Rumsfeld and Abu Ghraib
Rumsfeld and Abu GhraibBy JOANNE MARINER ---- Monday, Apr. 25, 2005
A year ago, when the first photos appeared of U.S. soldiers beating and sexually humiliating detainees at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq, President George W. Bush expressed horror and disgust. Recognizing the damage that the abuses had done to the image of the U.S. abroad, he promised, in an interview broadcast to the Arab world via the Pentagon-funded TV station Al-Hurra, that the crimes would not go unpunished.
In the coming months, he affirmed, "those mistakes will be investigated, and people will be brought to justice."
And, indeed, investigations have been conducted, court martials have been held, and a few perpetrators have been convicted. One soldier, army reservist Charles Graner, Jr., was sentenced to a ten-year term of imprisonment, the heaviest penalty to date.
But these results represent partial justice, at best. Notably, with the exception of one major personally implicated in abuse, only low-ranking soldiers -- privates and sergeants -- have been held to account.
Thanks to the Abu Ghraib photos, Graner became the smiling face of American brutality. Yet there is no ignoring the fact that while he and other underlings have faced prosecution, those beyond the camera's frame -- those who made policies, gave orders, and condoned or ignored abuses -- have not.
If this is justice, in President Bush's view of things, it comes awfully close to scapegoating. For the evidence shows that the abuses at Abu Ghraib were not isolated and aberrant acts and that, in fact, the worst perpetrators may not have been those whose faces were captured on camera.
As Human Rights Watch described yesterday, in an important new report, the abuses at Abu Ghraib are part of a broader picture. They fit a pattern of brutality and mistreatment, evident at Guantanamo, in Afghanistan, and in dozens of U.S. detention facilities worldwide, that "did not result from the acts of individual soldiers who broke the rules. It resulted from decisions made by the Bush administration to bend, ignore, or cast rules aside."
Rumsfeld's Possible Legal Responsibility
Human Rights Watch's exhaustively-documented report names the top officials, both civilian and military, that it believes should be investigated for crimes against detainees. Its list starts with Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, and goes on to include George Tenet, the former CIA director; Lt. Gen. Ricardo Sanchez, U.S. military commander in Iraq from June 2003 to July 2004; and Gen. Geoffrey Miller, the U.S. military commander at Guantanamo.
While the report does not reach any conclusions as to the ultimate guilt or innocence of these officials, it argues that abundant evidence exists to justify their investigation. Under both U.S. and international law, it explains, civilian officials and military commanders may be held criminally liable if they order, induce, instigate, aid, or abet in the commission of a crime. In addition, under the doctrine of "command responsibility," individuals who are in positions of civilian or military authority may be criminally liable for the crimes of those under their command.
Secretary Rumsfeld, the report asserts, may well be liable under both of these theories. He may have directly instigated abuses when, on December 2, 2002, he approved a list of inhumane interrogation techniques for use at Guantanamo.
These techniques -- which include the use of hoods, stress positions, isolation, stripping, deprivation of light, removal of religious items, forced grooming, and dogs -- violate not only the Geneva Conventions but also legal prohibitions on torture and other ill-treatment. The techniques later "migrated" to Iraq and Afghanistan, where they figured prominently in abuses against detainees there. In Iraq, moreover, Rumsfeld approved the hiding of detainees from the International Committee of the Red Cross, a practice likely to facilitate abuse.
Journalist Seymour Hersh has alleged, in addition, that Secretary Rumsfeld approved a secret program that encouraged the physical coercion and sexual humiliation of Iraqi prisoners.
Rumsfeld may also bear command responsibility for abuses against detainees. To be liable under the doctrine of command responsibility, a superior must have known, or have had reason to know, that a subordinate was committing a crime, and the superior must have failed to take reasonable steps to prevent the crime or to punish the perpetrator.
Rumsfeld clearly had the necessary knowledge. In Afghanistan, Iraq, and Guantanamo, Secretary Rumsfeld had access to military briefings, ICRC reports, human rights reports, and press accounts that would have put him on notice that U.S. troops were committing war crimes, including torture. Yet, despite receiving abundant warning of abuses, there is no evidence that Rumsfeld ever exerted his authority to protect prisoners from mistreatment.
The Need for an Independent Counsel
Yet while soldiers like Charles Graner, Jr. and Lynndie England are put on trial, Rumsfeld is not. Indeed, if there were any doubts as whether legal liability for Abu Ghraib abuses might eventually be traced up the chain of command, a high-level Army investigation whose findings were announced last Friday probably put them to rest.
Conducted by the Army Inspector General, a subordinate to Secretary Rumsfeld, the new investigation exonerated four of the five top Army officers in charge of detention policies and operations in Iraq. To Human Rights Watch, the American Civil Liberties Union, and other groups that have documented military abuses, it provided further proof of the need for an independent counsel to look into allegations of abuse.
For when President Bush told the world that the perpetrators of crimes at Abu Ghraib would be brought to justice, he didn't not qualify his claim. He didn't say that a handful of low-level perpetrators would be brought to justice.
And we shouldn't, in retrospect, have to say it for him.
On a lighter note I found an interesting genealogy site by Laura Knight-Jadczyk. We may all be Blue Bloods!!
Bedtime Stories
Okay, here is a list of feel-good reading for you. Just chant ohm and maybe it will go away.What Hit The Pentagon? CommentsOn The Pentagon Strike
The pilot had his last routine communication with the control tower at 8:50 a.m. "At 9:09 a.m., being unable to reach the plane by radar, the Indianapolis air controllers warned of a possible crash," the Washington Post reported. Vice-President Dick Cheney would later explain that the terrorists had "turned off the transponder, which led to a later report that a plane had gone down over Ohio, but it really hadn't." [Meet the Press, NBC, 16 Sept 2001]
On 12 September it was learned that the transponder had been cut off at about 8:55 a.m., rendering the plane invisible to civilian air controllers. During this period of invisibility, the plane was said to have made a U turn back to Washington. This is, of course, an assumption. The information that the plane turned around has no known source.
The problem is: turning off the transponder, under the conditions that prevailed that day, would have been the best way of raising an alert.
From the Secret Wartime Psychological Profile--Hitler as the German people knew him.
It is certainly clear to us that Bush is following the roadmap of Hitler - with certain improvements, of course - and that the same sorts of things that were going on behind the smoke screen of the Nazi propaganda machine are definitely going on behind the smoke screen of the Bush Propaganda machine.
True Identity of Fulcanelli and The Da VinciCode
The Soul must acquire greater powers not only for conception but also for retention, and therefore if we wish to obtain still more knowledge, the organs and secret springs of physical life must be wonderfully strengthened and invigorated. “The Soul must acquire new powers for conceiving and retaining...”
OfficialCulture in America :A Natural State of Psychopathy
Why do some shun knowledge and others crave it?
Why do some resist the programming, and others welcome it?
It is as though with some people - those who most avidly embrace the "we are right" view - have minds that are closed from the very get-go, and they are entirely incapable of opening them, even just a crack. There is no curiosity in them. There are no questions in their minds. There are no "what ifs?" or "maybes".
TheCosmic COINTELPRO Timeline
Religions are always "secret" in one respect or another - even if that secrecy is only the declaration that no changes can be made, no questions asked, because the ultimate truth about God is a "mystery," a "secret." That is why the teachings of religion are so easily distorted and misunderstood. It is so easy for the central "authority" to achieve the "pinnacle" of the religion and declare to the followers the correct interpretation and that no other is permitted.
Conspiracy Theorists
Conspiracy theories arise from evidence. After the government releases an explanation of a particular event, a conspiracy theory is only born because evidence exists to disprove their explanation, or at least call it into question. There's nothing insane about it, unless you define sanity as believing whatever the government tells you. In light of the fact that our government lies to us regularly, I would define believing everything they tell you as utter stupidity.
Meteors,Asteroids, Comets and NEOs
It must be remembered that impact is a random process not only in space but also in time. The next large impact with the Earth could be an "impact-winter"-producing event or even a K-T-sized event. To emphasize this point, in March 1989 an asteroidal body named 1989 FC passed within 700,000 km of the Earth. This Earth-crossing body was not discovered until it had passed the Earth. It is estimated to be in the 0.5 km size-range, capable of producing a Zhamanshin-sized crater or a devastating tsunami. Although 700,000 km is a considerable distance, it translates to a miss of the Earth by only a few hours, when orbital velocities are considered. At present, no systems or procedures are in place, specifically for mitigating the effects of an impact.
MOSSAD and Moving Companies
CLOUDCROFT, NM -- That they were speeding through the school zone first got his attention.
That they had Israeli driver's licenses and expired passports made him suspicious.
Cloudcroft Police Chief Gene Green stopped the 2-ton van on Thursday, for speeding. Initially, Green thought the truck was commercial because of exterior markings. But when he found it was out of Chicago, he asked for documentation such as logs books and manifests.
"They said this is a U-Haul truck and handed me a rental agreement (for) in-town delivery only in Illinois, (which) had expired two days before," Green said. He called for backup, and Otero County Sheriff's Deputy Billy Anders, who patrols the Sacramento Mountains, arrived, along with Capt. Norbert Sanchez and Det. Eddie Medrano.
"We got them out and started digging a little deeper," Green said, "got permission to search the truck. They claimed they were hauling furniture from Austin to Chicago." When officers advised the men they were not exactly en route from one town to another, Green said the two men claimed they were Deming bound. "But they couldn't give us an address in Deming they were going to," he said. "Once we got into the truck, they had some junk furniture I wouldn't have given to Goodwill."
RossInstitute: Agent of MOSSAD/COINTELPRO?
MahmoudAhmed and The Secret Cult of 9-11
The War on Terrorism is a LIE.
The pretext to wage this war has been created and executed by the Bush Reich and their minions.
The September 11 attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon are the biggest frauds in American History.
The Bush Reich and the Mass Media continue to manipulate public opinion, to make their Fraud appear to be an indelible truth.
The American People have been misled from the very beginning regarding the causes and consequences of the September 11 "attack on America."
The EVIDENCE, including MOUNTAINS OF OFFICIAL DOCUMENTS that get no Media play at all, confirms that the 9-11 event was part of the ongoing globalization plans of the Bush Reich. The way they deal with this documentation is to pass laws to suppress it and to protect their illegitimate rule.
WhoWrote The Bible?
People have been reading the Bible for ages. It has achieved a status in our culture assigned to no other single body of text. There are more copies of the Bible on the face of the planet than any other single book. It is quoted (and misquoted) more often than any other book. It is translated into more languages than any other book ever written as well. More people in recorded history have read it, studied it, taught it, admired it, argued about it, loved it, lived by it, and killed and died for it. It is the singular document at the heart of Judaism and Christianity, and yet the common man doesn’t really seem to ever ask: Who wrote it, really? They think they know: it is divinely dictated, revealed or inspired
HAARPand The Canary In the Mine
The powerful radio transmitter array at the HAARP observatory near Gakona, Alaska, is designed to transmit a narrow beam of powerful radio signals into the sky. The response to this intervention reveals details of the chemistry and physics of the ionosphere.
One such experiment carried out in March 2004 had an unexpected outcome, inducing artificial optical emissions bright enough to be seen as small speckles by the naked eye. This occurred not in the quiet ionosphere, but in the midst of a pulsating aurora, and represents features much smaller and brighter than ever observed previously.
TheGreenbaum Speech
In Chicago at the first international congress where ritual abuse was talked about I can remember thinking, "How strange and interesting." I can recall many people listening to an example given that somebody thought was so idiosyncratic and rare, and all the people coming up after saying, "Gee, you're treating one, too? You're in Seattle"...Well, I'm in Toronto...Well, I'm in Florida...Well, I'm in Cincinnati." I didn't know what to think at that point.
It wasn't too long after that I found my first ritual-abuse patient in somebody I was already treating and we hadn't gotten that deep yet. Things in that case made me very curious about the use of mind-control techniques and hypnosis and other brainwashing techniques. So I started studying brainwashing and some of the literature in that area and became acquainted with, in fact, one of the people who'd written one of the better books in that area.
RossInstitute: Agent of MOSSAD/COINTELPRO?
Dr.Strange AKA Vincent Bridges: New Age Grifter
WHAT is evil? In today's largely secular western society we may find it hard to define. But, historically, the question of evil has been a theological one. Generations of apologists have searched for ways to justify God in an imperfect world. In the Christian tradition, Saint Augustine distinguished between two forms of evil: "moral evil", the evil humans do, by choice, knowing that they are doing wrong; and "natural evil", the bad things that just happen - the storm, the flood, volcanic eruptions, fatal disease.
OrganicPortals: The Other Race? Why is it that there is so much strife in the world, why are so many divided over the promotion of war or peace, respect or disrespect, environmental protection or destruction, in short, a purely material self serving outlook or a spiritual serving of others outlook?
Perhaps we are getting close to the answer, for the truth would seem to be that there is not and never has been a homogenous “we” (the human race) on the planet, “we” are not all alike, “we” do not see the world in the same way, “we” are not just a divided race, we are two different races.
AlienAbduction, Demonic Possession and the Legend of theVampire
Down through the ages people have been visited by all sorts of strange beings. Some of these have been utterly fantastic in description as well as activity. By far the most common type, however, have been humanoid -- and by that I mean having some semblance to the human physical configuration --although their powers have been distinctly super-human.
ForteanFire
So many strange things are reported here.
TheFlu Threat
What you don't want to do.
Ethnic Specific Weapons
The London TimesNovember 15 1998
ISRAEL is working on a biological weapon that would harm Arabs but not Jews, according to Israeli military and western intelligence sources. The weapon, targeting victims by ethnic origin, is seen as Israel's response to Iraq's threat of chemical and biological attacks.
TheKennedy Assassination Now, the most important thing initially that happened in finding the photos was discovering a number of photographs- -films and still photos--that showed the sixth floor window empty with nobody in it. This is what originally convinced me that we had a different sort of conspiracy going than one involving Lee Harvey Oswald, because if he wasn't in the window--and nobody was in the window--then what happened?
Who fired the shots? And where from?
High Strangeness
The signal-to-noise aspect of the UFO problem is aggravated to a high degree because the signal is a totally unexpected signal, and represents an entirely new set of empirical observations which do not fit into any existing framework in any of the accepted scientific disciplines. One may even contemplate that the signal itself signals the birth of a new scientific discipline.
April 28, 2005— One of the world's largest, most beautiful and most legendary woodpeckers may not be extinct after all, say ornithologists studying startling new video evidence from Arkansas of the long-lost ivory-billed woodpecker in Arkansas.
