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13 mai 2004 — Le nom du général Boykin est apparu dans le scandale des tortures aux USA. Une dépêche Reuters du 11 mai le signale, à partir de remarques inquiètes de diverses sources, des experts du Congrès et des membres des associations Arabo-Américaines.
« Congressional aides and Arab-American and Muslim groups said any involvement by Boykin could spark new concern among Arabs and Muslims overseas the U.S. war on terrorism is in fact a war on Islam.
» “This will be taken as proof that what happened at Abu Ghraib (prison) is evidence of a broader culture of dehumanizing Arabs and Muslims, based on the American understanding of the innate superiority of Christendom,” said Chris Toensing, editor of Middle East Report, a U.S.-based quarterly magazine. One Senate aide, who asked not to be identified, said any involvement by Boykin could be explosive. “Even if he knew about the abuse, that would be a big deal,” he said.
» Boykin has declined comment, and defense officials could not say what the extent of his involvement or knowledge about the mistreatment of Iraqi prisoners might have been. »
Le nom de Boykin est apparu pour la première fois dans ce cadre lors de l’audition au Congrès du général Taguba et du secrétaire à la défense adjoint Stephen A. Cambone, le 10 mai. (Une audition au cours de laquelle, par ailleurs, Taguba et Cambone se sont trouvés en désaccord sur le point important de l’interprétation des pouvoirs donnés au renseignement militaire dans la prison d’Abou Ghraib, à partir de novembre 2003.)
Voici le passage, lors de questions posées par le sénateur Jack Reed, démocrate de Rhode Island :
REED: But General Miller didn't think it was important enough to brief you, Mr. Secretary.
CAMBONE: I was not briefed by General Miller.
REED: Who were you briefed by?
CAMBONE: Deputy General Boykin briefed me on the report.
REED: So General Boykin and General Miller were collaborating on this exercise?
CAMBONE: Not at all, not at all, sir.
REED: General Boykin didn't think it was important enough to brief you on that?
CAMBONE: No, sir. Again, your suggestion that the report on the phrase “setting the conditions” is tantamount to asking the military police to engage in abusive behavior I believe is a misreading of General Miller's intent.
REED: Mr. Secretary, what I'm suggesting is anyone in your position should have asked questions. One specifically would be: What does it meant to set the conditions for these troops under the Geneva Conventions?
CAMBONE: Sir...
REED: Did you ask that question?
CAMBONE: And, well, I didn't have to answer that question. Why? Because we had been through a process in which we understood what those limits were with respect to Iraq and what those were with respect to Guantanamo.
REED: Mr. Secretary, what is the status of the detainees in that prison under the Geneva Convention?
CAMBONE: I'm sorry, sir, which prison?
REED: Abu Ghraib.
CAMBONE: They are there under either Article 3 or Article 4 of the Geneva Convention.
REED: Let me recite Article 4. ''“Persons protected by the convention are those who in any manner whatsoever find themselves, in case of a conflict or occupation, in the hands of a party to the conflict or occupying power of which they are not nationals. These are protected persons.”
» Let me read Article 31. “No physical or moral coercion shall be exercised against protected persons in particular to obtain any information from them or from third parties.”
CAMBONE: Sir, we're in agreement here.
REED: Well, we're in agreement. I don't think we are, Mr. Secretary.
Boykin est un “vieux de la vieille”, un spécialiste des coups fourrés au sein des Special Forces. En avril 1980, il était un des principaux adjoints du colonel “Bull” Simons, qui mena l’expédition pour tenter de récupérer les 53 otages américains de Téhéran, expédition qui se termina par un désastre. Boykin est aussi un chrétien évangéliste extrêmement zélé, on dirait même un zélote, qui ne craint pas un instant d’exprimer les vues extrêmes que lui inspire cette foi chrétienne. Pour l’instant, dans tous les cas depuis le 11 septembre 2001, les Arabes et les musulmans en général sont l’objet principal de ses anathèmes fondamentalistes chrétiens.
Il ne s’en cache pas, ce qui fit scandale lorsqu’on apprit sa nomination à un poste particulièrement sensible, comme adjoint militaire de Steephen A. Cambone. Par ailleurs, dans notre rubrique “Notre bibliothèque”, à la date d’aujourd’hui, nous publions trois textes de cette époque (octobre 2003), qui permettent de mieux cerner le portrait de Boykin et les circonstances entourant sa nomination.
Depuis, on a pu avoir des signes convaincants de l’importance du rôle de Boykin. Il est certain que Boykin est derrière le durcissement des tactiques US en Irak, depuis novembre 2003, notamment avec des attaques de terreur, voire des éliminations sommaires. Le Guardian du 9 décembre s’en fit l’écho à propos de la coopération des Israéliens avec les Américains pour développer des tactiques d’assassinats et de terreur. (« Israeli advisers are helping train US special forces in aggressive counter-insurgency operations in Iraq, including the use of assassination squads against guerrilla leaders, US intelligence and military sources said yesterday. (...) One of the planners behind the [US November 2003] offensive is a highly controversial figure, whose role is likely to inflame Muslim opinion: Lieutenant General William “Jerry” Boykin. »)
Un article particulièrement intéressant concernant les tactiques employées, au coeur de l’élaboration desquelles on trouve Boykin, est celui de Seymour Hersch, le même 9 décembre dans le New Yorker. Hersch met en évidence les liens entre Boykin et Cambone. Ci-dessous, le passage centré sur Boykin (avec Cambone).
« One of the key planners of the Special Forces offensive is Lieutenant General William (Jerry) Boykin, Cambone’s military assistant. After a meeting with Rumsfeld early last summer—they got along “like two old warriors,” the Pentagon consultant said—Boykin postponed his retirement, which had been planned for June, and took the Pentagon job, which brought him a third star. In that post, the Pentagon adviser told me, Boykin has been “an important piece” of the planned escalation. In October, the Los Angeles Times reported that Boykin, while giving Sunday-morning talks in uniform to church groups, had repeatedly equated the Muslim world with Satan. Last June, according to the paper, he told a congregation in Oregon that “Satan wants to destroy this nation, he wants to destroy us as a nation, and he wants to destroy us as a Christian army.” Boykin praised President Bush as a “man who prays in the Oval Office,” and declared that Bush was “not elected” President but “appointed by God.” The Muslim world hates America, he said, “because we are a nation of believers.”
» There were calls in the press and from Congress for Boykin’s dismissal, but Rumsfeld made it clear that he wanted to keep his man in the job. Initially, he responded to the Times report by praising the General’s “outstanding record” and telling journalists that he had neither seen the text of Boykin’s statements nor watched the videotape that had been made of one of his presentations. “There are a lot of things that are said by people in the military, or in civilian life, or in the Congress, or in the executive branch that are their views,” he said. “We’re a free people. And that’s the wonderful thing about our country.” He added, with regard to the tape, “I just simply can’t comment on what he said, because I haven’t seen it.” Four days later, Rumsfeld said that he had viewed the tape. “It had a lot of very difficult-to-understand words with subtitles which I was not able to verify,” he said at a news conference, according to the official transcript. “So I remain inexpert”—the transcript notes that he “chuckles” at that moment—“on precisely what he said.” Boykin’s comments are now under official review.
» Boykin has been involved in other controversies as well. He was the Army combat commander in Mogadishu in 1993, when eighteen Americans were slain during the disastrous mission made famous by Mark Bowden’s book “Black Hawk Down.” Earlier that year, Boykin, a colonel at the time, led an eight-man Delta Force that was assigned to help a Colombian police unit track down the notorious drug dealer Pablo Escobar. Boykin’s team was barred by law from providing any lethal assistance without Presidential approval, but there was suspicion in the Pentagon that it was planning to take part in the assassination of Escobar, with the support of American Embassy officials in Colombia. The book “Killing Pablo,” an account, also by Mark Bowden, of the hunt for Escobar, describes how senior officials in the Pentagon’s chain of command became convinced that Boykin, with the knowledge of his Special Forces superiors, had exceeded his authority and intended to violate the law. They wanted Boykin’s unit pulled out. It wasn’t. Escobar was shot dead on the roof of a barrio apartment building in Medellín. The Colombian police were credited with getting their man, but, Bowden wrote, “within the special ops community . . . Pablo’s death was regarded as a successful mission for Delta, and legend has it that its operators were in on the kill.”
» “That’s what those guys did,” a retired general who monitored Boykin’s operations in Colombia told me. “I’ve seen pictures of Escobar’s body that you don’t get from a long-range telescope lens. They were taken by guys on the assault team.” (Bush Administration officials in the White House, the State Department, and the Pentagon, including General Boykin, did not respond to requests for comment.)
» Morris Busby, who was the American Ambassador to Colombia in 1993 (he is now retired), vigorously defended Boykin. “I think the world of Jerry Boykin, and have the utmost respect for him. I’ve known him for fifteen years and spent hours and hours with the guy, and never heard him mention religion or God.” The retired general also praised Boykin as “one of those guys you’d love to have in a war because he’s not afraid to die.” But, he added, “when you get to three stars you’ve got to think through what you’re doing.” Referring to Boykin and others involved in the Special Forces planning, he added, “These guys are going to get a bunch of guys killed and then give them a bunch of medals.” »
Toutes ces précisions conduisent à deux remarques au moins, sous forme d’hypothèses :
• Avec de tels dirigeants, avec de telles conceptions, avec de telles actions, il n’y a aucun étonnement à avoir si l’on a la confirmation que le scandale des tortures révèle évidemment un vaste système, où les abus, mauvais traitements, etc, font partie d’une philosophie systématique appuyée sur une appréciation suprématiste faisant des Irakiens des êtres inférieurs. Les Britanniques ont compris depuis un certain temps que c’est effectivement la conception américaine.
• Dans un tel contexte, il n’y aurait également aucun étonnement particulier à marquer si l’on avait confirmation pleine et entière de l’implication de Boykin et de Cambone dans l’organisation du même système général de traitement “spécial” des prisonniers. D’ores et déjà, Rumsfeld lui-même n’est pas loin de déclarer publiquement qu’il en est partisan, en affirmant joliment qu’après tout ces pratiques ne violent pas la Convention de Genève.
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