Lawyer: Manning Subjected to 'Degrading' Treatment in Military Prison

The soldier facing charges in connection with allegedly leaking U.S. diplomatic cables and other sensitive documents is being subjected to "ritual humiliation," according to his lawyer and to media outlets. His alleged treatment faintly echoes the outrages of Abu Ghraib in that Manning is not only forced to relinquish all of his clothing at night, but his clothing is not returned to him before he is forced to stand naked at attention.

Bradley Manning, Pfc., has been held in solitary confinement for ten months. He is currently being detained at the military base in Quantico, Virginia. He is allowed out of his cell for one hour every day-- but only to go into a windowless room large enough for him to walk around in. Before retiring at night, Manning is forced to strip naked. He is also required to stand at attention without clothing in the morning during roll call, according to his attorney, David Coombs.

Manning is accused of having supplied Wikileaks with an enormous cache of a quarter of a million diplomatic cables, some of them reportedly sensitive in nature. Manning also allegedly provided information on the killing of civilians by U.S. Armed Forces in Baghdad.

While some are debating whether the leaks serve the causes of transparency and accountability--and whether those purposes provide adequate justifications for such leaks--others have zeroed in on reports that Manning is a gay (or possibly transgendered) servicemember. Some have even held up the suspect's reported homosexuality (or gender identity) as proof that "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" should not only be retained, but enforcement of the anti-gay law should be more aggressive.

Among some pundits, the issues raised by Manning's alleged actions, and his alleged status as a gay man, play to some of the most extreme fears and prejudices that have emerged around the issue of ending the 17-year-old law that bans military service by openly gay and lesbian patriots. Are gays a security threat to the military? If so, is it because they are gay--or because they are legally barred from open service?

Or is sexuality beside the point when it comes to Manning, a young man described in the media as a talented hacker who subscribes to the hacker ethos that "information wants to be free?" Do hackers in uniform--rather than gays as a general class--pose a hazard to national security? And are proponents of retaining "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" making a valid point when they point to the case, or are they muddying the waters by seizing on to a high-profile, highly controversial, and opportune media sensation?

A Nov. 29, 2010 posting at Accuracy in Media by the site editor, Cliff Kincaid, accused the mainstream media of glossing over the sexual orientation of Pfc. Manning. Accuracy in Media took aim at the New York Times and the Washington Post for having neglected to mention that Manning is reportedly gay; the article then praised the International Business Times for its "honest reporting" in asserting that, "Manning is openly gay and has been active in gay rights movements."

The article shifted the focus from the story away from the leaks and onto the issue of anti-gay law "Don't Ask, Don't Tell," asking, "But how was this possible if the Pentagon had a policy against gay soldiers?" The article went on to report, "Jonah Knox, the pseudonym for a noncommissioned officer and analyst in the United States Army Reserves, pointed out in an [Accuracy in Media] column that, rather than repeal the Pentagon's homosexual exclusion policy, the Wikileaks scandal demonstrates that the policy and regulations need to be tightened up."

Knox suggested that the military might be in the habit of disregarding part of the law, writing, "[I]t does not surprise me that the Army may never have investigated Manning for his support of the homosexual agenda, for his frequenting of homosexual events and/or establishments because Department of Defense policy does not seem to allow it." Knox added, "However, Department of Defense and Army regulations did allow the Army to investigate Manning based on his declarations of being a homosexual who despised the Army for not fully embracing the homosexual agenda and not acting quickly enough to repeal DADT."

Congress voted to repeal the measure last December, but DADT remains in effect until top military and political figures certify that the time is right to set the anti-gay ban aside.

Kincaid's "obsession" with Manning as a poster child for retaining DADT was noted at ConWebBlog, where an Aug. 4, 2010, posting reported on his writings about Manning and DADT. "Then again, Kincaid considers a guy who thinks the Nazi party began as a 'private homosexual military force' to be reliable, so perhaps his judgment on such issues is less than stellar," the posting said, referring to Scott Lively, an evangelist and co-author of the book The Pink Swastika, which makes the claim that Hitler and most Nazi leaders were gay. The posting went on to call Kincaid's articles "wild, hate-driven speculation. But Kincaid wants to see gays dead, so that's to be expected." The posting provided a link to an earlier report on Kincaid's support for a bill in Uganda that would impose the death penalty on gays.

A Nov. 29, 2010 op-ed at the Lincoln-Tribune by Jim Kouri adopted a less accusatory tone in examining the relationship between Manning's reported homosexuality and his arguably treasonous actions. Calling Manning a "disgruntled soldier," Kouri cited British newspaper The Telegraph as having reported that Manning is openly gay, and that he had suffered a breakup with a same-sex romantic partner.

Kouri's article noted that Manning faces a court-martial for his suspected role in the leaking of the sensitive material to Julian Assange, the founder of Wikileaks, who himself has recently been smeared with charges of (straight) sexual impropriety. Manning, Kouri's article noted, posted a message at this Facebook page that said he was "beyond frustrated with people and society at large."

Whistleblower? Gay? Transgendered?

Early reports on Manning following a leak of sensitive material concerning the war in Iraq last summer said that the 22-year-old Army intelligence officer was facing discharge for an unspecified "adjustment disorder," and noted that Manning himself allegedly wrote that he was in the midst of a personal "transition." These reports gave rise to speculation that Manning might be transgendered. The confusion surrounding Manning's sexuality and gender identity was heightened by the Telegraph claiming that Manning had been mulling gender reassignment.

The British press has taken an interest in the story. Manning has a British mother, and lived with her for a time in Wales. Media sources report that Manning then lived with his father in America--until his father discovered that Manning was gay, at which point he tossed the young man out of his house. It was at that point that Manning joined the Army, according to reports. Manning was assigned to work in military intelligence and sent to a posting near Baghdad. Media reports have outlined how, while stationed there, Manning felt increasingly disaffected.

Wired.com posted a June 6 story on Manning's eventual arrest, noting that Manning had allegedly leaked footage of a helicopter attack that killed a number of civilians in Baghdad in 2007, including two journalists.

It was that footage that seemed to have tipped Manning into the world of leaks and whistle blowing. But Manning didn't stop with the leaked footage of the helicopter attack. He also allegedly provided Wikileaks with another video showing an attack in Afghanistan, as well as with an Army document that assessed the level of threat Wikileaks posed to national security. Manning is also the chief suspect is the recently-released cache of around 260,000 communiqu�s among U.S. diplomats and staff that reportedly has the potential to wreak serious harm to relations between the United States and a number of other countries.

Manning took credit for the leaks in correspondence with a former computer hacker, claiming that the immense number of filched diplomatic communiqu�s would create a sensation once they were posted online.

Manning's alleged role in leaking secret material has landed the young man in serious trouble--and his problems just keep growing. A March 4 article in British newspaper The Guardian said that Manning was slammed with an additional 22 charges last week.

The Guardian noted that Manning "stands accused of computer fraud, theft of public records and willfully communicating classified information to a person not entitled to receive it." Added the article, "He now also finds himself faced with a rare charge known as 'aiding the enemy'--a capital offence for which he could face the death penalty."

The Guardian article decried the treatment to which Manning is reportedly subjected at Quantico, "Made to endure strict conditions under a prevention of injury order against the advice of military psychiatrists, he is treated like no other prisoner at the 250-capacity Quantico Brig detention facility in Virginia," the article said. "Despite that he is yet to be convicted of any crime, for the past 218 consecutive days he has been made to live in a cell 6ft wide and 12ft long, without contact with any other detainees."

The Guardian cited a friend of Manning, David House, who had seen the young man at the Quantico facility. House said that Manning had once been a "bright-eyed intelligent young man" but now seemed practically "catatonic."
House also noted that Manning's treatment was similar to that of another prisoner, Bobby Dellelo, who began to suffer from psychosis after a similarly long and isolated period of confinement. House speculated on why Manning was being so harshly treated.

"I think that Bradley Manning is being punished this way because the US government wants him to crack ahead of his trial," said House.

"In recent days and weeks the US government has condemned human rights abuses and repression in almost every country across the Middle East," The Guardian article said, "yet at a prison within its own borders it sanctions the persecution, alleged psychological torture and debasement of a young soldier who appears to have made a principled choice in the name of progress."

A March 5 Associated Press article reported that Manning had been denied his clothing since making "sarcastic comments about using underwear to commit suicide." The article quoted a blog posting by Coombs, who wrote that his client had observed that he could kill himself using "the elastic waistband of his underwear or with his flip-flops" if he were so inclined.

Manning has been held under a "prevention of injury" order (POI), which is similar to--but less drastic than--a suicide watch, the Guardian reported.

"Coombs alleges that the military jailers tightened the terms of the POI rather than imposing a suicide watch order because they knew that prison psychiatrists would never approve it," the Guardian said in a March 6 article. "The brig's psychiatric team has on several occasions indicated that they do not regard Manning as a mental health risk," the article added.

"The Brig's treatment of PFC Manning is shameful," Coombs stated. "There is no justification for treating a detainee in this degrading and humiliating manner."

In 2004, news broke that military personnel at Abu Ghraib, a prison in Iraq where suspects were detained, had tortured inmates of the facility using physical and psychological torture, including sexual humiliation. Detainees were forced to relinquish their clothing and to stand naked. Detainees were also allegedly forced to masturbate in front of military guards, and were reportedly subjected to rape and other abuses. The perpetrators themselves recorded some of the abuses with cameras.

Unclear is the degree to which Manning's reported treatment might be attributable to reports that he is gay, or whether a heterosexual military prisoner would be treated in the same manner.