Rachel is going to have Army Private Brandon Neely on

[seemslikeadream]

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=389&topic_id=5059892


Scott Horton: Former Gitmo Guard Tells All : Brutality; Rape; Contempt for Islam
Posted by seafan on Sun Feb-15-09 02:52 PM

Former Gitmo Guard Tells All

By Scott Horton
February 15, 2009



Army Private Brandon Neely served as a prison guard at Guantánamo in the first years the facility was in operation. With the Bush Administration, and thus the threat of retaliation against him, now gone, Neely decided to step forward and tell his story. “The stuff I did and the stuff I saw was just wrong,” he told the Associated Press. Neely describes the arrival of detainees in full sensory-deprivation garb, he details their sexual abuse by medical personnel, torture by other medical personnel, brutal beatings out of frustration, fear, and retribution, the first hunger strike and its causes, torturous shackling, positional torture, interference with religious practices and beliefs, verbal abuse, restriction of recreation, the behavior of mentally ill detainees, an isolation regime that was put in place for child-detainees, and his conversations with prisoners David Hicks and Rhuhel Ahmed.

.....

Three things struck me in reading through the account.

First, Neely and other guards had been trained to the U.S. military’s traditional application of the Geneva Convention rules. They were put under great pressure to get rough with the prisoners and to violate the standards they learned. This placed the prison guards under unjustifiable mental stress and anxiety, and, as any person familiar with the vast psychological literature in the area (think of the Stanford Prison Experiment, for instance) would have anticipated produced abuses. Neely discusses at some length the notion of IRF (initial reaction force), a technique devised to brutalize or physically beat a detainee under the pretense that he required being physically subdued. The IRF approach was devised to use a perceived legal loophole in the prohibition on torture. Neely’s testimony makes clear that IRF was understood by everyone, including the prison guards who applied it, as a subterfuge for beating and mistreating prisoners—and that it had nothing to do with the need to preserve discipline and order in the prison.

Second, there is a good deal of discussion of displays of contempt for Islam by the camp authorities, and also specific documentation of mistreatment of the Qu’ran. Remember that the Neocon-laden Pentagon Public Affairs office launched a war against Newsweek based on a very brief piece that appeared in the magazine’s Periscope section concerning the mistreatment of a Qu’ran by a prison guard. Not only was the Newsweek report accurate in its essence, it actually understated the gravity and scope of the problem. Moreover, it is clear that the Pentagon Public Affairs office was fully aware, even as it went on the attack against Newsweek, that its claims were false and the weekly’s reporting was accurate.

Third, the Nelly account shows that health professionals are right in the thick of the torture and abuse of the prisoners—suggesting a systematic collapse of professional ethics driven by the Pentagon itself. He describes body searches undertaken for no legitimate security purpose, simply to sexually invade and humiliate the prisoners. This was a standardized Bush Administration tactic–the importance of which became apparent to me when I participated in some Capitol Hill negotiations with White House representatives relating to legislation creating criminal law accountability for contractors. The Bush White House vehemently objected to provisions of the law dealing with rape by instrumentality. When House negotiators pressed to know why, they were met first with silence and then an embarrassed acknowledgement that a key part of the Bush program included invasion of the bodies of prisoners in a way that might be deemed rape by instrumentality under existing federal and state criminal statutes. While these techniques have long been known, the role of health care professionals in implementing them is shocking.

Neely’s account demonstrates once more how much the Bush team kept secret and how little we still know about their comprehensive program of official cruelty and torture.



When will George Bush, Richard Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, John Yoo, Steven Bradbury, David Addington, Jay Bybee, Alberto Gonzales and Michael Mukasey meet the grinding wheels of JUSTICE? The monstrous shame and increased national security risks these people have brought to America will outlast us.

WE MUST PROSECUTE THEM.



A Torture Report Could Spell Big Trouble For Bush Lawyers, Michael Isikoff in Newsweek, February 14, 2009

[liberalmuse]

1. Watching here.

I really respect a person who, even though they engaged in something wrong, is able to see the error of their ways and courageously speak out against that wrongdoing. Sadly, this is not an easy thing for people to do.

[leftstreet]

2. This makes me think of Cheney - all over the teevee saying the Dems 'knew'

Back in December he was interviewed and basically said - wtf, the Dems knew and did nothing.

BushInc knew this would all come out.

[seemslikeadream]

3. The torture has to be dealt with

It must

[elizfeelinggreat]

4. WTH?

Did they order the soldiers?

WE knew, too. We could not stop it. Did you see all the protests?

I hope the tone I'm reading is not correct but please tell me where do you put the responsibility?

[leftstreet]

5. No, Cheney tried to put the responsibility on congressional Dems

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,470706,00.html

CHENEY: Well, let me tell you a story about the terror surveillance program. We did brief the Congress. And we brought in...

WALLACE: Well, you briefed a few members.

CHENEY: We brought in the chairman and the ranking member, House and Senate, and briefed them a number of times up until — this was — be from late '01 up until '04 when there was additional controversy concerning the program.

At that point, we brought in what I describe as the big nine — not only the intel people but also the speaker, the majority and minority leaders of the House and Senate, and brought them into the situation room in the basement of the White House.

I presided over the meeting. We briefed them on the program, and what we'd achieved, and how it worked, and asked them, "Should we continue the program?" They were unanimous, Republican and Democrat alike. All agreed — absolutely essential to continue the program.

I then said, "Do we need to come to the Congress and get additional legislative authorization to continue what we're doing?" They said, "Absolutely not. Don't do it, because it will reveal to the enemy how it is we're reading their mail."

That happened. We did consult. We did keep them involved. We ultimately ended up having to go to the Congress after the New York Times decided they were going to make the judge to review all of — or make all of this available, obviously, when they reacted to a specific leak.

But it was a program that we briefed on repeatedly. We did these briefings in my office. I presided over them. We went to the key people in the House and Senate intel committees and ultimately the entirely leadership and sought their advice and counsel, and they agreed we should not come back to the Congress.

[elizfeelinggreat]

8. thanks for the quotes!

Sorry I misunderstood.

[Ichingcarpenter]

6. Listening on-line right now....

I hope he reveals more incidents.

[BlooInBloo]

7. Hurts to hear it, but I suppose it's my job. Sigh.

[malaise]

9. She's tearing Pawlenty a new one right now

He's taking the money despite being the Party of No.

[proud patriot]

10. Is anyone keeping a list of the whistleblowers ?

since Obama became The Prez people have
felt more comfortable .