Is Obama's New Afghan Commander a Violator of the Geneva Conventions?

By Tom Hayden, TheNation.com. Posted May 20, 2009.

According to reliable intelligence sources in Washington, General Stanley McChrystal, slated to become the top American commander in Afghanistan, directed an entity known as the Terrorist Screen Center (TSC) in Iraq in 2003, which held Iraqi suspects in secret facilities in violation of the Geneva Conventions requirement that the Red Cross have access to all detainees.

The TSC existed before the Abu Ghraib prison scandal exploded in 2004, during a period when the United States, as an occupying power, fell under the Geneva obligation to provide Red Cross access.

McChrystal's appointment could be threatened if an investigation establishes his direction over the secret facilities. Under international law, delayed access for the Red Cross can be justified only due to a "military necessity," such as extreme battlefield conditions, a far different scenario from detaining and interrogating prisoners in secret locations.

McChrystal has been reprimanded by the Pentagon before. A 2007 Pentagon investigation found McChrystal responsible for falsifying a claim that blamed the 2004 death of Army Ranger Pat Tillman on "devastating enemy fire." Tillman died of friendly fire.

In addition, Bob Woodward's 2008 book The War Within describes McChrystal as responsible for running a "top secret" 2006 program of extra-judicial killings of alleged Iraqi insurgents. Nearly all of McChrystal's five-year tenure in Iraq was spent in clandestine operations.

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Ed. Note: The following article by Gareth Porter from IPS offers background on McChrystal's troubling military career.

US choice hardly McChrystal clear
By Gareth Porter, IPS News

  WASHINGTON - The choice of Lieutenant General Stanley McChrystal to become the new United States commander in Afghanistan has been hailed by Defense Secretary Robert Gates and national news media as ushering in a new unconventional approach to counter-insurgency.

But McChrystal's background sends a very different message from the one claimed by Gates and the news media. His long specialization in counter-terrorism operations suggests an officer who is likely to have more interest in targeted killings than in the kind of politically sensitive counter-insurgency program that the Barack Obama administration has said it intends to carry out.

In announcing the extraordinary firing of General David McKiernan and the nomination of McChrystal to replace him, Gates said that the mission in Afghanistan "requires new thinking and new approaches by our military leaders" and praised McChrystal for his "unique skill set in counter-insurgency".

Media reporting on the choice of McChrystal simply echoed the Pentagon's line. The Washington Post said his selection "marks the continued ascendancy of officers who have pressed for the use of counter-insurgency tactics, in Iraq and Afghanistan, that are markedly different from the Army's traditional doctrine".

The New York Times cited unnamed "Defense Department officials" in reporting, "His success in using intelligence and firepower to track and kill insurgents, and his training in unconventional warfare that emphasizes the need to protect the population, made him the best choice for the command in Afghanistan."

See more stories tagged with: obama, afghanistan, geneva conventions, geneva conventions, mcchrystal

Tom Hayden was a leader of the student, civil rights, peace and environmental movements of the 1960s. He served 18 years in the California legislature, where he chaired labor, higher education and natural resources committees. He is the author of ten books, including "Street Wars" (New Press, 2004). He is a professor at Occidental College, Los Angeles, and was a visiting fellow at Harvard's Institute of Politics last fall.

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