May 13-19, 2004

pretzel logic

Coulda, Woulda, Shoulda

by Howard Altman

The woman in Baghdad hears the denials and the gushing gasps of disgust emanating from the White House and wonders what world the Bush administration inhabits.

The abuse of Iraqi detainees was not the isolated work of a few degenerates freelancing torture without the knowledge of superiors, says the woman, who knows a thing or two about the subject.

Nearly a year ago, long before anyone in the United States had ever heard of Abu Ghraib or seen pictures of naked Iraqis stacked upon each other, Sheila Provencher and her fellow volunteers with the Christian Peacemakers Teams (CPT) were interviewing detainees with horror stories about being abused.

"I see that a lot of our government leaders are saying this is just a problem of a few people, but we have experienced it as a systemic problem," says Provencher, on the phone from Baghdad. "The sheer number of cases, from several different areas, shows that. And it’s not just the fact that it is so widespread. There is a problem in the military system of hierarchy, with fierce loyalty supporting the silence in this issue."

At first, says Provencher, CPT workers began hearing stories from Iraqis who wanted information about loved ones whisked away by coalition forces. As the organization, which is dedicated to pacifism, stepped in to help, they began hearing about problems at Abu Ghraib and elsewhere. By last summer, she says, the organization decided to shift its focus from strictly humanitarian work to documenting the abuse. CPT, she says, spent the fall interviewing detainees, their families, clerics and village leaders.

"We took testimony that reflected patterns of detainees being handcuffed for long hours in the sun without water, being threatened by dogs, sleep deprivation, food deprivation, sometimes beatings or rough treatment. It was standard practice to have people be hooded," says Provencher.

CPT compiled the interviews into a report, detailing a system of abuse including mistreatment of detainees, raids and detentions based on bad information, excessive use of force and property damage, confiscation of personal property and detention without explanation.

"CPT has voiced these concerns to commissioned officers, some who rank as high as colonel," the report states. "Some officers have listened to these concerns and agreed that the safety of every Coalition soldier is wrapped up in how Iraqis perceive the behavior of Coalition representatives. However, the problems these trends indicate largely stem from decisions made by policy-makers rather than field officers and soldiers …"

CPT’s "Report and Recommendations on Iraqi Detainees" was released in January and given to members of the Coalition Provisional Authority, the Department of Defense, the State Department and Congress.

"We presented this report on January 3 to Colonel Ralph Sabatino in the Iraqi Assistance Center," says CPT spokesman Gene Stoltzfus. He expressed interested in the report, but he clarified for us that the war in Iraq and prisoners in Iraq do not fall under the Geneva Conventions and the courts."

"On January 24, we presented this report to Ambassador Richard Jones -- deputy to Ambassador Paul Bremer -- and his staff," adds Stoltzfus. "That was also very polite conversation, with expressions of curiosity and interest, even suggestions that something needs to be done about these matters. But pretty much nothing happened after that."

This was months before major media reports -- first Sy Hersh, in The New Yorker, then 60 Minutes II -- turned the detainee issue into an international outrage that surprised and shocked the president and his secretary of defense.

Neither the State Department nor the Department of Defense returned phone calls seeking comment.

Discussions about the CPT report began taking place in Congress in March. CPT gave it to U.S. Sen. Richard Lugar, a Republican from Indiana and chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, in the beginning of April. But, while CPT officials describe Lugar’s office as extremely helpful on the matter, again, not much happened.

"It was a report in a sea of reports," says a Foreign Relations Committee senior staffer. "Coulda, woulda, shoulda dug deeper, dug harder, but you get so many of these reports."

At least one congressman, however, did dig a little deeper, a little harder.

Alerted to the issue by a constituent who -- along with some Philadelphians -- staged a hunger strike to protest the treatment of Iraqi detainees, Congressman Rush Holt, a Democrat from New Jersey, fired off a letter on Feb. 5 to Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld.

"I am concerned that CPA tactics designed to secure the region are in fact compromising the long-term interests of Iraqis, other internationals, and even the CPA," Holt wrote.

The response, from Thomas L. Carter, senior counselor to Ambassador Bremer, was dated March 22, but not delivered to Holt until after The New Yorker and CBS broke their stories.

Given how events have unfolded, Carter’s words would be comical if not for the horrendous nature of this situation that has cast shame on our nation.

"The Coalition has established the processes that afford all persons in Coalition custody all the rights and safeguards set out in applicable International Humanitarian Law requirements," Carter writes. "Regarding Security Internees, the processes that have been established include review and appeal mechanisms that exceed International Humanitarian Law requirements."

If we are exceeding international requirements, I would hate to see what happens if we just lived up to them.