Filing Cabinets

by hilzoy

This story is a few days old, but worth thinking about nonetheless:

"United States Special Operations troops employed a set of harsh, unauthorized interrogation techniques against detainees in Iraq during a four-month period in early 2004, long after approval for their use was rescinded, according to a Pentagon inquiry released Friday. (...)

Despite the findings, General Formica recommended that none of the service members be disciplined, saying what they did was wrong but not deliberate abuse. He faulted "inadequate policy guidance" rather than "personal failure" for the mistreatment, and cited the dangerous environment in which Special Operations forces carried out their missions."

So what, exactly, did they do? Here's an example:

"General Formica found that in the third case at a Special Operations outpost, near Tikrit, in April and May 2004, three detainees were held in cells 4 feet high, 4 feet long and 20 inches wide, except to use the bathroom, to be washed or to be interrogated. He concluded that two days in such confinement "would be reasonable; five to seven days would not." Two of the detainees were held for seven days; one for two days, General Formica concluded."

Spencer Ackerman has a suggestion:

"Take all the shelving out of a typical filing cabinet. (My own office cabinet happens to be slightly smaller than the cell described here.) Now lock yourself in it for two days. You may notice you can neither stand up straight nor lie down, and crouching gets really uncomfortable extremely fast. Remember that as an Iraqi detainee, the Geneva Conventions apply to you. Now ask yourself: Why would Formica consider such treatment "reasonable" for two days? And if someone put an American soldier in such conditions for two days--or authorized doing so--what should happen to that person?"

Good questions. I'm also curious about how holding someone in a cell this size for a week could possibly not count as 'deliberate abuse' or the result of a 'personal failure', why these techniques were ever approved to begin with, and whether the people who approved them will ever be brought to justice.

Comments

[SomeOtherDude]

Sounds like Formica is spreading liberty, what's wrong witrh that?

[Ugh]

There was a thread on Drum's place a few days ago where someone (I think it was "Red State Mike") kept insisting that this is no worse, and in fact better, than sitting in an airline seat. I think my head exploded a time or two.

[hilzoy]

Well, it isn't any worse than an airline seat, except for the part about not having a seat and having to stay there for seven days, and little things like that...

[Ugh]

Red State Mike was impervious to such inconvenient facts. It was a valiant effort, really.

[Gary Farber]

Well, after all, airlines don't even serve lemon chicken any more. So there you go.

[Paul]

General Formica? Oh, Christ. Not for the first time do I wish Joseph Heller was still alive.

[hilzoy]

I hate puns, but even I had to resist saying something about the Picture of Corian Gray, or something.

[Jesurgislac]

I'm also curious about ..... whether the people who approved them will ever be brought to justice.

Why be curious about that? You surely know they never will be. The US justice system has made clear that for Americans to actually torture other people isn't that much of a crime - not even when an American murders their torture victim. Not enough for a soldier to lose his pension over, at least. Or go to jail, goodness no.

Not even when the victim has the protection of the Geneva Conventions: the Conventions have been established by the US as not having the force of law in any war the US is fighting in.

If torturing and killing people is not much of a crime in the US, then recommending how Americans should go about torturing people cannot be much of a crime either.

So, why be curious? Be outraged, be shocked, be appalled, be angry - but there's no need to be curious.

[Harald Korneliussen]

I am reminded of L. Ron Hubbard, the founder of scientology, when he recalled his "fair game" order. He wrote a short notice saying, essentially, we won't do that any longer: "The practice of declaring people FAIR GAME will cease."

And then he added "This [...] does not cancel any policy on the treatment or handling [of a scientology critic]".

I think the troops got the message in much the same way.

[Dianne]

Well, it isn't any worse than an airline seat, except for the part about not having a seat and having to stay there for seven days, and little things like that...

Not to mention that, with the exceptions of takeoff, landing, and turbulence, you can get out of an airplane seat whenever you want to.

[tree2]

Isn't this sweet? You guys are so concerned with the torture and killing of your fellow soldier citizens.

But, hey... let's don't question your partiotism.

Hilzoy focuses like a laser beam on the issues she cares about.

If only we could harness all this energy spent fighting Bush and focus it on the Islamic murders and oppressors of women and gays... they might already be defeated.

[Bruce Baugh]

Tree2, you'll have to take that up with your Commander in Chief, who said that he doesn't think much about the mastermind of the murder of 3,000 Americans and who walks hand-in-hand with the primary funders of the militant faction of Islam that produced most of Al Qaeda's recruits. If he ever decides that he'd like to do something about the people responsible for Americans suffering and dying, a bunch of us would gladly join in.

[Slartibartfast]

Hilzoy, like a goodly chunk of the blogosphere, writes about that which tickles her muse, to to speak. The soldiers have been amply written about elsewhere, so there are more than enough places one can read about that episode.

I doubt, though, that hilzoy feels anything much more gleeful than deep sadness over their deaths. Mindreading, sure, but hilzoy doesn't strike me as the sort that gets all triumphal about that sort of thing.

I haven't run into anyone like that, thank goodness.

Sebastian, von and Charles have been silent on this issue as well; is it your contention that the right and center-right are chuckling gleefully over this? Or otherwise neglecting it?

[Phil]

If only we could harness all this energy spent fighting Bush and focus it on the Islamic murders and oppressors of women and gays

The oppressors of women and gays? You want us to fight the Republican Party?