Rumsfeld Backs Iraq Interrogation Methods

[lanlady]

WASHINGTON - Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld defended military interrogation techniques in Iraq on Wednesday, rejecting complaints that they violate international rules and may endanger Americans taken prisoner.

Rumsfeld told a Senate committee that Pentagon lawyers had approved methods such as sleep deprivation and dietary changes as well as rules permitting prisoners to be made to assume stress positions.

Gen. Richard Myers, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, also noted that the rules require prisoners to be treated humanely at all times.

But Sen. Richard Durbin, D-Ill. said some of the approved techniques "go far beyond the Geneva Convention," a reference to international rules governing the treatment of prisoners of war.

...more...

http://www.comcast.net/News/DOMESTIC//XML/1152_Cabinet/209ad233-0e12-4ab5-91bc-99625440962b.html

[zbird]

1. I am utterly speechless.

He needs to be impeached and brought up on war crimes charges NOW!

[taxidriver]

2. with republican control of the senate..

and cheney there to break a tie, it'll never happen. unfortunately. It never hurts to dream, though.

[zbird]

3. You are, unfortunately, correct about that.

What's even more unfortunate is that Bushco probably conducted a poll to see if that stance would hold up after the Berg execution and got a resounding yes.

[DarkPhenyx]

4. remember people.

He's backing the official methods. Not the crap we saw in the pictures.

[nolabels]

5. The other part of the story

Gen. Sanchez' Command OK'd Use of Dogs on Prisoners
by Mark Rothschild

The star witness before yesterday's Senate Armed Services Committee hearing was Army Maj. Gen. Antonio M. Taguba. Taguba carried out an investigation on the activities of the Army's 800th Military Police Brigade at Abu Ghraib prison. Afterward, he wrote a 6,000 page report, the summary of which was leaked to the press by Seymour M. Hersh and disclosed in the New Yorker magazine.

The full report is still so secret that the Pentagon has not even shown all of it to the Senators sitting on the Senate Armed Services Committee.
(snip)
The gun-toting Brigadier General Ricardo S. Sanchez, a native of the rough and tumble US/Mexico border region known to locals as "the valley," is the Commanding General in Iraq. Sanchez' order approving the use of dogs and the other methods was dated, October 19, 2003. But Sanchez, whose career must surely now be on the brink, was not the only official to be scathed by the revelation that specific written lists of "approved techniques" exist.

Under questioning by Senator Ted Kennedy, of Massachusetts, Undersecretary Cambone admitted that his boss, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld also has his own list of "approved techniques," saying that when interrogators at Guantanamo Bay want to surpass the severity of the techniques on Rumsfeld's list, the permission of the Secretary of Defense himself is required.

Some have wondered why the highest ranking officer or official to be implicated is US Brig. Gen. Janis Karpinski. Senator Bill Nelson asked Taguba, "Well, what's the highest ranking officer you interrogated?" Taguba answered, "Brigadier General Janis Karpinski." Nelson then asked if Taguba had interviewed Sanchez. Taguba replied, "No Sir." Pressed further on what other officers he investigated for his report he said simply, "Sir, none. I stopped at General Karpinski."
(snip)
http://www.antiwar.com/orig/rothschild.php?articleid=2559

[Moderator]

6. Please add your link and discuss this story here

Thanks

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=102x549655

[jpak]

7. Does Rumsfeld cast images in mirrors??? Is he repelled by garlic???

Soulless fucking bloodsucker.

All this is a direct consequence of ChimpCo's "we-don't-need-no-permission-slip" mindset and their blatantly racist attitudes toward Muslims in general and "A-rabs" in particular.

The fish rots from the head.