Dirty Wars and Democracy

In Chile, “moment has come” for ex-soldiers to reveal secrets of Pinochet dictatorship

By EVA VERGARA, The Associated Press

SANTIAGO, Chile

Hundreds of former military draftees rallying outside Chile’s presidential palace were asked Sunday to come forward and reveal crimes they committed and witnessed during Gen. Augusto Pinochet’s dictatorship.

The draftees have long feared that if they name names and reveal where bodies are buried, they will face prosecution by the courts or retaliation by those who ordered them to torture and kill.

But now the information they once promised to carry to their graves has become both a heavy psychological burden and a bargaining chip. By offering confessions, some of these now-aging men believe they can improve their chances of getting government pensions and mental health care.

“Perhaps today is the day when the moment has come, for us to describe what we saw and what we suffered inside the military bases, the things that we witnessed and that we did,” said Fernando Mellado, who leads the Santiago chapter of the Former Soldiers of 1973.

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By Jan Roch, BBC, Sao Paulo, Oct. 27, 2009

Twenty four years after the military left power in Brazil, the government is to create a Truth Commission to investigate crimes committed by the security forces between 1964 and 1985.

Brazil is the only country in Latin America which has not investigated deaths, disappearances and torture which took place during its dictatorship, or put alleged perpetrators on trial.

Although the number of victims is far smaller than those who died during military rule in neighbouring Argentina and Chile, nearly 500 people were killed or disappeared in Brazil. Thousands more were tortured, exiled or deprived of their political rights.

All attempts to bring people to justice have foundered on the blanket provisions of the 1979 Amnesty Law.

This not only authorised the release of political prisoners and the return of exiled opponents, but amnestied all political crimes and “connected crimes”, which was understood to mean torture.

Now, just a year before he leaves office, President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva has decided to set up a commission to investigate crimes committed during the dictatorship. Several of his ministers were themselves arrested and tortured by the military.

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In response to a challenge from MSNBC’s Joe Scarborough (see below), the progressive website, thinkprogress.org has prepared a comprehensive dossier on the effectiveness (or lack of effectiveness) of the Bush Administration’s “Enhanced Interrogation Techniques” approach to intelligence gathering. You can find the report here:

In the same context, CNN reported on May 14 that finding a “smoking gun” linking Iraq and al Qaeda became the main purpose of the abusive interrogation program the Bush administration authorized in 2002, according to a former State Department official.

The allegation was included in an online broadside aimed at former Vice President Dick Cheney by Lawrence Wilkerson, chief of staff for then-Secretary of State Colin Powell. In it, Wilkerson wrote that the interrogation program began in April and May of 2002, and then-Vice President Cheney’s office kept close tabs on the questioning.

“Its principal priority for intelligence was not aimed at preempting another terrorist attack on the U.S. but discovering a smoking gun linking Iraq and al Qaeda,” Wilkerson wrote in The Washington Note, an online political journal.

This doesn’t seem to have impacted MSNBC’s “Morning Joe,” host Joe Scarborough who launched an angry defense of torture, according to thinkprogress.org. When MSNBC’s Carlos Watson explained that waterboarding is ineffective, Scarborough lashed out at him, nearly kicking him off the set:

SCARBOROUGH: I’ve got to stop you right there. How do you dare come on this set and say that’s [waterboarding] not effective? That’s just not the truth! And if you have any evidence that it is not effective, let me know right now!

ThinkProgress has taken up Scarborough’s challenge, with this comprehensive document explaining why Bush’s enhanced interrogation tactics were a failure.

By Ari Melber

The Nation, May 5, 2009

Jacob Weisberg, the talented journalist, editor and opinion leader, floats a very dangerous idea in the new issue of Newsweek.

Weisberg argues that because illegal torture was essentially America’s official policy after 9/11, operating with complicity from the general public, it would be wrong to enforce US laws against torture now.This argument basically morphs the infamous Nixon standard into a referendum–if the public supports something, then it is not illegal.

Does that sound too crazy to be a serious proposal? Here is the core premise of Weisberg’s column, “Our Tacit Approval of Torture“:

…waterboarding was ordered and served up in secret. But it, too, was America’s policy–not just Dick Cheney’s. Congress was informed about what was happening and raised no objection. The public knew, too. By 2003, if you didn’t understand that the United States was inflicting torture upon those deemed enemy combatants, you weren’t paying much attention. This is part of what makes applying a criminal-justice model to those most directly responsible such a bad idea. (emphasis added)

In this lawless paradigm, public awareness of government misconduct is cited as a justification for placing government officials above the law. Weisberg rules out the “criminal justice model”–you know, those laws that govern the rest of us–because some segment of the public “knew” about government torture in 2003. “Well before the nation reelected George W. Bush in 2004,” the article states, “investigative reporters had unearthed the salient aspects of his torture policy.”

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The Latin Americanist (April 29, 2009)

A Spanish magistrate said that he will investigate abuses committed at the Guantanamo Bay detention camp.

In a ruling issued on Wednesday, Judge Baltasar Garzon said that he will probe the “perpetrators, the instigators, the necessary collaborators and accomplices” behind illicit actions taken at Gitmo. The judge mentioned that recently declassified papers “revealed what was previously a suspicion: the existence of an authorized and systematic program of torture and mistreatment of persons deprived of their freedom”.

Garzon’s move came after four former detainees detailed torture allegations including “sexual abuse” and “beating”. (Two of them were acquitted and “similar charges against two others were shelved.”)

Garzon’s decision was unrelated to a separate investigation against several former White House officials including ex-Attorney General Alberto Gonzales. Spanish Attorney General Candido Conde-Pumpido declared weeks ago that that case had “no merit” and could be used as a political “toy.”
Online Sources- The Latin Americanist, Guardian UK, AFP, CNN

Friday, May 1, 2009 

So you’re through torturing people. And you’re never, ever going to do it again. You’re not that kind of country. What on earth were you thinking? And what is the best way to put it all behind you?

The United States is far from the first nation to misbehave, regret it, make itself this promise and then face this kind of question. The question might be about things far worse even than torturing a few terrorism suspects. But the possible answers still boil down to three: (1) forgive and forget; (2) forgive but don’t forget; and (3) don’t forgive and don’t forget.

Option One is off the table. In a genuine advance of civilization, some variation on a “truth commission” has become almost mandatory as proof of sincerity when the good guys (or at least when different guys) take power. President Obama frankly longs for Option Two, saying (with some justification) that he needs to worry about the future, not the past. But many Americans feel that prosecuting the perpetrators is required for reasons of catharsis or “closure.” They also remember being told from their youngest days that no one is above the law. Why should torturers, of all people, be forgiven?

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After reading “The Pinochet Effect: Transnational Justice in the Age of Human Rights” in Dirty Wars last semester, this name popped right out of the page while I was reading the newspaper this morning.

Baltasar Garzón, a Spanish judge now famous for his efforts to prosecute former Chilean military ruler Augusto Pinochet, has opened an investigation into the former Bush Administration over alleged torture and human rights abuses at Guantánamo Bay.

 Full article from the New York Times

By Kathleen Parker, Washington Post
Sunday, April 26, 2009

Several years ago, I asked a veteran journalist for advice.

“I’m trying to figure out if I have an ethical conflict,” I began.

“If you have to ask, you do,” he said.

Simple as that. In posing a question, we often reveal the answer.

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Pew Research Center for the People & the Press, April 23, 2009

Overview

Amid intense debate over the use of torture against suspected terrorists, public opinion about this issue remains fairly stable. Currently, nearly half say the use of torture under such circumstances is often (15%) or sometimes (34%) justified; about the same proportion believes that the torture of suspected terrorists is rarely (22%) or never (25%) justified.

The latest national survey by the Pew Research Center for the People & the Press, conducted April 14-21 among 742 adults interviewed in English and Spanish on landlines and cell phones, finds little change in opinions about the use of torture against suspected terrorists.
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