at a hastily scheduled hearing, concluded that the abuses such as those at Abu Ghraib prison were aberrations that did not result from flawed Army doctrine.
Mikolashek and his team blamed 20 detainee deaths and 74 other reported abuses, including beatings, sex assaults and thefts, on "the failure of individuals to follow known standards of discipline and Army values and, in some cases, the failure of a few leaders to enforce those standards of discipline."
Mikolashek's 300-page report detailed failures at 16 prison facilities. But it said the individual abuse cases were not part of a pattern and involved only a tiny percentage of the more than 50,000 detainees who have been held by U.S. forces in Iraq and Afghanistan. The Pentagon and the Bush administration have blamed a few rogue soldiers for the abuses at Abu Ghraib.
"These abuses should be viewed as what they are -- unauthorized actions taken by a few individuals," said the report, which went on to praise the majority of soldiers. "We found numerous examples of military professionalism, ingrained Army values and moral courage in both leaders and soldiers."
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2004/07/23/MNGQH7RTQ21.DTL