Posted on 01/27/2006 10:58:26 AM PST by NormsRevenge
The U.S. Army in Iraq has at least twice seized and jailed the wives of suspected insurgents in hopes of "leveraging" their husbands into surrender, U.S. military documents show.
In one case, a secretive task force locked up the young mother of a nursing baby, a U.S. intelligence officer reported. In the case of a second detainee, one American colonel suggested to another that they catch her husband by tacking a note to the family's door telling him "to come get his wife."
The issue of female detentions in Iraq has taken on a higher profile since kidnappers seized American journalist Jill Carroll on Jan. 7 and threatened to kill her unless all Iraqi women detainees are freed.
The U.S. military on Thursday freed five of what it said were 11 women among the 14,000 detainees currently held in the 2 1/2-year-old insurgency. All were accused of "aiding terrorists or planting explosives," but an Iraqi government commission found that evidence was lacking.
Iraqi human rights activist Hind al-Salehi contends that U.S. anti-insurgent units, coming up empty-handed in raids on suspects' houses, have at times detained wives to pressure men into turning themselves in.
Iraq's deputy justice minister, Busho Ibrahim Ali, dismissed such claims, saying hostage-holding was a tactic used under the ousted Saddam Hussein dictatorship, and "we are not Saddam." A U.S. command spokesman in Baghdad, Lt. Col. Barry Johnson, said only Iraqis who pose an "imperative threat" are held in long-term U.S.-run detention facilities.
But documents describing two 2004 episodes tell a different story as far as short-term detentions by local U.S. units. The documents are among hundreds the Pentagon has released periodically under U.S. court order to meet an American Civil Liberties Union request for information on detention practices.
In one memo, a civilian Pentagon intelligence officer described what happened when he took part in a raid on an Iraqi suspect's house in Tarmiya, northwest of Baghdad, on May 9, 2004. The raid involved Task Force (TF) 6-26, a secretive military unit formed to handle high-profile targets.
"During the pre-operation brief it was recommended by TF personnel that if the wife were present, she be detained and held in order to leverage the primary target's surrender," wrote the 14-year veteran officer.
He said he objected, but when they raided the house the team leader, a senior sergeant, seized her anyway.
"The 28-year-old woman had three young children at the house, one being as young as six months and still nursing," the intelligence officer wrote. She was held for two days and was released after he complained, he said.
Like most names in the released documents, the officer's signature is blacked out on this for-the-record memorandum about his complaint.
Of this case, command spokesman Johnson said he could not judge, months later, the factors that led to the woman's detention.
The second episode, in June 2004, is found in sketchy detail in e-mail exchanges among six U.S. Army colonels, discussing an undisclosed number of female detainees held in northern Iraq by the Stryker Brigade of the 2nd Infantry Division.
The first message, from a military police colonel, advised staff officers of the U.S. northern command that the Iraqi police would not take control of the jailed women without charges being brought against them.
In a second e-mail, a command staff officer asked an officer of the unit holding the women, "What are you guys doing to try to get the husband — have you tacked a note on the door and challenged him to come get his wife?"
Two days later, the brigade's deputy commander advised the higher command, "As each day goes by, I get more input that these gals have some info and/or will result in getting the husband."
He went on, "These ladies fought back extremely hard during the original detention. They have shown indications of deceit and misinformation."
The command staff colonel wrote in reply, referring to a commanding general, "CG wants the husband."
The released e-mails stop there, and the women's eventual status could not be immediately determined.
Of this episode, Johnson said, "It is clear the unit believed the females detained had substantial knowledge of insurgent activity and warranted being held."
___
On the Net:
First document: http://www.aclu.org/torturefoia/released/t2614_2616.pdf
E-mail exchange: http://www.aclu.org/projects/foiasearch/pdf/DOD044843.pdf
Well said.
It's supposedly not a matter of "questioning." Taking the wife of a suspected terrorist "as leverage" is an act of hostage-taking, and a form of terrorism.
It is certainly appropriate to question the veracity of this report. But I hope you'll agree that the idea of Americans taking hostages is not a good one.
Oh yeah -- "Uday seized more than we did" is a GREAT defense.... Sheesh. Either we're the good guys, or we're not, and it's our actions that make the difference.
Geez this is from the AP.....and I'm sure every fact is absolutely positively accurate and true ....oh, no there's nothing inaccurate here.......Do they identify the reporter? Is his Name Jason Blair?
And to think, that poor woman hadn't had the CONSTITUTIONAL RIGHT to an abortion ...
And how, exactly, does this make us the BAD guys????
Don't get me wrong, we should not give enemy combatants quarter, we should engage and destroy them whenever and whereever we find them, but resorting to these types of measures will come to bite us in the nether regions sooner or later.
As long as they didn't eavesdrop, torture, detain, arrest, interrogate them I see no problem with it. sarc
Logic is that if americans were so pissed at the dems for making this woman cry -- these same americans should be pissed to no end about bush arresting and incarcerating these poor innocent as the wind driven snow women who just happen to be the wives of terrorists and whos children they sent strapped with bombs to blow up us soldiers
The press and the dems do not care at all for any of these people. their cold heartless use of this to try to smear bush stands out naked in all its shame.
A must read. Love, Me
Love him or loathe him, he nailed this one right on the head..........
Rush Limbaugh says:
I think the vast differences in compensation between victims of the September 11 casualty and those who die serving our country in Uniform are profound. No one is really talking about it either, because you just don't criticize anything having to do with September 11. Well, I can't let the numbers pass by because it says something really disturbing about the
entitlement mentality of this country. If you lost a family member in the September 11 attack, you're going to get an average of $1,185,000. The range is a minimum guarantee of $250,000, all the way up to $4.7 million.
If you are a surviving family member of an American soldier killed in action, the first check you get is a $6,000 direct death benefit, half of which is taxable..
Next, you get $1,750 for burial costs. If you are the surviving spouse, you get $833 a month until you remarry. And there's a payment of $211 per month for each child under 18. When the child hits 18, those payments come to a screeching halt.
Keep in mind that some of the people who are getting an average of $1.185 million up to $4.7 million are complaining that it's not enough. Their deaths were tragic, but for most, they were simply in the wrong place at the wrong time. Soldiers put themselves in harms way FOR ALL OF US, and they and their families know the dangers.
We also learned over the weekend that some of the victims from the Oklahoma City bombing have started an organization asking for the same deal that the September 11 families are getting. In addition to that, some of the families of those bombed in the embassies are now asking for compensation as well.
You see where this is going, don't you? Folks, this is part and parcel of over 50 years of entitlement politics in this country. It's just really sad. Every time a pay raise comes up for the military, they usually receive next to nothing of a raise. Now the green machine is in combat in the Middle East while their families have to survive on food stamps and live in low-rent housing. Make sense?
However, our own U.S. Congress voted themselves a raise. Many of you don't know that they only have to be in Congress one time to receive a pension that is more than $15,000 per month. And most are now equal to being millionaires plus. They do not receive Social Security on retirement because they didn't have to pay into the system.
If some of the military people stay in for 20 years and get out as an E-7, they may receive a pension of $1,000 per month, and the very people who placed them in harm's way receives a pension of $15,000 per month.
I would like to see our elected officials pick up a weapon and join ranks before they start cutting out benefits and lowering pay for our sons and daughters who are now fighting.
"When do we finally do something about this?"
War ain't pretty.
Hostage-taking does seem to be a favorite tactic of bad guys....
I don't for a minute think that we're the bad guys in Iraq ... but I also don't think we ought to be taking hostages. Any Americans who do so, should be punished.
Always assuming, of course, that this is a credible and accurate report in the first place.
well, if true, then that would probably be the only thing that could convince me she wasn't a willing participant in her kidnapping.
Not believable.
Hillary hasn't had her biscuit buttered, (by a guy,) since Vince was offed.
Another piece of anti-american fodder for the weekend MSM discussions will condemn the administration and our military with little rebuttal from the WH, Rush, and others. All in coordination with DNC to exaggerate and mis-label catch-phrases (e.g. 'domestic-spying') that become the DNC talking points.
Five out of Fourteen THOUSAND detainees are an increasing trend? These people need a life. I got a better idea, Just bomb their house with a one ton bomb at three AM. This is after all a friggin war...
bump later read
What does Iraq have to do with "Americans' Civil Liberties"??
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