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.
In yesterdays session Rep. Heather Wilson posed the question: Who signed the November 19, 2003 order for authority to be put under the MI.
The response she received was Sanchez.
So I don't know if it will just stop at Kapinski.
At yesterdays hearing Sen Dayton said getting the news of this photos was more important
Who gives a royal crap! Kerry and Wes Clark got a bunch of medals. Are they Audie Murphy too? Medals are great for what you get for a specific point in time. How this translates into a free pass to being an @sshole is beyond me!
Asked whether Rumsfeld should resign, Ellen said no because he would just take the fall for the president and then it would be over.
Before the war started ... did Ellen comment how she hoped we'd lose the war because it would be good for the Democrats???
By Andrew Hammond
DUBAI (Reuters) - His apology was late and the damage done, said Arab and European commentators on Saturday, reacting to Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld.
"While he (Rumsfeld) has been in charge, murder, torture and humiliation were heaped on Iraqi detainees almost as a matter of course," the Saudi daily Arab News commented.
"Rumsfeld's apology came too late," said Jordanian analyst Hani Hourani. "I believe Rumsfeld should resign because the torture reflected a widespread policy adopted by the U.S. army in Iraq and maybe Afghanistan as well."
Rumsfeld took responsibility on Friday for abuse of Iraqi prisoners by U.S. troops and offered his "deepest apology" to victims during U.S. Senate hearings broadcast live in the Arab world as well as the United States.
But Rumsfeld said he would not resign just to satisfy his political enemies.
Many Arabs and Europeans, however, said he should quit.
Reinhard Buetikofer, chairman of Germany's Green Party, a junior partner in the government, said: "The minister who is responsible for such things must resign: Mr. Rumsfeld."
VISIONS OF SADDAM
And Kuwait, a close U.S. ally in the Gulf, said the abuses by American soldiers recalled the brutality of Saddam Hussein's regime.
"For us in Kuwait these (abuses) mean a lot of things, and recall the brutal acts by Saddam Hussein's regime in the same prison, Abu Ghraib, which held many Kuwaiti detainees," Foreign Minister Sheikh Mohammad al-Salem al-Sabah was quoted as saying.
Arabic newspapers, from Egypt's opposition al-Wafd to Saudi Arabia's semi-official Okaz, showed pictures of Rumsfeld looking troubled with his hands over his face.
The Arab News dismissed Rumsfeld's order for a review of the case.
"Rumsfeld's suggestion that an independent inquiry be set up into what happened is a waste of time, and Iraqis simply do not have time to waste," it said.
"If he resigns without fuss, perhaps he may begin to redeem himself by making a tiny contribution to the restoration of America's good name in the world."
Underscoring emotions in the Arab world, al-Wafd had a picture of a dead Iraqi child with the caption: "The new Mongols massacre the children of Iraq before the eyes of the world."
Of 60,000 respondents to a poll on the Web site of leading Arabic satellite channel Al Jazeera, some 87 percent said the United States would be unable to improve its image among Arabs and Muslims.
"I used to agree with the American campaign in Iraq, now I'm very reluctant, I don't know if they are fulfilling the purpose they are meant to fulfil anymore," said Suliman Buhaimed of the American University of Kuwait.
Rumsfeld failed to impress ordinary Iraqis, who suffered three-decades of brutal Saddam rule before insurgents locked horns with U.S.-led occupying forces after last year's invasion. "Apology is not enough. What they have committed against the Iraqis won't be erased from our memory," Taha Duraib Hussein, 41, a shopowner in Baghdad, said.
BROKEN TRUST
"By committing these atrocities, the Americans have broken the trust between them and the Iraqis and it's very difficult to build it again," Salah Wadie, 30, said.
President Bush, seeking re-election in November, sought to repair the U.S. image by pledging on Arab television last week that Americans behind the prisoner abuse and killings of detainees would be punished.
A number of European newspapers said the scandal signaled the failure of Bush's Iraq policy.
"If Rumsfeld takes responsibility for what happened in Iraqi prisons, as he declared yesterday in the Senate, his only possibility...is to resign," leading Spanish daily El Pais said.
French left-wing daily Liberation said: "The torture was not the work of a handful of corrupt criminals ... They were really the disciplined cogs of a system ignorant of the Geneva Convention (on treatment of prisoners)."
(Additional reporting by Baghdad, Cairo, Amman, Madrid, Paris, Kuwait)
Your Right! She was a delusional vision Billy Boy had.
Bill was delusional...after all look what he married.
It may get worse, before it gets better. But I am not underestimating the Bush administration. They'll get to the bottom of it. Of course by then, the press will put the story on the back burner.
My sisters and I found a bunch of old letters like that my father wrote during his service in WWII ...
By MATT KELLEY, Associated Press Writer
WASHINGTON - Pentagon officials rejected an Army plan last year to send an experienced military lawyer — who is also a Republican member of Congress — to help oversee the unit blamed for prisoner abuse at the Abu Ghraib complex outside Baghdad.
That left the prison complex, which holds up to 7,000 Iraqis, without an onsite lawyer to guide interrogations and treatment of prisoners.
The top lawyer for the 800th Military Police Brigade, the Army unit in charge of detainees at Abu Ghraib, later came under fire in an Army report about the abuse for being ineffective and "unwilling to accept responsibility for any of his actions."
The rejected lawyer, Rep. Steve Buyer, R-Ind., and other experts say having had a lawyer at the prison might have prevented or at least mitigated the beatings, sexual humiliation and other abuse detailed in photographs and the Army probe.
"It's always good to have a lawyer around so you've got a conscience for the command and an opportunity to vet questions," said retired Army Maj. Gen. William L. Nash, who commanded an armored brigade during the 1991 Gulf War.
Pentagon officials confirmed there was no onsite lawyer at Abu Ghraib, but spokesmen for Army Secretary Les Brownlee and Pentagon personnel officials did not respond to repeated requests for comment Friday. Bryan Whitman, a spokesman for Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, referred questions to the Army.
Buyer, a strong supporter of the Iraq war and a lieutenant colonel in the Army Reserves, had volunteered to go to Iraq shortly after the invasion in March 2003.
In a telephone interview Friday with The Associated Press, Buyer said military officials all the way up to the Joint Chiefs of Staff had approved his assignment to the 800th Military Police Brigade, which has handled Iraqi prisoners of war since the beginning of the conflict.
Pentagon personnel officials and Brownlee rejected the assignment, saying the Army could fill the requirement another way. Brownlee also wrote to Buyer that his high-profile status could bring danger to the troops around him.
Buyer said he objected to David Chu, the Pentagon's personnel chief, and Charles Abell, Chu's deputy.
"I expressed the importance of having a (lawyer) at the camp," Buyer said. "You have to ask, when you had a qualified officer, and the civilian leaders, Dr. Chu and the secretary of the Army, said no, who did you send in his place?"
Soldiers from the 800th MP Brigade have been accused not only of abusing prisoners in Abu Ghraib but also detainees at the Camp Bucca POW facility near Basra in southern Iraq. The military also is investigating a dozen prisoner deaths in Afghanistan and Iraq, some of them in facilities run by the 800th Brigade.
Buyer served as a lawyer at a prisoner of war camp run by the 800th Brigade during the first Gulf War. His duties, Buyer said, included helping the International Committee of the Red Cross monitor conditions and ensuring guards followed international law such as the Geneva Conventions. He said he also questioned some Iraqis suspected of war crimes.
"The 800th MP Brigade performed exemplary service in the Gulf War," Buyer said. "There was no hint of any mistreatment or maltreatment of prisoners. It never happened. They had excellent leadership."
The investigation of Abu Ghraib by Army Maj. Gen. Antonio Taguba found serious problems with the brigade's leadership, including its commander, Brig. Gen. Janis Karpinski.
Taguba wrote that even after the abuse at Camp Bucca in May 2003, Karpinski did not give the unit proper training.
"I could find no evidence that BG Karpinski ever directed corrective training for her soldiers or ensured that MP soldiers throughout Iraq clearly understood the requirements of the Geneva Conventions relating to the treatment of detainees," Taguba wrote.
The Associated Press obtained a copy of the classified report this week.
I did not say Sanchez would be caught up in anything. I posted that it was stated that Sanchez signed the order.
Why indeed??????? No big deal if Leftists- who will totally sell us out to the world & terrorism, N. Korea, Iran, France, the U.N., Kyoto etc- get into power?? Over this? Or anything else? Price-of-tomatoes kinda stuff, eh?
Rinocratic socialists have been in power in the USA since Goldwaters loss in '64.
This latest flap is just more internecine political squabbling. The perps will be wrist slapped & nothing basic will change.
How revealing of your, uh, mindset.
My political 'mindsets' are revealed every day here on FR. -- You have problems with them?
Be specific, or be seen as just another troll.
Defense Sec. Donald Rumsfeld House Testimony on Iraqi Prisoners
Defense Sec. Donald Rumsfeld Senate Testimony on Iraqi Prisoners
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