The Situation Room takes a look at the upcoming documentary Standard Operating Procedure by Errol Morris (The Fog of War, The Thin Blue Line) which examines the incidents of abuse and torture at the Abu Ghraib prison.
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More videos from the film via The New Yorker, in which Sy Hersh first broke the story of the US’s gulag in Iraq.
I look forward to seeing how complete and honest an account of what went on this film is. It looks promising. I’m sure Janis Karpinski will do her part to make sure they set the record straight. Also, I’m pretty sure I know where the film’s title comes from:
Army documents show. After the overthrow of Saddam Hussein in April 2003, U.S. soldiers and intelligence personnel began to use these techniques in Iraq, where they were informally “accepted as SOP [standard operating procedure] by newly arrived interrogators,” according to an August 2004 report on Abu Ghraib abuses by Maj. Gen. George R. Fay. By September 2003, Gen. Geoffrey Miller had arrived at Abu Ghraib, allegedly with a mandate to “Gitmo-ize” interrogation procedures at the prison.
In light of the recent revelations that torture techniques were discussed and approved in meetings by the National Security Council’s Principals Committee, a group that included Vice President Cheney, Condoleezza Rice, Colin Powell, Donald Rumsfeld, George Tenet, John Ashcroft, and that President Bush admits he was fully aware of them, I think the Pentagon spokesman’s statement at the end of the CNN report that there was never “any government policy that directed, encouraged, or condoned abuse” is not only demonstrably false, it shows what a sham the military’s investigation into the matter was. Janis Karpinski was right all along.
Filed Under: Gitmo/Abu Ghraib, Iraq, The Situation Room/Wolf Blitzer, Torture
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Impeach and indict!
INVESTIGATE, INDICT, IMPEACH, IMPRISON
Our national shame will endure for a generation.
And it’s high time we make sure people understand: This happened under the GOP. America’s own Nazi party. Fuck yeah, I said that. Godwin, kiss my ass. It’s true.
Bad apples: the WH cabal.
I hope all those that enable this Administration are happy with themselves.
YOU have betrayed the United States and all she has stood for.
A pox on all of you.
well, if it’s errol morris, you know it’s gonna be good.
Any nation that will torture the ‘enemy’ in wartime, and arrogantly asserts it has the right to use torture, WILL find excuses to torture its own citizens….
I’m sure Blacwater will eventually be used tom torture US citizens, and will be given a pass….
Here is a question- The Republicans claim to love the troops- but by torturing the Iraqis, they send an invitation for them to torture captured US troops. What cant the repugs see this????????
Of course it was SOP. Also, most of the hardcore military types I know (mostly marines) say that they see nothing wrong with the actions at Abu Ghraib.
Recently reading an article about this film, I was most suprised by the info that children and wives of the “enemy combatants” were also kept in Abu Ghraib. I am a huge fan of Errol Morris and I am sure that this film excellent and hopefully open the eyes of everyone who thinks that this is Standard Operating Procedure.
Still waiting for the outrage.
Standard Operational Procedure: A SOP for the public.
More proof that under the Bush Regime our military has become the fascist Nazis our fathers and grandfathers once fought and died, to defeat this type of governmental abuse! We have become what we started out to defeat! Heil Bush!
Impeachment is to good for Bush$Co
yeah, even you don’t know what happened at abu ghraib. This video of a Marine confessing what happened, what HE did as a guard in abu ghraib. well, here it is: they intentionally grabbed underaged girls and were systematically raped. don’t believe me? watch the video.
Condoning torture is turning our our country into animals.
L.A. Confidential @ 9:
Me too. When I first saw those pictures, first I cried, then I was sure that this was the catalyst that would enrage the public enough to do something. After waiting months, now years for the outrage, something inside me died. That’s probably when I gave up on America.
this is such a travesty and an outrage… too bad the msm nor the congress seem to think the same.
psst dems in congress: fucking do something.
*america yawns*
You say “…I look forward to seeing how complete and honest …”
But how will we ever know how complete and how honest the story is?
Bushco — doing the Nazis proud since 1933!
post 11 I was going to say generally the same with the addition of The “greatest generation” and their willingness to vote for Mccrazy.
They lived through the depression and fought Imperial Japan and Nazi Germany and now have the same things going on in this country but then again they get their news from MSM who cover up most of this.
Maybe that generation wasn’t that great and the ones that followed haven’t lived up to their promise either
FOX is State Sponsored TV @ 13:
This is and always has been a violent country. Abu Ghaib is one of many examples of it.
whatever happened to the, even more, disturbing videos from abu ghraib?
america: we torture, so?
navyswan @ 7:
I wonder if they won’t mind if it was SOP for the enemy to do unspeakable things then ?
navyswan @ 14:
When the President does it, it isn’t illegal.
When brown people are the victims, no one cares.
Heh, we hung brown people from trees for half a century in THIS country before anyone started to give a shit.
Samson- @ 20:
They are behind lock and key. That is if they haven’t been destroyed by now, like the tapes of the CIA torturing people.
Don’t allow this trivial shit to distract you…..that colored boy called you “bitter”.
Samson- @ 20:
They’re gonna be released as a box set, exclusive to QVC.
It’s been frequently noted how the US military has declined to discipline or prosecute those higher up the food chain i.e. the generals for Abu Graib and elsewhere. I also would like to point out that, between Abu Ghraib Commander Colonel Janis Karpinski and Gitmo staff judge advocate Lt. Colonel Diane Beaver, the manly men of the Bush Administration and the US military fraternity ensured that women would be stuck holding the bag for their depraved indifference to human rights.
-AF
Andrew Sullivan Is A Fraud
navyswan @ 23:
i would bet my ham sandwich that cheney has a copy. i can envision him watching them for entertainment, a la uday hussein
There’s also an element seldom discussed of… you want to fu*k with the USA? Okay we’ll teach you a lesson you will never EVER forget.
Obviously it’s long past time we start pulling in the reins though. But unfortunately this thing has become too profitable for the Offense Industry.
L.A. Confidential @ 28:
Offense business… I like that. We have not been in the business of defense in a long, long time.
navyswan @ 29:
It should now be called The U.S. Department of Offense
navyswan @ 29:
me too, good stuff.
and, the dept of defense should go back to its original and accurate name, too.
Threevok @ 6:
Many of the M.P.’s at AG were cops in “civilian” life and learned their interrogation techniques here in the U.S. After an investigation which just happened to end after the statute of limitations had run, Lt. Jon Burge, and others in the Chicago Police Department, were found to have committed numerous acts of torture. A Northwestern University study of that investigation found torture to be “widespread and systematic” in the police department.
FOX is State Sponsored TV @ 13:
No, your people, as with all human beings, are already animals.
This turns animals into monsters.
L.A. Confidential @ 30:
Agreed. Our “foreign policy” is pretty damn offensive. P.U. it stinks.
Don’t forget to tell Congress what you think.
PS The ACLU site has an option that allows you to enter your information for the petition, but doesn’t save the information - in case you are worried about spam etc.
What does this do to the American claim that we are the world’s ‘bastion of freedom’?
I heard one right wing radio host argue that our ability to use torture PROTECTS freedom.
In the real world, torture=the absense of freedom.
I’m left to wonder how the right wing defines the word ‘freedom’.
fiver @ 32:
That human rights scandal here in Chicago is ongoing, costing us millions of dollars in compensatory damages and having numerous “guilt by torture” cases thrown out. I hope the many innocent Iraqis sue the hell of of this government and expose the evil of the Bush crew.
Hey Left&Left!
I’m in Oregon now, but I’m from East Rogers Park on the far North Side.
so .. who are the real “terrorists” ?
These are the same techniques the US used on the Native Americans, on the Filipinos (when “we” “liberated” them from Spain), on the VietNamese, in ElSalvador, in the Shah’s prisons and the American Embassy in Iran when the Shah was “our” man .. and in many US prisons today ..
The only real difference is we had pictures of the torture at Abu Ghraib a few months after the events .. not “just” written descriptions years later ..
GW Bush really hasn’t done anything that the Fascist Cabal hasn’t done before - he and his administration have just been much more blatant about it.
Waterboarding saved lives. You know what real torture is. It is being on your knees wating to be beheaded like Dan Pearl and others. THAT IS TORTURE!!!! YOU NEED TO WAKE UP
John Rone @ 36:
it starts to clue american citizens as to why the majority of the world saw through our BS claim as the ‘bastion of freedom’ decades and decades ago.
americans, innocently, believe that we do promote democracy, and use the power of our nation to spread freedom. so naive.
we need to wake the fuck up.
our foreign policy is NOT in our national interest. if we were really to be serious about the war on “terror” we would attack our own foreign policy.
neocons: empire through the military (cheney)
neoliberals: empire through the economy (clinton)
united states of blowback
Shame on the whole fucking lot of you. God damn America. God DAMN america.
After reading the Karpinski article on truthout, I have come to a conclusion about this administration. If we, the people of America, care at all about a beter world, we need to hold these people publicly accountable. We need a Nurenberg-style trial for those six people in the torture meetings and the people who were instrumental in implementing this. We should hold this trial in Iraq, and the death penalty should be in play.
I want to see Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Ashcroft, Rice, Tenet, Powell, Gonzales, Yoo, Addington, and all those in the chain of command of Abu Ghraib in a public trial a la Saddam Hussein in Iraq. I do not support the death penalty, but who am I to tell the people of Iraq that these people shouldn’t be punished by any conceivably legitimate punishment after a fair trial.
We are America. If we are to live up to our lofty aspirations, we need this.
Steve @ 40:
Do you have any evidence that waterboarding saved lives? I think Khalid Shiek Mohammed admitted to kidnapping the Lindberg baby after his “enhanced interrogation.”
Yes, of course the killing of Daniel Pearl was a monstrous act. What does one thing have to do with the other?
Samson- @ 41:
That is a good point.
just out of curiosity, would a free trade agreement that included protections for labor rights and environmental protection be different? I have always espoused adding these protections to existing trade agreements as a solution, but is the power dynamic between developed and developing countries so imbalanced that even the ammended agreement would be unfair? I don’t know enough about economics or trade to answer that.
MountainMan23 @ 39:
Yeah. I remember that excuse during Watergate.
“Oh, all President’s have done it. Nixon wasn’t the first. He simply got caught”.
War criminals, all.