WASHINGTON-The Department of Defense denied adopting a policy against camera phones, saying imaging devices are already covered by guidelines for wireless communications by the military and the Geneva Convention’s treatment of prisoners of war.
“There is a new policy-but it wasn’t signed by Mr. Rumsfeld. It had nothing to do with cameras, and it wasn’t about Iraq,” said Kenneth McClellan, a DoD spokesman.
The camera-phone issue arises at a time when the Pentagon is under siege over digital pictures showing abuses of prisoners by U.S. soldiers in Iraq’s Abu Ghraib prison.
“The new directive is about wireless devices and how they can be used on the Global Information Grid where DoD does its business,” said McClellan.
On April 14, Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz signed a department-wide wireless directive referenced by McClellan.
“Basically, we are in a situation today where everyone is using a cell phone or a Blackberry or some sort of wireless device that can be carrying voice, imagery or text-and we either need that to be highly encrypted or we need it off of DoD systems-because basically we don’t want to be in a situation where any guy with a scanner can figure out what we are about to do. That would really put us in a jam in a war situation,” said McClellan.
“As to cameras in prisons,” added McClellan, “Gen. [John] Abizaid or his commanders and lawyers may be looking at the risk those devices caused, but that would be a totally separate discussion.”
The Bush administration has begun a shakeup of military command in Iraq as a result of the Abu Ghraib controversy.
