Abuse of Prisoners Blamed on "Outdated Policy"

[Rose Siding]

...(I)nterrogators at temporary holding facilities washed down detainees and questioned them in overly air-conditioned rooms, fed them only bread and water when they were uncooperative, and made them kneel for long periods of time as part of an approach using "stress positions." The tactics also included giving detainees minimal amounts of sleep and using loud music and yelling to keep them from sleeping or communicating....

Army Brig. Gen. Richard P. Formica found that members of the Combined Joint Special Operations Task Force-Arabian Peninsula used official guidance that had been developed in September 2003 to create its own set of rules for interrogations, unknowingly including the forbidden tactics.

...Formica concluded that the soldiers using the tactics were not responsible for violating policy or the law from February to May 2004 because they believed what they were doing had been approved.
...
"I didn't find cruel and malicious criminals that are out there looking for detainees to abuse," Formica said in an interview with reporters at the Pentagon yesterday. He said it was "regrettable" that the soldiers were given the wrong policy.
...
Formica's investigation focused on three alleged cases of abuse at temporary holding facilities that the task force and the 5th Special Forces Group operated in Iraq. The allegations included claims from detainees that U.S. soldiers and Iraqi forces beat and sodomized them, and shocked them with electricity, and that their captors killed a detainee. Formica found the claims lacking in credibility, citing a lack of medical evidence and indications that the detainees had ties to the insurgency and motives to lie.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/06/16/AR2006061602042.html

[dailykoff]

1. The middle ages have been over for some time.

But I guess 9/11 set everyone back a spell.

[stellanoir]

2. yes

Lack of any shred of humanity is totally "outdated" or it should be anyway.

[Jack Rabbit]

3. Interesting

Unlike in the Abu Ghraib cases, however, Formica said the soldiers were not maliciously attempting to humiliate or hurt the detainees but were trying to follow the rules as they understood them.

General Formica appears to be blaming the policymakers for not explicitly ruling out torture and humiliating treatment.

Anybody who has read the Gonzales memos should know that is not an accident.

[fasttense]

4. Oh that's reassuring

They tortured people because of a 2003 policy. Well that makes me feel a whole lot better. :sarcasm: