The United States has submitted a report to the United Nations that acknowledges its personnel has committed isolated acts of torture on detainees, the French wire service AFP reports. Its unnamed source says that the American report was very forthright and involved a handful of cases which the US military intends on prosecuting as crimes:

Washington has for the first time acknowledged to the United Nations that prisoners have been tortured at US detention centres in Guantanamo Bay, as well as Afghanistan and Iraq, a UN source said.

The acknowledgement was made in a report submitted to the UN Committee against Torture, said a member of the ten-person panel, speaking on on condition of anonymity.

"They are no longer trying to duck this, and have respected their obligation to inform the UN," the Committee member told AFP. ...

"They haven't avoided anything in their answers, whether concerning prisoners in Iraq, in Afghanistan or Guantanamo, and other accusations of mistreatment and of torture," the Committee member said.

"They said it was a question of isolated cases, that there was nothing systematic and that the guilty were in the process of being punished."

The US report said that those involved were low-ranking members of the military and that their acts were not approved by their superiors, the member added.

While I suspect that the hysterical Gitmo=gulag crowd will jump all over this, it does serve to remind people that regardless of how intent we are on acting under the highest principles, it takes good management and a lot of discipline to keep interrogators and jailers from crossing the line. That was the lesson at Abu Ghraib, one that most people missed in their rush to smear the entire chain of command with the absurd notion that naked pyramids and leashes had been approved at the top levels of the Pentagon. Those involved in the Abu Ghraib abuses -- which probably have been included in this report -- belonged to a unit with poor discipline and excessive fraternization, both of which directly led to the abuses in that prison.

The report also shows the difference between America and (I can't believe I even have to write this) Nazi Germany, the Soviet gulag, and the Khmer Rouge. Our policies and aims do not accept torture, and when it occurs, it is treated as a crime and punished appropriately. We also do not imprison people arbitrarily and have the appropriate process to determine their need for detention. The latter three examples ran prisons and camps for the express purpose of torturing and killing people strictly for their ethnicity, religion, or political speech, and succeeded in killing millions upon millions in doing so.

If Americans have tortured prisoners -- and that means really tortured prisoners, not just left them in cold or hot rooms or humiliated them by having women rub themselves on them -- then they should be tried and imprisoned for their crimes. The American military appears capable of investigating these problems and holding the guilty accountable. Perhaps that will quell the hysterics from declaring the US a fascist state ... but somehow I doubt it.

Trackback Pings

TrackBack URL for this entry is

Listed below are links to weblogs that reference US Acknowledges Torture, And Prosecution Of Those Committing It:

» The Gitmo beat goes on from Macmind - Conservative Commentary and Common Sense
WASHINGTON, June 23 - Military doctors at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, have aided interrogators in conducting and refining coercive interrogations of detainees, including providing advice on how to increase stress levels and exploit fears, according to new,... [Read More]

Tracked on June 24, 2005 1:00 PM

» US Acknowledges Torture, And Prosecution Of Those Committing It from BlogSpy.NET
We found this blog entry very interesting so we've added a Trackback to it on our site. [Read More]

Tracked on June 24, 2005 1:06 PM

» Shall we play a game Part Deux from In Search Of Utopia
So now that the US has admitted Torture at "detainee," locations around the world. Lets see how the "Panties on the head is not torture", set, handles the spin. My favorite, The good Captain Ed: While I suspect that the... [Read More]

Tracked on June 24, 2005 3:04 PM

» Once again, under-emphasized, IT WAS ALREADY ADDRESSED from The Anchoress
One of the things that really irked me - and which continues to irk me - about the coverage of Abu Ghraib was the press' unwillingness to report - up front, where it mattered - that before the first story "broke" on that episode, the participating sold... [Read More]

Tracked on June 24, 2005 9:46 PM

» Real story vs. reported story - here we go again. from LyfLines
So the actual lede should have read something like this: The United States Military continues to monitor its members, and to act against them whenever they act unlawfully. Certain members of the military have acted unlawfully at Guantanamo Bay... [Read More]

Tracked on June 24, 2005 11:15 PM