- Top Features:
- War Room
- Glenn Greenwald
- Broadsheet
- Joan Walsh
- Camille Paglia
- Since You Asked
- Follow Salon:
Read other letters about this article
Graner definitely acted in inhumane, abusive, and illegal ways at Abu Ghraib, and he deserves the prison sentence he received. This is true whether or not the orders for the detainee torture and abuse came from superiors. If they did, he could have refused orders that he knew or perceived to be illegal, although that would have opened him up to abuse within the ranks, retaliation, charges of insubordination in wartime, and possible time in the brig. Of course, that would have been the ethical and moral course to take, but we need to be honest and admit that many or most people, when placed in the situation in which he found himself, would not have taken the ethical and moral course of action (that's not, however, to say that they'd necessarily have participated in or orchestrated the detainee abuse as eagerly as he appeared to.) Anyone who argues otherwise has an overly rosy view of human nature in general or their own precious personal moral compasses in particular.
Graner also has a troubled history. He served in the Gulf War and was clearly traumatized by the experience, as he sought help for his mental and emotional issues after the war but was denied (based on all we now know of the military's treatment of mental health problems among its enlisted personnel and veterans, this comes as no surprise.) He worked for a while as a civilian prison guard in the US, and undoubtedly that's where he first became acclimated to the abuse, dehumanization, humiliation, and degradation of prisoners. Such treatment is a regular, widespread feature of the domestic US prison system, as has been well-documented over the years, and plenty of the abusive treatment crosses the line into what most reasonable people would consider torture. Again, anyone who denies or tries to gloss over this reality of America's domestic prison system is either being disingenuous or hopelessly naive (or, even worse, thinks that such treatment is fine and dandy.)
So, we have a man who was psychologically damaged by previous wartime military service, and who presumably learned the basic arts of prisoner abuse, dehumanization, and degradation in the domestic prison system placed in a situation where detainee abuse, humiliation, and extreme interrogations that clearly crossed the line into torture were ordered from on high, and were the expected method of dealing with the detainees. The Army was doing it, the CIA was on-site and doing it, his superiors wanted it, many of those around him were engaging in it, etc. None of that excuses or condones his behavior, but it's important to place it in context.
All that aside, his conviction and sentence were justified, if even too lenient. I think such despicable acts call for more than 10 years in prison, but that seems par for the course when seen in light of the universally lenient punishments meted out to American servicemen who've committed crimes in Iraq (they must get a "military in wartime" discount off of normal sentences or something.) What is outrageous and really rankles is the obvious fact that he was singled out, scapegoated, and treated far more harshly than any other enlisted "grunt" who engaged in these atrocities, as is evident from the fact that he's the only one still incarcerated. Also outrageous, although totally unsurprising, is the fact that no one from the CIA or higher up the chain of command in the Army has faced criminal charges for these atrocities. He has been treated unfairly, in the sense of disproportionately or unequally, but not in the sense of being punished for something he didn't do. His prison sentence was excessively long only relative to those meted out to his co-torturers, and not considering the crimes he committed.
The other outrage is that he is being abused in prison. He's spent over half of his incarceration thus far in a tiny cell for 23 hours a day, with one hour of solitary exercise permitted in a cage per day, with no radio, TV, watch, clock, or calendar to pass the time, with the lights on 24/7, and almost no human interaction. The prison also refused to allow him any contact, whether written, by phone, or in person, with his wife for some TWO AND A HALF YEARS. He's prevented from any contact with his family in face-to-face interactions (they can't even touch or hug in a designated prison visiting room), and whenever he has visitors he's humiliatingly strip-searched afterwards, even though he only sees visitors from behind thick glass and steel.
Reasonable people may disagree over whether or not all of the above constitutes a form of torture. Personally, I'd argue that months on end of solitary for minor infractions, given its widely recognized deleterious effects on mental health alone, is tantamount to torture. Regardless, I'd think that most reasonable people would acknowledge that his treatment in prison is harsh, excessive, degrading, and probably abusive, unless there's something important that we don't know (for instance, he has repeatedly assaulted staff and other inmates.) It won't do to argue that his treatment in prison is less harsh than that doled out by the US at Gitmo or Abu Ghraib. For one thing, are those now the yardsticks by which we measure abuse in our domestic prison system? Gawd help us if that's the case! Secondly, just because his treatment might fall lower on the scale of abuse or torture than the treatment of prisoners in those cases doesn't mean that it's not itself a form of abuse or torture. Thirdly, has everyone forgotten the old saying "Two wrongs don't make a right"? Or has everyone just decided that it's meaningless crap? The fact that he abused prisoners doesn't mean that he should be abused in turn as part of his punishment.
Does anyone truly doubt that he'll leave prison after 10 years even more seriously damaged, mentally and emotionally, than he was before? How exactly will that benefit his family, community, and society as a whole?
