Latrine facilities for female soldiers serving in both Kuwait and U.S.-run prisons in Iraq were unlit, unlike the men’s, and widely known by both officers and enlisted personnel to be unsafe. Rather than risking attack, some women quit drinking by 3 or 4 p.m., despite temperatures of 120 degrees and higher.
Marjorie Cohn, in her weekly column for truthout, examines the many ways both military and Pentagon officials failed to effectively address an epidemic of rape suffered by women under their command and the mentality that enabled a politically hard-wired Lt. Gen. Ricardo Sanchez to cover-up dehydration as the reason a female master sergeant died in 2003 while serving in Iraq.
The actual number of women who died in their sleep from dehydration is still a mystery. Karpinski testified it was several based upon information she heard from “a surgeon for the coalition’s joint task force” during a briefing. In reaction, Sanchez ordered that details and gender no longer be discussed in open briefings. He “directed that the cause of death no longer be listed” after seeing “dehydration” listed as the cause of death on the master sergeant’s death certificate.
In response to Cohn’s questioning at last week’s Commission of Inquiry for Crimes against Humanity Committed by the Bush Administration, Col. (Ret.) Janis Karpinski repeated statements she’d made in September 2004 when interviewed by decorated war hero then crusader for military reform U.S. Army Col. (Ret.) David Hackworth, the founder of Soldiers For The Truth who died last year at the age of 74 while in Mexico seeking treatment for bladder cancer.
Karpinksi’s charge that Sanchez ordered a cover-up appears to be new.