DOD Declares War on … Underwear
Charlie Savage just tweeted that the Abu Ghraib tactics will continue for Bradley Manning.
Quantico tells me Bradley Manning will now be stripped every night as a “precautionary measure” to prevent self-injury
Remember, Manning was already being forced to sleep in his underwear.
When PFC Manning goes to sleep, he is required to strip down to his boxer shorts and surrender his clothing to the guards. His clothing is returned to him the next morning.
So this new enforced nudity policy purports that Manning’s underwear are a danger to him.
DOD, protecting us from terrorists … and boxer shorts.
I’m imagining Osama bin Laden sitting in his cave laughing his ass off at the Marines that run Quantico, frightened over one pair of underwear. And imagining a new version of the Marine Hymn:
From the Halls of Montezuma, to cells of Quantico. We will fight our country’s battles against truth and underroos.
Now, frankly, humor may be the best way to cope with learning about this. But it’s not fair to the Marines that run Quantico to ask them to do something as absurd as this, to trump up some stupid excuse about the threat one man’s boxer shorts pose so they can justify stupid persecution.
Our Marines deserve better than this. Our country deserves better than this.
If they were really worried about suicide they would give him a paper gown. That’s what they do in psych hospitals when they have a reason to think someone will try to hang themselves with their underwear. Of course, the whole suicide watch is a charade.
This brig commander is in absolute control of an enlisted man in the United States Army. She claims he is exhibiting psychological problems and she fears he might take his own life. If so, she has an affirmative duty to treat him medically and to adjust the conditions of his confinement so as to minimize the risk of harm. Continuing enforced nudity increases that risk.
If she truly thought Manning was exhibiting suicidal behavior, she would not add to his disorientation and vulnerability through enforced nudity, actions that would most likely push the patient/prisoner further out on the ledge. She could not do so and fulfill her responsibilities.
Nor could she leave him in a normal prison cell. She would admit him to a medical facility where he could be supervised not by men trained to kill, but by medical personnel trained to treat mental disorders. She could not leave him in his cell and keep him under conditions likely to worsen his psychological state.
She could do that if Mr. Manning were really psychologically fit. In that case, she and her superiors and spokespeople are lying, and breaching another professional responsibility.
If Mr. Manning is psychologically fit, he might be attempting to stay that way by asserting the dignity of his own personality over the mindless obedience demanded by the conditions of his confinement. He might be using body language or verbal language his captors think disrespects them.
If so, then this brig commander might be reminding Mr. Manning that his self-assertion is pointless and counterproductive, and evidence that he is exhibiting “a failure to communicate.” She would then be figuratively putting him in the box, enforcing nudity, in hopes of forestalling the moment when he might cheer on his prison mates and supporters by claiming that he can eat 50 eggs.
If that’s the case, this brig commander is being sadistic and breaching another professional responsibility. She is, however, presumably acting under direct orders from her superiors. Are those legal? If not, she has an affirmative duty to disobey them, lest she be complicit in committing crimes. The Navy gave her a poisoned chalice by putting her in command of this brig and at this time. How kind of the macho military to do this to a female warrant officer; the outcome will not shed the best light on the Army, the Navy or its female personnel or their male superiors or their political superiors. Worst of all is what they are intentionally doing to Mr. Manning.
ding ding ding
They must prevent his access to tools of asymmetric warfare – a rope to hang himself. The prisoner’s death by suicide would be a win for him and a loss for his captors, by their accounting. Remember how the camp commander classified the behavior of the Muslims who committed suicide in Gitmo – as a winning tactic of war, rather than of despair.
I asked this rhetorically on another thread, but it’s really not that bad of a question: How would one go about charging Chief Warrant Officer Denise Barns with the crime of bringing discredit on the military? Or for that matter, is the lying Geoff Morrel subject to the same kind of charge?
Torture….Murder….Treason, I can see it all now!
Psyco-sexual shit via closed circuit TV.
This country is hanging onto the toilet bowl hoping God will make the room stop spinning.
Same thing Germans did before the Gas Chamber…….
Man, I’ve got to think that the DOD is ratcheting up his treatment due to not really having the goods on him.
Could be like Al Queida briefs !
Oohh, you’re right–there’s a whole new thread of humor there.
Like the guy who gives Obama his national security briefs? Is he a terrorist now?
We should send them a couple thousand boxers with the 8th Amendment written on them in magic marker.
That’s a brilliant idea.
Though we’d also have to put the 5th and 6th, bc part of the problem is that DOD is just holding him w/o advancing to the Article 32 phase, and then imposition of POI w/o any reason defies due process.
8th on the front, 5th and 6th over either cheek.
Whaddya say?
Dunno, it might be nice to send hand written boxers, so you can choose which amendment you like.
EW,
I have to tell you that my link on the below post was not meant to be a celebration as Bmaz thought. It was to alert you that you were mentioned several times in his statements.
Ok, thanks!
bmaz has just had his lawyer had on very very tight of late. So he’s got to make sure we’re fighting for rule of law.
I used to believe it was a common problem associated w/JDs, but apparently not anymore.
I understand. I just want you both to know that I was sending it for you and your protection.
Appreciate it.
Should we make them pink plaids?
(link)
Lets send them to Quantico addressed to PFC Bradley Manning
“DOD, protecting us from terrorists … and boxer shorts.”
Didn’t we decide that they were mad because Manning and Assange embarassed them? I don’t think they need any help. They are doing just fine on their own.
The Marines at the brigg should refuse to participate in this sickness. Otherwise, they get the humiliation they deserve.
And here is B. Woodward:
http://www.consortiumnews.com/2011/030411a.html
Not really. They’re mostly bullying cowards and liars. Sure, they like torturing and killing people when they have overpowering advantages, but that leaves me unsympathetic to their plight.
Now that’s a difficult call, given all the moral monsters that inhabit the place.
I guess I’m angry about it.
How remarkably shallow and broad that statement is. You don’t know any Marines, do you?
Here, here. Most of them are highly-trained, dedicated and good people, with political and social views that encompass a wide spectrum, if generally veering toward the conservative end. In a sense, they are professional athletes, but not trained for sport. It’s a dangerous dirty job and we should be glad there are those fit and qualified to stand a post when we are not.
That said, they don’t choose their missions; those are determined by their political masters, as are the tools they are given and the principal orders they are meant to follow. It’s a rare order that is so obviously illegal that it can be disobeyed without there being someone else who will promptly obey it. Nor do we know what disinformation is being disseminated about the prisoners at
GitmoQuantico about more of the worst of the worst.As Marcy said, our Marines, this Navy warrant officer brig commander, and Bradley Manning deserve better treatment, starting with sounder, legal and more professional decisions coming from their political superiors, who should be concerned about more than covering their ample backsides.
I think all people who serve in the military or police are trained and desensitized to violence. The sadists are especially coddled and advanced in the system.
If you can’t commit violence in the service to the state you become a paper pusher and the real work is left to those who can.
That might explained why recruiting standards have been modified to make those with those with prior criminal records eligible for military service.
In the not too distant future, a prior criminal record may be a prerequisite for military service.
That said, the volunteer self-selects for those who have tolerance for their ‘duty’. I don’t figure there are whole lot of pacifists, that would be silly. The system optimizes opportunities for those so inclined to be involved in actions a good many of us would find abhorrent, say, rousting old folks out of their houses in the middle of the night, scaring the shit out of them in their own town, and then maybe beating or cuffing a couple to make a point.
Our military constantly trumps up their ability as the toughest, bestest fighting, read ‘killing’, machine, in the world. Why would one be surprised to find aggressive violent people there? Though there ARE circumstances that drive some to the military who do not bear those traits, the longer we wage these imperial aggressive occupations overseas, the less respect I have for the motives of those who volunteer to share its mission.
Support the Troops? As a mantra, I don’t really we should blindly do that, just as a refuse to blindly buy into Obama’s steady line of bullshit about freedom, security, Wikileaks, banks, tax cuts, ‘sacrifices’ we all have to make, or pretty much ANYTHING he has to say any more.
This is just another topic where truth lies somewhere in the middle, but trending right.
Respectfully. This is not knee-jerk or rash analysis. I think this conclusion is logically honest one.
Naked?
That’s what they do in Gitmo. Channel 4 in Britain had a special about what they did there, that I dug up for a blog a few years ago
… maybe I can find the link
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article17666.htm
Where is Manning’s attorney in all this? Why hasn’t he filed suit in Federal Court?
I believe a formal complaint was filed yesterday.
His attorney is David Coombs. Here’s his website and blog.
And here’s a snip of what he wrote today, as regards the legal status:
After submitting the rebuttal, the matter will go back to the Quantico Base Commander, Colonel Daniel J. Choike, for his review. Once complete, he will forward the report to the Secretary of the Navy for final review.
And, I wonder how long it will take Choike to forward his review to the sec. of the navy
DoD the Ministry of Love
MSM the Ministry of Truth
Yes, they do but Manning, (who also deserves better than this), is in the Army.
Yup.
Just felt bad for rewriting the Marine hymn.
The re-writing is valid as Manning is being held at the Marine brig at Quantico. But he almost certainly wouldn’t thank you for calling him a “marine”.
I wasn’t calling him a Marine.
He’s not the one who is claiming underwear is dangerous. I’m well aware he’s Army, but I wasn’t talking about him.
The Marines, who are Manning’s guards and torturers, deserve better than this too. The entire military machine is being misused by its overseers.
Yes. I said that:
I shudder every time I think of this young man, whose entire world is defined now by the cage he’s kept in, naked all night. It’s horrific. He’s surrounded by the most muy macho of the service branches, Marines, at a time when DADT is being trained out of the military — he’s gay, small, and weighs about 100 pounds, surrounded by US Marines. Naked.
This is psychosexual torture.
By our president.
Manning deserves better than this…
we deserve better than Obama and the Republicrats.
Not Republicrats. They should be called Vichycrats for the traitors they are.
Can you post (or repost) for the military percharge of Manning. I have several email messages in mind for that person.
O/T ,sort of
Former CIA spy Andrew Warren gets five-and-a-half years for …Mar 4, 2011 … Andrew Warren was head of the CIA’s operations in fractious Algeria … has been sentenced to five-and-a-half years in jail for drugging and …
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/…/Former-CIA-spy-Andrew-Warren-gets-half-years- drugging-sexually-abusing-Algerian-woman-going-crack-fuelled-run-polic…
ew
you really are too kind-hearted.
think of soldiers at abu grahib and their own “breakdown” – into torturers.
chances are, unless there is rapid rotation, and there very well may be to prevent guards from rebelling and talking,
that at least some of manning’s guards have developed an easy tolerance for what is being done to him.
the social psychology suggests we humans are inclined to tolerate/enjoy torture if “authorized” to do so. the guards have clearly been so authorized. they cannot possibly be oblivious to the sleep deprivation and loss of privacy they are inflicting on manning.
changing focus:
i wonder where the alexandria grand jury is on wikileaks “indictment”.
one explanation for the increased torture (in the form of humiliation) is that a grand jury is running out of time or is skeptical of the prosecutor’s evidence.
thus provoking increased pressure on manning:
– to plea bargain, hence the recent laundry list of charges including those involving a death penalty
– to confess outright, hence the increased psychological torture, to some direct involvement with wikil or with assange.
the major point here is that the torture of manning may be being controlled by the u. s. dept of justice.
would that not be odd?
certainly, doj/fbi under bush and now obama, has become the most ruthless, brutally soviet, of all the federal agencies involved in “security” matters for the nation.
i will add, parenthetically, that i believe doj/fbi operate the way they do nowadays because rightwing republicans gravitate naturally to these agencies for the opportunities they offer to lead authoritarian careers.
This is a good analysis. Let’s hope Manning is smart enough to see that they are trying to break him and resists. I’m willing to bet this man has what it takes as DOJ and its band of sadists are working hard to destroy him.
Time may be running out as this is getting more mainstream coverage and torture is not playing well with the Americans in this matter.
This is the same kind of inflated refusal to accept the truth of the mirror as the losing sports teams who whine “we deserved to win.”
We and our country get not what we “deserve,” only what we create.
And what we create can only ever be a reflection of ourselves.
Our world is our mirror. And until we all accept responsibility that this is our country, we created it, and everything about it reflects us and who we really are – nothing will ever change.
Eloquent and to the point EternalVigilance…Thank you!
Regardless of the legions of asswads and elitist scum that pull the levers…
we are very capable of smashing the levers and kicking the masters of destiny to the curb…
but a good portion of the Amerikan masses are too busy with manufactured bullshit and have drank copiously of the propaganda kool aid!
We need the Wisconsin protesting mindset in every village, city, and town…
maybe that would roll it all over!
Underwear: the new weapon of mass destruction.
Forced nakedness is a kind of sexual humiliation. It is torture. I suppose it is so awful to see this blatantly done and feel powerless to stop it, so humor may help us cope with it.
But as far as I’m concerned, it’s blatant and sadistic torture, meant, as your quote from the 2002 JTF-Gitmo SERE SOP makes clear, as degradation, “to demonstrate the omnipotence of the captor or to debilitate the detainee.”
That’s not fear of underwear. That’s sick and dangerous megalomania coming from the ruling elite and their armed legions.
Real subversion starts at the bottom.
We have every right to defend ourselves.
Ryan Gallagher, The Guardian
OT, I’m an inconsistent fan of Gillian Anderson. Some of my favorite X-Files – The Unnatural – were the ones without or where she played a small role. I marveled, however, at her performance in Bleak House. Surprisingly, she can be funny and poignant, not easy to do in a newspaper interview. Selected comments from an interview with the Guardian:
She’s one of the actresses I’ve always had a thing for. Maybe it’s the hair color, maybe it’s the voice, maybe it’s that she doesn’t play dumb-bimbo-airheads or psychos … probably all of the above
One obscure movie I saw about a year or two ago that she was in was really good, and I was amazed I hadn’t heard of it before. It’s called Closure or Straightheads – one is the British title and the other is the American title, I forget what it was called when I saw it
She grew up in London, which might explain her unusual ability to do a good, RP English accent. She’s not just Mulder’s second fiddle any more. But Californication is pretty good, too.
Glenn Greenwald
I am amazed they admitted this. Despicable.
On a related note, Glenn will be speaking in my neighborhood next
http://www.artshound.com/event/detail/441151805/Shredding_the_Constitution_Civil_Liberties_and_the_War_on_Terror
I will be there. Anyone else in the area going?
Sounds like a lot Brief sniffing to me. Maybe they have a penchant for used Briefs.
Did not the incoming president have the opportunity to clean house and replace all the US attorneys general as is the tradition, but for some reason decided to break precedent and not do so?
You mean US Attorney. He did replace some of them, but not all. In particular, he avoided replacing anyone who was in the midst of a corruption investigation.
But USAs aren’t involved in Manning’s current charges–they’re all military. Of course, O has the ability replace military officers too.
No military wants to be confronted with evidence – like the WikiLeaks information – that calls into question the moral righteousness of their killing of an enemy.
Militaries are particularly susceptible to misuse when their civilian leaders paint-up a despicable, less-than-human boogeyman, and ascribe all manner of depravity and ill-intent to that enemy; ginning-up the use of lethal force and animal control of a foreign population, in the face of a perceived, immediate existential threat.
Manning’s alleged activities force the military to make a choice between demonizing the messenger of an ugly truth that’s secretly bleeding-out the soul of a nation, or facing the likely reality that they’ve been immorally used to kill innocent others by their un-principled civilian ‘leaders.’
The protection that Manning needs now is to be shielded from the military displacing its rage on him – for what Bush ordered them to do.
billyP@55
you are correct.
president obama did have the opportunity to clean out the doj.
he refused to take advantage of that opportunity.
thus he lost a major opportunity to return the u.s. to a more tolerant view of the law and to that national state of mind where “rule of law” trumps the exploitation of law for power purposes.
as brad delong might say: another unforced error by obama.
as i would add: made by an inexperienced and amoral president.
And we can thank our lucky stars that we had ONE SOLDIER that had the guts to blow the whistle on the military. i.e. Bradley Manning.
And it appears to only be one person. Out of millions that have cycled through. How much does that tell you about those in the military?
Signed, Not really as staunch about this position as it sounds, but I feel this deserves a legitimate airing in the debate.
emptywheel@59
obama failed to replace leura canary u.s. attorney for middle district of alabama.
canary was involved in prosecutions so corrupt (specifically of former gov don siegelman) as to become a common cause for 40+ state attorney’s general.
the president, acting thru attorney general holder, similarly failed to replace republican appointees within the dept of justice and allowed doj’s “insiders are never held accountable” attitude to persist into his administration.
i assume the president, as he has elsewhere, decided to pursue the passive approach to of letting the organization sort itself out by its own rules.
that is not my view of moral leadership.
emptywheel@59
“…But USAs aren’t involved in Manning’s current charges–they’re all military. Of course, O has the ability replace military officers too.”
that is certainly true since assistant u.s. attorneys are involved within their own states.
but we do not know, or at least i do not know, whether u.s. attorneys with the doj are not directly involved with the manning case.
in fact, it seems to me highly likely they are. there has to be some goal or purpose for the treatment mannning is receiving. while that may be as simple as placing a head on a pike for the rest of the doughboys to see,
i would be very surprised if manning’s treatment is not directly tied to the doj’s efforts to get wikileaks.
on reflection i wlll add a second possible motive for dod’s mistreatment of pfc manning.
it may be that within the military’s legal system the dod does not have much of a case against manning at the moment, despite their recent “everything but the kitchen sink” filing.
hence a felt need to extract a confession from manning by use of torture.
but confessions elicited by torture would be illegal even in a military court,
hence the need for the dod, from the quantico brig to the office of the sec of defense,
to repeatedly lie to the american people about their motives for mistreating manning.
were the dod to acknowledge their motive in torturing manning, their case against him would collapse.
lying publicly, then, is essential for a “successful” trial of manning.
“Our Marines deserve better than this.”
Why? Because they are just following orders?
You take an oath to defend the constitution against enemies foreign and domestic. Following orders comes a distant second.
Manning believes he is fulfilling his oath, and he is several months into paying the price, deservedly or not. I am not sure what exactly the Marines of Quantico brig happen to believe in, so pardon me for being unclear on what they might deserve.
“Our Marines deserve better than this. Our country deserves better than this.”
Amen!
Does Manning have any defense lawyers yet? Can they do anything legally to counteract this immoral and inhumane treatment?
Bob in AZ