Elizabeth Holtzman (The Nation): Torture and Accountability

From The Nation
Issue of July 18, 2005
Posted online Tuesday June 28

Torture and Accountability
By Elizabeth Holtzman

Although the terrible revelations of torture at Abu Ghraib hit the front pages in April 2004, no senior officials in the US military or the Bush Administration have yet been held accountable. The scandal has shamed and outraged many Americans, in addition to creating a greater threat of terrorism against the United States. But it has prompted no investigative commission (in the manner of the 9/11 commission) with a mandate to find the whole truth, or full-scale bipartisan Congressional hearings, as occurred during Watergate. Indeed, it is as though the Watergate investigations ended with the prosecution of only the burglars, which is what the cover-up was designed to insure, instead of reaching into the highest levels of government, which is what ultimately happened.

In just the latest sign of the current Administration's nose-thumbing at accountability for higher-ups, Lieut. Gen. Ricardo Sanchez, the commander in Iraq when the Abu Ghraib abuses occurred, is reportedly under consideration for promotion.

Nonetheless, higher-ups can be held to account. Difficult as it may be to achieve, our institutions of government can be pressured to do the right thing. If the public and the media insist on thorough investigations and appropriate punishments for those implicated--all the way up the chain of command--they can prevail.

Several episodes from recent history illustrate how public opposition can change even the most entrenched government policy. Neither President Johnson nor President Nixon wanted to withdraw from Vietnam, but growing public anger forced Congress, finally, to end the war. Likewise, in Watergate, Congress did not commence impeachment proceedings to hold President Nixon accountable for his abuse of power until the American people demanded action after the Saturday Night Massacre (in which Nixon ordered the firing of Special Prosecutor Archibald Cox to keep him from getting incriminating personal tape recordings). And, of course, the most important example from the past fifty years is the civil rights movement, which brought down the system of segregation in the South through sustained and peaceful public protest.

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Elizabeth Holtzman is an attorney in New York. In 1974, she was a member of the House Judiciary Committee that recommended three articles of impeachment against President Nixon.

I just read it too, thanks for posting it.

Ms. Holtzman's article addresses only one aspect of this administration's criminal behavior, and that aspect alone is sufficient to warrant a War Crimes Tribunal. This is unparalleled and unprecedented criminality at the highest levels - dwarfing Watergate and dwarfing Iran/Contra (involving many of the same people).

From Democracy Now!
Broadcast Thursday June 30

Fmr. NY Congressmember Holtzman Calls For President Bush and His Senior Staff To Be Held Accountable for Abu Ghraib Torture
By Amy Goodman and Juan Gonzales

AMY GOODMAN: Well, it has been very interesting to read this article and also look at your background, from dealing with the issue of Holocaust war crimes to Watergate, to now talking about torture and accountability. Can you relate all three?

ELIZABETH HOLTZMAN: Well, I think we need justice in this world. We need to make sure that people who commit horrendous crimes are held accountable, and we need to have social justice, as well. But I got to Congress in 1973 when nobody had any clue that Richard Nixon would ever be held accountable in connection with the Watergate break in that took place just before that. And then it was because of a lot of independent and relentless prosecutors and judges and, most important, press, and in the end, the American public, that a President of the United States was held accountable for something that nobody could have dreamed months before that he would be held accountable for, and his top administration officials.

And it seems to me that with the terrible scandal, Abu Ghraib, that we need -- we can’t, as they tried in Watergate to do, cut off the investigation at the small fry, at the lowest level. You have to look, and the international law precedence and American law requires it, you look up the chain of command. What I discovered by accident was that -- this is not a concern that I have alone -- President Bush's White House counsel, Alberto Gonzales, himself, who is now the Attorney General of the United States, wrote a memo in January 2002 to President Bush saying one of the reasons we need to opt out of the Geneva Conventions wasn't just because they didn't like the Geneva Conventions because they don't like treaties, but he said, we have to worry about prosecutions under the U.S. War Crimes Act of 1996. That, it turns out, is a federal statute that applies to any U.S. national, military or civilian, high or low, who violates the Geneva Conventions in certain ways. In other words, who engages in murder, torture, or inhuman treatment. And it's not just those who engage in it, it's those who order it or those who, knowing about it, fail to take steps to stop it. That means higher-ups.

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