RINF.COM: HET BREKENDE ALTERNATIEF VAN HET NIEUWS
Dinsdag, 1 Juli, 2008
RINF.COM: HET BREKENDE ALTERNATIEF VAN HET NIEUWS
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`W.' betekent de Misdadiger van de Oorlog `'
Zondag, 29 Juni, 2008
Door Nationaal Hentoff | In 6 Juni de brief aan Procureur Algemene Michael Mukasey-largely door een pers die in de toekomst van Hillary Clinton-56 Democrats in het Huis van Vertegenwoordigers wordt ondergedompeld dat een „direct onderzoek met de benoeming van een speciaal advies wordt gevraagd negeerde te bepalen of de acties die door de Voorzitter, zijn Kabinet, en andere ambtenaren van het Beleid worden gevoerd in schending van het Akte zijn van de Misdaden van de Oorlog (18 U.S.C. 2441) . . . en de andere V.S. en internationale wetten.“ Dit is voor-pagina geen nieuws? De brief begon met een korte rekening van de bekende feiten over Abu Ghraib (“ seksuele uitbuiting en marteling“) en Guantánamo (een“ onafhankelijk onderzoek door het Internationale Comité van het Rode Kruis documenteerde verscheidene. . . handelingen van marteling. . . met inbegrip van het doorweken van het hoofd van een gevangene in alcohol en het aansteken van het op brand“). Noch was „dwangondervraging“ in weggelaten Afghanistan: „In Oktober 2005, De New York Times rapporteerde dat drie gevangenen tijdens ondervragingen in Afghanistan en Irak door de agenten van de CIA of de contractanten van de CIA.“ werden gedood Dit is geen vraag naar artikelen van beschuldiging. Bush zal spoedig gegaan worden, en de nieuwe voorzitter en het Congres hebben veel teveel te doen krijgen mired in dat quicksand. Dit zijn ernstige misdadige lasten, en aangezien de internationale misdaden evenals de V.S. geïmpliceerdn zijn. Het Akte van de Misdaden van de oorlog en het Akte van de anti-Marteling, andere naties de van wie wetten „universele jurisdictie“ omvatten konden vervolgen. Maar waarom Gerechtelijk Comité Jr. van voorzitter John Conyers zou huisvesten. en de leden Jerrold Nadler (mijn congresvertegenwoordiger) en Januari hebben van de Intelligentie van het Comité schakowsky-onder ander onderschrijvingsslip-merk dergelijke dramatische en historische lasten van „oorlogsmisdaden“ nu, na de meeste congresDemocraten niet de zelfde rente getoond? De Spreker Nancy Pelosi van het huis, bijvoorbeeld, is niet op de lijst van onderschrijvingsslips; zij en de Senaat de Democratische meerderheidsleider Harry Reid, in hun verzet tegen het beleid nooit heeft, komen overal dichtbij deze stuitende beschuldigingen. Vanaf dit het schrijven, heb ik geen alarm duidelijk onder Republikeinen gezien, maar als het verhaal benen heeft, zal de reactie met een belachelijke eis beginnen dat dit goedkope, transparante, en een struik-liga truc is om de verkiezing van Barack Obama aan te drijven. But in the letter, these latter-day Thomas Paines (assuming you agree with them) assert that what impelled them to act immediately was that, “within the last month, additional information has surfaced that suggests the fact that not only did top Administration officials meet in the White House and approve of the use of enhanced techniques, including waterboarding against detainees, but that President Bush was aware of and approved of the meetings taking place. . . . This information indicates that the Bush administration may have systematically implemented, from the top down, detainee interrogation policies that constitute torture or otherwise violate the law.” (Emphasis added.) If Bush, Cheney, Gonzales, et al. are ever in the dock after such an investigation, I am sure that the prosecutors will show, among other thoroughly documented sources, the very specific names of the perpetrators and the dates of this series of crimes, as published in Torture Team: Rumsfeld’s Memo and the Betrayal of American Values by Phillippe Sands (Palgrave MacMillan) and the irrefutable evidence found in University of Houston professor Jordan J. Paust’s Beyond the Law: The Bush Administration’s Unlawful Responses in the “War” on Terror (Cambridge University Press). The latter is a book I wish every voter in November will have read, along with the same publisher’s 1,249-page The Torture Papers: The Road to Abu Ghraib, edited by Karen J. Greenberg and Joshua L. Dratel. Such books will help build the careers of future historians around the world. I am further encouraged because chairman John Conyers, the June 8 Washington Post reported, “is looking into the role played by administration lawyers” in all of these crimes. Conyers, calling treatment of detainees “a truly shameful episode,” emphasizes that Bush’s “enhanced” interrogation techniques were “used under cover of Justice Department legal opinions,” and so “the need for outside counsel is obvious.” And since the letter from the 56 House Democrats is going to Attorney General Michael Mukasey—who claims that he cannot prosecute any perpetrator of these alleged war crimes because, by golly, they were authorized by Justice Department legal opinions—these House patriots are saying that Mukasey must appoint a special counsel rather than handle the investigation himself. To give you a snapshot of Michael Mukasey’s dedication to the rule of law and its essential requirement of fairness and impartiality in all trials, Bush’s attorney general recently told an annual conference of Washington federal judges that trials of suspected terrorists by military commissions at Guantánamo will be “in the best traditions of the American legal system” (New York Sun, June 5). On June 12, the Supreme Court, declaring the commissions unconstitutional, exposed Mukasey’s constitutional ignorance. The administration lawyers, whom Conyers is also going after, designed those Guantánamo military commissions after advising Bush that the prisoners were not entitled to the protections of habeas corpus and the Geneva Conventions—and didn’t have to be tried in our federal courts. In Beyond the Law, Paust says of these lawyers (most of them graduates of our premier law schools): “Not since the Nazi era have so many lawyers been so clearly involved in international crimes concerning the treatment and interrogation of persons detained during war. . . . Such a direct role in a process of denial of protections under the laws of war [and our Constitution] is far more serious than the loss of honor and integrity to [presidential] power. It can form the basis for a lawyer’s civil and criminal responsibility. . . . “[These were lawyers] . . . directly advising how to deny protections in the future (denials of such protections are violations of the laws of war and war crimes).” And dig this: The administration lawyers advised the president how to take “actions that allegedly would avoid the restraints of various criminal statutes and their reach to the President and others with respect to future conduct,” and especially with respect to the planned “coercive” interrogation tactics authorized by George W. Bush. (Emphasis added). Some of these lawyers have gone on to prominent government positions—like Dick Cheney’s chief of staff, David Addington. Next week: the legal and historic precedents for “command responsibility.” See More:BushHave Your Say: The ‘W.’ Stands for ‘War Criminal’ Please note, only selected comments will be published. Or discuss this report in our new forums 2 Responses to “The ‘W.’ Stands for ‘War Criminal’”
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