October 16, 2004
NO WONDER THEY WON'T TALK:
Broad Use Cited of Harsh Tactics at Base in Cuba (NEIL A. LEWIS, 10/17/04, NY Times)
Many detainees at Guantánamo Bay were regularly subjected to harsh and coercive treatment, several people who worked in the prison said in recent interviews, despite longstanding assertions by military officials that such treatment had not occurred except in some isolated cases.The people, military guards, intelligence agents and others, described in interviews with The New York Times a range of procedures that included treatment they said was highly abusive occurring over a long period of time, as well as rewards for prisoners who cooperated with interrogators.
One regular procedure that was described by people who worked at Camp Delta, the main prison facility at the naval base in Cuba, was making uncooperative prisoners strip to their underwear, having them sit in a chair while shackled hand and foot to a bolt in the floor, and forcing them to endure strobe lights and screamingly loud rock and rap music played through two close loudspeakers, while the air- conditioning was turned up to maximum levels, said one military official who witnessed the procedure. The official said that was designed to make the detainees uncomfortable as they were accustomed to high temperatures both in their native countries and their cells.
Most Americans will be justifiably furious that they received such lenient treatment. Posted by Orrin Judd at October 16, 2004 6:06 PM
I'd tell them everything rather than listen to the likes of Ja Rule.
Posted by: H. Ratliff at October 16, 2004 6:13 PMI'd tell them everything rather than listen to the likes of Ja Rule.
Posted by: H. Ratliff at October 16, 2004 6:13 PMMr. Judd;
Doesn't this fall under the same complete misunderstanding of the American Street rubric as Dawkin's Tony Martin attack on the invasion of Iraq? Perhaps we call refer to them as "cowboy insults", after the archetypical example of the EUlite calling President Bush a "cowboy", thinking it's an insult.
AOG:
Even more revealing is how the press dropped Abu Ghraib when they realized no one minded much.
Posted by: oj at October 16, 2004 6:22 PMWouldn't it have been a lot simpler to leave them under the control of the Uzbek militias?
Posted by: Bart at October 16, 2004 6:25 PMSounds like many nights I endured in clubs waiting for the band to get onstage. I wouldn't give up my spot at the front no matter how bad the pre-show music got, but maybe these fellows are wimpier than I was.
Posted by: Andrea Harris at October 16, 2004 6:48 PMFor the ones who still refuse to cooperate, we reserve an even greater horror:
Strummin' my fate with his fingers
Singin' my life with his words . . .
See, I have ways of making you talk! :-)
Posted by: Mike Morley at October 16, 2004 8:50 PMTrue enough - especially since we have read of at least two released detainees who were back fighting Americans again in Afghanistan.
Maybe they were tagged with tracers - who knows?
But I doubt if people would complain if they were buried up to their necks on the beach at low tide.
Posted by: jim hamlen at October 16, 2004 10:49 PMWell, at least they didn't use "The Comfy Chair!!!" To do so would be simply inhuman(e).