US Special: America's Legacy of Torture

On Thursday, The New York Times published the editorial "A Legacy of Torture":

The Bush administration insisted that “enhanced interrogation techniques” — torture — were necessary to extract information from prisoners and keep Americans safe from terrorist attacks. Never mind that it was immoral, did huge damage to this country’s global standing and produced little important intelligence. Now, as we had feared, it is also making it much harder to try and convict accused terrorists.

The editorial continued:

Because federal judges cannot trust the confessions of prisoners obtained by intense coercion, they are regularly throwing out the government’s cases against Guantánamo Bay prisoners.

A new report prepared jointly by ProPublica and the National Law Journal showed that the government has lost more than half the cases where Guantánamo prisoners have challenged their detention because they were forcibly interrogated. In some cases the physical coercion was applied by foreign agents working at the behest of the United States; in other cases it was by United States agents.

Even in cases where the government later went back and tried to obtain confessions using “clean,” non-coercive methods, judges are saying those confessions too are tainted by the earlier forcible methods. In most cases, the prisoners have not actually walked free because the government is appealing the decisions. But the trend suggests that the government will continue to have a hard time proving its case even against those prisoners who should be detained.

Credit to the Times for not sheltering Torture within quotation marks and instead noting how the Bush Administration tried to hide it with the euphemism "enhanced interrogation". Credit for calling out the rationalisation/deception that it had produced significant intelligence and for mentioning that this was a moral transgression.

But this is an article that could and should have been written years ago. The legal complications were clear soon after the Guantanamo Bay detention facility was opened in 2002, after the "rendition" of detainees not only to Guantanamo but to "black sites" in countries in the Middle East and Eastern Europe was exposed (but often gingerly set aside), and after techniques such as waterboarding were revealed.

Even the specific information in the ProPublica study is not new. Andy Worthington, who has worked tirelessly for years to bring out the details on Guatanamo's legal minefield, has been keeping a running tally of the habeas corpus cases where prisoners were petitioning for their freedom. Latest score: Prisoners 38, US Government 15.

And the twists and turns of interrogation, torture, and trials are far from complete. Charlie Savage wrote in The New York Times this week:

After working for a year to redeem the international reputation of military commissions, Obama administration officials are alarmed by the first case to go to trial under revamped rules: the prosecution of a former child soldier whom an American interrogator implicitly threatened with gang rape.

The defendant, Omar Khadr, was 15 when he was captured in Afghanistan and accused of throwing a grenade that killed an American soldier. Senior officials say his trial is undermining their broader effort to showcase reforms that they say have made military commissions fair and just....

Senior officials at the White House, the Justice Department and the Pentagon have agreed privately that it would be better to reach a plea bargain in the Khadr case so that a less problematic one would be the inaugural trial, according to interviews with more than a dozen current and former officials. But the administration has not pushed to do so because officials fear, for legal and political reasons, that it would be seen as improper interference.

Mr. Khadr’s trial at the naval base in Guantánamo Bay started earlier in August but was put on a month-long hiatus because a lawyer got sick and collapsed in court. The pause has allowed the administration to consider the negative images the trial has already generated.

Chief among them are persistent questions about the propriety of prosecuting a child soldier. Moreover, in a blow to establishing an image of openness, the Pentagon sought to ban journalists who wrote about publicly known information that it decreed should be treated as secret.

The judge declined to suppress statements Mr. Khadr made after an Army interrogator sought to frighten him with a fabricated story about an Afghan youth who disappointed interrogators and was sent to an American prison where he died after a gang rape. In a pretrial hearing, the interrogator confirmed making that implicit threat, but the judge ruled it did not taint Mr. Khadr’s later confessions.

And prosecutors disqualified an officer from the jury because he said he agreed with President Obama that Guantánamo had compromised America’s values and international reputation.

So let's return to the "Legacy of Torture". While The New York Times should be credited for joining the recognition of the Bush Administration's wrongs --- which they got away with for so long in part because the media sometimes supported, often blinded itself to "enhanced interrogation" --- I can't help thinking that even this has a problem with priorities.

Certainly the failure to convict detainees is an outcome of the torture regime that began in 2002. But there are other outcomes that might be placed before, rather than after, this. In an editorial considering the "legal", perhaps the newspaper could have said that the Bush torture was --- beyond any doubt --- illegal.

And perhaps it could have put the "immoral" at the top of the list, especially because the "immoral" of this story has not been remedied and will not be remedied simply by bemoaning a Not Guilty verdict for someone who has spent years behind American bars.

Iraq Video & Analysis: Odierno Sets Up the Long Haul Non-Withdrawal

A big US military public-relations push today, with General Raymond Odierno, the commander in Iraq, appearing on CNN's State of the Union (transcript) and CBS's Face the Nation as well as holding a press conference in Baghdad.

The set-up? American commanders are already looking beyond the nominal drawdown to 50,000 troops on 31 August --- the ostensible reason for the press coverage --- and even beyond the 2011 deadline for the removal of all combat troops. So Odierno is spinning a long-term "strategic partnership" with the Iraqis as the pretext for the continuing military commitment.

Iraq Special: When a War is Not Over (Bacevich)
Iraq Special: Obama Declares Victory. Sort Of. Depends How You Look at It. (The Onion)
Iraq Special: When a Withdrawal Is Not a Withdrawal (Alaaldin)

If all goes well, with an Iraqi government --- a "trustworthy" Iraqi government in Washington's eyes --- formed after months of stalemate, a downturn in violence, and a "reliable" Iraqi army and security forces, then perhaps the US can meet the nominal 2011 target of no combat troops. (Of course, numerous US support forces, trainers, and logistical personnel, as well as "private" American operators, will remain.)

And if all does not go well? Well, Odierno is ready for that, with promises that the US can re-introduce forces. In fact, he was quite happy to set out how that scenario might unfold. There was not only the possibility that the lack of security might draw back in US forces. There was also the prospect of an unacceptable external power grabbing influence.

Who might that be? As Voice of America summarises:

Iran is fueling instability in neighboring Iraq by funding and training Shi'ite extremist groups in the country.

General Ray Odierno told CNN on Sunday that Iran does not want Iraq to become a strong democratic country. He said Iran would rather see Iraq become a "weak governmental institution".

Turkey's Israel "Problem": Analysing the Supposed Threat from Washington (Yenidunya)

On Tuesday, a Ramallah resident, Nadim Injaz, entered the Turkish Embassy in Tel Aviv and triedto take one of the employees hostage with a knife and what later turned out to be a toy gun. After a standoff of several hours, he was shot in the legs and hospitalised.

Fatah issued an official statement denying that Injaz had been employed by the Palestinian Authority: "He is a drug dealer who lives in Tel Aviv under official Israel protection." Israeli police confirmed that Injaz collaborated with Israel's security services in the past.

Gaza: UN Releases Report on War “No Judgement”

After the incident, a Turkish diplomatic source told Turkish daily Hurriyet: “This incident has proven that there is a security weakness. The results of Tuesday’s attack would have been worse if our security personnel had not been able to act in time."

The Turkish comment comes after a Financial Times report of a warning from President Obama to Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan that the US cut off military supplies unless Ankara eased the friction in its foreign policy towards Israel.

Responses from Washington complicated the situation. White House Deputy Press Secretary Bill Burton denied the news:

The President and Erdogan did speak about 10 days ago and they talked about Iran and the flotilla and other issues related to that. But we obviously have an ongoing dialogue with them. But no such ultimatum was issued.There’s no ultimatum.

Then a senior Obama administration official, quoted by the FT, "clarified":

The president has said to [Recep Tayyip] Erdogan that some of the actions that Turkey has taken have caused questions to be raised on the Hill [Congress] . . . about whether we can have confidence in Turkey as an ally.

On Wednesday, the Turkish side denied the original report. Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu told Turkey's Zaman: "No country can warn Turkey. No one can display such a stance towards the Turkish Prime Minister."

President Abdullah Gul  said: "There are no problems in ties with the US. The Turkey that some had grown accustomed to no longer exists. Instead, there is a Turkey that plays a central role in many processes. There are those who are confused by this."

However, on the same day, Erdogan said there could be problems with weapon sales because of the US Congress.  He added that "such matters are internal in every country" and that Turkey is capable of manufacturing many of the armaments.

After this confusion, a Turkish committee headed by Foreign Ministry Undersecretary Feridun Sinirlioglu and Deputy Undersecretaries Selim Yenel and Tacan Ildem will be going to Washington, according to diplomatic sources. Iran's nuclear programme, Afghanistan, Iraq, and relations with Israel are expected to be on the agenda.

Ankara's message is clear: "Our goals are same but strategies may be different. Turkey's axis is not shifting; we are just looking for relative autonomy." The request to the Obama Administration will beto help Ankara fix its image in the Congress.

Pakistan and the Floods: America's Broken Response (Mull)

EA correspondent Josh Mull is the Afghanistan Blogging Fellow for The Seminal and Brave New Foundation. He also writes at Rethink Afghanistan:

The scale of Pakistan's flooding disaster is beyond imagination:

More people have been affected by Pakistan's catastrophic floods than any other natural disaster on record -- over 20 million and counting. That's more than were affected by the 2005 Pakistan earthquake, the 2004 Asian tsunami, and this year's earthquake in Haiti combined.  As millions of dislocated Pakistanis search for shelter and food and as health conditions deteriorate and disease spreads, the need for an immediate, large-scale humanitarian response is urgent.  And this is just the beginning.  Once the floodwaters subside from Pakistan's swollen rivers, the task of rebuilding will be staggering - with a price tag in the billions, and lasting for years to come.

US Analysis: The Limits of Military Power (Miller)

From a humanitarian standpoint, the disaster should be a fierce call to action like nothing else in our lifetime. But that's not the primary US concern in foreign policy, is it? Charity and human decency are great, but we care about terrorism, security, and American dominance:

The effectiveness of the response to these relief and rebuilding challenges will have serious implications for the wellbeing of the country's citizens, for the peace and stability of Pakistan and the entire South Asian region, and for U.S. national security.

There's no way around it, this is a national security issue for the United States. Galrahn explains at Information Dissemination:

There is a long history of natural disaster playing a significant role in the global security condition, or influencing war, or having a significant and generational impact on nations. When considering the scope and geography of this disaster, it would be difficult to suggest that the monsoon floods of 2010 won't have a huge impact on the security of Pakistan, or a significant impact in influencing the war in Afghanistan, or a huge generational impact on Pakistan. [...]

Pakistani people know the United States unmanned drone very well thanks to their newspapers and our actions in that country against Al Qaeda and affiliates. Here is a chance to put a positive visible symbol of US power over Pakistan at a time the need far exceeds local capacity - and we can't do it why?

Actually, we know why we can't do it. We've known for years. Remember 2006?

Stretched by frequent troop rotations to Iraq and Afghanistan, the Army has become a “thin green line” that could snap unless relief comes soon, according to a study for the Pentagon.

Andrew Krepinevich, a retired Army officer who wrote the report under a Pentagon contract, concluded that the Army cannot sustain the pace of troop deployments to Iraq long enough to break the back of the insurgency. He also suggested that the Pentagon’s decision, announced in December, to begin reducing the force in Iraq this year was driven in part by a realization that the Army was overextended.

Of course, the military didn't "snap". That's not how it works, as Hilary Bok wrote on Obsidian Wings at the time:

It's not as though one day we will hear a loud snap and find the Army broken in two. We will not get up one morning, flip a switch, and discover that the Army doesn't work any more. We will not have to hire a tow truck to drag it off to war. Whatever goes wrong with the Army, it won't be like that.

For one thing, there is no sharp, discontinuous transition between an "unbroken" Army and a "broken" one: the kind that happens when a plate shatters, a fuse blows, or a motor finally gives out. For another, a "broken" Army will still be able to function, more or less....

What we are doing to the Army is less like breaking something, and more like slowly degrading its ability to perform its tasks to an unacceptable level. It's a gradual process, one that does not provide us with clear points at which we can look at the Army and say: well, now it is well and truly broken.

To be clear, these reports were specific to the US Army, and Bok focused mostly on the recruitment and stability of the officer corps, but it isn't hard to apply this to the other military branches,or to the US foreign service as a whole.

After all, on Pakistan's Independence Day, as 20% of the country lay under water, this was the American priority:

The US carried out its first Predator airstrike inside Pakistan's tribal areas in almost three weeks. Twelve "rebels" were reported killed in the airstrike in Pakistan's Taliban-controlled tribal agency of North Waziristan.

The strike took place today in the village of Issori, just outside of Miramshah, the main town in North Waziristan. One missile fired from either a Predator or the more more deadly Reaper struck a compound thought to be sheltering Taliban or al Qaeda operatives.

That's not all the US did, to be sure. We have US marines on the ground in Pakistan, and we're conducting rescue and relief operations by air. But that's still not enough --- indeed, it is a blip compared to the enormous scale of the disaster. . We can send helicopters to Pakistan, but are they effective? Are we accomplishing anything close to what we'd like to?

I realize this analysis is a bit odd. Normally when the issue of an over-stretched and ineffective military is discussed, we think of it in terms of being defenceless against enemies. If we're attacked, we'll be defenceless because of our broken military. TIME magazine wrote in 2003:

Deep inside the Pentagon, where young colonels arrive before dawn to revise once more the short list of available combat units ready to deploy overseas, a nightmare scenario hangs in the air, unmentioned but unmistakable. With 140,000 U.S. troops tied down stabilizing Iraq, 34,000 in Kuwait, 10,000 in Afghanistan and 5,000 in the Balkans, what good options would George W. Bush have if, say sometime next spring, North Korea's Kim Jong Il decided to test the resilience of the relatively small "trip-wire" force of 37,000 American troops in South Korea? Where would the Pentagon turn if it had to rush additional combat troops to the 38th parallel? Might a lack of ready reinforcements force Washington to consider using nuclear weapons to save South Korea from defeat?

But that's not really realistic, is it? North Korea isn't about to roll across the 38th parallel any more than Putin is about to rear his head over Alaskan airspace. Those aren't the kinds of national security threats we face in 2010 (or 2003 for what it's worth). What we have to deal with now are natural disasters, collapsing states, massive displaced populations, terrorism and radical militancy, narcotics and organized crime, captured, corrupt, or oppressive governments --- all of which converge in Pakistan.

These are the consequences of a decade of military adventurism, occupying Iraq and Afghanistan. This is why, no matter what it is that the US is sending to Pakistan, it will not be enough. We just don't have enough to give.

It's not only the military breaking, or the State department, or the White House, or Congress, or the media, or the apathy of the American public. It's all of these things adding up to a slow, incompetent, ineffective response to the threats we face. The ability for the United States to project power abroad --- to protect its national security interests --- is broken.

The so-called battle for hearts and minds in Pakistan, the battle against anti-Americanism, radicalism, and militancy in the tribal regions, the battle for a secure and stable Central Asia: this is the war that America will lose because of our occupations in Iraq and Afghanistan. This is what we are defenceless against, helpless to stop.

This outcome is quite possibly more dangerous than any of the other tragic consequences of our wars. It has wreaked havoc on the American budget and deficit, sapped us of funds for basic social services, and dramatically raised the threat of terrorism both here and overseas. But we have let all this happen with at least the illusion that we were still the most powerful country, capable of defeating any threat.

That's not true. We are so tied down in our wars that when a real threat appears --- not Kim Jong-Il in North Korea, but floods in Pakistan --- we cannot response

We have to end our reckless, bloody and expensive occupation in Afghanistan. Not only because we can't afford it domestically, but along with Iraq it has catastrophically weakened our ability to protect our country and our interests abroad. We don't know yet what horrors will be unleashed, for generations to come, thanks to our failure in Pakistan, and this is only one disaster. How many more will there be while we're wasting away in Afghanistan?

US Analysis: The Limits of Military Power (Miller)

James Miller writes for EA:

Last week, Tom Ashbrook (On Point Radio) interviewed Andrew Bacevich, retired U.S. Army colonel, and professor of history and international relations at Boston University. His newest book, Washington Rules: America's Path to Permanent War, examines the constant war-readiness of the United States.

Bacevich points out that America has had a history of a military engagement with the rest of the world. From the opening salvo of our independence, through our expansion in the West, our early imperialist conquests (Puerto Rico to the Philippines), and the World War/Cold War era, the US has a long history of spreading its ideology through military might, sometimes for better and sometimes for worse. Large parts of the global map have been written by United States military involvement, from the Monroe Doctrine to the defeat of the Axis powers to containment of Communism.

However, Bacevich, a former colonel, argues that the policies that built American power need to change, as they no longer work in the modern world. The numerous conflicts and interventions that the US has engaged in since 1945 have resulted in limited short-term success and even more limited long-term success. The expansion of American power over the last few decades has coincided with the growth of economic disparity, global jihadism, nuclear proliferation, and many other negative events, many of which have at least partially been caused by the unintended consequences of American policy.

To be clear, neither Bacevich (nor I) are appealing for disarmament or pacifism. Instead, Bacevich points out that Teddy Roosevelt's "speak softly and carry a big stick" policy has changed, since World War II, into a yell loudly and hit people with a stick approach. He asserted that we have placed ourselves as the chief military enforcers of the world, and this approach has serious consequences at home and abroad. He also questions whether these actions are the moral responsibility of the people of the United States.

The constant use or threat of our military might to maintain global order has put America in the position of picking the winners and losers in the rest of the world. The problem is that the United States has a nasty habit of backing less-than-upstanding leaders. Washington is then partially responsible for the actions of those leaders, as well as the backlash against these leaders if and when they are challenged by their own people. Haiti, large parts of South America, Saddam Hussein in Iraq, and the Shah of Iran are all prime examples.

One of the primary weaknesses in our military approach is the sheer cost of war. Since 2001, more than $1 trillion has been spent in Iraq and Afghanistan alone, not to mention the expense of our ramped-up intelligence and security operations across the globe. We have largely financed these operations by borrowing from places like China.

In other words, to maintain our national security and expand our global reach, we traded our influence in Iraq and Afghanistan for billions that we gave to the second-most powerful economic and military power in the world. (If this was a video game, the scale of this mistake would be immediately obvious, right?) While our future generations are paying this debt while also struggling to maintain our global position, future generations of Chinese will be able to use the payments on these debts to springboard to dominance.

Furthermore, neither of these wars occurred in isolation. Both were partially, or entirely, started as a result of the intersection of American militaristic engagement in the Middle East and the long-term, unintended consequences of those actions. What were the costs of installing dictators, redrawing maps, leading coups, defending Kuwait, maintaining a no-fly zone, supporting guerrilla fighters in Afghanistan, or any of the myriad of other actions, both big and small, that have had known and unknown consequences? What are the costs to maintain the readiness to jump into these situations at the drop of a hat?

None of this even considers the human costs: upon soldiers, their families, the wounded, the dead, or the millions of civilians affected by this violence. We also have not considered the human and financial cost of terrorism and the security designed to stop it, terrorism that can often be directly linked as a response to US foreign policy.

There are larger problems with this over-reliance on military might to solve global problems. Because of the human and economic costs of military engagement, the United States has picked and chosen which threats or humanitarian crises they respond to. Any time the price tag is too high, the political or physical terrain is too disquieting, the domestic political will is lacking, or our forces are engaged elsewhere, the U.S. is forced to ignore places that perhaps should not be overlook. As long as military action is the primary tool of choice for affecting global change and stability, other tools become blunted.

Wars like Iraq and Afghanistan are not exceptions to the rule; they are the new rule. Long gone are the days where superpowers constantly worried about widespread conventional warfare. Instability is rife in large parts of Africa, Southeast Asia, parts of South America, the Caribbean, and of course the Middle East. As the world gets hotter, water dries up (or floods), and conflict over oil rages, the United States will need to rely on less expensive and dangerous tools than the threat of force.

To adequately prepare for these problems, both political parties in America will have to drastically rethink their beliefs on American military dominance. Bacevich points out that this problem is bigger than the obvious spike in neo-conservative expansionism. Both Democrats and Republicans are drinking from the "police the world and expand the role of the military" Kool-aid. In fact, no major politician, on either side of the aisle, has successfully advocated an isolationist or military-reductionist platform in recent years. These thoughts are like political Kryptonite. The generations of reliance on an ultra-strong military are so deeply ingrained into the American psyche that it is hard for us to even contemplate the idea that this military strength might have become a liability.

The time has come for America to rethink its obligation to police the world, especially in its use of the military as its strongest negotiating tool. Bacevich is repeating many of the same warnings that we have heard from commanders over the generations, including Dwight Eisenhower in his speech about the military-industrial complex. When are the politicians finally going to take the hint?