Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld must resign or be forced out
of office. The circumstances surrounding the prisoner abuse at Abu
Gharib prison has tarnished his record and destroyed his
credibility.
As defense secretary, Rumsfeld is one of the most important
public servants. He must be trusted by the president, Congress and
the country at large. Though he personally cannot be held
accountable for the actions of every soldier, Rumsfeld’s own
actions leading up to the abuse and following the abuse were
unacceptable.
As noted by The Washington Post on Thursday, Rumsfeld’s
Pentagon since the invasion of Afghanistan systematically has
weakened safeguards afforded to prisoners of war. Whether held in
Cuba at Guantanamo Bay’s Camp X-ray, or a prison in Iraq,
America’s detainees have not been afforded full Geneva
Convention protections. This denial of rights is a matter of
policy.
Contrary to a past Rumsfeld statement, it is not enough for
prisoners to be treated in “a manner that is reasonably
consistent” with international conventions. Prisoners must be
afforded the due process and protections we would expect for
American soldiers. The country may be fighting terrorists, but that
does not give the Pentagon the right to run roughshod over
international law ““ either intentionally or because of
unauthorized abuses.
The individual soldiers responsible for the specific cases of
Iraqi abuse must be punished, but the Pentagon’s policies
also must change. All guards must be trained fully in the handling
of prisoners, and consideration for international conventions must
be paramount.
Rumsfeld must be held accountable not only for the policies of
the Pentagon but for his handling of the abuse once it came to
light. On CBS, Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., asked why Congress was
not informed about the instances of abuse. Though he was informed
of the abuse in mid-January, Rumsfeld himself said he had not read
the entire Pentagon report on the matter.
Just as Rumsfeld cannot be held personally accountable for the
actions of every soldier, he cannot be expected to deal personally
with every question of military justice. Nonetheless, Rumsfeld
should have realized the incredible potential the abuse had to
damage U.S. credibility in the Arab world. Pictures documenting the
abuse are horrible not only because of the physical and sexual
mistreatment they portray but because they have the potential to
inflame much of the Arab world.
As soon as he learned of the pictures, Rumsfeld should have made
the abuse investigation one of his top priorities. He should have
worked to contain the damage, and he should not have waited for the
media to blow the case wide open.
But now, months after the fact, it is too late for a few weakly
uttered apologies to be enough. The United States’ honor is
at stake. Rumsfeld may not want to go, and Bush still may believe
him to be an important part of his team. But at the end of the day
honor demands that an example be made in this instance.
Only a drastic measure possibly could show the world the United
States will play by the rules as it asks others to follow its lead
in pursuit of a safer and fairer world community.