Word: ghraib
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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Some observers in the military believe the nudity and sexual humiliations staged at Abu Ghraib are not all that different from the crude hazing and horseplay that are commonplace among servicemen. In his 2003 book Jarhead: A Marine's Chronicle of the Gulf War and Other Battles, author and former Marine Anthony Swofford describes how his unit staged a "field f___," a simulated mass rape of one Marine by others, to let off steam and entertain a visiting journalist. Says Swofford of the scenes at Abu Ghraib: "We can be assured that somewhere on American military bases throughout the world...
...other hand, some experts on torture deeply doubt that members of an MP company from a small town could have come up with something like the pose seen in one of the most infamous images from Abu Ghraib--one in which a hooded prisoner stands on a box with electrical wires connected to his arms and genitals. The photo could have been a textbook illustration of a classic torture method known as crucifixion, says Darius Rejali, an associate professor of political science at Reed College and author of Torture and Modernity. This kind of standing torture was used...
What fate awaits those accused from Abu Ghraib? If their cases proceed to trial, their guilt must be proved beyond a reasonable doubt. Rules of evidence in a court-martial are similar to those in the civilian system. But aside from capital crimes, it takes only a two-thirds majority of a jury "panel" (composed of at least five military members) to convict. The prisoner-abuse suspects could face decades behind bars if convicted. U.S. military officials plan to try them in Iraq to show Iraqis that U.S. law can be applied fairly on their turf. That alone...
...attacks on the battlefield and terrorist attacks at home. And no matter what anyone says, there is just no attractive way to extract information from people who don't want to give it. "This is tough, tough business," as Major General Geoffrey Miller, the new commanding officer at Abu Ghraib, told reporters last week...
Here is what the business looks like, separate and apart from the brutality documented at Abu Ghraib prison: since 9/11, according to U.S. officials and former prisoners, detainees under U.S. supervision in Iraq, Afghanistan and Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and at undisclosed other locations have been stripped naked, covered with hoods, deprived of sleep and light, and made to stand or sit in painful positions for extended periods. Some have been drugged. Sexual humiliation is not unheard of. Even the Federal Bureau of Prisons has lent a hand in this enterprise. According to a Justice Department inspector-general's report, Muslim...