...from Reuters a report submitted to the company's senior editors in mid-January, less than two weeks after the journalists were detained, by Bureau Chief Andrew Marshall, who had interviewed the three staffers separately.
"Soldiers would move between them, whispering things in their ear. Ahmad and Sattar did not understand what was whispered. Salem says they whispered that they wanted to have sex with him and were saying "come on, just for two minutes." They also said he should bring his wife so they could have sex with her.
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"Soldiers would whisper in their ears "One, two, three..." and then shout something loudly right beside their ear. All of this went on all night. ... Ahmad said he collapsed by morning. Sattar said he collapsed after Ahmad and began vomiting.
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"When they were taken individually for interrogation, they were interrogated by two American soldiers and an Arab interpreter. All three shouted abuse at them. They were accused of shooting down the helicopter. Salem, Ahmad and Sattar all reported that for their first interrogation they were told to kneel on the floor with their feet raised off the floor and with their hands raised in the air.
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"If they let their feet or hands drop they were slapped and shouted at. Ahmad said he was forced to insert a finger into his anus and lick it. He was also forced to lick and chew a shoe. For some of the interrogation tissue paper was placed in his mouth and he had difficulty breathing and speaking. Sattar too said he was forced to insert a finger into his anus and lick it. He was then told to insert this finger in his nose during questioning, still kneeling with his feet off the ground and his other arm in the air. The Arab interpreter told him he looked like an elephant. ...
"Ahmad and Sattar both said that they were given badges with the letter 'C' on it. They did not know what the badges meant but whenever they were being taken from one place to another in the base, if any soldier saw their badge they would stop to slap them or hurl abuse.
Greg Mitchell/Editor & Publisher May.19.04
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link KWSnet May.20.04
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I'm wondering what happens if the military gets much more weakened. Spiritually. Not that it isn't already compromised, but that, like the police, even though they may be corrupt and dangerous, there's still a certain amount of truly malignant stuff they protect "us" from. So if they become too weak, we become too vulnerable.
Also that the kid at the big box store, with his oddly-fitting bright blue synthetic uniform and his desperate geniality and rote helpfulness, isn't responsible for the ill-made overpriced crap the store sells. Even the manager is a disposable part of that. The television-drama conditioning makes us want to "get" the soldiers who beat and abused these prisoners of no-war-at-all. But a real conscience would say get the ones who caused it first.
