Posted on 05/07/2004 11:02:41 PM PDT by saquin
CUMBERLAND, Md., May 7 — Ivan Frederick was distraught. His son, an Army reservist turned prison guard in Iraq, was under investigation earlier this year for mistreating prisoners, and photographs of the abuse were beginning to circulate among soldiers and military investigators.
So the father went to his brother-in-law, William Lawson, who was afraid that reservists like his nephew would end up taking the fall for what he considered command lapses, Mr. Lawson recounted in an interview on Friday. He knew whom to turn to: David Hackworth, a retired colonel and a muckraker who was always willing to take on the military establishment. Mr. Lawson sent an e-mail message in March to Mr. Hackworth's Web site and got a call back from an associate there in minutes, he said.
That e-mail message would put Mr. Lawson in touch with the CBS News program "60 Minutes II" and help set in motion events that led to the public disclosure of the graphic photographs and an international crisis for the Bush administration.
It is still not entirely clear who leaked the photos and how they got into the hands of a "60 Minutes II" producer. What is clear, however, is that the furor over the photos is unlikely to dissipate any time soon.
And it may only get worse.
Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld disclosed Friday that there were "many more photos" and videos of abuse that have not yet become public. And he acknowledged in Senate testimony that the military might have mishandled the affair by not alerting members of Congress and the public to the growing seriousness of the military's investigation into the abuses before the images became public on "60 Minutes II."
"I wish I had been able to convey to them the gravity of this before we saw it in the media," Mr. Rumsfeld said.
The irony, Mr. Lawson said, is that the public spectacle might have been avoided if the military and the federal government had been responsive to his claims that his nephew was simply following orders. Mr. Lawson said he sent letters to 17 members of Congress about the case earlier this year, with virtually no response, and that he ultimately contacted Mr. Hackworth's Web site out of frustration, leading him to cooperate with a consultant for "60 Minutes II."
"The Army had the opportunity for this not to come out, not to be on 60 Minutes," he said. "But the Army decided to prosecute those six G.I.'s because they thought me and my family were a bunch of poor, dirt people who could not do anything about it. But unfortunately, that was not the case."
Many of the incriminating photographs appear to have been taken on a digital camera by a soldier in the 372nd Military Police Company who is now facing a court-martial. From there, they appear to have circulated among military personnel in Iraq via e-mail and computer disks, and some may have found their way to family members in the United States.
But there are still numerous unresolved questions about the photographs. One is why they were taken. Some officials suggest that soldiers wanted the photographs as souvenirs, but some relatives said they believed that the photographs were going to be shown to other prisoners to pressure their cooperation.
Then there is the question of how the photographs became public.
Lt. Gen. Lance Smith, deputy commander of forces in the region, testifying Friday before Congress, said he was still unclear how that happened. "It was a surprise that it got out," General Smith said.
Military officials were aware of two disks with photographs on them that were part of continuing investigations, one in Iraq and another in Washington, he said.
"That was the limit of the pictures, and we thought we had them all," General Smith said.
Producers at "60 Minutes II" are not saying exactly how they got the photographs. But Jeff Fager, the executive producer, said, "We heard about someone who was outraged about it and thought that the public should know about it."
Digital cameras have become so ubiquitous in the military that many relatives of personnel in the 372nd and other units in Iraq said they routinely received photographs by e-mail. But the photographs were usually tourist-type photographs of smiling sons and daughters, relatives said.
Officials said that the photographs showing psychological or physical abuse numbered in the hundreds, perhaps more than 1,000, with Mr. Rumsfeld hinting Friday that more may come out.
Among some prison personnel in Iraq, the photographs were apparently an open secret. "Some soldiers in Iraq had them — I'm hearing that soldiers were showing them to everybody," Mr. Lawson said. He said he did not have the original photos and did not turn them over to anyone.
The photographs have now turned soldiers like Mr. Lawson's nephew, Staff Sgt. Ivan Frederick, and Pfc. Lynndie R. England into graphic symbols of military abuse. But for Mr. Lawson, they are evidence of a complete breakdown in training and authority in the Iraqi prison system.
He shared his frustration in his March 23 e-mail message to Mr. Hackworth's Web site, writing: "We have contacted the Red Cross, Congress both parties, Bill O'Reilly and many others. Nobody wants to touch this."
Less than five weeks later, images of his nephew — interviewed on "60 Minutes II" with Mr. Lawson's help — would be shown around the world. Far from untouchable, the story would become unavoidable.
Yep, it is. :) Hi EV. and Ping for the guys I work with.
I've already told you, this was not RIGHT, this was a totally immoral move. Releasing the pictures would have been acceptable if all attempts to get the military to investigate had been exhausted. That was not the case. The investigations started the day after the report, the media was notified, two and a half months later reports were delivered exposing the entire brigade weakness and another investigation into the contractors had already started. So what was honorable about releasing the pictures unless it was to demoralize our military (BTW, just talk to some of them, they are furious) and to give aid and comfort to our enemies?
Sadar and his thugs are already offering rewards for capturing military people alive (can you guess why?) and openly saying any woman military personnel can be kept for sex slaves. Nice work that one, don't you think?
The other thing these mental midgets who released the pictures didn't count on is the revenge factor in the Arab world. All the people involved in this, all six of the people involved, will be targets. There will be jihadis out there who will devote their lives to hunting them down and getting revenge. Another nice little piece of work, don't you think?
I wonder if any of them have any idea of the potential for suffering that will be the long term result.
And just who would those leaders be TP?
That remains to be seen, 999.
From company grade officers, -- on up the chain of command, - we should find out.
-- Can you agree?
On an earlier thread, I wondered if these dummies in the photos were set up by one of the interrogators, and were told that the pictures were for intimidation of other prisoners. In reality, the important thing was for said interrogator to get photos he could release to the press.
Well, my idea isn't quite so fanciful, it seems. The object of this whole exercise was to disseminate inflammatory photos. We now know the extent of the abuses in the prison. So WHY are more photos supposed to come out? What is the purpose?
To try and meet their own ends, I doubt they even consider it or care.
Do you have a link??
That's what HACK says about himself. If HACK is calling them as he sees them then it only confirms that he has his head firmly implanted up his own arse...because what he's seeing is pure BS.
I sure don't want to minimize the prestige and importance of a combat "V" on a meritorious ribbon, but it isn't worth killing yourself, either. That whole thing is so weird and I don't think we're getting the full story.
I do think that whoever smuggled out the copy of the report should be discovered (and undoubtedly will) and cashiered from the service.
The damage this has done to our cause throughout the world, the way it has added to the Islamists view that we are a decadent society has undone all the work we've done since 9-11 to change that image. There is no way to put a price to that kind of damage.
Fortunately, I don't think this is going to cause as much trouble in Iraq as we feared, but it has REALLY given the Bin Laden group a great recruiting tool.
By TERENCE HUNT, AP White House Correspondent
WASHINGTON - In one of the darkest weeks of his administration, President Bush saw America's reputation sullied, the U.S. effort in Iraq damaged and his own campaign for re-election clouded. And more bad news may be on the way.
While the world already has been horrified by pictures of American soldiers abusing Iraqi prisoners, the Pentagon warns there are many more photos and videos that have not been disclosed.
They show "acts that can only be described as blatantly sadistic, cruel and inhuman," embattled Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld told Congress.
From the White House to Capitol Hill, policy-makers are worried that the United States faces lasting damage abroad — particularly in the Middle East — from the pictures of naked Arab men being tortured and humiliated by American soldiers, the same forces sent to Iraq to liberate the country from Saddam Hussein's torture and repression.
Analysts describe the pictures as great recruiting tools for al-Qaida and other extremist groups and said they undermine America's claims to a moral high ground. Rumsfeld said the impact was "radioactive."
Bush, in his weekly radio address Saturday, said, "They are a stain on our country's honor and reputation." He said the abuses were the work of a few and do not reflect the overall character of the 200,000 members of the U.S. military who have served in Iraq in the past year.
Six months from the November elections, Iraq weighs heavily on the president.
April was the deadliest month yet for American soldiers in Iraq and May is off to a bloody start.
On the diplomatic front, the administration does not know who will take power in Iraq from the United States in a June 30 handover.
Costs are soaring. The administration has sent Congress an unexpected $25 billion request for Iraq and Afghanistan.
Day after day, the extraordinary apologies from the president and his top deputies dominated the news.
Pollsters and presidential experts are scratching their heads over how the prisoner scandal will affect Bush's re-election hopes.
"There's such a big question mark there, it's unlike anything we've seen before," said Andrew Kohut, director of the Pew Research Center.
"The public is very critical of (Bush's) management of Iraq. They don't think he has a clear plan for bringing it to a successful conclusion, but a thin majority of the public has been hanging in with that it was the right decision to go to war," Kohut said. "This could be the event which makes people say 'Oh, we did make a mistake.'"
Political scientist James Thurber of American University likened the Iraq images to the infamous Vietnam pictures of a naked young girl fleeing a napalm attack and a Viet Cong prisoner being executed on a Saigon street.
Referring to the new pictures, Thurber said, "That's what we're going to remember about Iraq. It's just not going to go away. That may have a lasting and negative effect on his campaign. It certainly does right now and I think you'll see it in the polls immediately."
Support for Bush's handling of foreign policy and terrorism, usually his strongest issue, was at 50 percent in an Associated Press-Ipsos poll released Friday. That compares with 55 percent a month ago.
Kurt Campbell, a former Pentagon official during the Clinton administration, said it was too early to tell whether Rumsfeld would be able to keep his job.
"The real issue is there's more stuff that's going to come out that is troubling, beyond humiliation and torture. Deaths I think," said Campbell, director of international security at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.
"And there's going to be quite a long record of warnings that were either ignore or dismissed. And that I think is going to be problematic," Campbell said.
Lawmakers worried the pictures would harm U.S. credibility for years, perhaps decades. While the United States champions freedom and democracy in Iraq, the pictures show vivid scenes of cruelty and insensitivity.
Splashed across front pages across the Middle East and around the world, the pictures may undermine "the substantial gains toward the goal of peace and freedom in various operation areas of the world, most particularly Iraq," said Sen. John Warner, R-Va., chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee.
Michigan Sen. Carl Levin, the committee's top Democrat, said the abuses "dishonored our military and our nation and they made the prospects for success in Iraq even more difficult than they already are."
Added Rep. Tom Cole, R-Okla.: "This was a political and public relations Pearl Harbor."
Bush pledged in his radio address that the United States would not be thrown into retreat.
"This has been a difficult few weeks," Bush said. "Yet our forces will stay on the offensive, finding and confronting the killers and terrorists who are trying to undermine the progress of democracy in Iraq."
___
EDITOR'S NOTE: Terence Hunt has covered every president since Ronald Reagan.
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