<div id="intro">
<p>Rumsfeld visit is tomorrow. Mass. District Attorney phone numbers at end of article, please call them today and email them this post. ARREST RUMSFELD!<br></p><p>------<br></p><p><a href="http://www.dailykos.com/story/2011/09/20/1018370/-Welcome-to-Boston,-Mr-Rumsfeld-You-Are-Under-Arrest">http://www.dailykos.com/story/2011/09/20/1018370/-Welcome-to-Boston,-Mr-Rumsfeld-You-Are-Under-Arrest</a><br>
</p><h2><font size="2"><a id="titleHref" href="http://www.dailykos.com/story/2011/09/20/1018370/-Welcome-to-Boston,-Mr-Rumsfeld-You-Are-Under-Arrest">Welcome to Boston, Mr. Rumsfeld. You Are Under Arrest.</a></font></h2>
<p>Former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld has been <a href="http://www.thenewamerican.com/usnews/crime/8515-court-advances-us-torture-victims-case-against-donald-rumsfeld">stripped of legal immunity</a>
for acts of torture against US citizens authorized while he was in
office. The 7th Circuit made the ruling in the case of two American
contractors who were tortured by the US military in Iraq after
uncovering a smuggling ring within an Iraqi security company. The
company was under contract to the Department of Defense. The company
was assisting Iraqi insurgent groups in the "mass acquisition" of
American weapons. The ruling comes as Rumsfeld begins his book tour
with a visit to Boston on Wednesday, September 21, and as new,
uncensored photos of Abu Ghraib spark fresh outrage across Internet.
Awareness is growing that Bush-era crimes went far beyond mere
waterboarding. <br>
<em><br>
Torture Room, Abu Ghraib</em><br>
<img src="http://farm7.static.flickr.com/6176/6165241310_c93f470044_m.jpg"></p>
<p>Republican Senator Lindsey Graham <a href="http://www.salon.com/news/politics/war_room/2005/07/25/abughraib">told reporters in 2004</a>
of photos withheld by the Defense Department from Abu Ghraib, “The
American public needs to understand, we’re talking about rape and
murder here...We’re not just talking about giving people a humiliating
experience. We’re talking about rape and murder and some very serious
charges.” And journalist <a href="http://boingboing.net/2004/07/15/hersh-children-raped.html">Seymour Hersh says</a>:
"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."</p>
<p>Rumsfeld resigned days before a criminal complaint was filed in
Germany in which the American general who commanded the military police
battalion at Abu Ghraib had promised to testify. General Janis
Karpinski <a href="http://www.talkleft.com/story/2005/11/10/019/41657">in an interview with Salon.com</a>
was asked: "Do you feel like Rumsfeld is at the heart of all of this
and should be held completely accountable for what happened [at Abu
Ghraib]?" </p>
<p>Karpinski answered: "Yes, absolutely." In the criminal complaint filed in Germany against Rumsfeld, Karpinski <a href="http://jicj.oxfordjournals.org/content/7/5/1087.full">submitted 17 pages of testimony</a>
and offered to appear before the German prosecutor as a witness.
Congressman Kendrick Meek of Florida, who participated in the hearings
on Abu Ghraib, said of Rumsfeld: "There was no way Rumsfeld didn’t know
what was going on. He’s a guy who wants to know everything." </p>
<p>And Major General Antonio Taguba, who led the official Army investigation into Abu Ghraib, <a href="http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2008/06/18/41514/general-who-probed-abu-ghraib.html">said in his report</a>:<br></p>
<blockquote>"there is no longer any doubt as to whether the [Bush]
administration has committed war crimes. The only question is whether
those who ordered the use of torture will be held to account."</blockquote>
<p><em>Abu Ghraib Prisoner Smeared with Feces</em><br>
<img src="http://farm7.static.flickr.com/6172/6164708169_3747b20d55_m.jpg"></p>
<p>Amazingly, the two American contractors in the 7th Circuit decision
were known by the military to be working undercover for the FBI, to
whom they had reported witnessing the sale of U.S government munitions
to Iraqi rebel groups. The FBI in Iraq had vouched for Vance and Ertel
numerous times before they nevertheless disappeared into military
custody. They were held at Camp Cropper in Iraq where the two were
tortured, one for 97 days, and the other for six weeks. </p>
<p>In a puzzling and incriminating move, Camp Cropper base commander
General John Gardner ordered Nathan Ertel released on May 17, 2006,
while keeping Donald Vance in detention for another two months of
torture. By ordering the release of one man but not the other, Gardner
revealed awareness of the situation but prolonged it at the same time.</p>
<p>It is unlikely that Gardner could act alone in a situation as
sensitive as the illegal detention and torture of two Americans
confirmed by the FBI to be working undercover in the national interest,
to prevent American weapons and munitions from reaching the hands of
insurgents, for the sole purpose of using them to kill American troops.
Vance and Ertel suggest he was acting on orders from the highest
political level.</p>
<p>The forms of torture employed against the Americans included
"techniques" which crop up frequently in descriptions of Iraqi and
Afghan prisoner abuse at Bagram, Guantanamo, and Abu Ghraib. They
included "walling," where the head is slammed repeatedly into a
concrete wall, sleep deprivation to the point of psychosis by use of
round-the-clock bright lights and harsh music at ear-splitting volume,
in total isolation, for days, weeks or months at a time, and
intolerable cold. </p>
<p>The 7th Circuit ruling is the latest in a growing number of legal
actions involving hundreds of former prisoners and torture victims
filed in courts around the world. Criminal complaints have been filed
against Rumsfeld and other Bush administration officials in <a href="http://jicj.oxfordjournals.org/content/7/5/1087.full">Germany, France, and Spain</a>. Former President Bush <a href="http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/02/05/us-bush-torture-idUSTRE7141CU20110205">recently curbed travel to Switzerland</a>
due to fear of arrest following criminal complaints lodged in Geneva.
"He's avoiding the handcuffs," Reed Brody, counsel for Human Rights
Watch, told Reuters.</p>
<p>And the Mayor of London threatened Bush with arrest for war crimes earlier this year should he ever set foot in his city, <a href="http://newsbusters.org/blogs/tim-graham/2010/11/24/pacifica-radio-mayor-london-suggests-bush-could-be-arrested-torture-if-h">saying that were he</a>
to land in London to "flog his memoirs," that "the real trouble — from
the Bush point of view — is that he might never see Texas again."</p>
<p>Former Secretary of State Colin Powell's Chief-of-Staff Col. Lawrence Wilkerson <a href="http://ed.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2011/05/04/6587693-col-wilkerson-rumsfeld-is-delusional">surmised on MSNBC</a>
earlier this year that soon, Saudi Arabia and Israel will be "the only
two countries Cheney, Rumsfeld and the rest will travel too."</p>
<p><em>Abu Ghraib: Dog Bites</em><br>
<img src="http://farm7.static.flickr.com/6160/6165241402_6d168ae66c_m.jpg"></p>
<p>What would seem to make Rumsfeld's situation more precarious is the
number of credible former officials and military officers who seem to
be eager to testify against him, such as Col. Wilkerson and General
Janis Karpinsky. </p>
<p>In a signed declaration in support of torture plaintiffs in a civil
suit naming Rumsfeld in the US District Court for the District of
Columbia, Col. Wilkerson, one of Rumsfeld's most vociferous critics, <a href="http://humanrights.ucdavis.edu/projects/the-guantanamo-testimonials-project/testimonies/testimonies-of-foreign-affairs-officials/declaration-by-lawrence-b-wilkerson-in-the-case-of-adel-hamad">stated:</a>
"I am willing to testify in person regarding the content of this
declaration, should that be necessary." That declaration, among other
things, affirmed that a <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/04/26/AR2007042601569.html">documentary on the chilling murder</a> of a 22-year-old Afghan farmer and taxi driver in Afghanistan was "accurate." Wilkerson <a href="http://www.wsws.org/articles/2006/mar2006/sixm-m07.shtml">said earlier this year</a>
that in that case, and in the case of another murder at Bagram at about
the same time, "authorization for the abuse went to the very top of the
United States government.” </p>
<p><strong>Dilawar</strong></p>
<p>The young farmer's name was Dilawar. The <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2005/05/20/international/asia/20abuse.html?pagewanted=all">New York Times reported on May 20, 2005:</a></p>
<blockquote>"Four days before [his death,] on the eve of the Muslim
holiday of Id al-Fitr, Mr. Dilawar set out from his tiny village of
Yakubi in a prized new possession, a used Toyota sedan that his family
bought for him a few weeks earlier to drive as a taxi.
<p>On the day that he disappeared, Mr. Dilawar's mother had asked him
to gather his three sisters from their nearby villages and bring them
home for the holiday. However, he needed gas money and decided instead
to drive to the provincial capital, Khost, about 45 minutes away, to
look for fares."</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Dilawar's misfortune was to drive past the gate of an American base
which had been hit by a rocket attack that morning. Dilawar and his
fares were arrested at a checkpoint by a warlord, who was later
suspected of mounting the rocket attack himself, and then turning over
randam captures like Dilawar in order to win trust. </p>
<p>The <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2005/may/21/afghanistan.afghanistantimeline">UK Guardian reports:</a></p>
<blockquote>"Guards at Bagram routinely kneed prisoners in their thighs
-- a blow called a "peroneal strike"...Whenever a guard did this to
Dilawar, he would cry out, "Allah! Allah!" Some guards apparently found
this amusing, and would strike him repeatedly to show off the behavior
to buddies.
<p>One military policeman told investigators, "Everybody heard him cry
out and thought it was funny. ... It went on over a 24-hour period, and
I would think that it was over 100 strikes.""</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Dilawar was shackled from the ceiling much of the time, with his
feet barely able to touch the ground. On the last day of his life,
after 4 days at Bagram, an interpreter who was present said his legs
were bouncing uncontrollably as he sat in a plastic chair. He had been
chained by the wrists to the top of his cell for much of the previous
four days.</p>
<p>The New York Times reported that on the last day of his life, four days after he was arrested:</p>
<blockquote>"Mr. Dilawar asked for a drink of water, and one of the two
interrogators, Specialist Joshua R. Claus, 21, picked up a large
plastic bottle. But first he punched a hole in the bottom, the
interpreter said, so as the prisoner fumbled weakly with the cap, the
water poured out over his orange prison scrubs. The soldier then
grabbed the bottle back and began squirting the water forcefully into
Mr. Dilawar's face.
<p>"Come on, drink!" the interpreter said Specialist Claus had shouted, as the prisoner gagged on the spray. "Drink!"</p>
<p>At the interrogators' behest, a guard tried to force the young man
to his knees. But his legs, which had been pummeled by guards for
several days, could no longer bend. An interrogator told Mr. Dilawar
that he could see a doctor after they finished with him. When he was
finally sent back to his cell, though, the guards were instructed only
to chain the prisoner back to the ceiling.</p>
<p>"Leave him up," one of the guards quoted Specialist Claus as saying."</p>
</blockquote>
<p>The next time the prison medic saw Dilawar a few hours later, he was
dead, his head lolled to one side and his body beginning to stiffen. A
coroner would testify that his legs <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2005/05/20/international/asia/20abuse.html">"had basically been pulpified."</a>
The Army coroner, Maj. Elizabeth Rouse, said: "I've seen similar
injuries in an individual run over by a bus." She testified that had he
lived, Dilawar's legs would have had to be amputated.</p>
<p>Despite the military's false statement that Dilawar's death was the
result of "natural causes," Maj. Rouse marked the death certificate as
a "homicide" and arranged for the certificate to be delivered to the
family. The military was forced to retract the statement when a
reporter for the New York Times, Carlotta Gall, tracked down Dilawar's
family in Afghanistan and was given a folded piece of paper by
Dilawar's brother. It was the death certificate, which he couldn't
read, because it was in English. </p>
<p>The practice of forcing prisoners to stand for long periods of time,
links Dilawar's treatment to a memo which bears Rumsfeld's own
handwriting on that particular subject. Obtained through a Freedom of
Information Act Request, the memo may show how fairly benign-sounding
authorizations for clear circumventions of the Geneva Conventions may
have translated into gruesome practice on the battlefield. </p>
<p>The memo, which addresses keeping prisoners "standing" for up to
four hours, is annotated with a note initialed by Rumfeld reading: ""I
stand for 8–10 hours a day. Why is standing limited to 4 hours?" Not
mentioned in writing anywhere is anything about accomplishing this by
chaining prisoners to the ceiling. There is evidence that, unable to
support his weight on tiptoe for the days on end he was chained to the
ceiling, Dilawars arms dislocated, and they flapped around uselessly
when he was taken down for interrogation. The <a href="http://natcath.org/NCR_Online/archives2/2005c/081205/081205z.htm">National Catholic Reporter writes</a> "They flapped like a bird’s broken wings"</p>
<p>Contradicting, on the record, a February 2003 statement by Rumfeld's
top commander in Afghnanistan at the time, General Daniel McNeill, that
“we are not chaining people to the ceilings," is Spc. Willie Brand, the
only soldier disciplined in the death of Dilawar, with a reduction in
rank. Told of McNeill's statement, Brand told <a href="http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2006/03/02/60minutes/main1364163.shtml">Scott Pelley on 60 Minutes</a>:
"Well, he's lying." Brand said of his punishment: "I didn't understand
how they could do this after they had trained you to do this stuff and
they turn around and say you've been bad"</p>
<p><em>Exhibit: A sketch by Sgt. Thomas V. Curtis, a former Reserve
M.P. sergeant, showing how Dilawar was chained to the ceiling of his
cell</em><br>
<img src="http://farm7.static.flickr.com/6153/6164038341_cef3d9b191.jpg"></p>
<p><a href="http://www.charlydmiller.com/LIB06/2005JulyMedscapePOWRA.html"><em>Exhibit: Dilawar Death Certificate marked "homicide"</em></a><br>
<img src="http://farm7.static.flickr.com/6154/6164561776_c703af44af.jpg"></p>
<p><a href="http://www.slate.com/features/whatistorture/pdfs/020927.pdf"><em>Exhibit: Rumsfeld Memo: "I stand 8-10 hours a day. Why only 4 hours?"</em><br>
<img src="http://farm7.static.flickr.com/6172/6164588786_7d3761cb7c_m.jpg"></a></p>
<p><em>Dilawar's daughter and her grandfather</em><br>
<img src="http://farm7.static.flickr.com/6171/6165355974_33b22f88a8_m.jpg"></p>
<p><strong>Binyam, Genital-Slicing</strong></p>
<p>Binyam Mohamed was seized by the Pakistani Forces in April 2002 and
turned over to the Americans for a $5,000 bounty. He was held for more
than five years without charge or trial in Bagram Air Force Base,
Guantánamo Bay, and third country "black" sites.</p>
<p>In his diary he describes being flown by a US government plane to a prison in Morocco. He writes:</p>
<blockquote>"They cut off my clothes with some kind of doctor's
scalpel. I was naked. I tried to put on a brave face. But maybe I was
going to be raped. Maybe they'd electrocute me. Maybe castrate me...
<p>One of them took my penis in his hand and began to make cuts. He
did it once, and they stood still for maybe a minute, watching my
reaction. I was in agony. They must have done this 20 to 30 times, in
maybe two hours. There was blood all over. "I told you I was going to
teach you who's the man," [one] eventually said.</p>
<p>They cut all over my private parts. One of them said it would be
better just to cut it off, as I would only breed terrorists. I asked
for a doctor."</p>
<p>I was in Morocco for 18 months. Once they began this, they would do
it to me about once a month. One time I asked a guard: "What's the
point of this? I've got nothing I can say to them. I've told them
everything I possibly could."</p>
<p>"As far as I know, it's just to degrade you. So when you leave here,
you'll have these scars and you'll never forget. So you'll always fear
doing anything but what the US wants."</p>
<p>Later, when a US airplane picked me up the following January, a
female MP took pictures. She was one of the few Americans who ever
showed me any sympathy. When she saw the injuries I had she gasped.
They treated me and took more photos when I was in Kabul. Someone told
me this was "to show Washington it's healing".</p>
</blockquote>
<p><strong>The obvious question for any prosecutor in Binyam's case is:
Who does "Washington" refer to? Rumfeld? Cheney? Is it not in the
national interest to uncover these most depraved of sadists at the
highest level?</strong> US Judge Gladys Kessler, in her findings on
Binyam made in relation to a Guantanamo prisoner's petition, found
Binyam exceedingly credible. <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/feb/04/guantanamo-torture">She wrote:</a></p>
<blockquote>"His genitals were mutilated. He was deprived of sleep and
food. He was summarily transported from one foreign prison to another.
Captors held him in stress positions for days at a time. He was forced
to listen to piercingly loud music and the screams of other prisoners
while locked in a pitch-black cell. All the while, he was forced to
inculpate himself and others in plots to imperil Americans. The
government does not dispute this evidence."</blockquote>
<p><strong>Obama: Torturers' Last Defense</strong></p>
<p>The prospect of Rumsfeld in a courtroom cannot possibly be relished
by the Obama administration, which has now cast itself as the last and
staunchest defender of the embattled former officials, including John
Yoo, Alberto Gonzalez, Judge Jay Bybee, Dick Cheney, George W. Bush,
and others. The administration employed an <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/feb/04/guantanamo-torture">unprecedented twisting of arms</a>
in order to keep evidence in a lawsuit which Binyam had filed in the UK
suppressed, threatening an end of cooperation between the British MI5
and the CIA. This even though the British judges whose hand was forced
puzzled that the evidence "contained "no disclosure of sensitive
intelligence matters." The judges suggested another reason for the
secrecy requested by the Obama administration, that it might be
"politically embarrassing."</p>
<p>The Obama Justice Department's active involvement in seeking the
dismissal of the cases is by choice, as the statutory obligation of the
US Attorney General to defend cases against public officials ends the
day they leave office. Indeed, the real significance of recent court
decisions, the one by the 7th Circuit and yet <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/08/04/donald-rumsfeld-torture-lawsuit_n_917966.html">another against Rumsfeld in a DC federal court</a>,
may be the clarification the common misconception that high officials
are forever immune for crimes committed while in office, in the name of
the state. The misconception persists despite just a moment of thought
telling one that if this were true, Hermann Goering, Augusto Pinochet,
and Charles Taylor would never have been arrested, for they were all in
office at the time they ordered atrocities, and they all invoked
national security.</p>
<p>Judge Kessler's findings point to yet another even more alarming
aspect of the Bush-era crimes for which Rumsfeld is now being pursued
for his part. And that is the emerging evidence that the tortures
perpetrated were not designed to protect national security at all, but
to obtain false confessions in order to score propaganda points for the
War on terror.</p>
<p><a href="http://www.alternet.org/rights/103289/">Andy Worthington writes</a> that:<br></p>
<blockquote>"As it happens, one of the confessions that was tortured
out of Binyam is so ludicrous that it was soon dropped...The US
authorities insisted that Padilla and Binyam had dinner with various
high-up members of al-Qaeda the night before Padilla was to fly off to
America. According to their theory the dinner party had to have been on
the evening of 3 April in Karachi ... Binyam was meant to have dined
with Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, Abu Zubaydah, Sheikh al-Libi, Ramzi bin
al-Shibh and Jose Padilla." What made the scenario "absurd," as
[Binyam's lawyer] pointed out, was that "two of the conspirators were
already in U.S. custody at the time -- Abu Zubaydah was seized six days
before, on 28 March 2002, and al-Libi had been held since November
2001.""</blockquote>
<p>The charges against Binyam were dropped, after the prosecutor, Lieutenant Colonel <a href="http://www.vanityfair.com/magazine/2008/12/torture200812?currentPage=4">Darrel Vandeveld, resigned.</a> He told the BBC later that he had concerns at the repeated suppression of evidence that could prove prisoners’ innocence. </p>
<p>The litany of tortures alleged against Rumsfeld in the military
prisons he ran could go on for some time. The new photographic images
from Abu Ghraib make it hard to conceive of how the methods of torture
and dehumanization could have possibly served a national purpose. </p>
<p>The approved use of attack dogs, sexual humiliation, forced
masturbation, and treatments which plumb the depths of human depravity
are either documented in Rumsfeld's own <a href="http://jdeanicite.typepad.com/i_cite/2005/05/taxonomy_of_tor.html">memos</a>, or credibly reported on. </p>
<p><a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2004/may/08/iraq.iraq">The UK Guardian writes:</a></p>
<blockquote>"The sexual humiliation of Iraqi prisoners at Abu Ghraib
prison was not an invention of maverick guards, but part of a system of
ill-treatment and degradation used by special forces soldiers that is
now being disseminated among ordinary troops and contractors who do not
know what they are doing, according to British military sources.
<p>The techniques devised in the system, called R2I - resistance to
interrogation - match the crude exploitation and abuse of prisoners at
the Abu Ghraib jail in Baghdad.</p>
<p>One former British special forces officer who returned last week
from Iraq, said: "It was clear from discussions with US private
contractors in Iraq that the prison guards were using R2I techniques,
but they didn't know what they were doing.""</p>
</blockquote>
<p><strong>Torture Now Aimed at Americans, Programs Designed to Obtain False Confessions, Not Intelligence</strong></p>
<p>The worst of the worst is that Rumsfeld's logic strikes directly at
the foundations of our democracy and the legitimacy of the War on
Terror. The torture methods studied and adopted by the Bush
administration were not new, but adopted from the Survival, Evasion,
Resistance, and Escape program (SERE) which is taught to elite military
units. The program was developed during the Cold War, in response to
North Korean, Chinese, and Soviet Bloc torture methods. But the aim of
those methods was never to obtain intelligence, but to elicit false
confessions. The Bush administration asked the military to <a href="http://www.historycommons.org/context.jsp?item=a1201seretorture#a1201seretorture">"reverse engineer"</a> the methods, i.e. figure out how to break down resistance to false confessions.</p>
<p>In the 2008 <a href="http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/20081212_report_rumsfeld_responsible_for_detainee_abuse/">Senate Armed Services Committee report</a>
which indicted high-level Bush administration officials, including
Rumsfeld, as bearing major responsibility for the torture at Abu
Gharib, Guantanamo, and Bagram, the Committee said:</p>
<blockquote>"SERE instructors explained "Biderman's Principles" – which
were based on coercive methods used by the Chinese Communist
dictatorship to elicit false confessions from U.S. POWs during the
Korean War – and left with GTMO personnel a chart of those coercive
techniques."</blockquote>
<p>The Biderman Principles were based on the work of Air Force
Psychiatrist Albert Biderman, who wrote the landmark "Communist
Attempts to Elecit False Confessions from Air Force Prisoners of War,"
on which SERE resistance was based. <a href="http://www.american-buddha.com/torture.bidermanmemo.htm">Biderman wrote</a>:<br></p>
<blockquote>"The experiences of American Air Force prisoners of war in
Korea who were pressured for false confessions, enabled us to compile
an outline of methods of eliciting compliance, not much different, it
turned out, from those reported by persons held by Communists of other
nations. I have prepared a chart showing a condensed version of this
outline."</blockquote>
<p>The chart is a how-to for communist torturers interested only in
false confessions for propaganda purposes, not intelligence. It was
the manual for, in Biderman's words, "brainwashing." In the reference
for Principle Number 7, "Degradation," the chart explains:</p>
<blockquote>"Makes Costs of Resistance Appear More Damaging to
Self-Esteem than Capitulation; Reduces Prisoner to "Animal
Level...Personal Hygiene Prevented; Filthy, Infested Surroundings;
Demeaning Punishments; Insults and Taunts; Denial of Privacy"</blockquote>
<p>Appallingly, this could explain that even photos such as those of
feces-smeared prisoners at Abu Ghraib might not, as we would hope, be
only the individual work of particularly demented guards, but part of
systematic degradation authorized at the highest levels.</p>
<p><em>Exhibit: Abu Ghraib, Female POW</em><br>
<img src="http://farm7.static.flickr.com/6165/6164632871_c5d4bb7612_m.jpg"></p>
<p>This could go far toward explaining why the Bush administration seemed so tone-deaf <a href="http://www.opednews.com/articles/Top-Interrogation-Experts-by-George-Washington-090423-933.html">to intelligence professionals</a>,
including legendary CIA Director William Colby, who essentially told
them they were doing it all wrong. A startling level of consensus
existed within the intelligence community that the way to produce good
intelligence was to gain the trust of prisoners and to prove everything
they had been told by their recruiters, about the cruelty and
degeneracy of America, to be wrong. </p>
<p>But why would the administration care about what worked to produce
intelligence, if the goal was never intelligence in the first place?
What the Ponzi scheme of either innocent men or low-level operatives
incriminating each other DID accomplish, was produce a framework of
rapid successes and trophies in the new War on Terror.</p>
<p><strong>And now, American contractors Vance and Ertel show, unless
there are prosecutions, the law has effectively changed and they can do
it to Americans.</strong> Jane Mayer in the New Yorker describes a new
regime for prisoners which has become coldly methodical, quoting a
report issued by the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe,
titled “Secret Detentions and Illegal Transfers of Detainees.” In the
report on the CIA paramilitary Special Activities Division detainees
were “taken to their cells by strong people who wore black outfits,
masks that covered their whole faces, and dark visors over their eyes.”</p>
<p><a href="http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2007/08/13/070813fa_fact_mayer#ixzz1YQpfptPh">Mayer writes</a> that a former member of a C.I.A. transport team has described the “takeout” of prisoners as:</p>
<blockquote>"a carefully choreographed twenty-minute routine, during
which a suspect was hog-tied, stripped naked, photographed, hooded,
sedated with anal suppositories, placed in diapers, and transported by
plane to a secret location."</blockquote>
<p>A person involved in the Council of Europe inquiry, referring to
cavity searches and the frequent use of suppositories, likened the
treatment to “sodomy.” He said, “It was used to absolutely strip the
detainee of any dignity. It breaks down someone’s sense of
impenetrability."</p>
<p>Of course we have seen these images before, in the trial balloon
treatment of Jose Padilla, the first American citizen arrested and
declared "enemy combatant" in the first undeclared war without end.
The designation placed Padilla outside of his Bill of Rights as an
American citizen even though he was arrested on American soil. Padilla
was kept in isolation and tortured for nearly 4 years before being
released to a civilian trial, at which point according to his lawyer he
was useless in his own defense, and exhibited fear and <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2006/12/04/us/04detain.html">mistrust of everyone, complete docility, and a range of nervous facial tics</a>.</p>
<p><em>Jose Padilla in Military Custody</em><br>
<img src="http://farm7.static.flickr.com/6160/6164680753_dcd067a495_m.jpg"></p>
<p>He was convicted by a Miami jury and sentenced to 17 more years. As of <a href="http://www.globalwinnipeg.com/world/us+court+says+17-year+prison+sentence+for+terror+plotter+jose+padilla+is+too+short/6442484691">this writing, and meriting it's own outrage, on Sept. 19, an appeals court threw out Padilla's sentence as "too lenient"</a> and has sent it back for review.</p>
<p>Rumsfeld's avuncular "golly-gee, gee-whiz" performances in public
are legendary. Randall M. Schmidt, the Air Force Lieutenant General
appointed by the Army to investigate abuses at Guantanamo, and who
recommended holding Rumsfeld protege and close associate General
Geoffrey Miller "accountable" as the commander of Guantanamo, watched
Rumfeld's performance before a House Committee with some interest. <a href="http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2007/06/25/070625fa_fact_hersh?printable=true#ixzz1YRBn1bZQ">“He was going, ‘My God!</a> Did I authorize putting a bra and underwear on this guy’s head and telling him all his buddies knew he was a homosexual?’ ”</p>
<p>But General Taguba said of Rumsfeld: “Rummy did what we called ‘case
law’ policy —- verbal and not in writing. What he’s really saying is
that if this decision comes back to haunt me I’ll deny it.”</p>
<p><a href="http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2007/06/25/070625fa_fact_hersh?printable=true#ixzz1YR8TixVE">Taguba went on</a>: “Rumsfeld is very perceptive and has a mind like a steel trap. There’s no way he’s suffering from C.R.S.—Can’t Remember Shit."</p>
<p>Miller was the general deployed by Rumfeld to "Gitmo-ize" Abu Ghraib
in 2003 after Rumfeld had determined they were being too "soft" on
prisoners. He said famously in one memo "you have to treat them like
dogs." General Karpinski questioned the fall of Charles Graner and
Lyndie England as the main focus of low-level "bad apple" abuse in the
Abu Ghraib investigations. "Did Lyndie England deploy with a dog
leash?" she asks. </p>
<p><i>Exhibit: Dog deployed at Abu Ghraib, mentally-ill prisoner</i><br>
<img src="http://farm7.static.flickr.com/6179/6164708125_9be71d6434_m.jpg"></p>
<p><em>Abu Ghraib prisoner in "restraint" chair, screaming "Allah!!"</em><br>
<img src="http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3277/2595108571_dc4a2991da.jpg"></p>
<p>Rumfeld's worry now is the <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Universal_jurisdiction">doctrine of Universal Jurisdiction</a>,
as well as ordinary common law. The veil of immunity stripped in civil
cases would seem to free the hand of any prosecutor who determines
there is sufficient evidence that a crime has been committed based on
available evidence. A grand jury's bar for opening a prosecution is
minimal. It has been said "a grand jury would indict a ham sandwich."
Rumsfeld, and the evidence against him, would certainly seem to pass
this test.</p>
<p>The name Dilawar translates to English roughly as "Braveheart." Let
us pray he had one to endure the manner of his death. But the more
spiritual may believe that somehow it had a purpose, to shock the world
and begin the toppling of unimaginable evil among us. Dilawar
represented the poorest of the poor and most powerless, wanting only to
pick up his three sisters, as his mother had told him to, for the
holiday. The question now is whether Americans will finally draw a
line, as the case against Rumsfeld falls into place and becomes legally
bulletproof. Andy Worthington noted that the case for prosecutors
became rock solid when Susan Crawford, senior Pentagon official
overseeing the Military Commissions at Guantánamo — <a href="http://www.andyworthington.co.uk/2009/01/20/bush-era-ends-with-guantanamo-trial-chiefs-torture-confession">told Bob Woodward</a> that the Bush administration had "met the legal definition of torture.” </p>
<p>As Rumfeld continues his book tour and people like Dilawar are
remembered, it is not beyond the pale that an ambitious prosecutor,
whether local, state, or federal, might sense the advantage. It is
perhaps unlikely, but not inconceivable, that upon landing at Logan
International Airport on Wed., Sept. 21st, or similarly anywhere he
travels thereafter, Rumsfeld could be greeted with the words such as: <strong>"Welcome to Boston, Mr. Secretary. You are under arrest."</strong></p>
<blockquote>Massachusetts District Attorneys Who Can Indict Rumsfeld, Please Email them this post and call them.
<p><a href="http://www.haguejusticeportal.net/Docs/NLP/Germany/Rumsfeld_CriminalIndictment_29-11-2004.pdf">SAMPLE INDICTMENT TEXT, BASED ON GERMAN CRIMINAL COMPLAINT</a></p>
<p>Massachusetts Attorney General Martha Coakley:<br>
email: <a href="mailto:ago@state.ma.us">ago@state.ma.us</a></p>
<p>One Ashburton Place<br>
Boston, MA 02108 -1518<br>
Phone: (617) 727-2200</p>
<p>County <br>
Name <br>
Address<br>
Berkshire County: District Attorney C. Samuel Sutter <br>
Elected November 2006 <br>
OFFICE ADDRESS: P.O. Box 973<br>
888 Purchase Street<br>
New Bedford, MA 02741<br>
PHONE: (508) 997-0711<br>
FAX: (508) 997-0396<br>
INTERNET ADDRESS: <a href="http://www.bristolda.com/">http://www.bristolda.com</a><br>
Berkshire Acushnet, Attleborough, Berkley, Dartmouth, Dighton,
Easton, Fairhaven, Fall River, Freetown, Mansfield, New Bedford, North
Attleborough, Norton, Raynham, Rehoboth, Seekonk, Somerset, Swansea,
Taunton, Westport</p>
<p>Bristol County District Attorney David F. Capeless <br>
Appointed March 2004 <br>
Elected November 2004 <br>
OFFICE ADDRESS: 7 North Street<br>
P.O. Box 1969<br>
Pittsfield, MA 01202-1969<br>
PHONE: (413) 443-5951<br>
FAX: (413) 499-6349<br>
Internet Address: <a href="http://www.mass.gov/berkshireda">http://www.mass.gov/...</a><br>
Bristol Adams, Alford, Becket, Cheshire, Clarksburg, Dalton,
Egremont, Florida, Great Barrington, Hancock, Hinsdale, Lanesborough,
Lee, Lenox, Monterey, Mount Washington, New Ashford, New Marlborough,
North Adams, Otis, Peru, Pittsfield, Richmond, Sandisfield, Savoy,
Sheffield, Stockbridge, Tyringham, Washington, West Stockbridge,
Williamstown, Windsor</p>
<p>Cape & Islands District Attorney Michael O'Keefe <br>
Elected November 2002 <br>
OFFICE ADDRESS: P.O.Box 455<br>
3231 Main Street<br>
Barnstable, MA 02630<br>
PHONE: (508) 362-8113<br>
FAX: (508) 362-8221<br>
INTERNET ADDRESS: <a href="http://www.mass.gov/da/cape">http://www.mass.gov/...</a><br>
Aquinnah (formerly Gay Head), Barnstable, Bourne, Brewster,
Chatham, Chilmark, Dennis, Eastham, Edgartown, Falmouth, Gosnold,
Harwich, Mashpee, Nantucket, Oak Bluffs, Orleans, Provincetown,
Sandwich, Tisbury, Truro, Wellfleet, West Tisbury, Yarmouth</p>
<p>Essex County: District Attorney Jonathan W. Blodgett<br>
Elected November 2002 <br>
OFFICE ADDRESS: Ten Federal Street<br>
Salem, MA 01970<br>
PHONE: (978) 745-6610<br>
FAX: (978) 741-4971<br>
INTERNET ADDRESS: <a href="http://www.mass.gov/da/essex">http://www.mass.gov/...</a><br>
Amesbury, Andover, Beverly, Boxford, Danvers, Essex, Georgetown,
Gloucester, Groveland, Hamilton, Haverhill, Ipswich, Lawrence, Lynn,
Lynnfield, Manchester-by-the-Sea, Marblehead, Merrimac, Methuen,
Middleton, Nahant, Newbury, Newburyport, North Andover, Peabody,
Rockport, Rowley, Salem, Salisbury, Saugus, Swampscott, Topsfield,
Wenham, West Newbury</p>
<p>Hampden District Attorney Mark Mastroianni <br>
Elected 2010 <br>
OFFICE ADDRESS: Hall of Justice<br>
50 State Street<br>
Springfield, MA 01103<br>
PHONE: (413) 747-1000<br>
FAX: (413) 781-4745<br>
Agawam, Blandford, Brimfield, Chester, Chicopee, East Longmeadow,
Granville, Hampden, Holland, Holyoke, Longmeadow, Ludlow, Monson,
Montgomery, Palmer, Russell, Southwick, Springfield, Tolland, Wales,
West Springfield, Westfield, Wilbraham</p>
<p>Middlesex County: District Attorney Gerard T. Leone, Jr.<br>
Elected November 2006 <br>
OFFICE ADDRESS: 15 Commonwealth Avenue<br>
Woburn, MA 01801<br>
PHONE: (781) 897-8300<br>
FAX: ((781) 897-8301<br>
INTERNET ADDRESS: <a href="http://www.middlesexda.com/">http://www.middlesexda.com</a><br>
Middlesex Acton, Arlington, Ashby, Ashland, Ayer, Bedford, Belmont,
Billerica, Boxborough, Burlington, Cambridge, Carlisle, Chelmsford,
Concord, Dracut, Dunstable, Everett, Framingham, Groton, Holliston,
Hopkinton, Hudson, Lexington, Lincoln, Littleton, Lowell, Malden,
Marlborough, Maynard, Medford, Melrose, Natick, Newton, North Reading,
Pepperell, Reading, Sherborn, Shirley, Somerville, Stoneham, Stow,
Sudbury, Tewksbury, Townsend, Tyngsborough, Wakefield, Waltham,
Watertown, Wayland, Westford, Weston, Wilmington, Winchester, Woburn</p>
<p>Norfolk District Attorney Michael Morrissey<br>
Elected 2010 <br>
OFFICE ADDRESS: 45 Shawmut Ave.<br>
Canton, MA 02021<br>
PHONE: (781) 830-4800<br>
FAX: (781) 830-4801<br>
INTERNET ADDRESS: <a href="http://www.mass.gov/da/norfolk/">http://www.mass.gov/...</a><br>
Avon, Braintree, Brookline, Canton, Cohasset, Dedham, Dover,
Foxborough, Franklin, Holbrook, Medfield, Medway, Millis, Milton,
Needham, Norfolk, Norwood, Plainville, Quincy, Randolph, Sharon,
Stoughton, Walpole, Wellesley, Westwood, Weymouth, Wrentham</p>
<p>Northwestern District Attorney David Sullivan <br>
Elected 2010 <br>
HAMPSHIRE OFFICE ADDRESS: One Gleason Plaza<br>
Northampton, MA 01060<br>
PHONE: (413) 586-9225<br>
FAX: (413) 584-3635<br>
FRANKLIN OFFICE ADDRESS: 13 Conway Street<br>
Greenfield, MA 01301<br>
PHONE: (413) 774-3186<br>
FAX: (413) 773-3278<br>
WEBSITE:<br>
Northwestern <a href="http://www.mass.gov/da/northwestern">http://www.mass.gov/...</a><br>
Amherst, Ashfield, Athol, Belchertown, Bernardston, Buckland,
Charlemont, Chesterfield, Colrain, Conway, Cummington, Deerfield,
Easthampton, Erving, Gill, Goshen, Granby, Greenfield, Hadley,
Hatfield, Hawley, Heath, Huntington, Leverett, Leyden, Middlefield,
Monroe, Montague, New Salem, Northampton, Northfield, Orange, Pelham,
Plainfield, Rowe, Shelburne, Shutesbury, South Hadley, Southampton,
Sunderland, Ware, Warwick, Wendell, Westhampton, Whately, Williamsburg,
Worthington</p>
<p>Plymouth District Attorney Timothy J. Cruz <br>
Appointed November 2001 <br>
Elected November 2002 <br>
OFFICE ADDRESS: 32 Belmont Street<br>
Brockton, MA 02303<br>
PHONE: (508) 584-8120<br>
FAX: (508) 586-3578<br>
INTERNET ADDRESS: <a href="http://www.mass.gov/da/plymouth/">http://www.mass.gov/...</a><br>
Plymouth Abington, Bridgewater, Brockton, Carver, Duxbury, East
Bridgewater, Halifax, Hanover, Hanson, Hingham, Hull, Kingston,
Lakeville, Marion, Marshfield, Mattapoisett, Middleborough, Norwell,
Pembroke, Plymouth, Plympton, Rochester, Rockland, Scituate, Wareham,
West Bridgewater, Whitman</p>
<p>Suffolk County: District Attorney Daniel F. Conley <br>
Appointed January 2002 <br>
Elected November 2002 <br>
OFFICE ADDRESS: One Bulfinch Place<br>
Boston, MA 02114<br>
PHONE: (617) 619-4000<br>
FAX: (617) 619-4009<br>
INTERNET ADDRESS: <a href="http://www.mass.gov/da/suffolk/">http://www.mass.gov/...</a><br>
Boston, Chelsea, Revere, Winthrop </p>
<p>Worcester District Attorney Joseph D. Early, Jr. <br>
Worcester Elected November 2006 <br>
Worcester OFFICE ADDRESS: Courthouse - Room 220<br>
Worcester 2 Main Street<br>
Worcester Worcester, MA 01608<br>
Worcester PHONE: (508) 755-8601<br>
Worcester FAX: (508) 831-9899<br>
Worcester INTERNET ADDRESS: <a href="http://www.worcesterda.com/">http://www.worcesterda.com</a></p>
</blockquote>
</div>