10 Feb Opposition to the ICC Equals Condoning Genocide?
Samantha Power, a tireless Pulitzer-Prize-winning advocate of more aggressive action by the United States to stop genocide and war crimes, offers her take on why the ICC would be more effective than an ad hoc tribunal (a topic we’ve been batting about here) in today’s NYT. Count me as a skeptic of her claim that the ICC will deter war crimes appreciably more than an ad hoc tribunal, but then again, unlike Power, I haven’t spent years reporting on conflicts in Bosnia, Rwanda, and now Sudan. But the most interesting aspect of her article is Power’s obvious contempt for the Bush Administration, which undercuts her otherwise very persuasive piece.
In a very unfair (but effective) phrase, she accuses the Bush Administration of not being able to decide whether it dislikes “genocide” more than the ICC. This is unfair because she is equating opposition to the ICC with condoning genocide. The ICC may be great, but surely Power must concede there are some reasonable objections to the ICC and that one can still want to prosecute genocide while still opposing the ICC, even in Darfur.
Power also notes that the ICC has not “begun investigating the torture and murder carried out by American soldiers and contractors in Iraq or Guantanamo Bay” as an argument that the ICC doesn’t threaten the U.S. The missing word here: “alleged.” Like many in the human rights community, she takes as a given that U.S. policy in Guantanamo Bay has consisted of torture and abuse, but I think, at least with respect to Guantanamo Bay, that cannot be so lightly assumed just yet. The info trickling out of Gitmo has come from allegations in lawsuits that have not yet been confirmed, and from some info from FOIA requests that are piecemeal and incomplete. But Power’s attitude that such allegations are enough for her to conclude that crimes of torture and abuse rising to the level of the ICC’s consideration is more evidence of how quickly she will is willing to assume the worst of motives and intentions of this Administration.
In doing so, Power is playing to her audience of elite opinion and Bush-haters, but she is not convincing anyone else.
I suppose it’s possible to disregard the repeated and consistent claims by former Gitmo detainees that they have been subjected to interrogation procedures that, by any definition other than the one in the infamous August 2002 memo, clearly qualify as torture; after all, the detainees have an incentive to make their treatment seem as bad as possible. But what about the statements of FBI agents who witnessed such procedures first-hand? As recorded in a June 25, 2004, FBI “Urgent Report,” one FBI agent reported that he witnessed “strangulation, beatings, placement of lit cigarettes into the detainees’ ear openings, and unauthorized interrogations.” Is Professor Ku suggesting there is reason to doubt the veracity and credibility of that FBI agent and the others who reported similar events at Gitmo? What I find most problematic, even disturbing, about Professor Ku’s post is his statement that some of the information scholars and activists are using to construct their argument that torture took place at Gitmo comes “from FOIA requests that are piecemeal and incomplete” — as if that in itself, apart from the substance of the information that has been released, undermines the torture argument. Let’s not forget why the ACLU and others’ FOIA… Read more »
Your point is well taken in that the Bush Administration is obviously not interested in opening the door here to more investigations, although I think “disingenous” is a bit too strong here. There is some strange disconnect here between the assumption that torture did indeed occur in Guantanamo and the strange failure by the usual suspects (Congress, the Media, etc) to seek an official investigation. FOIA requests and Alien Tort Statute lawsuits are a messy way to determine the facts. Why can’t we seek a special counsel at Justice? Or request hearings in Congress? Even if they are denied on a party-line vote, then you can start claiming cover-up with some justification. But to blithely assume the worst without definitive evidence is strange to say the least.
I agree with you that a congressional hearing or special counsel at Justice (or better yet, someone outside of Justice with similar powers) would be preferable to enless bickering between the Administration and the ACLU. I’m not sure, though, that the failure of Congress and the media to investigate Gitmo more thoroughly tells us much about the validity of the claim that torture took place at Gitmo.
I apologize, by the way, for my poor choice of the word “disingenuous.” I was simply trying to make the point that the Administration’s unclean hands regarding the flow of information from Gitmo has to be taken into account when we decide whether to believe its oft-repeated claim that all of the detainees there have been treated “humanely.”
Heller’s at it again. The vast bulk of conduct at Gitmo was not, and did not qualify, as torture. Though in the new age world where simply snappy a yellow-starbust with the word NEW! in it qualifies as marketing, the lazy, squishy kicking around of the word “torture” appears par for the course. This is not to say that there weren’t incidents that were cruel and that may have even been torture, but Mr. Heller, what is YOUR master plan for combating islamofascists and what is YOUR response to the ticking-time bomb scenario?