A few bad apples

Administration officials had described detainee abuse as “a few bad apples” in the past (especially at Abu Ghraib). It was a reasonable question: were these loose cannon military operatives crossing the line, or was this a systematic betrayal of American ideals? After the events of the last week, this question has been definitively answered. The problem came from the top.

Two recent events have addressed this question. The first is the report from the Senate Armed Services Committee detailing the causes of detainee abuse. From the press release about the report:

The Committee concluded that the authorization of aggressive interrogation techniques by senior officials was both a direct cause of detainee abuse and conveyed the message that it was okay to mistreat and degrade detainees in U.S. custody.

The report was approved unanimously by 13 Democrats and 12 Republicans (including John McCain) on the committee. This isn’t anything we didn’t already know, but it’s a bipartisan confirmation of it.

The second event was when Cheney said that he approved of the methods (including waterboarding) used against Khalid Sheikh Mohammed (interview transcript). Again, this isn’t something we didn’t already know, but it’s a confirmation.

The more I think and read about this issue, the harder I find it to come up with reasons as to why there shouldn’t be serious investigation into war crimes at the highest levels of government. An investigation would be bad, but inaction seems worse.

This is all I intend to write about torture for a little while, I’d like to start looking at some other topics unless something new happens.