WASHINGTON – More than two dozen soldiers and contractors attached to a military intelligence unit at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq approved or took part in abuses of Iraqi detainees, an Army investigation has found in one of the most comprehensive looks to date at the scandal that damaged America’s image around the world.
A few of the abuses amounted to torture, Maj. Gen. George Fay, one of the chief investigators, said Wednesday.
“This is clearly a deviation from everything we’ve taught people on how to behave,” said Gen. Paul Kern, who oversaw the investigation. “There were failures of leadership, of people seeing these things and not correcting them. There were failures of discipline.”
Officers in charge of the prison were negligent in the training and management of their troops, and some may face criminal charges, Army officials said. Until now, just seven lower-ranking military police soldiers have been charged.
The White House has blamed the scandal on a group of rogue soldiers who it said were acting on their own.
The new report identifies 27 people attached to the 205th Military Intelligence Brigade, which oversaw interrogations at Abu Ghraib, who are accused of complicity in the abuses. Of those, 23 are soldiers and four were civilian contractors working for the unit.
The investigation report says the violent and sexual abuses – particularly those captured in the now-famous pictures of naked and frightened prisoners – were mostly the work of a group of guards and military intelligence personnel who were not conducting interrogations but instead amusing themselves.
The report distinguishes this group of abuses from mistreatment committed during actual interrogations, which also occurred.
About 15 of 23 soldiers from the 205th who are accused of abuse were interrogating prisoners and wrongly believed they were using approved techniques to question them, Army officials said. One such unapproved technique was interrogating a detainee naked, the report said.
The Army’s findings appear to widen to more than 50 the number of people who may face charges or disciplinary action for the abuses at Abu Ghraib. Criminal allegations against civilian contractors will be referred to the Justice Department for possible prosecution.
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