Should US military and intelligence forces be permitted to kidnap, detain, and/or interrogate children in order to get to their parents?
The News & Observer
March 29, 2004
Questionable anti-terror tactic
By Kimberly Yaman
Edition: Final
Section: Editorial/Opinion
Page: A9
In the past 18 months I have read a handful of reports that U.S. troops and intelligence operatives worldwide have detained and interrogated noncombatant children in intelligence and combat operations overseas. According to reports in The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, The Washington Post and various international media outlets, children -- some as young as 7 -- are held as hostages to ensure that family members who are al-Qaeda suspects, battlefield leaders during the Iraqi ground war or Iraqi resistance fighters will turn themselves in. On at least one occasion, detained children, ages 7 and 9, reportedly were taken from their home and held for an indeterminate number of months before being used as leverage in the interrogation of their father, a suspected al-Qaeda leader.
Last summer, after reading about the kidnapping and detention by U.S. troops of the daughter of an Iraqi field commander (a note was left at his home saying that if he wanted to see his family again, he should turn himself in), I compiled all the news reports I'd read on the subject and forwarded them to U.S. Sens. Elizabeth Dole and John Edwards and U.S. Rep. David Price, asking for an inquiry into whether these methods were being used by the United States. Aaron Mullins, a legislative aide in Sen. Dole's office, talked with officials at the U.S. Department of Defense in July 2003 and confirmed that, yes, the United States was indeed using this tactic, and that it was considered both "safe and effective" -- that the children are not harmed, and that "if they were cleared of wrongdoing" they are "usually released."
Wall Street Journal correspondents Jess Bravin and Gary Fields, who have written extensively about U.S. interrogation practices and broke the story of the use of children as leverage in interrogation of a senior al-Qaeda suspect, stand by their story, which has never been refuted by the Defense Department or the White House. A recent call to U.S. Central Command likewise elicited no denial of the reports, saying only that commanders have the discretion to do what they believe is necessary.
I find this practice barbaric, and I have grave concerns about the consequences of setting a precedent of using children in this way. What good are the principles of democracy, justice, and freedom if we are willing to stoop to kidnapping children to maintain them? And if we are willing exploit children for what is considered good and noble, what distinguishes us from those would use them for less noble reasons?
However, I recognize that the United States is unlikely to stop using the tactic of detaining children to get to their parents. If that is so, sheer pragmatism calls for rules ensuring oversight and some degree of transparency to the process.
Who is responsible for giving troops and intelligence operatives the option of taking children from their homes? Where are these children held, under what conditions and for how long? What organizations will be permitted to check in on the children while they are being held? Who is ensuring that the children are returned to their families? What aftercare is provided for these children if it is needed after their ordeal?
While inquiring into this matter for the past nine months I've been startled to learn how few of our representatives in Congress are aware that the United States is permitting troops and intelligence operatives to detain and interrogate noncombatant children. This ignorance of what is being done in our name must end. I urge readers to call their senators and representatives and ask that they look into this tactic and end it -- or, at the very least, acknowledge the practice and devise fair standards under which it can continue.