t r u t h o u t - Marjorie Cohn | Military Hides Cause of Women Soldiers' Deaths
Military Hides Cause of Women Soldiers' Deaths
By Marjorie Cohn
Monday 30 January 2006
In a startling revelation, the former commander of Abu Ghraib prison testified that Lt. Gen. Ricardo Sanchez, former senior US military commander in Iraq, gave orders to cover up the cause of death for some female American soldiers serving in Iraq.
Last week, Col. Janis Karpinski told a panel of judges at the Commission of Inquiry for Crimes against Humanity Committed by the Bush Administration in New York that several women had died of dehydration because they refused to drink liquids late in the day. They were afraid of being assaulted or even raped by male soldiers if they had to use the women's latrine after dark.
The latrine for female soldiers at Camp Victory wasn't located near their barracks, so they had to go outside if they needed to use the bathroom. "There were no lights near any of their facilities, so women were doubly easy targets in the dark of the night," Karpinski told retired US Army Col. David Hackworth in a September 2004 interview. It was there that male soldiers assaulted and raped women soldiers. So the women took matters into their own hands. They didn't drink in the late afternoon so they wouldn't have to urinate at night. They didn't get raped. But some died of dehydration in the desert heat, Karpinski said.
Karpinski testified that a surgeon for the coalition's joint task force said in a briefing that "women in fear of getting up in the hours of darkness to go out to the port-a-lets or the latrines were not drinking liquids after 3 or 4 in the afternoon, and in 120 degree heat or warmer, because there was no air-conditioning at most of the facilities, they were dying from dehydration in their sleep."
"And rather than make everybody aware of that - because that's shocking, and as a leader if that's not shocking to you then you're not much of a leader - what they told the surgeon to do is don't brief those details anymore. And don't say specifically that they're women. You can provide that in a written report but don't brief it in the open anymore."
For example, Maj. Gen. Walter Wojdakowski, Sanchez's top deputy in Iraq, saw "dehydration" listed as the cause of death on the death certificate of a female master sergeant in September 2003. Under orders from Sanchez, he directed that the cause of death no longer be listed, Karpinski stated. The official explanation for this was to protect the women's privacy rights.
Sanchez's attitude was: "The women asked to be here, so now let them take what comes with the territory," Karpinski quoted him as saying. Karpinski told me that Sanchez, who was her boss, was very sensitive to the political ramifications of everything he did. She thinks it likely that when the information about the cause of these women's deaths was passed to the Pentagon, Donald Rumsfeld ordered that the details not be released. "That's how Rumsfeld works," she said.
"It was out of control," Karpinski told a group of students at Thomas Jefferson School of Law last October. There was an 800 number women could use to report sexual assaults. But no one had a phone, she added. And no one answered that number, which was based in the United States. Any woman who successfully connected to it would get a recording. Even after more than 83 incidents were reported during a six-month period in Iraq and Kuwait, the 24-hour rape hot line was still answered by a machine that told callers to leave a message.
"There were countless such situations all over the theater of operations - Iraq and Kuwait - because female soldiers didn't have a voice, individually or collectively," Karpinski told Hackworth. "Even as a general I didn't have a voice with Sanchez, so I know what the soldiers were facing. Sanchez did not want to hear about female soldier requirements and/or issues."
Karpinski was the highest officer reprimanded for the Abu Ghraib torture scandal, although the details of interrogations were carefully hidden from her. Demoted from Brigadier General to Colonel, Karpinski feels she was chosen as a scapegoat because she was a female.
Sexual assault in the US military has become a hot topic in the last few years, "not just because of the high number of rapes and other assaults, but also because of the tendency to cover up assaults and to harass or retaliate against women who report assaults," according to Kathy Gilberd, co-chair of the National Lawyers Guild's Military Law Task Force.
This problem has become so acute that the Army has set up its own sexual assault web site.
In February 2004, Rumsfeld directed the Under Secretary of Defense for Personnel and Readiness to undertake a 90-day review of sexual assault policies. "Sexual assault will not be tolerated in the Department of Defense," Rumsfeld declared.
The 99-page report was issued in April 2004. It affirmed, "The chain of command is responsible for ensuring that policies and practices regarding crime prevention and security are in place for the safety of service members." The rates of reported alleged sexual assault were 69.1 and 70.0 per 100,000 uniformed service members in 2002 and 2003. Yet those rates were not directly comparable to rates reported by the Department of Justice, due to substantial differences in the definition of sexual assault.
Notably, the report found that low sociocultural power (i.e., age, education, race/ethnicity, marital status) and low organizational power (i.e., pay grade and years of active duty service) were associated with an increased likelihood of both sexual assault and sexual harassment.
The Department of Defense announced a new policy on sexual assault prevention and response on January 3, 2005. It was a reaction to media reports and public outrage about sexual assaults against women in the US military in Iraq and Afghanistan, and ongoing sexual assaults and cover-ups at the Air Force Academy in Colorado, Gilberd said. As a result, Congress demanded that the military review the problem, and the Defense Authorization Act of 2005 required a new policy be put in place by January 1.
The policy is a series of very brief "directive-type memoranda" for the Secretaries of the military services from the Under Secretary of Defense for Personnel and Readiness. "Overall, the policy emphasizes that sexual assault harms military readiness, that education about sexual assault policy needs to be increased and repeated, and that improvements in response to sexual assaults are necessary to make victims more willing to report assaults," Gilberd notes. "Unfortunately," she added "analysis of the issues is shallow, and the plans for addressing them are limited."
Commands can reject the complaints if they decide they aren't credible, and there is limited protection against retaliation against the women who come forward, according to Gilberd. "People who report assaults still face command disbelief, illegal efforts to protect the assaulters, informal harassment from assaulters, their friends or the command itself," she said.
But most shameful is Sanchez's cover-up of the dehydration deaths of women that occurred in Iraq. Sanchez is no stranger to outrageous military orders. He was heavily involved in the torture scandal that surfaced at Abu Ghraib. Sanchez approved the use of unmuzzled dogs and the insertion of prisoners head-first into sleeping bags after which they are tied with an electrical cord and their are mouths covered. At least one person died as the result of the sleeping bag technique. Karpinski charges that Sanchez attempted to hide the torture after the hideous photographs became public.
Sanchez reportedly plans to retire soon, according to an article in the International Herald Tribune earlier this month. But Rumsfeld recently considered elevating the 3-star general to a 4-star. The Tribune also reported that Brig. Gen. Vincent Brooks, the Army's chief spokesman, said in an email message, "The Army leaders do have confidence in LTG Sanchez."
*****************************************************************
I WISH I HAD SOMEONE BETTER TO VOTE FOR BESIDES MR. BILL - NELSON HAS NO BACKBONE! HE NEVER STANDS TOGETHER WITH THE PARTY. HE NEVER DOES WHAT WE WANT HIM TO DO. WILL SOMEONE PLEASE RUN ON THE DEMOCRAT TICKET AGAINST BILL NELSON! PLEASE! ALL I WANT IS SOMEONE TO STAND UP FOR US, FOR OUR FREEDOM, FOR MY CHILDREN'S FUTURE. HE WILL VOTE NO FOR ALITO AND NO FILIBUSTER.
HE CAN'T GIVE US A FIGHT
HE'S LOST IN SPACE
Senator Nelson sent this letter to the President on Wednesday, Jan. 25, having posted a press statement on his web site the day before.
http://billnelson.senate.gov/news/details.cfm?id=250706&
Although the Senator's forthcoming vote against the Alito confirmation has been reported, this letter to the President, which explains the depth of his concerns, has not been publicized. This was sent to me by Ruth Roman Lynch, who obtained it through the local NAACP and it is available on the Senator's web site:
http://billnelson.senate.gov/news/details.cfm?id=250761&
There are rumors that Senator Nelson will support the filibuster, but please continue to give him your support and thank him for standing firm.
Phil
_________________________
Mr. President:
The gospel promises all of us impartiality at judgment. And, I would suggest impartiality -- or, justice for all - is a principle embedded deep in our constitutional democracy.
I believe in an America where courts address injustice, and correct it. I believe in an America where our judges serve the people by interpreting the Constitution - without agenda.
I may have no greater responsibility in the Senate than to be charged by our Constitution with advising the president on his picks for the United States Supreme Court.
And in assuming this awesome responsibility, I rise today to oppose Judge Alito's confirmation to the Supreme Court.
Soon, the Supreme Court likely will hear cases about protecting our personal privacy from government and corporate intrusion; and about the sharing of power between Congress and the president.
These decisions will have an important affect on each of our lives, and on the future of our nation.
Over the past few weeks, Iheld numerous town hall meetings at which residents shared their thoughts and opinions on Judge Alito.
That's one reason why I carefully studied his record over the past fifteen years on the U.S. Third Circuit Court of Appeals. During his time on the bench, Judge Alito ruled on cases ranging from the rights of individuals to the stewardship of the environment.
After his testimony before the Judiciary Committee, I was concerned that he more often than not ruled in favor of big government and big corporations over the ordinary American.
Following the hearings, I personally met with Judge Alito to discuss my concerns.
I explained how much a recent Supreme Court decision has frightened many of my constituents. They fear their homes can now be seized by the government to make way for a private developer's project.
While he expressed sympathy for the parties whose homes had been seized, he offered no misgivings whatsoever about the legal reasoning that led to that outcome.
I am concerned about his rulings in other cases pitting the government against individuals -- over issues ranging from the environment to workers' rights to racial discrimination.
In Public Interest Research Group of New Jersey v. Magnesium Elektron, he established high barriers to prevent individuals from being able to sue polluters for violations of the Clean Water Act. The Supreme Court later rejected his reasoning by a vote of 7-2.
In Chittister v. Department of Community and Economic Development, he ruled that state employees could not sue for damages to enforce their rights under the federal Family and Medial Leave Act. Again, the Supreme Court later reversed this ruling by a vote of 6-3.
In Riley v. Taylor, he ruled that there was no basis for appeal in a death penalty case in which prosecutors had used their peremptory challenges to exclude black jurors from the jury pool. The full Third Circuit later heard this case and overturned Judge Alito's ruling.
These and other cases highlight the broader concerns I have with Judge Alito's record.
Mr. President, during my years in the Senate, I have voted for almost all of President Bush's judicial nominees. All told, I have voted for 216, or 96 percent of the president's 226 judicial picks, including Chief Justice John Roberts.
And I greeted Judge Alito's nomination with an open mind.
But his many legal writings, judicial opinions and evasive answers both at his hearing and in my private meeting with him, convinced me he would tilt the scales of justice against the average Joe.
Because he is not the centrist voice I believe this nation needs to replace the retiring Justice Sandra Day O'Connor, who fiercely defended the rights and liberties of all Americans, I'm going to vote no on this confirmation.
No comments:
Post a Comment