" Some of the worst things that happened you don't know about, okay? Videos, um, there are women there. Some of you may have read that they were passing letters out, communications out to their men. This is at Abu Ghraib ... The women were passing messages out saying 'Please come and kill me, because of what's happened' and 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. And the worst above all of that is the soundtrack of the boys shrieking that your government has. They are in total terror. It's going to come out."
salon.com
For the record, the videos and acts described by Mr. Hersh are not the same ones President Obama decided to withhold yesterday. We do not know if they are worse, but we should assume the worst and make our call for justice that much louder until we know exactly what was done by the Bush/Cheney Junta.
The quote from above comes from a Salon.com report by Alex Koppelman.
After Donald Rumsfeld testified on the Hill about Abu Ghraib in May, there was talk of more photos and video in the Pentagon's custody more horrific than anything made public so far. "If these are released to the public, obviously it's going to make matters worse," Rumsfeld said. Since then, the Washington Post has disclosed some new details and images of abuse at the prison. But if Seymour Hersh is right, it all gets much worse.
Hersh gave a speech last week to the ACLU making the charge that children were sodomized in front of women in the prison, and the Pentagon has tape of it. The speech was first reported in a New York Sun story last week, which was in turn posted on Jim Romenesko's media blog, and now EdCone.com and other blogs are linking to the video. We transcribed the critical section here (it starts at about 1:31:00 into the ACLU video.) At the start of the transcript here, you can see how Hersh was struggling over what he should say:
salon.com
This was written about back in 2004 here on DKos by gryn. The title of the diary was Kids sodomized at Abu Ghraib, Pentagon has the videos - Hersh and it received 430 comments. This link was included in the article I quoted above.
Let me ask you this. What makes our soldiers face harm needlessly? Making public tapes of criminal behavior that was ignored under Bush/Cheney? Or sending those same troops to an illegal war of aggression based on false evidence that was gathered by torturing people?
America needs to grow up fast. There is no place for hiding our heads in the sand. There is no place for looking the other way. There is no way to move forward if we leave this crime against humanity un-punished behind us. To do so is criminally negligent, and it guarantees two things. It guarantees that we will torture again and it guarantees that we will go to war needlessly and without evidence again.
If you need more evidence the ACLU has plenty of it, all gained through the same sort of FOIA requests that Obama has advised WH lawyers to fight against. Evidence like this.
Allegations, with evidence lacking of rape of Iraqi civilian women, assault of EPWs in custody and other "Geneva Convention violations, specifically, shooting wounded Iraqi soldiers." Reports follow on additional offenses and victims
DoD report 7/2004
and this
Karpinski testifies that she visited cell blocks 1A and 1B regularly (AG 80, 89); that AGP housed juveniles detainees, including a detainee who "looked like he was 8-years old." The juvenile told her that "his brother was there with him, but he really wanted to see his mother, could he please call his mother. He was crying"
DoD memo
Read through the released evidence at the ACLU's website. There is a lot of info like this. Too much. This can never be allowed to happen again.
Here is the fact. If President Obama will not release the torture photos we should assume that they depict things even your worst nightmares could not imagine. We must assume the worst, as though these pictures show hell on earth. If these pictures depict rape or worse they can not be released. If not, they must be released. If President Obama will not release them on the grounds that they are so bad it will further place the troops at harm, there is only one logical step to take.
Name a Special Prosecutor to Investigate and Prosecute Bush/Cheney et al immediately.
Either these photos are so unbelievably bad we will only destroy our image by releasing them, which means we must investigate and prosecute, or they are not, and this is a whitewash.
Those are the two options IMHO.
If they are that nightmarish, investigate.
If not, release them, and investigate.
We can not have it both ways.
