September 24, 2005
A decorated Army officer reveals new allegations of detainee mistreatment in Iraq and Afghanistan. Did the military ignore his charges?
The U.S. Army has launched a criminal investigation into new allegations of
serious prisoner abuse in Iraq and Afghanistan made by a decorated former
Captain in the Army's 82nd Airborne Division, an Army spokesman has
confirmed
to TIME. The claims of the Captain, who has not been named, are in part
corroborated by statements of two sergeants who served with him in the 82nd
Airborne; the allegations form the basis of a report from Human Rights Watch obtained by TIME and due to be
released
in the next few days (Since this story first went online, the organization has decided to put out its report; it can be found here). Senate sources tell TIME that the Captain has also
reported his charges to three senior Republican senators: Majority Leader
Bill
Frist, Armed Services Committee chairman John Warner and John McCain, a
former
torture victim in Vietnam. A Senate Republican staffer familiar with both
the
Captain and his allegations told TIME he appeared "extremely credible."
The new allegations
center around systematic abuse of Iraqi detainees by men of the 82nd
Airborne
at Camp Mercury, a forward operating base located near Fallujah, the scene
of
a major uprising against the U.S. occupation in April 2004, according to
sources familiar with the report and accounts given by the Captain, who is
in
his mid-20s, to Senate staff. Much of the abuse allegedly occurred in 2003 and
2004, before and during the period the Army was conducting an internal investigation
into
the Abu Ghraib prison scandal, but prior to when the abuses at Abu Ghraib became
public. Other alleged abuses described in the Human Rights report occurred
at
Camp Tiger, near Iraq's border with Syria, and previously in Afghanistan. In addition, the
report details what the Captain says was his
unsuccessful effort over 17 months to get the attention of military
superiors.
Ultimately he approached the Republican senators.
The Human Rights Watch report—as well as accounts given to Senate
staff—describe officers as aware of the abuse but routinely ignoring or
covering it up, amid chronic confusion over U.S. military detention
policies
and whether or not the Geneva Convention applied. The Captain is quoted in
the
report describing how military intelligence personnel at Camp Mercury
directed
enlisted men to conduct daily beatings of prisoners prior to questioning;
to
subject detainees to strenuous forced exercises to the point of
unconsciousness; and to expose them to extremes of heat and cold—all
methods
designed to produce greater cooperation with interrogators. Non-uniformed
personnel—apparently working for the Central Intelligence Agency,
according
to the soldiers—also interrogated prisoners. The interrogators were out of
view but not out of earshot of the soldiers, who overheard what they came
to
believe was abuse.
Specific instances of abuse described in the Human Rights Watch report
include
severe beatings, including one incident when a soldier allegedly broke a
detainee's leg with a metal bat. Others include prisoners being stacked in
human pyramids (unlike the human pyramids at Abu Ghraib, the prisoners at
Camp
Mercury were clothed); soldiers administering blows to the face, chest and
extremities of prisoners; and detainees having their faces and eyes exposed
to
burning chemicals, being forced into stress positions for long periods
leading
to unconsciousness and having their water and food withheld.
Prisoners were designated as PUCs (pronounced "pucks")—or "persons under
control." A regular pastime at Camp Mercury, the report says, involved
off-duty soldiers gathering at PUC tents, where prisoners were held, and
working off their frustrations in activities known as "F____a PUC" (beating
the prisoner) and "Smoke a PUC" (forced physical exertion, sometimes to the
point of collapse). Broken limbs and similar painful injuries would be
treated
with analgesics, the soldiers claim, as medical staff would fill out
paperwork
stating the injuries occurred during capture.
Support for some of the allegations of abuse come from a sergeant of the
82nd
Airborne who served in both Iraq and Afghanistan. Human Rights Watch quotes
him as saying that, "To 'F____ a PUC' means to beat him up. We would give
them
blows to the head, chest, legs, and stomach, pull them down, kick dirt on
them. This happened every day. To 'smoke' someone is to put them in stress
positions until they get muscle fatigue and pass out. That happened every
day.
Some days we would just get bored so we would have everyone sit in a corner
and then make them get in a pyramid. This was before Abu Ghraib but just
like
it. We did that for amusement.
"On their day off people would show up all the time," the sergeant
continues
in the HRW report. "Everyone in camp knew if you wanted to work out your
frustration you show up at the PUC tent. In a way it was sport. The cooks
were
all U.S. soldiers. One day a sergeant shows up and tells a PUC to grab a
pole. He told him to bend over and broke the guy's leg with a mini
Louisville
Slugger that was a metal bat. He was the cook."
The sergeant says that military intelligence officers would tell soldiers
that
the detainees "were bad" and had been involved in killing or trying to kill
Americans, implying that they deserved whatever punishment they got. "I
would
be told, 'These guys were IED [improvised explosive device] trigger men
last
week.' So we would f___ them up. F___ them up bad ... At the same time we
should be held to a higher standard. I know that now. It was wrong. There
are
a set of standards. But you gotta understand, this was the norm. Everyone
would just sweep it under the rug ... We should never have been allowed to
watch guys we had fought."
The Captain making the allegations, say those who have been in contact
with
him, gave lengthy statements to Human Rights Watch only after his attempts to report what he had seen and heard
to
his own chain of command, were met, he claims, with repeated brush-offs. He
is
currently in special forces training at Fort Bragg in North Carolina. The
two
non-commissioned officers served in both Iraq and Afghanistan, and likewise
approached the watchdog group, but have not conferred with Senate staff.
"The
captain is a very sincere officer, and troubled by what he says he has
seen,"
says another senior aide to a Republican senator. "Only an investigation
can
determine how accurate his account will prove to be."
The Human Rights Watch report describes the Captain, in particular, as
deeply
frustrated by his attempts to report the abuse to his own superiors, who
repeatedly instructed him to keep quiet, to ignore what he'd seen and to
consider the implications for his career. The Captain told Human Rights
Watch
and Senate staff that he had contacted legislators reluctantly, believing
it
was the only way he could get the army to take him seriously. He also said
that "I knew something was wrong" as he watched Secretary of Defense Donald
Rumsfeld on television in 2004 testifying before a Congressional committee
that the U.S. was following the Geneva Convention to the letter in Iraq.
The
Monday morning after Rumsfeld's testimony, he told Human Rights Watch, "I
approached my chain of command." Eventually, the captain says, he
approached
his company commander, battalion commander and representatives of the Judge
Advocate Corps (the military justice system), trying in vain to get
clarification of rules on prisoner treatment and the application of the
Geneva
Convention. At one point, the Captain asserts, his Company commander told
him,
in effect, "Remember the honor of the unit is at stake," and, "Don't expect
me
to go to bat for you on this issue ..."
The Captain also says he was told there were pictures of abuse that
occurred at Camp Mercury similar to photos taken by Military Police at Abu
Ghraib prison. It is not clear whether the Captain saw the pictures, but he
has said, sources tell TIME, that the photos were so similar to what was
depicted at Abu Ghraib that, when the scandal erupted, soldiers burned them
out of fear that they too could be punished.
The Captain has also told Senate staff that many of the actions he
witnessed
did not, at the time, violate his personal code of conduct. He was also
under
the impression that the conduct was in line with military policy. It was
only
later, Congressional sources tell TIME, that he became aware of what he
regarded as a blatant contradiction in official U.S. policy. As the captain puts
it,
according to the report: "I witnessed violations of the Geneva Conventions
that I knew were violations of the Geneva Conventions when they happened
but I
was under the impression that that was U.S. policy at the time. And as soon
as
Abu Ghraib broke and they had hearings in front of Congress, the Secretary
of
Defense testified that we followed the spirit of the Geneva Conventions in
Afghanistan, and the letter of the Geneva Conventions in Iraq, and as soon
as
he said that I knew something was wrong. So I called some of my classmates
[from West Point], confirmed what I was concerned about and then on that
Monday morning I approached my chain of command ..."
An Army spokesman confirmed to TIME that a criminal investigation has
begun
into the allegations, and that the Captain has been given permission to
speak
to members of Congress about his concerns. Since the Abu Ghraib scandal
became
public, hundreds of cases of alleged abuse have emerged based on
reports
from
the International Committee of the Red Cross, U.S. government
documents,
prisoner legal filings and other sources. The Army alone says it has
conducted
investigations into more than 400 allegations of detainee mistreatment.
To
date, more than 230 Army personnel have been dealt with in courts
martial, non-judicial punishments and other administrative
actions.