Hersh: Children sodomized at Abu Ghraib, on tape

Originally posted by jd140Been to Iraq twice and have met very few, maybe 10 in my two tours who didn't appreciate what we have done for them.

Seriously, do you really think they are going to tell you they resent you? Heck no, the ones that REALLY resent you are going to smile and say "Thank you Sir". They won't waste their words, or risk being labeled "insurgents", they know action and support of the Mujahadeen means far more than wasting words on the enemy.

In the name of Allah (S.W.T), The Most Gracious, The Most Merciful. May Allah incur his wrath on all those who are responsible. First they frame us for 9/11. Then they invade and occupy our lands, killing millions upon millions of innocent blood. And steal all our resources. May Allah raise the curtains that these cowards hide behind. May Allah punish them in this life and the next for all of eternity. I always cry when I hear/see these injustices. But THIS is crossing the line. The worst part is I can't do nothing about it except feel in my heart. But then I tell myself don't worry. All those killed innocent are martyrs. Remember this with every breath you take that one day you will die. It's not about when you die, it's how you die. I hope to God they release those photos to the public so everyone can see the truth. I don't care if the establishment burns to the ground. With me in it. I don't care. By a man dying for what he believes in, he teaches men how to live. Send me to a concentration camp. Torture me. Suicide is forbidden upon me, but I yearn for death. As much as I hate this world, I must still live it till my last breath. But it's my brothers and sisters who suffer. No water. Their environment contaminated with depleted uranium. Birth defects. Living as second class citizens in their own lands. Apartheid governments. They don't need fancy cars, fat house and a bitch on the side. They need food and shelter. We live in a dream. They live in reality. Ameen.

reply to post by usamaizm


Realize in all likelihood the actual RAPISTS are in fact Iraqi's. That means Muslim by birth.

The Quran states clearly what happens to rapists, not so sure what happens to those that watch and allow. Are you? If you are hating on Americans just realize in this case the ones Allah will punish for the TRUE crime of rape will not likely be Americans.


Allah realizes this is not black and white, there are good people and evil people on BOTH sides. He sees all. He judges fairly. Trust his judgement more than your own emotion.

Originally posted by LDragonFire
I do wonder why Obama would go so far to protect the last administration, other than if these photos where to be release the world would demand justice, and that justice would come at the end of a rope!

I guess these children were terrorist and we should just ignore this?

He's "protecting" the former administration because he knows that his administration will be continuing to torture at Bagram!
Obama will not do anything because he doesn't want to be in a similar position in the future.

Close Guantanamo Bay but expand Bagram. I'm sorry but it's really just business as usual.

Originally posted by deessellClose Guantanamo Bay but expand Bagram. I'm sorry but it's really just business as usual.

Yeah it is business as usual. Either Bagram or handing them over to various friendly dictator regimes. Shooting them in the head and martyring them would be kinder than sending them to some of those hell holes. But this isn't about what is kind.

They should just send the prisoners to their home countries free and clear (as in declare they are officially proven innocent and set them free). We have created a million insurgents since we caught those few, release them into the wild, they have suffered enough.


[edit on 16-5-2009 by Sonya610]

Yep! this seems to support the theory WHY Obama reversed his decision this week to release the photos.

May 13, 2009 at 18:20:40

"Sadistic....Violent....Inhuman"

They must be horrific. So violent, in fact, so obscene, so counter to even the basic tenets of human decency that President Barack Obama sought today to block the release of hundreds of photos showing prisoners in Iraq and Afghanistan being abused, violated, tortured. He ordered this reversal of his position -- he had been in favor of the decision to release this further evidence of war crimes committed under orders from George W. Bush and Dick Cheney -- after military commanders warned that the images could inflame anti-American sentiment and endanger U.S. troops.

But, it is far worse than that. The reality is this: Anti-American sentiment could not be more "inflamed" than it already is in the Middle East, Afghanistan, and Pakistan. Our policy of indiscriminate bombing after the location of a "target" has been determined has caused the deaths of hundreds of men, women and children in both Pakistan and Afghanistan. Our policies of providing weapons of terror -- such as white phosphorous, concussion bombs, advanced jet fighters, massive tanks bristling with the power to annihilate anything in its path, explosives packed in cases made of depleted uranium -- to be used by Israel against an utterly defenseless Palestinian population is known throughout the Middle East, throughout the world, except, of course, here in the U.S.

No, the release of the photos and videos in question would do more than "inflame anti-American sentiment and endanger U.S. troops." If we are to believe reports that began circulating four years ago, reports from investigative journalists such as Seymour Hersh, their release would unleash a wave of anti-American hatred that would endanger the lives of not just U.S. soldiers, but the lives of all Americans, civilians as well as military personnel. Hersh, who helped uncover the scandal, said in a speech before an ACLU convention:

"Some of the worse that happened that you don't know about, ok? Videos, there are women there. Some of you may have read they were passing letters, communications out to their men ... The women were passing messages saying 'Please come and kill me, because of what's happened.' Basically what happened is that those women who were arrested with young boys/children in cases that have been recorded. The boys were sodomized with the cameras rolling. The worst about all of them is the soundtrack of the boys shrieking that your government has. They [the Bush Crime Family] are in total terror it's going to come out."

At today's White House press briefing, press secretary Robert Gibbs told reporters that the president was concerned that the photos' release would pose a national security threat. In other words, these unreleased photos and videos

show acts of degeneracy so vile there is no way they can be explained or rationalized. They contain images of children -- some of them the children of detainees -- being raped and sodomized as a means of forcing confessions from the adult detainees that would provide the links between Saddam Hussein and al-Quaeda that Dick Cheney and George W. Bush insisted were the basis of their orders to invade and occupy Iraq.

Children of detainees being raped and sodomized as a means of obtaining confessions. In testimony before Congress five years ago no less a war criminal than the murderous former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said the unrevealed photos and videos contain acts "that can only be described as blatantly sadistic, cruel and inhuman."

Two months ago, Hersh, speaking at the University of Minnesota, said the following in trying to reveal yet more of the incredible depravity and lawlessness of Dick Cheney:

"After 9/11, I haven't written about this yet, but the Central Intelligence Agency was very deeply involved in domestic activities against people they thought to be enemies of the state. Without any legal authority for it. They haven't been called on it yet. That does happen. Right now, today, there was a story in the New York Times that if you read it carefully mentioned something known as the Joint Special Operations Command - JSOC it's called. It is a special wing of our special operations community that is set up independently. They do not report to anybody, except in the Bush-Cheney days, they reported directly to the Cheney office. They did not report to the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff or to Mr. [Robert] Gates, the secretary of defense. They reported directly to him.

"... Congress has no oversight of it. It's an executive assassination ring essentially, and it's been going on and on and on. Just today in the Times there was a story that its leaders, a three star admiral named [William H.] McRaven, ordered a stop to it because there were so many collateral deaths. "Under President Bush's authority, they've been going into countries, not talking to the ambassador or the CIA station chief, and finding people on a list and executing them and leaving. That's been going on, in the name of all of us."

[Note: The former head of JSOC -- Lt. General Stanley McChrystal was named this week to replace Gen. David McKiernan as U.S Commander and Commander of NATO forces in Afghanistan.]

Torture conducted by the CIA. The rape and sodomizing of children. Sending detainees to countries whose methods of torture are medieval in their scope and techniques. Assassination squads that answered only to Dick Cheney. This was your country. This was your country in the grip of a madman. This is your country trying desperately to deny, to hide, to bury, the evidence of war crimes on a massive scale.

www.mikemalloy.com

Mike Malloy is a former writer and producer for CNN (1984-87) and CNN-International (2000). His professional experience includes newspaper columnist and editor, writer, rock concert producer and actor. He is the only radio talk show host in America to have received the A.I.R (Achievement in Radio) Award in both Chicago and New York City, the number three and number one radio markets in the country

www.opednews.com...

World citizens!

Do you think these men responsable should go free?

[edit on 16-5-2009 by Chevalerous]

Truly disgusting and I am apalled by Obama's response and he sure looks like he is no different than the previous administration.

It's all speculation and conjecture there is no proof of anything other than the photos in question have never been released to the public and they are from investigations into alleged abuses inside Abu Ghraib.

For Usamaizn, Does your heart bleed every time a suicide bomber bombs a market? If we would have killed half of the civilians that they do we would have been forced out of Iraq by now. Saddam was murdering them before we got there and Al-qaeda will be doing it after we leave.

whats new , people been saying for the last 7 years ? that the U.S policy of freedom deliverance is bogus , and if anything just plain genocide.

"enforcing our freedom where ever we may be"

could be the new motto for u.s of a.

i dont mean to be a rude person but the endless supply of shait that comes from your own people and goverment is phenomenol.

i mean, while the world sits and ponder "will it ever end" you guys just keep on coming up with more ,

theres a saying " like the restroom , like the bar "

i was acturly looking forward for the total collape of the usa, i mean what better final streak for a country that went to wars un justefied , almost , just almost caused a global economic collaps and then the collaps of a federation or what ever kind of political and national system you ve got over there ,

3 strikes and your out ,

not knowing is one thing ,
knowing and turning a blind eye aginst it is another

50+ years of u.s war mongering has only lead the world to nothing but atrocities and poo.

Originally posted by TheEndofEvolution
It's all speculation and conjecture there is no proof of anything other than the photos in question have never been released to the public and they are from investigations into alleged abuses inside Abu Ghraib.

For Usamaizn, Does your heart bleed every time a suicide bomber bombs a market? If we would have killed half of the civilians that they do we would have been forced out of Iraq by now. Saddam was murdering them before we got there and Al-qaeda will be doing it after we leave.

Are you one of them who still support these kind of actions and torture?

People who do this should be ashamed of themselves in front of the whole world.

If you think all this is speculation? in that case I feel very sorry for you and your soul!

Seymore Hersh, Donald Rumsfeld and Sen. Lindsey Graham - all three of them confirm the content of the video & photo material with almost the same words, just look a few pages back and make your own conclusion about this horrendous crime against the humanity!

Even Obama understand the ramifications of this photos so he reversed his decision this week, and will now not release them to ACLU.

But you are still in denial?

Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., told reporters, "The American public needs to understand we're talking about rape and murder here. we're not just talking about giving people a humiliating experience."

People who deny these horrible crimes must be really depraved souls!

I keep hearing people expressing the idea that somehow, because there are suicide bombers, sadistic leaders, oppressive regimes, that we need to legitimize torture.

It seems more punitive than exploratory to me. And there's no doubt that drugs are equally effective. Given the choice, why do our 'patriots' choose to dehumanize themselves? Ritualistic abuse can not seriously be contended as the more effective means to achieve the goals they claim to be after.

Originally posted by Sonya610

Originally posted by jd140Been to Iraq twice and have met very few, maybe 10 in my two tours who didn't appreciate what we have done for them.

Seriously, do you really think they are going to tell you they resent you? Heck no, the ones that REALLY resent you are going to smile and say "Thank you Sir". They won't waste their words, or risk being labeled "insurgents", they know action and support of the Mujahadeen means far more than wasting words on the enemy.

Spoken like a person who has never been there.

Believe a reporter or believe a person who has been there. I really don't care which one you choose. Your opinion on the subject is insignificant to me.

This is absolutely horrible and sickening. Like an earlier poster said go all the way up the line of command and presecute everyone of these sick bastards.

Originally posted by mopusvindictus

Once again a person who can't read

dO YOU always assume someone can't read when they ask you to elaborate on your rants?

At the bottom of my post I said very clearly...

I was a moron about this too... we all were

about "this?" just what is it you are calling "this"

all I'm saying is stop talking sh and wake up, it's going to be UGLY now to get rid of this and if you don't do something NOW it's going to be too late to do it ever.

Again, you refer to "this"? what is "this" so that I know what you are talking about specifically, what exactly, is "this"

No... not only didn't I say a word I cheered it on because I was at 9-11 on the Brooklyn Bridge and when I watched MY FRIENDS DIE,

and you "cheered it on? what did you "cheer about"

I was mental over what I saw right in front of my face for a long time and i'm pretty pissed I was obviously duped by emotion

I can understand. but how were you "duped" by your emotion?

I'm one of the biggest American patriots alive...

is that so.

How would I be able to say these words dead on if they didn't fool me too?

I am still trying to understand your "dead on" words that fooled you too.

I guess if they fooled YOU, what chance do I have they wouldn't fool me.

You don't have to respond, I simply want to save you the time explaining what even you admit, you don't understand.

while most of you are still in denile about what happend , theres about 4million iraqie kids with out parents , about 2-4 million dead civilians , and about the same ammount on the run from their home country because of faked documents that lead to an unjustefied war about wmd,


all i can say is that my children will not read your history books.


whats even funnier is that " god " told bush to wipe out the birth place of "god"

its almost as if i hear stichin in the next room shouting " i made it all up , puor me an other one"

shame on you




[edit on 16-5-2009 by zerbot565]

reply to post by Chevalerous


Pump your brakes champ. I don't condone torture, I think it's for cowards. We aren't talking about torture though we are talking about something far worse. All I ask for is proof, something other than a passing remark by a liberal journalist and a remark from a congresswoman, none of which match the title of this thread. None of which are proof.

Originally posted by HunkaHunka
Here is the compromise.


I too feel that these pictures don't necessarily need to be released... not just yet.

It truly would radicalize many... many who might even be us.

However, the people responsible, from the top down should be brought to trial and the recordings used in that court.

Once the trials have been had, and the sentences passed down, then release them.

If we have convicted people on this and justice has prevailed, then it will be merely a very sad day in American history, but one that Justice has been served for.

However, if there are no convictions, and the pictures are indeed that horrific... I pray for all of us.

I agree completely with this solution. As a matter of fact it is the best idea I saw on the thread.

Whether or not one believes that Timothy McVeigh was the sole person responsible for Oklahoma City is not the issue with the point I am going to try to make so please don't badger me with it was an inside job responses as I believe that too. This is merely for comparative purposes.

Let's assume that McVeigh was the person responsible. If one single person had been prosecuted at Waco, Oklahoma City would have never happened. Instead, they make this big point to make McVeigh the public enemy and NOT ONE SINGLE PERSON ever aid, "Hey this was done on the anniversary of Waco and by a person with ties to the group, I wonder if this was a case of retaliation." We learned nothing from that lesson (most likely because it WAS an inside job, but that's a discussion for another thread entirely).

So let's move forward in time to fall of 2001. Supposed terrorists fly planes into our twin towers, what is the first thing we do? Retaliate. This is the natural response when someone kills your people. Sadly enough our government has not learned this very basic and simple lesson. With all the supposed intellect in Washington, I wonder how many more times the same scenario must play out before someone develops cognitive thought.

What would any of us do if someone tortured our kids or murdered them? Would you just sit back and let it go? You can pretty much expect some very serious retaliation if there is no prosecutions of high ranking individuals from this. Perhaps it will happen anyway, but it will be a whole lot worse and span for generations if nothing is done. I am sure we have all heard the stories of Christ being tortured and suffering; 1975 years later this story still draws people to Christianity. This will martyr those whom suffered and create more radicals than anyone ever thought possible, perhaps even as much as an average sized country's army.

I have said it before and I will say it again; dealing with our government is like dealing with a three year old child. They don't learn from their mistakes and if left unsupervised will make a colossal mess out of everything they get their hands on.

[edit on 5/16/2009 by DarrylGalasso]

The Brussels War Crimes Tribunal and the newly established Blair War Crimes Foundation are building a case for the former British prime minister’s prosecution

These are extraordinary times. With the United States and Britain on the verge of bankruptcy and committing to an endless colonial war, pressure is building for their crimes to be prosecuted at a tribunal similar to that which tried the Nazis at Nuremberg. This defined rapacious invasion as “the supreme international crime, differing only from other war crimes [sic] in that it contains within itself the accumulated evil of the whole”. International law would be mere farce, said the chief US chief prosecutor at Nuremberg, the Supreme Court justice Robert Jackson, “if, in future, we do not apply its principles to ourselves”.

That is now happening. Spain, Germany, Belgium, France and Britain have long had “universal jurisdiction” statutes, which allow their national courts to pursue and prosecute prima facie war criminals. What has changed is an unspoken rule never to use international law against “ourselves”, or “our” allies or clients. In 1998, Spain, supported by France, Switzerland and Belgium, indicted the Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet, client and executioner of the west, and sought his extradition from Britain, where he happened to be at the time. Had he been sent for trial, he almost certainly would have implicated at least one British prime minister and two US presidents in crimes against humanity.

The Spanish high court is currently investi­gating a former Israeli defence minister and six other top Israeli officials for their role in the killing of civilians, mostly children, in Gaza. Henry Kissinger, who was largely responsible for bombing 600,000 peasants to death in Cambodia in 1969-73, is wanted for questioning in France, Chile and Argentina. Yet, on 8 February, as if demonstrating the continuity of American power, President Barack Obama’s national security adviser, James Jones, said: “I take my daily orders from Dr Kissinger.”

Like them, Tony Blair may soon be a fugitive. The International Criminal Court, to which Britain is a signatory, has received a record number of petitions relating to Blair’s wars. Spain’s celebrated judge Baltasar Garzón, who indicted Pinochet and the leaders of the Argentinian military junta, has called for George W Bush, Blair and the former Spanish prime minister José María Aznar to be prosecuted for the invasion of Iraq – “one of the most sordid and unjustifiable episodes in recent human history – a devastating attack on the rule of law” that had left the UN “in tatters”. He said: “There is enough of an argument in 650,000 deaths for this investigation to start without delay.”

These are extraordinary times. Blair, a perpetrator of the epic crime of the 21st century, shares a “prayer breakfast” with President Obama, the yes-we-can man now launching more war.

“We pray,” said Blair, “that in acting we do God’s work and follow God’s will.”

www.newstatesman.com...

cruciality.wordpress.com...


Spain to investigate war crime suspects from the Bush administration

Investigation against top Bush Administration lawyers involved in Guantanamo policy has been reopened for investigation regarding torture and crimes against the humanity. The lawyers are:

-Jay S. Bybee, United States Court of Appeal for the Ninth Circuit
-Douglas Feith, Senior Fellow, Hudson Institute
-William J Haynes, Chief Corporate Counsel, Chevron Headquarters
-John Yoo, UC Berkeley School of Law
-Alberto R. Gonzales
-David Addington

The action means that if these lawyers travel to Spain or to the 24 countries that participate in the European extraditions convention outside the U.S., they could be arrested. They could also be arrested in other countries, but that would require more extensive extradition proceedings.

The action was taken by Judge Baltasar Garzón, referred to as "Europe's counter-terrorism magistrate."

The action parallels a criminal probe into allegations of torture involving the American CIA that was opened this week in the United Kingdom.

Spain operates under the principle of "universal jurisdiction," a doctrine that allows courts to reach beyond national borders in cases of torture, terrorism or war crimes

Garzón is best known for his prosecution of a criminal investigation against Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet that resulted in the issuance of an arrest warrant for Pinochet while he was visiting England

Pdf file in spanish with the lawyers names and accusations - also victims names
www.publico.es...

www.elpais.com...

www.publico.es...

www.talkleft.com...

www.google.com...

legalift.wordpress.com...

hopemarin.wordpress.com...

www.guardian.co.uk...

www.boston.com...

Nuremberg is a Valid Precedent for Iraq Trials

The Nuremberg Principles, a set of guidelines established after World War II to try Nazi party members, were developed to determine what constitutes a war crime. The principles could also be applied today, when judging the conditions that led to the Iraq war and in the process to the deaths of hundreds of thousands of people, many of them children, and to the devastation of a country’s infrastructure.

In January of 2003, a group of U.S law professors warned President George W. Bush that he and senior officials of his government could be prosecuted for war crimes if military tactics violated international humanitarian law. The group, led by the New York-based Center for Constitutional Rights, sent similar warnings to British Prime Minister Tony Blair and to Canadian Prime Minister Jean Chretien.

Although Washington is not part of the International Criminal Court (ICC), U.S. officials could be prosecuted in other countries under the Geneva Convention, indicated Michael Ratner, president of the Center for Constitutional Rights. Ratner likened the situation to the attempted prosecution by a Spanish magistrate, Baltazar Garzón, of the Chilean military dictator Augusto Pinochet, who was held under house arrest in London.

Both former President George W. Bush and senior officials in his government could be tried for being responsible for torture and other war crimes under the Geneva Conventions. In addition, should Nuremberg principles be followed by an investigating tribunal, former President Bush and other senior officials in his administration could also be tried for violation of fundamental Nuremberg principles. In 2007, Luis Moreno-Ocampo, the ICC’s chief prosecutor, told The Sunday Telegraph that he could envisage a scenario in which both British Prime Minister Tony Blair and then President George W. Bush could face charges at The Hague.

thewip.net...

Yeah! hope the process starts soon and I really hope they include the zionist top handler of Bush and Blair - Mr. Kissinger - for war crimes against the humanity and the world.

Ahhh! the celebration of sucha event against the NWO and their sub-minions makes me all warm & fuzzy inside!


Why We Must Prosecute - Torture Is a Breach Of International Law

While at The Hague, I felt myself standing in a long line of American prosecutors working for a world where international standards restricted what one nation could do to another during war, stretching back to at least Justice Robert Jackson at the Nuremberg trials. Those standards protected our own soldiers and citizens. They were also moral and right. So I didn't understand why, a few months after the attacks in 2001, the Bush administration withdrew its consent to joining the International Criminal Court. Wasn't accountability for war crimes one of the things America stood for? Although staying with the court did mean that the United States would be subject to being charged in that court, how likely was that to happen? Surely we would never do these things. And, in any event, the court could only assume jurisdiction over a person whose own government refused to prosecute him; surely, that would never happen in the United States.

I watched with horror the changes that were happening back home. The events are now well known: Abu Ghraib; Guantanamo; secret "renditions" of prisoners to countries where interrogators were not afraid to get rough; secret CIA prisons where there appeared to be no rules. I tried to answer, as best I could, the questions from my international colleagues at The Hague about what was happening in and to my country. But as each revelation topped the last, I soon found myself without words.

I hope that the United States has turned the page on those times and is returning to the values that sustained our country for so many years. But we cannot expect to regain our position of leadership in the world unless we hold ourselves to the same standards that we expect of others. That means punishing the most senior government officials responsible for these crimes. We have demanded this from other countries that have returned from walking on the dark side; we should expect no less from ourselves.

www.washingtonpost.com...



[edit on 17-5-2009 by Chevalerous]

Originally posted by lucid eyes
reply to post by whaaa

 

So its "guilty until proven innocent"?

And: How did boys get there in the first place? Who raped them and why?

I guess its more important to call for the Destruction of America than to be asking for some evidence.

I'm more concerned that you're making such an argument over the alledged sodomy of children and ignoring the pictures at hand. Are those not bad enough for you ? - Do we actually need children to be sodomized before certain people will stand up and shake their fists ? What next ? .. should we have children sodomize each other ? ... what then ? what will we need THEN in order for it to be bad enough for us to actually take a stand for once against these individuals ?

I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that, judging from those pictures, any person who can force men to perform oral sex(as in those pictures) on each other, IN FRONT of them, could quite easily be considered the type of person to rape another. Why not ? that is already a form of rape anyway. please wake up dude.