Army Adds Farce to Abu Ghraib Shame

[kpete]

First Published 2007-08-28, Last Updated 2007-08-28 11:03:59

Army Adds Farce to Abu Ghraib Shame


A US Army intelligence analyst, my job at Abu Ghraib was systems administrator. But I had the bad luck to be on the 2000 to 0800 night shift. And so I saw the detainees dragged in for interrogation, heard the screams, and saw many of them dragged out, says Sam Provance.

......................

An Army intelligence analyst, my job at Abu Ghraib was systems administrator (“the computer guy”). But I had the bad luck to be on the 2000 to 0800 night shift. And so I saw the detainees dragged in for interrogation, heard the screams, and saw many of them dragged out.

Watching Act I of the faux-trial of Lt. Col. Steven Jordan last week at Fort Meade, Maryland, confirmed my worst suspicions. I know Jordan; I was in place for his entire tenure at Abu Ghraib, including when prisoners were being tortured; he was my immediate boss.

Enter from the wings reserve Maj. Gen. George Fay. MG Fay was handpicked to run interference for then-Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld by conducting the same kind of “full and thorough investigation” that former President Richard Nixon ordered for Watergate. With Fay, too, I speak from personal experience. Shortly after photos of the torture at Abu Ghraib were published, I found myself being interviewed by Fay on May 1, 2004. It was a surreal performance, with Fay seeming to take his cue at times from Peter Seller’s Inspector Clouseau.

Except it wasn’t funny then; and it is not funny now. To me, Fay showed himself singularly uninterested in what really was going on at Abu Ghraib. I had to ask him repeatedly to listen to my eyewitness account. Whereupon he said he would recommend action against me for not reporting what I knew sooner for, if I had done that, I could have prevented the abuse. Right.

...............

Sam Provance, a former sergeant specializing in intelligence analysis, refused to remain silent about the torture of Abu Ghraib, where he served for five months at the height of the abuses. He was punished for refusing to take part in the cover-up, and pushed out of the Army. For his sworn testimony to Congress, click here: http://www.humanrightsfirst.info/pdf/06214-usls-provance-statment.pdf

more at:
http://www.middle-east-online.com/english/opinion/?id=21897

[Richard Steele]

1. K&R

[MindPilot]

2. I hope the next administration will begin a program to

find and amply reward all these people who did the right thing.

[pansypoo53219]

3. that would be just

but apparently that was also changed by 9/11.