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MoJo Video: Inside the Secret Cellblocks of Abu Ghraib

A soldier-narrated tour of the detainee camp during its final days.

Thu Apr. 23, 2009 11:51 AM PDT

With the recent release of new torture memos, and the news that Obama isn't entirely ruling out prosecutions, it's important to remember just how widespread America's use of torture has been. This video footage was taken of Abu Ghraib during its final days in 2006, after the prisoners left but before it was torn down, and evidence of the camp was buried and burned. While not as dramatic as hundreds of rounds of waterboarding, the abuse outside interrogation rooms was another cog in the torture machine. The thousands of detainees living in the sprawling tents were kept in squalid conditions, exposed to the elements and mortar fire. The soldiers who filmed this tape point out the outdoor segregation cells where detainees were kept and deprived of sleep—even years after the Bush administration said the camp had been cleaned of any abusive practices. Abu Ghraib has closed, but these two matter-of-fact video tours remind us what it was like. That chapter in American history is not over.

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Justine Sharrock is a former Mother Jones staffer. Her book Tortured: How Our Cowardly Leaders Abused Prisoners, American Soldiers, and Everything We're Fighting For, will be out in June. For more of her stories, click here.

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Comments

Torture

Dear U.S. Government and Media outlets. Please don't torture anyone in the name of "keeping me safe". I can take care of myself. Thanks

The Nazi's were much neater

The Nazi's were much neater with their concentration camps. I can't believe that the Americans are so sloppy with their torture and extermination centers.

Beach Boyz

Let's go surfin' now Everybody's learnin' how Do some waterboardin' with me!

Beach Boyz

Let's go surfin' now Everybody's learnin' how Do some waterboardin' with me!

This is not Abu Ghraib...

Abu Ghraib is one of Saddam's most notorious prisons, as big as any "Stone City" in this country. This video is a bunch of tents and barbed wire.

The stone city you speak of

The stone city you speak of is what the soldiers lived in. The prisoners were kept outside and we lived inside because of the mortars.

MoJo Video: Inside the Secret Cellblocks of Abu Ghraib

In answer to questions from CNN Español interviewer Juan Carlos López about the attempts in Spain to bring the Bush officials to justice, Obama replied, “I’m a strong believer that it’s important to look forward and not backward.” What is this ????????????? Jive talk.

MoJo Video: Inside the Secret Cellblocks of Abu Ghraib

Why are some posts that were here previously removed ? Is this censorship by Mother Jones in some way associated with AIPAC ?

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What "secret cellblocks"?

What "secret cellblocks"? These are pictures of a bunch of tents.

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