Whistleblower! - US Interrogator Confirms Routine Iraq Torture

[EuroObserver]

Original post by Levity, Dailykos.com – November 28, 2005

Here's a story that will disappear until bloggers start talking about it. Only PBS Frontline and Democracy Now! have dared to interview U.S. interrogator Tony Lagouranis, who reports widespread torture and abuse throughout Iraq.

He admits:
- frustrated US soldiers torture Iraqi families at length in their homes - including flesh burning, bone breaking, and ax attacks - with impunity
- no matter how obvious their innocence, detainees are always treated as guilty and sent to Abu Ghraib
- officers filed unfounded reports to bolster the claim that Fallujah dead were foreigners
- actually the Fallujah corpses included numerous women and children
- Lagouranis's multiple official abuse reports, ignored by CID and commanders for over a year, were suddenly re-filed after he appeared on Frontline
- torture has produced no useful intelligence, and efforts to legalize it are "the worst thing we could do"

This confirms not just detainee reports and Abu Ghraib evidence, but reports from U.S. soldiers like Sgt. Greg Ford and Capt. Ian Fishback, the West Point graduate who complained of murder and abuse condoned in Iraq - ignored by commanders, Senator Bill Frist, and many others for 17 months until he went public to Human Rights Watch. Fishback's letter was read by Dick Durbin and John McCain in the Senate the day the Anti-Torture Amendment passed 90-9.

Let's link, recommend, report, and hold the media accountable until every citizen knows what Lagouranis, Fishback, and our bravest soldiers are saying: we can't win this war of hearts and minds because in Iraq they know the truth - that our commanders have decided torture is OK.

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2005/11/28/151943/75

[EuroObserver]

1. Just in time to fix links! n/t

[90-percent]

2. Well

American Soldiers torturing and murdering and lynching innocent civilians?

Man, are we kicking ass or what! I am so proud my taxes support such actions. I hope we get decades of benefits from this!

Only logical reason for actions such as these is to motivate terrorists to nuke NYC so GWB can declare the martial law we all know he craves.

Could somebody please leak the governments secret plans for "Operation Northwoods for the 21st Century"?

-85%

[Richard Steele]

3. Kicked and recommended. How many witnesses do we need before...

...the American Media starts reporting this stuff?

THE REST OF THE WORLD ALREADY KNOWS,
so why can't the American Public be told?

[Hubert Flottz]

4. Every day Bush is catching up to Adolf and the GESTAPO and

the SS. The difference between the neocons and the Nazis is, that the Arab has become the Jew in the "New World Order," or the neocon's Fourth Reich.

[Monkey see Monkey Do]

5. kick

[Norquist Nemesis]

6. K&R n/t

[stop the bleeding]

7. K&R

[wiggs]

8. Deserving and worthwhile dupe

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=104&topic_id=5387361

[EuroObserver]

14. Aha, my apologies. Search didn't find it.

...And what about those 'other' Abu Ghraib photos, btw?

-see eg. The Pentagon's Secret Stash. Why we'll never see the second round of Abu Ghraib photos

<snip>

"The Pentagon realizes that it's images that sell the story," Aftergood says. "The reason that there is a torture scandal is because of those photographs. There can be narratives of things that are much worse, but if they aren't accompanied by photos, they somehow don't register....The Abu Ghraib photos are sort of the military equivalent of the Rodney King case....And I hate to attribute motives to people I don't know, but it is easy to imagine that the officials who are withholding these images have that fact in mind."

</snip>

-and eg. Speculation on the unreleased Abu Ghraib photographs

<snip>

In defiance of court orders <1>, the current U.S. administration refuses to release additional torture pictures and videos. The justification proffered is that the material on the photographs is so graphic that it would fuel additional hatred for the United States and put U.S. troops in harm's way. However, one is inclined to suspect a larger political motive for their actions.

<1> Kate Zernike, "Government defies an order to give up Iraq abuse photos," New York Times, July 23, 2005.

I would propose that some or all of the following may be behind the Administration's actions:

* The material on the photographs and videos is indeed, as Seymour Hersh, Donald Rumsfeld, Gen. Meyers, and various senators have described, so bad as to make milk curdle and children cry. Grotesque footage of the rape of little children and naked, bound prisoners being savaged by feral dogs is somewhat over the top.
* The security situation is so wretched in Iraq at the moment that the release would very likely plunge the country into civil war with a possible rout of the so-called coalition forces. If tens of thousands of Iraqis were to die over a few week span and if the U.S. casualties were to spike into the several thousands, it probably wouldn't play well in Peoria.
* The photos and videos imply knowledge and acceptance by the brass. These "leaders" had the good grace not to practice marital infidelity (an unforgivable offense, apparently), but rather, to permit and possibly condone torture and rape by and of those under their command. If any are drawn into this beyond the chosen NCO patsies, it would imply knowledge up the chain of command of the prison's activities and would signal a coverup. This would be at odds with Congressional testimony and would likely constitute impeachable offenses. Defending these charges in the media or the courts could prove to be an inconvenience for an embattled Administration trying to reclaim support for an unpopular war.

</snip>

[KansDem]

9. I bought Jimmy Carter's book "Endangered Values."

no matter how obvious their innocence, detainees are always treated as guilty and sent to Abu Ghraib

In it he writes that between 70-90 percent of (as I recollect) Abu Ghraib detainees are/were innocent civilians, and cites a "credible source" for these statistics (I've used the phrase "as I recollect" because I don't have the book in front of me as I type this so the number could be for all US prisons in Iraq. I also remember the "credible source" as an agency or organization whose public statements I would not be inclined to doubt). But the 70-90 percent is accurate as it is burned in my brain!

10. Kick

:kick:

[cantstandbush]

11. Send link to Congress now!!! Don't let them off the hook pleading

ignorance. They do have this intel.

[jackstraw45]

12. CALL Pelosi, Waxman, Byrd, Conyers, etc...

This man should TESTIFY at a hearing - even if it's in a basement.

[Karenina]

13. Kick!

:kick:

[FreedomAngel82]

15. Oh how horrible

:cry: So much for freedom in Iraq and things are going along swell.

[newyawker99]

16. kick

:kick:

[Joanne98]

17. It's not the troops doing this, It's the CONTRACTORS!

[Independent_Liberal]

18. Kick!

[enough]

19. kick

[gulfcoastliberal]

20. Rumsfeld the torture advocate. K&R

NT

[Nothing Without Hope]

21. K & R. Let's work to publicize this. n/t