Gulf War POW's take another one on the chin

[lcpd24]

More Bull Crap from the Bush Admin, seems like it's never going to end with this Bush in office!




Posted on Sun, Nov. 16, 2003

U.S. opposes money for gulf war POWs
BY PHILIP SHENON
New York Times

WASHINGTON ? The Bush administration is seeking to block a group of American troops who were tortured in Iraqi prisons during the Persian Gulf War in 1991 from collecting any of the hundreds of millions of dollars in frozen Iraqi assets they won last summer in a federal court ruling against the government of Saddam Hussein.

In a court challenge that the administration is winning so far but is not eager to publicize, administration lawyers have argued that Iraqi assets frozen in bank accounts in the United States are needed for Iraqi reconstruction and that the judgment won by the 17 former American prisoners should be overturned in its entirety.

If the administration is successful, the former prisoners would be deprived both of the money they won and, they say, of the validation of a judge's ruling that documented their accounts of torture by the Iraqis ? including beatings, burnings, starvation, mock executions and repeated threats of castration and dismemberment.

"I don't want to say that I feel betrayed, because I still believe in my country," said Lt. Col. Dale Storr, whose Air Force A-10 fighter jet was shot down by Iraqi fire in February 1991.

"I've always tried to keep in the back of my mind that we were never going to see any of the money," said Storr, who was held by the Iraqis for 33 days ? a period in which he says his captors beat him with clubs, broke his nose, urinated on him and threatened to cut off his fingers if he did not reveal military secrets. "But it goes beyond frustration when I see our government trying to pretend that this whole case never happened."

Another former prisoner, David Eberly, a retired Air Force colonel whose F-15 fighter was shot down over northwest Iraq and whose Iraqi interrogators repeatedly pointed a gun at his head and pulled the trigger on an empty chamber, said he was surprised by the administration's eagerness to overturn the judgment.

"The administration wants $87 billion for Iraq," he said. "The money in our case is just a drop of blood in the bucket."

Officials at the Justice Department and State Department, which are overseeing the administration's response to the case, say they are sensitive to the claims of the former prisoners, who brought suit against Iraq under a 1996 law that allows foreign governments designated as terrorist sponsors to be sued for injuries.

But they say the case cannot be allowed to hinder American foreign policy and get in the way of the administration's multibillion-dollar reconstruction efforts in Iraq ? an argument that federal appeals courts seem likely to accept.

"No amount of money can truly compensate these brave men and women for the suffering that they went through at the hands of a truly brutal regime," said Scott McClellan, the White House spokesman. "It was determined earlier this year by Congress and the administration that those assets were no longer assets of Iraq, but they were resources required for the urgent national security needs of rebuilding Iraq."

In a related case, a federal judge in New York ruled in September that the families of people killed in the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks could not claim any part of about $1.7 billion in frozen Iraqi assets in the United States, even if the families were able to show some tie between Iraq and the attacks.

The judge noted that President Bush had signed an executive order in March, on the eve of the American invasion of Iraq, that confiscated Iraqi assets and converted them into assets of the U.S. government. In May, after the overthrow of Saddam Hussein, Bush issued a declaration that effectively removed Iraq from a list of countries liable for some court judgments involving past human right abuses and links to terrorism.

In a sworn court filing in the case for the former prisoners, L. Paul Bremer, the American administrator in Iraq, said the money won by the former prisoners had already been "completely obligated or expended" in reconstruction efforts.

"These funds are critical to maintaining peace and stability in Iraq," he said. "Restricting these funds as a result of this litigation would affect adversely the ability of the United States to achieve security and stability in the region."

The lawyers who brought the case on behalf of the former prisoners depicted the ruling as a larger victory, saying such a huge penalty against Iraq would discourage other governments from using torture against American troops caught in future conflicts.

"This was a major human rights decision," said John Norton Moore, one of the lawyers and a professor of national security law at the University of Virginia. "It never occurred to me in my wildest dreams that I would then see our government coming in on the side of Saddam Hussein and his regime to absolve them of responsibility for the brutal torture of Americans."

The administration moved within days of Roberts' decision to block the former prisoners from collecting any of the money. On July 30, the judge reluctantly sided with the government, saying Bush's actions after the overthrow of Saddam had barred the transfer of the frozen assets to the former prisoners.

The case is being appealed by the former prisoners through the U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia.

Stephen Fennell, a Washington lawyer who is also representing the former prisoners, said the Bush administration had rejected a proposal that would have allowed the United States to delay the payments to his clients for months or years ? until after the reconstruction of Iraq was well under way. "My guys are obviously real patriots, and they authorized us to tell the government that we were willing to wait," he said. "But that was turned down."

[39mto39g]

Now don't get me wrong, I think everyone should get as much as they can from anybody they can get it from.
But if these prisoners get money, then all the rest of the prisoners everywhere get money, even the ones we hold now in cuba. Those prisoners were not individuals at the time of there imprisonment, they were property of the US government. Now if they were in Iraq on business they would have a case. Bush has nothing to do with the laws, Maybe someone might be a Gore fan?

Ron

[lcpd24]

I agree with you 100%, an no not Gore fan

[1CAVCCO15MED]

I voted for Bush. Since then they have tried to cut combat pay, cut the dependant allowance for guys in combat, tried to cut the life insurance payout in half to families of soldiers killed in combat, tried to change the disabled vet definition so that any soldier injured in a noncombat situration in Iraq would be SOL, they knowingly used false information to go to war. Now they want to take the money from some former POW's tortured by Iraq. Vote for Gore? Hell, after all this betrayal of our fellow soldiers, I'd vote for Hillary.

[DMZ-LT]

Say it ain't so Fred - not HILLARY !

[Gimpy]

like it is Fred!

You're ABSO-PHUCKIN-LUTELY correct!

This administration and their brand of "compassionate conservatism" has done MORE to hurt and cause misery to active military & military veterans than any other in HISTORY!

Everything you've statec is an absolute FACT!

[PHO127]

Run Keith on the PSYCO VETS PARTY, I am going to write him in for sure. ELECT A PSYCO VET TO OFFICE.

[Keith_Hixson]

Yep, I'll run on the Psycho Vet Party. Now lets establish a platform.

Keith

[1CAVCCO15MED]

Keith, you may be the answer to something I read today: If God had meant for us to vote he would have given us candidates.

[1CAVCCO15MED]

One board in the Plank: Elimination of the slippery slope arguement. It is the one thing the pro abortion groups and the NRA wholeheartedly agree on. Eliminating partial birth abortions is not a bad thing in and of itself but it puts us on the slippery slope of eliminating all abortions. Trigger locks on guns in houses where there are children is not a bad idea in and of itself but it puts us on the slippery slope of gun control. To hell with slippery slopes, if it is a good idea, let's do it. PS I forgot another reason to vote for Hillary: Charging wounded soldiers for their food in military hospitals.