http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2004/...in614063.shtml
Apparently Saddam practiced a nastier brand of torture, not the cuddly amerikkkan type.
Link to pictures is above the pic of the general.
Printable View
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2004/...in614063.shtml
Apparently Saddam practiced a nastier brand of torture, not the cuddly amerikkkan type.
Link to pictures is above the pic of the general.
Well, I dunno why any1 finds it surprising that US troops would flout the geneeva convention in this way tbh. They broke a few international lawas when they started this invasion. Our forces are just as guilty tho, same thing happened end of last year when it came out about them hanging an iraqi soilder froma forklift truck and taking pictures of themselves standing next to him. IIRC the woman in the processing shop developed the photos of them and called the police.
Its just one disaster to the next with this war.
I don't think you can read too much into this. It's very easy to say that this is another addition to the pile of antiwar and antibush sentiment but at the end of the day you have 6 soldiers out of 140,000 that have done this. If you infer from this that all American soldiers are torturing xenophobes then you're no better than the people who say all Asylum seekers are scroungers.
Well said that man.Quote:
Originally Posted by GreenPiggy
I agree too - locking up people in Saddam's old torture prison, taking pictures of them thinking they'll be electrocuted if they fall off a box while blindfolded, making them pose for pictures as if they are having sex with other prisoners...Quote:
Originally Posted by GreenPiggy
Heck - they must feel right at home
They must Thank God Saddam has gone....
As usual american's think they are so great. The geneva convention and intenational law doesn't apply to them.
How about this then?
http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.j...9§ion=news
I thought this part was particularly telling:
"God willing, the day will come when bodies of Americans and Jews will be dragged, humiliated and trampled in the Arabian peninsula, them and their tyrants and allies. The day will come, God willing, when we will destroy their bases over their heads and kick them out of our land," one statement by Muqrin said."
Now, a few Americans, very few...
http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.j...toryID=5018315
...may have crossed the line and humiliated some Iraqi troops - we all agree that's wrong, and all superiors and supporters of the troops in general, condemn that action. Where though are the Islamic voices of condemnation of such actions as posted here? More than that, where are the voices of the mainstream Arab and/or Islamic leaders?
I'm suprised people are shocked by this kinda thing tbh, soldiers need to have a certain, erm mental and ethical disposition in order to get the job done, however unPC that disposition is....
This means that they do and will in the future do things to get there kicks/buzzes etc....
not all of it. the 1977 articles of the geneva conventions have not been ratified by the USA, and do not apply.Quote:
Originally Posted by Twigman
http://deoxy.org/wc/wc-proto.htm for the full text of that
Well at least they are honest about what thay plan to do to retain their 'Freedom'.Quote:
Originally Posted by Galant
Exactly soldiers are only normal people who have been given the power to kill. And as we all know humans will do some pretty nasty things to each other if given half a chance.Quote:
Originally Posted by [GSV]Trig
The fact that people seem so surprised that American or British soldiers are capable of such things shows that we have some kind of fake superiority complex. People seem to think that 'we' would never do things like that.
The recent set of pictures of British soldiers torturing one iraqi have been proven to be fake...
Not to say it doesn't happen, but the anti-war mob have a lot to answer for...
Not talking about the pics of British soldiers, they are the pics of US soldiers.
Where is the proof they are not real? (pics of brits I mean.)
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/3681059.stm
Yeah the way the "anti-war mob" insist on torturing prisoners and cluster-bombing villages is disgusting.
No this is not what I said, that is what you choose to infer, interesting though the way your thinking works when you see my post. Anyway my point is that Saddam was allegedly removed for the same human rights abuses being perpetrated right now in Iraq by the "alleged" liberators, although I always knew that was a crock of shi*.Quote:
Originally Posted by GreenPiggy
The British army by the way according to Amnesty International has the best and most modern torture of anyone, they had lots of practice in Carrick.
I wouldn't start down that route as I think the Pro-war camp has a hell of a lot more to answer for.Quote:
Originally Posted by TeePee
I simply don't think it's valid to compare the two in the same breath. Like I said, we have 6 soldiers whose actions have been widely condemned by everyone and are probably going to be severely punished for their actions compared with a regime who happily tortured and killed millions of people.Quote:
Originally Posted by Blub2k
I don't think it should be brought into the wider argument of the rights and wrongs of the whole thing. It's an isolated incident and should be treated as such.
Quote:
Originally Posted by GreenPiggy
I'm sorry that is apologist tripe you are talking, this IS part of the occupation and you will not talk it into anything else. It is not an isolated incident, did you see the pics of the Iraqis hanging in scramble nets from the forklift?
The title of your thread is "support this? You should be ashamed!"
No-one is supporting this.
The soldiers concerned are being dealt with.
It's not as if George is saying "tut tut boys" wink wink and sending them back to get on with it.
It just seems like people want to use this to get on the back of the governments for political gain. If their response to it is correct, where is the problem?
The US and the British government have done something extremely cynical by employing civilian contractors in Iraq to circumvent the Geneva convention yet you can claim that it is only a few of them. tschah is all I say to that.
What does that have to do with soldiers abusing Iraqi prisoners?
Because the contractors are working alongside the soldiers and have set a precedent for them to follow, I can only assume from your answer just now that you have not gone further than the headlines and actually read up on this.
Read this:Quote:
Originally Posted by GreenPiggy
http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story...208259,00.html
and this thread:
http://forums.hexus.net/showthread.php?t=18802
I know there are US contractors in Abu Ghraib prison Blub.
Whether a US court martial or something else, the contractors and the troops will be dealt with.Quote:
Originally Posted by DaBeeeenster's article
It's ridiculous to say that the contractors are only over there so that they can torture people with no fear of the Geneva convention.
Like I said in post 16, this has happened twice. Everyone has condemned it and the authorities will deal with those responsible. Seems like a perfectly correct response to me. What is the problem here?
Sure if there are more reports of this or if the contracters go unpunished then fine, go nuts, but I just think your current "I told you so" position is incorrect.
Well you may think it is ricidulous but personally I think they are there to circumvent Geneva as I am not as trusting of the UK or US governments as you seem to be. Dont forget your government occupied this country in a dirty war for years and this is in the ha'penny place compared to what they are capable of.
The revisions are only happening since they were caught, before that they thought they would get away with it.
They have done the same with "Gitmo" bay where they are also trying to circumvent the law.
And I say this has not happened just once anyway, did you not see the pictures of the prisoners that the Brits were hanging in cargo nets???
The position might make sense if it was targeted abuse - eg trying to get information out of prisoners. But these pictures on the face of it just seem to be for the soldiers own amusement. Are you really saying that the governments would go to all the trouble of finding a way to circumvent the Geneva convention just to humiliate a few people.
It makes no sense, especially in an election year when Iraq is probably the defining issue.
Terribly sorry, post edited. That was 11 months ago. I think 2 reports in a year is hardly evidence of systematic abuseQuote:
Originally Posted by Blub2k
GreenPiggy. you say that "this has happened twice". That's not quite accurate is it? As far as we know, this has happened AT LEAST once. The UK photos are of dubious authenticity.
The point is that these are the only photos that have made it to the news media. How can you be certain that this is not happening up and down Iraq? I'm not saying it is, I'm just saying that I dont know if it is not. See what I mean?
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/05/04/in...st/04CONT.html
Hardly being strung up, is it?Quote:
WASHINGTON, May 3 — More than two months after a classified Army report found that two contract workers were implicated in the abuse of Iraqis at a prison outside Baghdad, the companies that employ them say that they have heard nothing from the Pentagon, and that they have not removed any employees from Iraq
For one of the employees, the Army report recommended "termination of employment" and revocation of his security clearance. For the other, it urged an official reprimand and review of his security clearance.
But J. P. London, chief executive of CACI, one of the companies involved, said in an interview on Monday that "we have not received any information or direction from the client regarding our work in country — no charges, no communications, no citations, no calls to appear at the Pentagon."
It is targetted abuse they use contractors to interrogate prisoners cos their soldiers are not allowed to and it appears that some soldiers got caught up in the "festivities".
I am not saying that it is to humiliate a few people, it is the method they are using to gather intelligence from the captured prisoners and using them to circumvent the convention on human rights.
The contractors are working in a legal black hole.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story...208259,00.htmlQuote:
Normally, an individual's crimes would then fall under the local nation's laws. But there are no established Iraqi legal institutions - that is why we are running their prisons in the first place - and, in any case, coalition regulations explicitly state that contractors don't fall under them. In turn, because the acts were committed abroad, and also reportedly involve some contractors who are not US citizens, the application of US law is problematic. As one military lawyer said: "There is a dearth of doctrine, procedure, and policy."
This leaves a vacuum. Phillip Carter, a former US army officer now at UCLA Law School, notes: "Legally speaking, they [military contractors] fall into the same grey area as the unlawful combatants detained at Guantánamo Bay."
I can't. What i said at the top of the post was that I hope people don't take this as evidence that this is official policy or portraying the US troops in the way we've become accustomed to.Quote:
Originally Posted by DaBeeeenster
My only position here is that all these people whether they be Troops or contracters be held responsible for their actions. If, as DaBeeeeenster suggests this is not happening in the case of the contracters then something needs to be done about it.
I don't buy into the theory that the contracters are there specifically for that purpose.
I dont think the contractors were there SPECIFICALLY for that reason, but I think the US was aware of the legal situation when they started outsourcing jobs like that.
I mean, really, Uutsourcing of Prison Interrogation Officer! It's absurd.
I think this sort of thing is going on a lot more than we hear about.
Well we will agree to differ on that one, I am more of a cynic and believe their specific purpose there is to work in the legal " black-hole" that Beenster describes.(not necessarily as torturers, but they definitely had it in mind)
What do the US/UK care about legality anyway? Blair should be tried ffs never mind soldiers on the ground.
when people are saying that it is only 6 amerikkkan troops doing the torture, how can you be sure it was only 6? many, many more incidents may/have occured but have never been brought to light. if anything does occur in the future, it aint likely for it to come to light anymore. i mean, take that Guantanamo (sp?) Bay place, the way the prisoners are kept and treated borders on torture anyway. held without charge for crimes the 'authorities' either invent or embellish to get a prosecution. how many innocents could be held there at this point in time?! they are not allowed access to a lawyer, no contact with family or friends and kept and treated like animals. that is torture.
and as for what has just been revealed in the papers; when i saw the pictures it made me feel physically sick, i had to fight it back. how can forces who claim to be liberating the country have any authority over them after it has been shown there are ulterior (sp?) motives for this. oil and power seem to have taken over from the original invented 'mission objectives' of peace and liberation. these people are being treated worse than they would have been under Saddam. the sooner the occupation ends and the Iraqi's are left to resolve the problems caused by the invasion in their country in their own way, the better it will be for everyone.
the yanks fail to see that they are not being attacked by terrorists in Iraq, they are being attacked by people trying to defend their own country and way of life. the amerikkkans hold their way of life so proudly, with their so-called 'land of the free', they fail to see other nations also desire freedom to act in their own way, be it free from western ideals or values. i'm pretty damn sure that in the very rare situation of the UK being taken over by yanks, a lot of people here would attack them too to defend our way of life. cultural differences is a phrase bush has probably never heard.
sorry for the rant and goin a bit off-topic, but this is a subject i hold passionately to my heart.
peace.
http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.j...7§ion=newsQuote:
Originally Posted by GreenPiggy
Quote:
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Two Iraqi prisoners were murdered by Americans and 23 other deaths are being investigated in Iraq and Afghanistan, the United States revealed on Tuesday as the Bush administration tried to contain growing outrage over the abuse of Iraqi detainees.
"The actions of the soldiers in those photographs are totally unacceptable and un-American," Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said of humiliating images in the media of Iraqi prisoners. "Any who engaged in such action let down their comrades who serve honorably each day and they let down their country."
Army officials said the military had investigated the deaths of 25 prisoners held by American forces in Iraq and Afghanistan and determined that an Army soldier and a CIA contractor murdered two prisoners. Most of the deaths occurred in Iraq.
An official said a soldier was convicted in the U.S. military justice system of killing a prisoner by hitting him with a rock, and was reduced in rank to private and thrown out of the service but did not serve any jail time.
The official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said a private contractor who worked for the CIA was found to have committed the other homicide against a prisoner.
hey!
isn't there this great court in iraq being set up for the trial of some guy who violated the human rights of iraqis & killed a bunch of them?
isn't that the most appropriate course fo action for those responsible? anything less might be considered hypocritical.
:shocked2: :shocked2: :shocked2: