Rummy in the dock: climbing the chain of command.

• Author: Cavanaugh, Tim
• Position: Citings - Brief Article

A NEW LAWSUIT against Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld isn't likely to bring justice for prisoners abused at Abu Ghraib and other military prisons, but it may help resolve the controversy over who's accountable for the torture.

As of this writing, nobody above the rank of sergeant has been convicted in the Abu Ghraib case, despite credible claims that the Pentagon's civilian leadership was encouraging, if not mandating, detainee abuse. (Defense Department documents and geographic disparity--similar incidents have surfaced in Afghanistan and Guantanamo--offer tantalizing evidence of a system-wide pattern of abuse.) By suing Rumsfeld in the state of Illinois, where he is believed to have assets, eight Afghan and Iraqi detainees represented by the American Civil Liberties Union and Human Rights First are trying to place...