By Kenneth J. Theisen, 9/7/06
On Wednesday, September 6, President Bush finally
acknowledged one of the worst kept secrets – that his regime has held dozens of
“suspected terrorists” in secret CIA prisons abroad and “subjected detainees to
tough interrogation.” That last phrase
is BushSpeak for torture. He also stated
that the remaining 14 detainees have now been transferred to Guantanamo Bay, Cuba
to await trials. According to the Bush
administration, those 14 are presently incarcerated at the Navy detention
center and they include “high-level al Qaeda operatives responsible for the
September 11 terrorist attacks, other bombings and foiled plots.”
Lest anyone think that this latest move indicates that the
Bush regime is now willing to stop its abuse of prisoners, we need to examine what
the regime is really doing. This latest
move is meant to explicitly legalize the abuse and to deny rights to the
prisoners. He is pressuring Congress to
authorize the use of military tribunals to try detainees held by U.S. forces around the world, including more
than 400 held at Guantanamo. He also wants to legalize the use of “tough
interrogation techniques.” In addition,
he further hopes to boost his “national security credentials.”
Bush made his intentions clear when he stated, “As soon as
Congress acts to authorize the military commissions I have proposed, the men
our intelligence officials believe orchestrated the deaths of nearly 3,000
Americans on September 11, 2001, can face justice.”
So far civil courts have rebuked the regime for trying to
avoid regular legal proceedings for most of these detainees. On June 29, 2006, the Supreme Court ruled
that Congress must authorize trials before military tribunals and they must be
“fair” under both U.S.
and international law. What Bush wants
is the ability to try these people before military tribunals where normal legal
procedures are bypassed. Such procedures
as the right to counsel of your choice, the right to a speedy and public trial,
the exclusion of coerced statements and hearsay, the right to examine all
evidence against you, the right of cross-examination of witnesses, the right to
a unanimous verdict, etc. would not exist in these hearings if the Bush regime
gets its way. Even the right to appeal
the tribunal decisions would be limited. In essence, the regime wants to
legalize the use of kangaroo courts.
By transferring these “high-value” prisoners now, Bush hopes
to not only get the legislation he wants to use these kangaroo courts, but he
hopes to emphasize his regime’s alleged strongpoint of dedication to protecting
national security in the media before the November elections. At the same time as Bush was making his
admission about the secret prisons, the administration released information to
the media regarding the foiling of 8 planned attacks.
A summary of the CIA detainee program was provided to the
media by the National Intelligence Director John Negroponte’s office. The
implication made by the regime is that its ability to have secret prisons and
to use torture is necessary to make Americans safe. Bush made this clear when he stated, “Were it
not for this program, our intelligence community believes that al Qaeda and its
allies would have succeeded in launching another attack against the American
homeland.” We are supposed to agree that only by using these tools can further
plots be stopped.
Negroponte’s summary and Bush’s speech both stressed that the
U.S. Justice Department reviewed the interrogation techniques used by the CIA
and found them to be legal. Of course
this is the same Justice Department run by Attorney General Gonzales, the man
who wrote a memo describing the Geneva Convention proscriptions against torture
as “quaint.” It is telling that the
regime, which claims everything it does is legal, is seeking a new law that
shields U.S.
personnel from civil lawsuits and from criminal prosecutions for violations of
the Geneva Conventions.
In addition to its political and legal motives as indicated
above, the Bush regime is attempting to scare the public into going along with
its crimes in order to keep ourselves “safe.”
But protecting Americans can not justify the Bush regime’s actions or
make us complicit in them. Yes, the
crimes of this regime has increased hatred for the U.S. and put people from this
country in harm’s way. But are American
lives worth more than others? Accept
this premise and you”re on a slippery slope to justifying murder and torture of
others. The Bush regime would love
nothing more than for people to accept this Faustian bargain – in exchange for
protection we will acquiesce in whatever, wars and other crimes the Bush regime
wages and commits in order to “protect” us.
Instead we must demand the moral clarity articulated by
former United Kingdom
Ambassador, Craig Murray, before the International Commission of Inquiry on
Crimes Against Humanity by the Bush Administration (www.bushcommission.org):
“Evil begets more evil.
If we’re supporting a regime-and you must remember most of the people being
tortured were Muslims, and most of them were being tortured because they were
religious Muslims. If we’re supporting a regime like that, is it any wonder
some Muslims come to hate us? No, it’s no wonder at all. And my charge before
this commission is, not only that the CIA knowingly and openly uses information
got from torture, that this administration has introduced a dehumanization of
our Muslim brothers and sisters which means that anything done to them doesn’t
count. And that is a step along the road to the ultimate evil. And that, ladies
and gentleman, is I believe where we are”Which is just to say I don’t believe
it works, but even if it did work, I would personally rather die than have
anyone tortured to save my life.”