U.S. Abuse Of Detainees Was Routine At Afghanistan Bases

An eight-month McClatchy investigation of the detention system created after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks has found that the U.S. imprisoned innocent men, subjected them to abuse, stripped them of their legal rights and allowed Islamic militants to turn the prison camp at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba into a school for jihad.

American Bombing In Afghanistan 2001

KABUL, Afghanistan — American soldiers herded the detainees into holding pens of razor-sharp concertina wire, the kind that's used to corral livestock.

The guards kicked, kneed and punched many of the men until they collapsed in pain. U.S. troops shackled and dragged other detainees to small isolation rooms, then hung them by their wrists from chains dangling from the wire mesh ceiling.

Former guards and detainees whom McClatchy interviewed said Bagram was a center of systematic brutality for at least 20 months, starting in late 2001. Yet the soldiers responsible have escaped serious punishment.

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My Comment: It is difficult to accept carte blanche what many of the detainees are saying. Many of them are pro Osama Bin Laden, openly hostile to the U.S. and its allies. But were they mistreated? This was right after 9/11, and U.S. forces and their allies were trying their best to destroy the Taliban and Al Qaeda in Afghanistan. Information and intelligence was a premium, and it was needed as quickly as possible.

Were interrogators rough? The answer is probably yes. Were results obtained that helped the war effort. The answer is also probably yes. But was it the right thing to do it ....

It is easy to pass judgment today on what should have been done when Afghanistan fell apart in November-December 2001. But I do remember 7 years ago that the answers were not so easy. The over riding concern was to prevent another attack on the U.S., and if it meant to be rough .... so be it. Failures in U.S. intelligence and a lack of will from the political leadership to confront terrorist groups like Al Qaeda produced the situation of 9/11, and the end result was the need for U.S. intelligence services to then go to the "extreme" of obtaining information as quick as possible.

I repeat ..... seven years ago the American people were not only demanding justice, but also demanding that everything must be done to make sure that another 9/11 did not happen. In the process, I am sure that a lot of innocent people were hurt. But a lot of bad people were also taken out.

Like all conflicts, a balance had to be reached. The only thing that could be done now is to admit to mistakes, explain why things were done, and then move on. For this, I give credit for the work that the McClatchy Papers have done in producing these reports, but they should also present a perspective of what the environment was like 7 years ago.