Friday, January 13, 2006
Pentagon's CITF Opposed Interrogation Tactics at Guantanamo
Some of the Pentagon's experts on interrogation were ordered not to participate in detainee questioning at Guantanamo which were deemed by supervisors to use unlawful techniques.
"The aggressive techniques, approved by Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld and the Joint Chiefs of Staff in late 2002, led to at least one high-value detainee being placed in women's underwear, led around by a dog leash and stripped in front of female interrogators. Similar tactics later emerged in Iraq and were highlighted in photographs of abuse at the Abu Ghraib prison.
"Members of the Pentagon's Criminal Investigation Task Force worked with FBI agents to investigate possible crimes that the men may have committed before they were captured -- crimes that could be prosecuted in court. Declassified e-mail messages and orders show that their commanders were concerned about the tactics almost immediately after they were implemented and joined FBI officials in reporting allegations of abuse.
"The memos indicate that even military units at Guantanamo Bay pushed back against the department's efforts to use new, aggressive tactics against detainees during the facility's first year. The military's top lawyers also warned that the approval of such tactics could lead to abuse and unlawful conduct."
Rumsfeld, of course, continues to cover his exposed ass:
Rumsfeld told reporters at the Pentagon yesterday that there is no evidence to suggest that high-level policies authorized or condoned the abuse of detainees.
"What took place at Guantanamo is a matter of public record today, and the investigations turned up nothing that suggested that there was any policy in the department other than humane treatment," Rumsfeld said. "And it is also clear, by the very fact that some 250 people have been punished in one way or another, that there was behavior that was inappropriate."
The experts knew better:
"All deployed CITF personnel are instructed to disengage, stand clear, and report any questionable interrogation techniques," a legal adviser to the task force wrote in a Jan. 15, 2003, memo. "CITF maintains that its personnel will not utilize non-law enforcement techniques or participate, support, advise, or observe aggressive interrogation techniques or strategies."
The legal adviser, whose name was blacked out in the documents, said in the memo that he wrote it "to preserve critical correspondence concerning development of interagency policies involving aggressive interrogation techniques."
It is pathetic that the apologists for the administration continue to blame detainee abuse at Guantanamo and in Iraq on low level enlistees when they have long known better.
