Iraq War: The West Case (Pt. 2 of 2)

(Cont. from Part 1) What he claims is that soldiers under his command "physically aggress[ed]" (presumably beat) their presumably unarmed prisoner, for which they were fined.  West claims he fired a pistol in the immediate presence of the prisoner, once very close to his head. West claimed that an informant had told him the suspect, an Iraqi policeman, knew about ambushes being planned. "Col West said the detainee then provided information on a planned attack and the names of accomplices." (Rumsfeld mum over accused colonel)<?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" />

His fans have picked up on this aspect of the case, which is apparently based only on his own account and not confirmed independently in any of the news stories I've seen. As stated by West and his defenders, it's like the perfect sophomore philosphy class question: if you knew someone was going to get killed unless you got information out of a captive right away, would you use torture to get it?

The Fox News report I cited in Part 1 is even more circumspect about that aspect of West's defense. It repeats as fact his claim that he "scared vital intelligence information out of the officer about an ambush plot against American soldiers. The Iraqi named alleged co-conspirators who were later arrested."

The Freeper crowd may be using this as kind of a dry run for more serious atrocity stories. Their version is that this heroic soldier used a little rough stuff to get vital information out of an enemy Iraqi about an impending ambush on American troops.

But if any part of the story other than the fact that West has been charged with assault has been independently confirmed, it's not clear to me from the news stories I've seen. Was there any actual evidence in any of this except the claim of a man who probably believed the Americans were about to blow his brains out if he didn't give them some names?

Tags: iraq war