How common is US abuse of detainees?

It is a rate of 1 investigation for more than 100 detainees, and for the Pentagon, it is a point of pride - apparent proof that abuses are the work of a misguided few.

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Outside the Pentagon, however, those numbers - and the positive assessment - are open to doubt. As the world, and increasingly the country's lawmakers, look at how America has treated those captured in the war against terror, many have come to the conclusion that, as one expert puts it: "The one thing we know is that we don't know everything."

Clearly, this is the first time that the health and status of detainees have been such a pressing issue for the American public, and the military justice system is straining to meet the desires for a more open process. Taken together with President Bush's decision to exempt certain prisoners from the protections of the Geneva Conventions, it has brought the fog of war to the cellblock, as activists and attorneys alike wonder whether the military is faithfully investigating abuse and meting out appropriate punishments.

"The ability of anyone to get a handle on it is becoming impossible," says Eugene Fidell, president of the National Institute of Military Justice here, which studies trends in military law. "The net effect is that public opinion is lost in a fog, and I don't think that's healthy."

From the military's perspective, it has done its job as best it can. Of the 600 investigations conducted by military officials, about 450 have been closed, yielding 280 punishments, which ranged from imprisonment to admonishment.

"This is the most investigated Army in history," says Maj. Wayne Marotto, an Army spokesman. "We've taken every allegation of detainee abuse seriously."

Moreover, the Pentagon has taken the unprecedented step of impaneling a dozen reviews of detainee abuse. The latest, chaired by Vice Adm. Albert Church, found "no policy that condoned or authorized either abuse or torture."

None of the reviews found evidence that torture and abuse were part of any servicewide policy. Yet critics note that each of the reviews was initiated by the Pentagon, and they note that certain questionable interrogation techniques migrated from one detention facility to another. The review by former Defense Secretary James Schlesinger concluded that the scandal went beyond a few rogue soldiers: "There is both institutional and personal responsibility at higher levels."

The question, say some analysts, is whether senior leaders knowingly neglected to provide clear standards as to what were acceptable interrogation tactics. When the administration elected not to afford Geneva protections to detainees taken in Afghanistan, "there was a lot of uncertainty," says William Banks, director of the Institute for National Security and Counterterrorism at Syracuse University in New York.

The result, many say, is the scandal that now encompasses Iraq, Afghanistan, and Guantánamo Bay. "The main reason that the abuse was so widespread was the lack of clarity, and the lack of desire to be clear," says Jumana Musa of Amnesty International.

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