US Torture Ban Allowing Torture?

I shared pot luck with some activists with World Can’t Wait in New York City last week.  We were looking at what’s changed with the Obama presidency, and what continues from the Bush years.  The discussion turned to whether the Executive Orders Barack Obama issued will end torture by the United States.

Yes, United States policy will be different from what it’s been under Dick “waterboarding — it’s a no brainer” Cheney.  The generals are telling President Obama that the torture at Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo has not just damaged the US reputation, but contributed to US losses in Iraq.  Worldwide public opinion — and protests here in the US that affected US public opinion — turned against Bush.  Obama, as the new commander in chief of a largely disgraced military, wants to distance his administration from the policies associated with Bush.

I know people want to believe that the torture state will disappear on such orders.  As many of you have pointed out, torture was not invented by the Bush White House.  Tens of thousands of us protested over the last 20 years at the School of the Americas precisely because the U.S. has been “out-sourcing” torture for many years, and training others to perform it.  Let’s not get all misty-eyed for the “good old days” before George Bush, but also, let’s not fail to take responsibility for what happens under a new president.

Coverage and opinion on worldcantwait.org covers some essential points on what Obama said, and what the US will now do:

Jill McLaughlin, in No I Can’t: A Dissident to U.S. Empire But A Fighter For Humanity writes, “According to Allan Nairn, the executive order that Obama signed only covers those detained by any officer, employee, and agent of the U.S. in facilities operated or owned by the U.S. in an armed conflict. This leaves room for the U.S. interrogator to do as he/she pleases in places not in armed conflict as Nairn points out. Nairn also points out the U.S. history of torture by proxy. When one thinks of Abu Ghraib now reopened and under control of the Iraqi security forces one can only think of all kinds of torture by proxy taking place there. Then there is also the prison outside of Kabul, Afghanistan called Pul-i-charki which expanded in 2006 and is run by U.S. allies in Afghanistan. There is little known about this prison since the detainees there are denied legal counsel, and the International Red Cross has been denied access there.. There are also possible loopholes in this ban on torture. Obama may decide to employ some interrogation techniques not outlined in the Army Field Manual.”

Ken Theisen, Closing Gitmo is not Enough! We Need to Hold Those Responsible for the War of Terror Accountable! “As Obama becomes the Commander in Chief, he will take over the war of terror and its vast prison gulag. While he will close Gitmo eventually, he will still maintain the prisons run around the world by the Department of War. We need to hold him not only accountable for the detainees in Gitmo, but the thousands of others held by the Pentagon and its allies. We also need to demand that thousands be released; that they be compensated for their abuse; and that those responsible for the U.S. war of terror be prosecuted. But this will not happen if left to Obama, the Congress, or the courts. Only a mass movement of the people will force real accountability. Anything less will allow the Bush regime policies in the war of terror to continue under a younger and smoother talking Commander-in-Chief.

Jeremy Miller, Obama Lets CIA Keep Controversial Renditions Tool, in the Chicago Tribune today, writes, “Under executive orders issued by Obama last week, the CIA still has authority to carry out what are known as renditions, or the secret abductions and transfers of prisoners to countries that cooperate with the U.S.  Current and former U.S. intelligence officials said the rendition program is poised to play an expanded role because it is the main remaining mechanism-aside from Predator missile strikes-for taking suspected terrorists off the street.  The rendition program became a source of embarrassment for the CIA, and a target of international scorn, as details emerged in recent years of botched captures, mistaken identities and allegations that prisoners were turned over to countries where they were tortured.  The European Parliament condemned renditions as an “illegal instrument used by the United States.” Prisoners swept up in the program have sued the CIA as well as a subsidiary of Boeing Corp., which is accused of working with the agency on dozens of rendition flights.  But the Obama administration appears to have determined that the rendition program was one component of the Bush administration’s war on terrorism that it could not afford to discard.”

On a more personal note, attorney Candace Gorman writes about her client Mr. Al-Ghizzawi, who is still locked up in the “hell hole we call Guantanamo” in Flower Power. “Last week I received an email from the ‘privilege team,’ the ones that read our attorney/client mail. The email informed me that Al-Ghizzawi sent me a picture and on the back of the picture, there was a note stating that the picture was his gift to me. The privilege team decided that the note was ‘personal’ and that Al-Ghizzawi violated the rules in sending the picture through the legal mail. They informed me that I would have to send the picture back to him (through the legal mail) and tell Al-Ghizzawi to resend it to me through the ‘non-legal mail.’ (Really, I cannot make this shit up).”  It turned out that Mr. Al-Ghizzawi sent her a photo of flowers, and she refused to return it to him and make him re-send it.

And Robert Gannon, a reporter who has been covering Professor John Yoo at UC Berkeley for the East Bay Express, writes in John Yoo, War Criminal? “The chances that the notorious UC Berkeley law professor will be investigated for war crimes appear to have increased in recent weeks.” More at firejohnyoo.org and worldcantwait.org

Should all those associated with the Bush torture policies be indicted for war crimes, and prosecuted?  YES.  More on that next time.