Glazed Chicken at Gulag

On FOX News Sunday, Chris Wallace moderated a heated debate between Congressman Duncan Hunter, chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, and Tom Malinowski, Washington director of Human Rights Watch. The topic was the treatment of prisoners at Gitmo.

Transcript

(Excerpts)

WALLACE: ... the ICRC, the International Committee for the Red Cross, said that there were practices there that were, quote, "tantamount to torture." The FBI did have e-mails from agents complaining about abusive treatment. How do you respond?

HUNTER: Well, I respond very simply, not one person has been killed in Guantanamo. Mr. Gitani (ph) had so-called stressful methods applied to him. Those methods included embarrassing him, I think we saw the "Time" article this morning, having dogs nearby, which barked, did not bite.

So here you have a guy who was on his way to kill 5,000 Americans in the towers, was caught, the 20th hijacker, pushed out of the country before he could do that.

And we have people complaining because he had a dog bark at him in Guantanamo. Didn't touch him but barked at him.

Now, not one person is touched in Guantanamo. We had one sergeant who when a punch was thrown at him last July, threw a punch back. The American sergeant was busted for that. We have...

WALLACE: Let me let Mr. Malinowski -- is that true?

MALINOWSKI: Well, it's true about that there haven't been any deaths in custody in Guantanamo. We're talking about more than Guantanamo.

HUNTER: Then what are we talking about?

MALINOWSKI: We're talking about a series of detention facilities around the world, in which according -- hold on -- according to the Pentagon, there have been between 28 and 31 deaths that were the result of criminal homicides. That is a huge number, because you have to understand, torture rarely leads to death.

HUNTER: You understand...

MALINOWSKI: When you have 30 people killed in detention because of criminal homicides, that's the tip of a big iceberg.

HUNTER: Now, let's go back to Guantanamo, because we quickly shifted the subject. Because what I said was absolutely true. Nobody has been killed in Guantanamo. If you're a guard and you touch a prisoner in Guantanamo, you're subject to an Article 15.

When you handle the Koran, which we give to all the prisoners, Koran, prayer beads -- and we broadcast their prayer over the loudspeaker five times a day -- when you handle the Koran, you have to use gloves and you have to use both hands because otherwise you would insult the Islamic faith.

So we have the legend that end that there is so-called gulag-like treatment and the reality is honey glazed chicken on Sunday, and we give them honey and dates to break the fast on Ramadan.

...

HUNTER: But I think one thing you should do. I think instead of using these broad terms of torture, because when we looked up the list of torture items, one of them was forcing them to eat G.I. food. That was considered torture.

MALINOWSKI: No one is saying that's torture.

HUNTER: Well, that has been stated. In fact, that is listed officially as one of the prisoner abuses that's been listed at Guantanamo.

And we don't do it, we feed them now their Islamic food. We give them honey and dates when they break fast at Ramadan. We give them prayer beads, prayer oil, all paid for. In fact, if you did that for American G.I.s and you did a call to prayer five times a day, the ACLU would sue on the basis that we've broken the separation between church and state.

So my question is we even have footprints that are painted at the prison, where guards are not to step between prayer time because they will squeak, will make noise, and bother the prisoners. How can you possibly improve that treatment for the guys who are Osama bin Laden's bodyguards and the guy who was on his way to kill 5,000 Americans, no matter where you put them?

Good question.

Out of 68,000 detainees handled since 9/11, there have been 370 criminal investigations. Wallace points out that while these have been unfortunate, the occurrences of wrong-doing have been very rare.

Malinowski danced around the numbers by saying that "it's unfortunate and rare if it's not tied to policy."

That doesn't make sense. Rare is rare. Rampant is rampant.

Anyway, if you buy Malinowski's argument, if abuses are tied to policy, the U.S. guards and interrogators at Gitmo apparently aren't carrying out policy very well.