Despite all the talk over the past 15 years or so about the US and coalition forces being engaged in various 'wars', there haven't actually been any. To have a war you need two sizable armies representing two opposing nation states both with the capability to wage war on each other. I'd be impressed if anyone can point to the US or any Western nation being involved in such a conflict over the past 15 years, anywhere in the world.

During those last 15 years however, a very different type of war has been waged. It has been a much more subtle, stealthy and insidious war, and the mind of every Western citizen with two active neurons to rub together has been the target.

Do you know who Dr. Aafia Siddiqui is? She's a American-educated Pakistani cognitive neuroscientist and mother of three children, but she hasn't seen her children for seven years. Aafia and her children were abducted in Pakistan in 2003 by US and Pakistani intelligence agents and incarcerated on trumped up 'terrorism' charges.

During her long 'rendition' she was held in various locations, including the infamous US Bagram Air Force base in Afghanistan, where she was regularly tortured, raped and ultimately shot and wounded.

In September this year she was brought to the US for trial and sentenced to 86 years in one of the most brutal institutions in the USA, the Federal Medical Facility in Carswell, Texas. British journalist Yvonne Ridley, who has been campaigning on Aaifia's behalf explains what life is like in Carswell:

In the last 10 years...

Countless young women - more than 100 - have died under "questionable circumstances" with families unable to obtain autopsy reports

Numerous cases of sex abuse, including sodomy and rape, were carried out by prison chaplain Vincent Bassie Inametti whose reign of terror lasted eight years until he was finally convicted in 2008

Rampant sex abuse of prisoners was reported by prison doctor Roger Guthrie who was fired for whistle-blowing

Prison doctor was convicted of sexually abusing inmates while another doctor was allowed to leave without charges after being caught sexually abusing a woman patient

Gross medical negligence has been reported including lack of care for several cancer patients - one went untreated for a year and died

Serial sexual predator and prison guard Michael Miller was convicted of raping a detainee

Forced psychotropic medication on reluctant detainees

Infestation of ants went unchecked even when one patient in a coma was covered by the biting creatures as was the corpse of another.

To quote one local newspaper, The Fort Worth Weekly, time served in Carswell "can be a death sentence for women prisoners".