Lessons from Abu Ghraib

The physical and mental abuses allegedly meted out by US guards at the infamous prison of Abu Ghraib were highly unprofessional - and probably unproductive as well, say intelligence experts.

Stressing prisoners prior to questioning is a relatively standard military interrogation practice. Methods can include some actions that might surprise civilians, such as lying to prisoners, covering their faces, and depriving them of some physical comforts.

But standard practice should never include the sadistic and humiliating treatment recently revealed in Iraq, intelligence experts say. Such abuses are only likely to harden prisoners or produce worthless information. "You don't learn anything if you torture people," says Arthur Hulnick, a 35-year veteran of the CIA and military intelligence who supervised the questioning of North Korean defectors.

Overall weaknesses in the US military system for handling the 8,000 war prisoners and other detainees in Iraq include overcrowded facilities, too few military police and government interrogators, as well as a lack of higher-level supervision and outside scrutiny. This system, while failing to prevent the extreme mistreatment of prisoners by at least a few US soldiers at Abu Ghraib, much more regularly failed to even keep track of Iraqi detainees.

Exposure of the problems at Abu Ghraib has fueled a firestorm of protests about US conduct as the critical transfer of limited authority to Iraqis approaches. The reaction around the world has been such that some US ambassadors have cabled Washington for guidance on how to respond. Congress has been critical, as well, with key members demanding explanations, and committees booking hearings into the extent of military culpability.

The system for tracking detainees in Iraq is "still only about half as good as it ought to be," US Central Command Chief Gen. John Abizaid was quoted as telling the Wall Street Journal in October, just prior to when the abuses took place at Abu Ghraib.

"If you don't have the right ratio of guards to prisoners, you can't protect the prisoners" - or even keep track of them, says one military analyst. For example, Iraqi prisoners often just tore off the paper tags tied to them bearing their prisoner numbers. Confusing things more, Iraqi interpreters would repeatedly retranslate the prisoners' names with different English transliterations at each new level of the detention system.

To be sure, an overburdened detention system does not imply that abuses have been rampant. Many detainees are known to be treated humanely according to the Geneva Convention, and so far less than two dozen US military personnel in Iraq - including six men and women accused in the Abu Ghraib case - have been implicated in instances of mistreatment.

Still, according to US military doctrine, military police specialized in running prisons are trained to maintain custody of prisoners using a minimum of physical force in camps operated with a clear, unbroken chain of command. The recognition of a command failure was reflected in the announcement Monday by the top US commander in Iraq, Lt. Gen. Ricardo Sanchez that seven commissioned and noncommissioned officers in supervisory positions at Abu Ghraib had received severe reprimands, with a milder admonishment for one.

Further clouding the command picture are reports that the facility, which is run by military police, may have been put under the control of a military intelligence unit. The presence of civilian contractors working side by side at the prison with military personnel without being subject to military discipline is also an issue.

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