The release of video footage that appears to show four US Marines urinating on the corpses of Agfhan fighters has been greeted around the world with outrage. The US Defense Secretary has called the “behaviour depicted” deplorable and promised a full investigation. Other high ranking members of the US military have been equally forceful in their condemnation, and all have promised some form of disciplinary action. The Obama administration, embarrassed that the incident should come to light during the tenth anniversary of US detention camp in Guantánamo Bay, will do its best to placate public opinion, but the US government’s recent record with similar abuses leaves much to be desired.
When photographs of prisoner abuse at Abu Ghraib were released, there was similar outrage, but official blame fell at the feet of low-ranking soldiers and nobody with real authority was held accountable. In November 2005, when 26 Iraqis were killed in their homes in the town of Haditha, the US military promised another thorough investigation, but ended up laying charges against only one of the soldiers involved. In Afghanistan, the military is still investigating allegations from 2009 and 2010 that a “kill team” responsible for the deaths of unarmed Afghans kept fingers severed from their corpses as trophies. To date, despite an occupation that has lasted longer than World War Two, only 11 American soldiers have been convicted for the deaths of Afghans. And despite clear evidence of widespread abuses, no high-ranking commander has yet been convicted for crimes against civilians in either Afghanistan or Iraq.
There is little doubt of the gravity of the current incident. A law professor at Vanderbilt University has stated that “The law of war has long made [the desecration of the dead] a war crime in all circumstances during all types of conflicts, and [the United States] prosecuted people after World War II for situations like this.” But whatever the outcome of the promised enquiries, justice seems unlikely, not least because of America’s longstanding refusal to expose its citizens to criminal prosecutions in international fora. This refusal goes back several decades but it was most egregiously apparent during the Clinton years when the US successfully gutted the Rome Statute that created the International Criminal Court (ICC), and then denied the court any power to try Americans. Not content with this the US subsequently ‘unsigned’ the Rome Statute, to further disengage itself from international human rights encumbrances
This would have made little difference if the US had proved capable of prosecuting its own torturers and rights abusers, but the Bush years conclusively showed that this was not possible. Faced with clear evidence that high-ranking officials – Addington, Yoo, Gonzalez, Rumsfeld – had knowingly authorized interrogation techniques that violated the Geneva conventions, the US government promised little and delivered nothing. The high rhetoric of candidate Obama also led nowhere, with the new president quickly providing immunity for all involved.
Another regrettable aspect of the furore around the video is how easily it has distracted public attention from other news. Because it is easily broadcast, video always gains more attention than it should. While this incident dominates the airwaves, far more consequential stories are downplayed. Among them, the recent assassination of an Iranian nuclear scientist, the release of hundreds of political prisoners in Burma, the ongoing rebellions in Bahrain and Syria, and indications of a political crisis in Pakistan (where an unnamed official has told the Associated Press that Pakistan’s prime minister recently warned the British government that a coup seems imminent). Each of these stories has broader significance than the controversial video, but none provides footage that is nearly as compelling.
But even if it cared nothing for the wider world, American public opinion should feel just as outraged by the non-closure of Guantánamo Bay. According to the US government’s own statistics, the overwhelming majority of the 779 detainees have been held without charges or criminal trial. Furthermore, the Obama administration has concluded that 48 detainees cannot be either released or tried, but should be kept in indefinite detention. The complex bureaucracy that has provided the rationale for Guantánamo Bay, and made it practically impossible for the president to deliver on his promise to close the facility, may not have been filmed desecrating the corpses of their enemies, but it has perverted the values of the American constitution and inflicted lasting harm on the country’s moral reputation. That, too, is a form of desecration.
