Very grateful for support from the British government I'm sure - but I suspect very dismissive of any criticism. Governments are like that, not just America.

Most people are in fact, when there is even a hint of criticism. (I'm reminded of the old joke about the mother who gave her son a red tie and a blue tie. So he wears the red tie when he goes to see her. "So you didn't like that blue tiue I gave you?")

Obviously its important that prisoners are treated in a way that is not degrading (not least because this knd of thing is degrading the captors). If that is happening, and is confirmed by truly independent people who know about that kind of thing, that's good.

The combination of pictures, the kind of things that were being said by people like Rumsfeld, and the stickiness about accepting that these were prisoners of war - all these combined to give a very reasonable grounds fo suspecting that not to be the case. Not knee-jerk anti-Americans, people like Mary Robinson, whose job it is to speak up about those kind of concerns.

But it is also important that even powerful countries should operate within the rules they have pledged to uphold, such as the Geneva Conventions, and that cannot just be a private matter for politicians to mess arouind with.