NCRW - MisInformation Clearinghouse

“For fifteen years women servicemembers have been sexually assaulted in ways every bit as dehumanizing and agonizing as the assaults on prisoners in Abu Ghraib. The behavior of the men who commit these crimes is every bit as appalling, and the failures of leadership equally egregious.” As this statement by Irene Weiser, Executive Director of Stop Family Violence, makes clear, the Department of Defense has failed to address a disturbing pattern of abuse identified time after time in the military’s own reports on issues that range from domestic violence to the sexual assault of female servicemembers. Other reports, mandated by Congress, have not been released.

The recent release of photos and information about the abuse—often sexual in nature—of prisoners in Iraqi military prisons calls attention to an enormous problem within the US military. What many analyses of these pictures fail to capture, however, is that these cases reflect a disturbing pattern of abuse—as well as decades of failure to adequately acknowledge and respond to that abuse. Reports of domestic against military spouses are increasing. Evidence of the sexual abuse of women in the service and the abuse of female prisoners abounds. Together, these abuses reflect the systematic nature of violence—particularly sexual violence and violence against women—in the US military.

A new report by Amnesty International (see citation below) indicates that, between 1997 and 2001, wives and partners of servicemen reported more than 10,000 cases of abuse a year. They also report that, according to a few rare studies comparing civilian and military domestic abuse, these numbers indicate that domestic abuse in the military might reach twice the civilian level. These numbers are increasing. The Miles Foundation (see citation below) a nonprofit group in Connecticut, reports that before Sept. 11, the agency received about 75 calls from military families reporting abuse each month. It now it receives 150 calls each week.

There are similar reports of abuse by women in the military. While the first congressional hearings on sexual harassment in the military took place in 1980, in a recent survey 30% of female veterans who use Department of Veteran’s Affairs health services reported rape or attempted rape during active duty. According to Stop Family Violence (see citation below), in the past eighteen months alone, “more than 100 incidents of rape, sexual assault and other forms of sexual misconduct [have been] reported…by US women soldiers currently serving in Iraq and Afghanistan who have been sexually assaulted by fellow US soldiers.” Appallingly, Stop Family Violence, along with The Miles Foundation and Amnesty International, report that appropriate responses to victims’ medical and psychological needs are routinely lacking, and prosecution of these crimes is often delayed indefinitely.

And what of “The Other Prisoners” held by the US military? The Guardian reported in May 2004 (see citation below) that women at the Abu Ghraib prison had been raped, and that some were pregnant by US guards, but that no one knows how many. Pictures of this abuse have not been released to the public “ostensibly to prevent attacks on US soldiers in Iraq." To this date there is very sparse information on the status of women prisoners in Iraq . Cristel Amiss of the Black Women's Rape Action Project in London and Lisa Longstaff of Women Against Rape, also in London, have written to all Members of Parliament in the United Kingdom regarding this situation, but have yet to receive a reply.

There is some reason to believe that many of the women in Iraqi prisons are detained illegally. According to above-mentioned Guardian report, US officials have also acknowledged detaining Iraqi women in the hope of convincing male relatives to provide information. This action in particular is a flagrant violation of the Geneva Convention.

Much of this information should come as no surprise to the US Department of Defense. The issues of domestic violence received much attention following the 2002 murders of four wives of servicemen (three of whom had just returned from Afghanistan). It was then that the DoD launched an initiative to address domestic violence. According to an article in The New York Times (see citation below), in response to these cases, soldiers returning from active duty are now briefed on resuming “normal lives.” There is no indication, however, of follow-up to these “re-entry” sessions, or what else is being done to stop this pattern of abuse (in April 2004 another soldier, recently returned from Iraq , was charged with drowning his wife in a bathtub).

A search by NCRW researchers revealed that the DoD’s website for their Task Force on Domestic Violence has not been updated since 2002. Amnesty International’s findings (see citation below) indicate that this is in line with previous DoD responses to Congressional mandates on the reporting and handling of violence within the military, reporting that the military has yet to finish the computer system required by a 1988 Congressional mandate, which ordered defense officials to report crimes to the FBI. According to this report, Pentagon officials have also not complied with a Congressional mandate to respond by June 30, 2003 to the Defense Task Force on Domestic Violence’s recommendations on improving military handling of domestic violence. Catherine Lutz, Professor of Anthropology at Brown University, says in a statement to NCRW that: "The military does not adequately use existing research on domestic violence. Instead, it continues to use antiquated and inaccurate paradigms for understanding domestic violence...to understand the problem and to guide policy." (Click here to read her full statement)

Abuse within the military is also being investigated. A special Task Force was recently commissioned to look at the latest allegation of abuse within the army. The report released on May 13th by the Task Force lists in its appendix “some 46 previous reports, hearings and investigations relating to the issue of violence against women in the military, dating as far back as 1988” (Weiser, 2004). The Executive Director of The Miles Foundation, Christine Hansen, charges that the report is lacking in several areas:

The Report`s recommendations neglect the immediate
needs of victims serving in the current theater of operations,
such as rape evidence kits; testing supplies for STIs, HIV and
pregnancy; victim advocates; victim witness liaisons;
transportation protocols; emergency contraception; and
medication. The recommendations do not outline staffing
levels for victim advocates in order to ensure availability
and accessibility to victims and survivors.

Hansen concludes that: “The review, merely, confirms the findings of surveys, prior commissions and task forces, and antidotal reports contained within a long line of reviews through the decades concerning sexual assault in the U. S. Armed Forces.” (See citation below)

Much like information on domestic violence in the military, however, this report is not available on the DoD website. Disturbingly, it is not only this latest report on violence in the military that is no longer available online; many previous reports are no longer available. As one researcher recently wrote in a submission to NCRW’s MisInformation Clearinghouse: “I cannot even locate the DoD Sexual Harassment Surveys from 87, 95 or 2002, which were available within the last 90 days; documents that I have repeatedly found and referenced for the last seven years.” This same researcher noted the inconsistencies between this report and Defense Link’s mission statement:

The mission of the Defense Link is to support the overall
mission of the DoD by providing official, timely, and
accurate information about defense policies, organizations,
functions, and operations. Also, Defense Link is the single,
unified, starting point for finding military information online.

Linda Burnham, Executive Director of the Women of Color Resource Center asserts: “Militarized sexual domination,” as depicted in the horrific pictures from Abu Ghraib, “is neither ‘contrary to American values’ nor simply the work of a few ‘bad apples.’ It is, rather a daily practice.” As researchers, and as concerned citizens, we must ensure that the voices of military and civilian women who have been victims of systematic violence perpetuated by “militarized sexual domination” do not go unheard, and that this information is not only reported, but that the reports are made readily available and, above all, acted upon. As Loretta Kemsly, President of Women Artists and Writers International, states: “Tactics that are common in the US military have been exported to Iraq. Now the results are in full public view. We should start changing what we see; not pretend it isn’t there.”

MisInformation Exchange

MISSING - Information about US Military Abuse of Women