- WATCH THE VIDEO FIRST.
Lengthy article
A prisoner was kneeling on the ground, blindfolded and handcuffed, when an Iraqi soldier walked over to him and kicked him in the neck. A US marine sergeant was watching and reported the incident, which was duly recorded and judged to be valid. The outcome: "No investigation required."
[...]
Other logs record not merely assaults but systematic torture. A man who was detained by Iraqi soldiers in an underground bunker reported that he had been subjected to the notoriously painful strappado position: with his hands tied behind his back, he was suspended from the ceiling by his wrists. The soldiers had then whipped him with plastic piping and used electric drills on him. The log records that the man was treated by US medics; the paperwork was sent through the necessary channels; but yet again, no investigation was required.
This is the impact of Frago 242. A frago is a "fragmentary order" which summarises a complex requirement. This one, issued in June 2004, about a year after the invasion of Iraq, orders coalition troops not to investigate any breach of the laws of armed conflict, such as the abuse of detainees, unless it directly involves members of the coalition. Where the alleged abuse is committed by Iraqi on Iraqi, "only an initial report will be made … No further investigation will be required unless directed by HQ".
Frago 242 appears to have been issued as part of the wider political effort to pass the management of security from the coalition to Iraqi hands. In effect, it means that the regime has been forced to change its political constitution but allowed to retain its use of torture.
The systematic viciousness of the old dictatorship when Saddam Hussein's security agencies enforced order without any regard for law continues, reinforced by the chaotic savagery of the new criminal, political and sectarian groups which have emerged since the invasion in 2003 and which have infiltrated some police and army units, using Iraq's detention cells for their private vendettas.
Hundreds of the leaked war logs reflect the fertile imagination of the torturer faced with the entirely helpless victim – bound, gagged, blindfolded and isolated – who is whipped by men in uniforms using wire cables, metal rods, rubber hoses, wooden stakes, TV antennae, plastic water pipes, engine fan belts or chains. At the torturer's whim, the logs reveal, the victim can be hung by his wrists or by his ankles; knotted up in stress positions; sexually molested or raped; tormented with hot peppers, cigarettes, acid, pliers or boiling water – and always with little fear of retribution since, far more often than not, if the Iraqi official is assaulting an Iraqi civilian, no further investigation will be required.
Most of the victims are young men, but there are also logs which record serious and sexual assaults on women; on young people, including a boy of 16 who was hung from the ceiling and beaten; the old and vulnerable, including a disabled man whose damaged leg was deliberately attacked. The logs identify perpetrators from every corner of the Iraqi security apparatus – soldiers, police officers, prison guards, border enforcement patrols.
There is no question of the coalition forces not knowing that their Iraqi comrades are doing this: the leaked war logs are the internal records of those forces.
There is no question of the allegations all being false. Some clearly are, but most are supported by medical evidence and some involve incidents that were witnessed directly by coalition forces.
The coalition's answer, laid out in Frago 242, is to find justice from the senior officers of the Iraqi security forces. It is to them that the coalition send their reports. But those reports suggest that senior officers frequently are part of the problem.
A police lieutenant whose men have been beating up three suspected drug dealers, is recorded as confiding to a US captain that "light beatings and the threat of beatings were often used to gain information from prisoners". A chief of police in Riyadh is confronted with evidence that numerous detainees have been abused by his men and that bloodstains and "suspected tools of torture" have been found in his own office: "He responded he was aware of the beatings and supported it as a method of conducting investigations."
In June 2009, coalition forces dealt with a prisoner who was bruised, shaken and tearful and who reported that a unit of Iraqi soldiers had beaten him on the soles of his feet and on his back and threatened him with sexual assault. The log continued: "This is not the first time that this battalion have been accused of alleged detainee abuse. There have been at least three previous accusations."
They then noted that on the very afternoon this latest alleged assault had occurred their own senior officers had been meeting the Iraqi brigade commanders who were responsible for this battalion and who claimed to have heard nothing about any detainee being abused. "Brigade has a duty to control their subordinate units; if they fail to do so, the alleged violence, if it is occurring at the battalion level, will undoubtedly continue."
And it does continue. With no effective constraint, the logs show, the use of violence has remained embedded in the everyday practice of Iraqi security, with recurrent incidents up to last December. Most often, the abuse is a standard operating procedure in search of a confession, whether true or false. One of the leaked logs has a detainee being beaten with chains, cables and fists and then confessing to involvement in killing six people because "the torture was too much for him to handle".
Sometimes, the abuse is simply rough justice. When police catch a suspected bomb maker, they beat him up and, according to the log, allow a crowd of local people to join them in doing so. When a group of 10 officers pick up three drunken lads who have been stealing bananas, they tie them up and batter them severely.
TL; DR: The US Armed Forces adopted an official policy of "we do not give a damn" and allowed torture to happen or facilitated it by assisting Iraqi Security Forces. General Petraeus' top man is implicated in this and it would not surprise me if Petraeus himself did not condone this. Turns out the claims by Iraqis of widespread abuse at the hands of coalition forces were not enemy propaganda. What is worse, the American forces were engaged in a systematic coverup of such activities, in clear defiance of the rules of war.
I wonder how members of the US armed forces feel considering that they are now part of an organization that is condoning and facilitating war crimes?
It is also clear now why the USA continues to oppose the International Criminal Court, because the very existence of this order would be proof enough to haul the entire US chain of command in front of it as war criminals.
EDIT: Title edited for accuracy.
