"To what purpose are powers limited, and to what purpose is that limitation committed to writing,
if these limits may, at any time, be passed by those intended to be restrained?"
-- Chief Justice John Marshall, Marbury v. Madison, 1803

Iraqi Oz

by Lee

This is absolutely disgraceful.

United States soldiers at a prison outside Baghdad have been accused of forcing Iraqi prisoners into acts of sexual humiliation and other abuses.

The charges, first announced by the military in March, were documented by photographs taken by guards in the prison.

Some of the photographs, and descriptions of others, were broadcast in the US on Wednesday by a CBS television news program and were verified by military officials.

Of the six people reported in March to be facing preliminary charges, three have been recommended for courts martial.

The program reported that poorly trained US reservists were forcing Iraqis to conduct simulated sexual acts in order to break down their will before they were turned over to others for interrogation.

In one photograph naked Iraq prisoners stand in a human pyramid, one with a slur written on his skin in English.

In another, a prisoner stands on a box, his head covered, wires attached to his body. The news show said that, according to the army, he had been told that if he fell off the box he would be electrocuted. Other photographs show male prisoners positioned to simulate sex with each other.

“The pictures show Americans, men and women, in military uniforms, posing with naked Iraqi prisoners,” a transcript said.

“And in most of the pictures, the Americans are laughing, posing, pointing or giving the camera a thumbs-up.”

The program’s producers said the army also had photographs showing a detainee with wires attached to his genitals and another that showed a dog attacking a prisoner.

The Army is investigating, a Brigadier General has been relieved of command, and courts-martial are being prepared.  The distinction here is not that this occurred, but how we are dealing with it. 

I don’t for a second buy the argument that these younger soldiers are being used as scapegoats.  Anyone with a modicum of rational thought would know that humiliating prisoners in this manner is a violation of the Geneva Convention.  Can you imagine the reaction that would happen in America if a group of Jihadis did this to american soldiers?  Iraq would be the world’s largest sheet of glass right now.

The winning of hearts and minds in Iraq is a slow, laborious process, and any progress that has been made on this front has just been destroyed by the actions of these soldiers.  This is a violation of the UCMJ, it’s a violation of international law, and it’s a violation of simple human decency.

Look, you guys know me, I’m not soft on our enemies at all.  Kill ‘em all and let God sort ‘em out.  But it is these types of rules that separate Western society from the type of lawless thuggery promoted by the Islamists.  We are better than them, and one of the ways we demonstrate that is by idealism in our actions.  Saddam Hussein will have a lawyer at his trial, not because the right to a defense and the rule of law were principles he believed in, but because they are principles we believe in.  We cannot permit soldiers to treat prisoners this way.  This isn’t a simple case of an Iraqi thug “accidentally” walking into a door jamb, this is humiliation and degradation of the worst kind, and these soldiers deserve every punishment they have earned.  If their superiors knew about it then they too need to face consequences.

We have a job to do in Iraq, and a huge part of that job is convincing the rank and file Iraq people that the United States is there to help them.  Well, you can bet your ass that al Jazeera is going to be showing these photographs in heavy rotation for days or weeks.  The actions of these soldiers have set back the war effort by an incomprehensible amount, and there are over 700 dead soldiers who gave their lives in the furtherence of that effort.  How many more will have to die to make up the ground we have lost?

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