What's going on here?

[Ten Packs]

The latest chapter in the legal history of torture is being written by American pilots who were beaten and abused by Iraqis during the 1991 Persian Gulf War. And it has taken a strange twist.

The Bush administration is fighting the former prisoners of war in court, trying to prevent them from collecting nearly $1 billion from Iraq that a federal judge awarded them as compensation for their torture at the hands of Saddam Hussein's regime.

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/iraq/la-na-pow15feb15,0,3155150.story?coll=la-home-headlines

 

[Ten Packs]

The latest chapter in the legal history of torture is being written by American pilots who were beaten and abused by Iraqis during the 1991 Persian Gulf War. And it has taken a strange twist.

The Bush administration is fighting the former prisoners of war in court, trying to prevent them from collecting nearly $1 billion from Iraq that a federal judge awarded them as compensation for their torture at the hands of Saddam Hussein's regime.

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/iraq/la-na-pow15feb15,0,3155150.story?coll=la-home-headlines

 

[Ten Packs]

The latest chapter in the legal history of torture is being written by American pilots who were beaten and abused by Iraqis during the 1991 Persian Gulf War. And it has taken a strange twist.

The Bush administration is fighting the former prisoners of war in court, trying to prevent them from collecting nearly $1 billion from Iraq that a federal judge awarded them as compensation for their torture at the hands of Saddam Hussein's regime.

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/iraq/la-na-pow15feb15,0,3155150.story?coll=la-home-headlines

 

[Reverend Blair]

What's going on here? It looks to me like the Bush administraion is desperately trying to stave off setting a precedent that would allow all those illegally-held and tortured prisoners in Guantanamo and Abu Grhaib to collect compensation when they out.

The war is costing billions as it is. If Bush and company's war crimes have to be paid for it will cost even more. If the US government is successfully sued for those crimes it also leaves the door open for criminal charges being placed against Bush and his cronies.