Newsweek - Secret Memo—Send to Be Tortured
Not a smoking gun, but its pretty darned warm.
Aug. 8, 2005 issue - An FBI agent warned superiors in a memo three years ago that U.S. officials who discussed plans to ship terror suspects to foreign nations that practice torture could be prosecuted for conspiring to violate U.S. law, according to a copy of the memo obtained by NEWSWEEK. The strongly worded memo, written by an FBI supervisor then assigned to Guantanamo, is the latest in a series of documents that have recently surfaced reflecting unease among some government lawyers and FBI agents over tactics being used in the war on terror. This memo appears to be the first that directly questions the legal premises of the Bush administration policy of "extraordinary rendition"—a secret program under which terror suspects are transferred to foreign countries that have been widely criticized for practicing torture.
In a memo forwarded to a senior FBI lawyer on Nov. 27, 2002, a supervisory special agent from the bureau's behavioral analysis unit offered a legal analysis of interrogation techniques that had been approved by Pentagon officials for use against a high-value Qaeda detainee. After objecting to techniques such as exploiting "phobias" like "the fear of dogs" or dripping water "to induce the misperception of drowning," the agent discussed a plan to send the detainee to Jordan, Egypt or an unspecified third country for interrogation. "In as much as the intent of this category is to utilize, outside the U.S., interrogation techniques which would violate [U.S. law] if committed in the U.S., it is a per se violation of the U.S. Torture Statute," the agent wrote. "Discussing any plan which includes this category could be seen as a con-spiracy to violate [the Torture Statute]" and "would inculpate" everyone involved.
"
One of the real crimes of all this torture is that we will never be able to prosecute these people, that's why they will be detained for the duration of the war on terror(indefinitely,) and why others are being sent to countries where their tortured confessions are admissible. The very application of these techniques forces the rest of the violations of what we thought were our constitutional rights to trial and judicial oversight. Once the decision was made to torture, all the rest had to follow.
The real crime to me lies in the people who have been released from Guntanamo. Take the four released Brits who described some pretty black letter torture at Guantamo. They were, in turn, released by the British. The US gov't tortured innocent people. It reminds me of the ancient witch tests, the only way we can know your innocence is to torture you until we are satisfied that you are innocent.
Oh, and also, they were going to hold the Guantanamo prisoners until the end of the Global War on Terror. As it's been rebranded now to the Struggle Against Violent Extremism(with the insipid acronym SAVE) are they all now to be released?
This is not the America I was brough up to believe in.
Secret Memo—Send to Be Tortured
"Aug. 8, 2005 issue - An FBI agent warned superiors in a memo three years ago that U.S. officials who discussed plans to ship terror suspects to foreign nations that practice torture could be prosecuted for conspiring to violate U.S. law, according to a copy of the memo obtained by NEWSWEEK. The strongly worded memo, written by an FBI supervisor then assigned to Guantanamo, is the latest in a series of documents that have recently surfaced reflecting unease among some government lawyers and FBI agents over tactics being used in the war on terror. This memo appears to be the first that directly questions the legal premises of the Bush administration policy of "extraordinary rendition"—a secret program under which terror suspects are transferred to foreign countries that have been widely criticized for practicing torture.
In a memo forwarded to a senior FBI lawyer on Nov. 27, 2002, a supervisory special agent from the bureau's behavioral analysis unit offered a legal analysis of interrogation techniques that had been approved by Pentagon officials for use against a high-value Qaeda detainee. After objecting to techniques such as exploiting "phobias" like "the fear of dogs" or dripping water "to induce the misperception of drowning," the agent discussed a plan to send the detainee to Jordan, Egypt or an unspecified third country for interrogation. "In as much as the intent of this category is to utilize, outside the U.S., interrogation techniques which would violate [U.S. law] if committed in the U.S., it is a per se violation of the U.S. Torture Statute," the agent wrote. "Discussing any plan which includes this category could be seen as a con-spiracy to violate [the Torture Statute]" and "would inculpate" everyone involved.
"
One of the real crimes of all this torture is that we will never be able to prosecute these people, that's why they will be detained for the duration of the war on terror(indefinitely,) and why others are being sent to countries where their tortured confessions are admissible. The very application of these techniques forces the rest of the violations of what we thought were our constitutional rights to trial and judicial oversight. Once the decision was made to torture, all the rest had to follow.
The real crime to me lies in the people who have been released from Guntanamo. Take the four released Brits who described some pretty black letter torture at Guantamo. They were, in turn, released by the British. The US gov't tortured innocent people. It reminds me of the ancient witch tests, the only way we can know your innocence is to torture you until we are satisfied that you are innocent.
Oh, and also, they were going to hold the Guantanamo prisoners until the end of the Global War on Terror. As it's been rebranded now to the Struggle Against Violent Extremism(with the insipid acronym SAVE) are they all now to be released?
This is not the America I was brough up to believe in.
posted by mikevotes at
9:56 PM
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