Torture? What Torture?

Meet Chairman of the Chiefs of Staff Gen. Richard Myers, the Woodshed's "wanker of the week."

Top general defends guards at Guantanamo
By LOS ANGELES TIMES
.
WASHINGTON — The chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff on Sunday strongly defended the military’s treatment of detainees at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, calling the prison, which has been harshly criticized by human-rights organizations and others, a “model facility.”


Yeah, a model facility the Red Cross has expressed a few concerns about:

"International Committee of Red Cross charges in confidential reports to United States government that American military has intentionally used psychological and sometimes physical coercion 'tantamount to torture' on prisoners at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba...Red Cross has been conducting visits to Guantanamo since Jan 2002; this is first time it has asserted in such strong terms that treatment of detainees, both physical and psychological, amounts to torture; report says methods used on prisoners in latest visit are 'more refined and repressive' than those seen on previous visits; cites as examples 'humiliating acts, solitary confinement, temperature extremes, use of forced positions';'"
New York Times abstract of its November 30th, 2004 article on detainee abuse at Guantanmo

and this from Reuters quoting the NYT story

"The construction of such a system, whose stated purpose is the production of intelligence, cannot be considered other than an intentional system of cruel, unusual and degrading treatment and a form of torture," the Times quoted the report as saying."

Amnesty International had a few minor quibbles with the Gitmo resort as well:

Amnesty Takes Aim at 'Gulag' in Guantanamo
By PAISLEY DODDS, Associated Press Writer
Wed May 25, 7:15 PM ET
LONDON - Amnesty International castigated the U.S. prison camp in Guantanamo Bay as a failure Wednesday, calling it "the gulag of our time" in the human rights group's harshest rebuke yet of American detention policies.


So in short, Gen. Myers is either a lying bastard who is intentionally trying to cover up torture or an incompetant fool who has no idea what is going on at Gitmo. Either way, while he may be an air force general, he's a major wanker