"All detainees will be treated consistent with Common Article 3 of the Geneva Convention," said a military official who was not allowed to discuss the manual before it was made public and spoke only on condition of anonymity.
Common Article 3 -- found in each of the four Geneva pacts approved in 1949 -- prohibits torture and cruel treatment. Unlike other parts of the Geneva agreements, it covers all detainees, whether they are unlawful combatants or traditional prisoners of war.
After the abuse of detainees at Iraq's Abu Ghraib prison came to light in 2004, some Defense Department lawyers pushed to incorporate the protections of Common Article 3 into the field manual. But senior political appointees argued that doing so would tie the hands of U.S. troops by outlawing long periods of confinement or allowing detainees to accuse the military of "humiliating or degrading treatment," which is banned by the provision.
Because of those objections, senior Pentagon officials decided that the manual and the accompanying policy directives would demand that detainees be treated humanely, but would avoid any direct mention of Geneva.
But in June, the Supreme Court ruled in Hamdan vs. Rumsfeld that the provisions of the Geneva Convention could be applied to an unconventional conflict, like the war on terrorism. The court said that Common Article 3 covered all individuals caught up in a conflict, whether part of a regular military force or not.
A little over a week later, Deputy Defense Secretary Gordon R. England issued a memorandum saying that the U.S. military would adhere to the standards in Common Article 3.
The manual's guidelines will apply to all prisoners held in Defense Department facilities and to all interrogators working there. Under the McCain amendment, the protections also will apply to CIA prisoners held in Defense Department prisons or bases.
They will not apply to CIA interrogators working in prisons run by other countries, although under the McCain amendment, those prisoners must be treated humanely and cannot be tortured.
The Pentagon had intended to keep some of its interrogation techniques classified. Some military officials believe that releasing such tactics would make it easier for terrorists to learn how to resist questioning.
