Torture is Not American

Retired General Barry McCaffrey spoke out on the PRI Show "Here and Now" yesterday and forcefully expressed his disapproval of reports of captured suspects in the war on terror being repeatedly subjected to torture. Even though in the past such abominations have taken place in other wars--notably just off the battlefield by lower-ranks of individual, the government prosecuted those Americans who did terrorize and humiliate and attack chained up prisoners. (And continued to prosecute them in the wake of the scandals at Abu Gahib prison in Iraq in 2003-04).

But now it appears certain practices of torture are a normal bureaucratic procedure by CIA flying squads or military intelligence units: they include prolonged slapping upside the head of detainees , waterboarding (simulated drowning), subjecting detainees to freezing temperatures in special cold cells and chained to the floor in cells to sit in their own filth.

And all the while,despite the reports of special CIA "black sites" in Eastern Europe and the rendition policy of deporting nationals from Germany and Canada to other "friendly" nations in the Middle East which practice torture, the Bush Administration says we do not torture captured suspects or "enemy combatants". But it is clear from the hearings in Congress involving former Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, and others who have contradicted the former AG's testimony, that the Executive Branch has been doing just that. Gonzalez leaked "torture memo" and other documents reported in the New York Times and other media make it clear our government has crossed a line that American intelligence officers didn't cross even when dealing with the Nazi big shots in secret intelligence camps in World War II.

"It's like a grade-B Nazi movie," McCaffrey said, referring to the policies that include torture and spying on Americans without any judicial oversight.

McCaffrey is not a "Ivory Tower" academic, although he now teaches at West Point and is a on-air military consultant at NBC News. He was in Vietnam as a combat officer and went through part of Robert McNamara's meat-grinder during that long war. He also has a son currently serving as a combat combat either in Iraq or Afghanistan (he, understandably doesn't say which country his son is in. )

McCaffrey strikes me as a guy who knows a quagmire when he sees it and stated his case well against a major long-term US troop presence in Iraq both on the radio program and in the article below:

http://www.projo.com/news/content/mcCaffrey_Iraq_10-10-07_4H7EBFO.339afcc.html

It's interesting that it took a GOP stalwart like John McCain, the only presidential candidate who was tortured (as a POW in Hanoi), to get a law through Congress banning the sort of barbarity Mr Gonzales tried to rationalize. Prez Bush signed the bill, but I wonder given recent reports if the White House is actually living up to the law.