“What Is A Security Detainee, Anyway?”

Yesterday a split verdict ended the court martial of the only U.S. officer, Army Lt. Col. Steven Jordan, who faced a court-martial for prisoner abuse at Iraq's Abu Ghraib jail. Jordan, who argued he was being scapegoated, was acquitted of responsibility. He was sentenced to a reprimand. Gen. Janis Karpinski, formerly in charge of charge of fifteen detention Iraqi facilities including Abu Ghraib, gives two compelling filmed interviews about the case. Can’t be embedded here, so please click to Truthout to watch. A highlight is a discussion of the four private contractors formerly fired by the Department of Justice in Utah for prisoner abuse who were then rehired by the Department of Justice in Iraq as “prison experts” to reform the brutal Saddam-era prison system, apparently without either a workable plan or necessary expertise. Another is Karpinski’s description of her own quest for a military court martial. Unfortunately, it seems unlikely that the imbeciles within the Department of Justice who hired the questionable “prison experts” will ever be subjected to a military court martial for incompetence…