Torturers May Be Prosecuted

The world has known for quite a while now that the United States was commonly using torture against Muslim prisoners in Iraq, Afghanistan and at Guantanamo Bay. For years, the Bush administration denied they had approved the torture, and tried to put the blame on underlings that were caught carrying out their orders. It was the old lie about "a few bad apples".

But now there is no longer any doubt that torture was approved and ordered by the highest levels of government. Instead of a few apples being bad, we now know the whole tree was rotten from top to bottom. We know this because of top level secret memos by Bush administration officials that were released in the last few days.

Now if this was any other country, our government would be the first to demand the torturers be prosecuted -- both those who carried it out and those who ordered it to happen. We made that clear in the trials of the Germans and Japanese after World War II. We also made it clear that the excuse of "I was just following orders" was not a justifiable defense.

But it looks like that breaking of law only applies to other countries, and not to our own country. The Obama administration has been loathe to prosecute anyone involved in the torture. Attorney General Eric Holder has told us that intelligence officials "who acted reasonably and relied in good faith on authoritative legal advice from the Justice Department that their conduct was lawful, and conformed their conduct to that advice, would not face federal prosecutions for that conduct."

White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel seemed to take that even further by saying "those who devised policy" also should not be prosecuted. He said, "It's not a time to use our energy and our time in looking back." But it looks like he may have spoken too soon.

Yesterday, President Obama said that while he's " not suggesting that it should be done", he is leaving open the question of whether those who ordered the torture should be prosecuted or not. He said it would be up to Attorney General Holder to decide whether to prosecute anyone or not.

Frankly, this is disappointing. It looks like Obama is tossing this hot political football to an underling, because he doesn't want to take the heat for making a decision on this matter. Holder will have to take all the flak for whatever decision he makes.

I really don't see how this can not be prosecuted. It is very clear that both American and international law has been broken. It is a choice between morality and politics -- and in that kind of choice, morality should always win. All of the torturers should be prosecuted -- from those who ordered the torture to those who carried it out.

But I guess I should be grateful that at least the Obama administration is leaving open the possibility that those who ordered the torture can be prosecuted. If I had to choose between those who ordered it and those who carried it out being prosecuted, I would have to choose to prosecute the higher-ups who ordered it, because prosecuting that group would be the most likely to prevent it happening in the future.

It is still unlikely that anyone will ever be prosecuted for the torture, and that is a sad comment on our country. What has happened to our belief in justice? Does the law no longer apply equally to everyone?

(NOTE -- Picture above is from Seeds of Doubt.)