Pentagon Seeks Better Grip on Detainee Policy

[maddezmom]

By Will Dunham

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Pentagon (news - web sites), embroiled in a scandal over prisoner abuse, will form a new office to coordinate detainee policy and make sure Red Cross reports are seen at high levels, a senior official said on Friday.



Christopher "Ryan" Henry -- principal deputy under secretary of defense for policy -- did not announce any changes in the way the U.S. military holds and interrogates foreign prisoners but said previously scattered functions would be consolidated under one roof.


The moves follow revelations of abuse of Iraqi prisoners at the Abu Ghraib jail near Baghdad, investigations into deaths of dozens of prisoners held by the U.S. military in Iraq (news - web sites) and Afghanistan (news - web sites) and questions over the treatment of detainees at the U.S. naval base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.


As part of changes ordered by Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, reports from the Geneva-based International Committee of the Red Cross on U.S. detention facilities will go to key Pentagon policymakers rather than staying with commanders in the field, Henry said. The office will review ICRC reports and inform Rumsfeld, he said.

~snip~
more: http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=586&ncid=586&e=3&u=/nm/20040716/wl_nm/iraq_usa_prisoners_dc

[FlashHarry]

1. Great. More bureaucracy.

How long will that take to be implemented? They're just covering their asses for the horrors to come. WMD, al Qaeda connection... We're saving the Iraqis from Saddam's torture machine. So, remind me; why did we go to war?

[lovuian]

2. Yes a New Office Far Far Away in Another Galaxy!!!

So Far Away from the Pentagon and Rumsfeld & President

[gratuitous]

3. What were they "thinking"?

And I suspect I'm being generous in characterizing this whole fiasco as just botched "thinking."

Did they think no one would be captured? I can't believe that.

So they didn't have a coherent policy in place before they captured anyone? That's remotely possible, I suppose, but still stretches credulity.

Isn't anybody in the military command familiar with the Geneva Conventions? Their own code of military justice? Basic humanity and decency? I think we're still outside the realm of a credulous assertion.

So why is this necessary? Who's responsible in the chain of command? Has anyone at command level been dismissed, reprimanded, demoted or court martialed?

Golly, I wish this wasn't being done in my name with my tax dollars. I'd greatly prefer to be providing health care, or AIDS assistance funding, or clean water, or free education, or any of about a million other things that would fight terrorism more effectively and for less money.