"To be honest, the whole time I never really felt guilty because I was following orders and I was doing what I was supposed to do."

-Lynndie England, in an interview with German newsmagazine Stern.de, on her role in the maltreatment of prisoners at Abu Ghraib that became the international scandal.

This post is in the vein of the 3rd question from Dr. C's email:

"Based on the film, the class discussion and the readings, what specific policy changes to US military doctrine would decrease the levels of atrocity by US forces in conflict situations and in detention?"
..but with a slight diversion to include this really interesting interview

In trying to reduce the levels of mistreatment of protected persons in the Iraq conflict, it is important to recognize that the tone of the whole operation is set by the most senior personnel, in this case the President, Secretary of Defense, Theater Commander and on down the line, to the lowliest bottlewasher.

This is a point Wilmer makes, in looking at how the boundaries of "us" and "them" are formed and deliniated. The ICRC also makes this point in the executive summary we read, at least in a round-about way in its examination of why soliders do the inappropriate/wrong/wicked things they do. While the ICRC emphasizes that soliders need to be held accountable when they break the rules of war, the ICRC seemed to shy away from saying just what I said: the tone comes from the top, to use a management expression. (This is how diplomacy works-- reading between the lines for the unsaid.) I look at the role of 'tone' in the Abu Ghraib detention situation and then conflict situations.

Our film, "Ghosts of Abu Ghraib," made this point about tone. The film's take on how this shameful episode occured was basically that a reserve Military Police (MP) unit was assigned to run a detention centre at Saddam's infamous Abu Ghraib prison. When the MPs were allowed to run the prison in the conventional way, and there was a low inmate-to-staff ratio, things were fine, as prisons in war zones go.

According to the film, things at Abu Ghraib changed for the worse (for both staff and detainees) when several things occured:
1) more people were being picked up for alledged involvement with the growing insurgency and the population grew rapidly, while the number of staff did not,
2) Military Intelligence (MI) increased its presence in the prison, and detainees were seen as a resource for intelligence on the surgency,
3) the General who was in charge of setting up the Guantanamo facility was sent to make Abu Ghraib into a facility that produced more, and more useful intelligence. It was this General who transferred the running of the prison from the MPs to the MI staff,
4) One Charles Grener seems to have been given free rein to treat the prisoners as he wished, with a smile and a nod from the MI staff. The film noted that he came from the domestic US prison system-- I wonder if he behaved like that in his previous positions, especially with regard to the use of sexual humilitation, intimidation and violence. This raises serious questions about the treatment of prisoners in US facilities, which have further policy implications.

The film would have the viewer believe that the orders for the maltreatment of the detainees at Abu Ghraib came from on high. We have some evidence of efforts made in this direction, such as the memos that we read last week that reinterpret the official position on torture and hence military interrogation techniques. There also may be evidence in the language and rhetoric used by senior personalities in describing members of the insurgency, Al Qaeda in Iraq, etc. (This would be a good study, if only I knew how to do such a thing-- blending linguistics with IR, delicious!!) It is here that we're fortunant to see that Lynndie England, one of the ladies at Abu Ghraib who seemed to enjoy her role in humiliating and degrading the prisoners there, gave an interview with Stern.de. Here are two questions and responses that tie into the issue of whether the leaders gave the authorization or wink-wink for MI to use physical maltreatment to get what interrogators wanted:

"Stern: The former Secretary of Defense, Donald Rumsfeld, called you and your colleagues the "rotten apples" of the military. Bush claimed to be ashamed of what you did.
England: Well, back then I thought: How can they say that when it was happening all over Iraq. The same thing is happening in Guantanamo now and other places. We knew that our officers knew about it and our sergeants. We thought if they know then somebody else knows. And I really do still think that Rumsfeld knew what was going on. I mean he had been there while I was there at that prison. And if he was there I know he knew what was going on. How could he have not known? And Bush? He's the headman."

S: Saying you were a puppet again makes you sound like a victim.
E: Okay, I do take responsibility. (...) But when you're in the military you automatically do what they say. It's always, "Yes Sir, No Sir." You don't question it. And now they're saying, "Well, you should have questioned it."

England is playing the 'I was just following orders" card and the "I was doing what was expected of me" card. We know that 'following orders' is not an acceptible excuse after Nuremberg, but I think she's onto something in explaining that the US military culture inside Abu Ghraib made such disgraceful behaviour "normal."-- this is Wilmer's very point. It would also be seized upon by those who study institutional and organizational cultures and how they operate.

The organizational culture of militaries that are engaged in counterinsurgency operations (COIN Ops) is also relevant here; I've run across some of this working on my policy paper but haven't focused on it. My guess is that it would deal with what happens when you have an organized military fighting an invisible insurgency, and how on earth this is done. Certain strategies are better than others, while the most effective ones in the short-term are usually the most brutal. (more further research for me)

So, policy changes to decrease atrocities against the population at large and detainees.

1) The tone from the top must change. The Administration has been calling anyone who opposes US policy in Iraq 'terrorists'. Some of them are. But many are not. They just want to 1) run their country their way, 2) evict the people who screwed up their country for their own half-assed reasons and based on their unrealistic neo-con world-view, and 3) make sure their own group (ethnic, religious, tribal, clan, whatever) doesn't get screwed by any of the other groups. (This really is the world the Hobbes described)
By calling all of these people 'terrorists' (and probably not just the violent ones), these people are being labeled in such a way as to deny their genuine and bona fide aspirations, positions, methods etc. And when that's done, it's easier to group them together and assign characteristics. And these characteristics are not flattering, so the dehumanization, scapegoating etc begin.
When an 18 year old from a village in Kansas hears this rhetoric, about 'savage, rag-head terrorists', how does one expect him/her to see the Iraqis s/he interacts with, especially if his/her duties are to look for bona fide terrorists and murderers? What happens when a prison guard who is already accustomed to brutality is put in a position of virtually unlimited power over his charges, who are not seen as people worthy of respect because they're "terrorists"?
Also, cultural awareness training of individual troops can only do so much if one thinks of the Iraqis as "terrorists" before you even have reason to believe them as such.

The tone at the top is everything. In the business world, it plays a great role in worker morale and all of the good that flows from good energy in an enterprise. (In the 1980s American corporations were very keen to emulate Japanese morale and tone practices, trying to achieve the same level of productivity.) There is a reason the publisher of the Nazi propaganda newspaper Der Stürmer, Julius Streicher, was hanged at Nuremburg in 1946.

2. Other COIN methods must be used, that do not create witch-hunts and generate more resentment against the US and US forces for ruining and occupying their country. The Administration realised this a few years ago, hence the campaign to both win hearts and minds, and to understand Iraqi political and tribal culture in order to build the necessary alliances to stop Al Qaeda types and rely on traditional justice schemes to keep ordinary crime in check. I would argue that continuing to help improving the economic situation in Iraq will keep people from being idle and/or being tempted to turn to crime or terrorism as a way to supporting themselves and families. Clearly this is difficut, given the differences in culture, the fact that Iraq is still in a feudal stage of development culturally and the troop-to-population ratio. But these efforts have been successful and must continue.

For detainees, they must not be brutalized and forced to give confessions. Those are the tactics of the Spanish Inquisition, not the US. There are other, humane, effective methods of interrogation. What was done in the past, for example?