WTF Is It Now?!?

The Center for Constitutional Rights posts Pentagon memo

This memo and others show there was planning far up the chain of command to torture detainess; the atrocities at Abu Ghraib and elsewhere cannot be swept under the rug by going after low-level soldiers.

Apparently highly placed US officials were willing to approve interrogation methods that violate every convention on torture the United States has ever signed. But they needed to find cover for their actions and a defense to possible criminal prosecution.

Government lawyers writing this report wildly distorted the law in an effort to exempt officials from potential criminal prosecution.

And, under US law, the Bushies are responsible for torture under their command:

Even if no smoking gun is ever found to directly link American officials to [torture], they could still find themselves in serious jeopardy under international law.

Under the doctrine of command responsibility, officials can be held accountable for war crimes committed by their subordinates even if they did not order them - so long as they had control over the perpetrators, had reason to know about the crimes, and did not stop them or punish the criminals. This doctrine is the product of an American initiative. Devised by Allied judges and prosecutors at the Nuremberg tribunals, it was a means to impute responsibility for wartime atrocities to Nazi leaders, who often communicated indirectly and avoided leaving a paper trail. More recently, the international tribunals for Yugoslavia and Rwanda held that political and military leaders can be found liable for war crimes committed by those under their 'effective control' if they do nothing to prevent them.

Not only that, but if Bush conspired to commit war crimes, there are grounds for impeachment:

As Gonzales' memo suggests, if Bush, Rumsfeld or others personally authorized the recently revealed interrogation methods, they could be charged, at a minimum, with conspiracy to commit war crimes.

With America's international moral authority at an all-time low, we can't afford to let possible high-level crimes go unaddressed. John Ashcroft should appoint a special counsel to investigate whether senior administration officials conspired to violate the War Crimes Act. If Ashcroft drags his heels, Congress should begin its own hearings to investigate possible war crimes. And if it turns out that responsibility goes all the way to the Oval Office? Even the president can be impeached by Congress if he is suspected of high crimes and misdemeanors.

If 'I did not have sex with that woman' was enough to merit the impeachment of Bill Clinton, then surely conspiracy to commit war crimes should be adequate reason for Congress to consider impeachment proceedings against George W. Bush.