Editorial: Shine light on tactics for interrogation

Wednesday, May 5, 2004 | 9:58 a.m.

The unfolding story of prisoner abuse by American soldiers inside Abu Ghraib prison west of Baghdad has ignited worldwide condemnation. International support for our mission in Iraq, already miniscule, is in danger of dropping even lower. The risk to our forces in the field and to any of our captured troops or civilian workers has increased immeasurably. Photographs of naked Iraqi prisoners being physically abused and humiliated while U.S. soldiers laugh and strike obscene poses are invaluable recruitment tools for terrorists.

Yet the news from a Pentagon press conference Tuesday was that Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Gen. Richard Myers have not even read a 53-page Army report on the abuses that was completed in late February. And the news from the White House was that President Bush never even knew of the report until it made the papers and never saw the photos that have so outraged the world until last week, when they were broadcast on CBS' "60 Minutes II."

In the current issue of The New Yorker magazine, reporter Seymour M. Hersh, who obtained the report, wrote of its graphic descriptions and language. In the report's own words, there were "sadistic, blatant and wanton criminal abuses" at Abu Ghraib, Hersh writes. Particularly disturbing in the report was the fact that most of the prison detainees had been rounded up in random sweeps or highway stops and that more than 60 percent of them were not even thought to be a threat.

How much better it would have been for U.S. prestige if the Pentagon and White House had read the report and disclosed its findings soon afterward, along with announcing the swift actions they were taking. The human-rights violations would not have been any less horrifying, but the U.S. government would have been seen as self-policing, pro-active, and moving quickly to correct violations of its official policy. The report was begun as the result of a conscientious soldier reporting the abuses to the Army's Criminal Investigation Division, a fact that officials could have emphasized to show that we have a system that works.

Instead, the abuses were exposed by the media, leaving Pentagon and White House officials in the position of being reactive and defensive -- even as they properly express outrage and promise investigations. It is almost painful to listen as top officials try to explain why the report wasn't given higher priority from the start. "These things are complicated, they take some time," Rumsfeld said at the Tuesday press conference. Gen. Peter Pace, vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, added, lamely in our view, that the report had been moving up the chain of command.

The report was commissioned by Army Lt. Gen. Ricardo S. Sanchez, our highest ranking military officer in Iraq. It was written by Army Maj. Gen. Antonio M. Taguba, who minced no words in refuting an earlier, less critical report and in describing the torture and degradation inflicted upon the Iraqi detainees. It was explosive and should have been read immediately by the president and his Cabinet and shared with key members of Congress. Then it should have been shared with the public.

Because these steps were not followed, the Bush administration must now -- quickly -- embark on an aggressive course that will demonstrate how seriously this country takes such lapses in military conduct. Criminal charges against six low-ranking soldiers and reprimands for seven others are a start. We would like to hear next that Bush and Rumsfeld have read the full report and have ordered a full-scale investigation into our current methods of interrogating prisoners. In his article, Hersh writes, "General Taguba saved his harshest words for military intelligence officers and private contractors." The report details a prison culture in which intelligence officers and employees of CACI International, a private security company, used the soldiers who have been charged to prepare detainees for their interrogation, and overlooked, even encouraged, the sickenin g abuses.

How extensive is this practice around the world as we wage the war on terror? We must find out and put a stop to it, or risk a worldwide image as being no better than our enemies.