EXCLUSIVE: Documents Describe Prisoner Abuse Photos Obama is Withholding

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The female soldier interviewed by Army criminal investigators testified that she did not remember why the Iraqi prisoners in the photograph were "flexicuffed to the bars...and have sandbags covering their heads," but "detainees were put in that stress position either because the interrogators felt that the detainee could provide further intelligence, or because the detainee was a disciplinary problem." She said the detainees weren't placed in that position for the photograph but were "already there when we decided to take the picture."

That investigation was initiated by the Office of the Secretary of Defense, which was headed by Donald Rumsfeld and found evidence that several soldiers "committed the offenses of conspiracy, failure to obey a general order, and cruelty and maltreatment when they posed for an inappropriate photograph with detainees.

The female solider who appeared in the photo testified, "The other interrogators and I did not have a lot of work to do for a couple of days. Myself and several other MPs... were fooling around in the prison, and SGT [redacted] took several photographs."

The soldier said "everyone" was taking pictures and he was unaware of a "no picture" taking policy. "It was always an [military interrogator] call to zip-tie them and put them in certain positions."

The Army investigative report into the photographs found on the compact disc is more than 500 pages and determined that eight soldiers, whose identities were redacted, "committed the offense of dereliction of duty, when as guards detailed to secure and protect detainees, they willfully failed to perform their duties with no reasonable or just excuse, by jokingly pointing weapons at the bound detainees, and exposed photographs of this unwarranted activity."

Soldiers admitted that dozens of other photographs of prisoner abuse were destroyed after the Abu Ghraib prison scandal broke in May 2004. A separate Army criminal report prepared that month also found that a soldier "possessed a photograph of himself pointing what appears to be a pistol at an unidentified [prisoner], whose hands were tied and his head covered laying down."

The soldiers interviewed said Special Forces out of Fort Bragg was in charge of operating the military facilities where the photographs were taken and had never provided soldiers with any written guidelines on how to handle detainees.

In addition, soldiers interviewed said Special Forces Psyops and military interrogation teams authorized them to "play loud music and keep detainees awake if the interrogators wanted them to."

One soldier said they "kept the detainees awake by holding them up or by playing the loud music," the report noted. The soldier said Special Forces instructed soldiers that prisoners who were "violent or had information" were "flex-cuffed on their hands, heads covered and not allowed to sleep."

Sleep deprivation, which is what the soldier appears to be describing, would be a violation of the Geneva Conventions ban on cruel and inhumane treatment and underscores how the Bush administration's interrogation policies trickled down to low-level soldiers in Afghanistan and Iraq.

One solider admitted during a July 2004 interview with an Army investigator that he took "bad photographs" before "the incident in Iraq," which is likely a reference to the Abu Ghraib prison scandal. The soldier characterized the "bad photographs" as those in which the "public would be outraged" if it was released. He went on to state "that he was standing behind a prisoner with a weapon holding it at their head" in one of the two photographs he appeared in.

The corpse of the dead Afghanistan national was photographed sometime in January 2004 after he was shot to death by U.S. soldiers who believed he was responsible for a rocket-propelled grenade attack on Fire Base Tycze that seriously wounded three U.S. Soldiers. However, an investigation into the incident was never conducted.

Most of the soldiers interviewed in all of the incidents stated that they were not aware of any set policy on the treatment of detainees, and did not realize at the time that their actions were wrong nor did they believe it was inappropriate. A sergeant stated that he had also seen pictures on Army computers of detainees being kicked, hit or inhumanely treated while in U.S. custody.

Another soldier said he had "seen a few pictures of this nature before but thought nothing of it since these people are the ones that are trying to kill us."

On Wednesday, Obama told reporters that the photographs "are not particularly sensational."

Obama said that his decision to withhold the photographs stemmed from his personal review of the photos and his concern that their release would endanger American soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan. But pressure from Bush administration holdovers, the media and two senators also played a role.

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Jason Leopold is editor of the online investigative news magazine The Public Record, http://www.pubrecord.org, and the author of the National Bestseller, "News Junkie," a memoir. Visit www.newsjunkiebook.com for a preview. He is also a two-time (more...)

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