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Tortured logic

The Bush administration's push to allow inhumane interrogation techniques of terror suspects brings shame upon the country and endangers U.S. troops.

By handling terror suspects in a way that violates the Geneva Conventions and America's common values, the Bush administration has sullied our nation's image abroad and increased the risk to U.S. soldiers captured by the enemy.

News reports this week allege that the CIA has established a series of secret interrogation centers in Eastern Europe and other nations where leaders were willing to cooperate. But rather than be shamefaced by this revelation, President Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney are admitting nothing and insisting that abusive interrogations remain an option.

Cheney has been personally lobbying Congress to reject a Senate-passed amendment that would explicitly bar inhumane treatment of prisoners. The measure is championed by Sen. John McCain, the Arizona Republican and former Vietnam prisoner of war who knows something about torture. A vote in the House that would have indicated widespread bipartisan support for the measure was put off this week so as not to embarrass the vice president.

The hypocrisy of an administration that talks about decency, freedom and the rule of law, but no longer plays by those rules itself, is about to be put on worldwide display. The European Union plans to investigate whether Poland, one of its members, and Romania, soon to be a member, allowed the establishment of CIA jails for the interrogation of terror suspects. The existance of "ghost detainees" held by the CIA in places where American law doesn't reach has long been an open secret.

Pressure to reassert the Geneva Conventions is even coming from people within our own government. According to the New York Times, senior military lawyers and Defense and State Department officials are pressing to prohibit "cruel," "humiliating" and "degrading" interrogation techniques are widely considered ineffective.

Abusive interrogation techniques are widely considered ineffective, counterproductive and ultimately a threat to the safety of our own troops. That was recognized more than 50 years ago when the United States stood as a leader in promoting the humane treatment of prisoners of war. The backtracking this administration is doing now, with the president and vice president leading the charge, is a shameful and disastrous policy.

[Last modified November 5, 2005, 01:22:18]