Getting Away with Torture: Secret Government, War Crimes and the Rule of Law

That American forces should torture prisoners in their ‘war’ on terror is disturbing, but more shocking still is that the highest officials of the Bush-Cheney administration planned, authorized, encouraged and concealed these war crimes. Most Americans are now embarrassed by reports of CIA kidnappings for purposes of torture, secret prisons into which prisoners have disappeared without trace, and rigged tribunals to convict al Qaeda suspects on evidence obtained by torture. The ‘secret government’ now threatens the very foundations of the American constitution. The moral standing of the USA will not be restored until that ‘secret government’ is brought under rule of law.