Why Did The CIA Destroy Detainee Tapes?

Source Tells CBS News Interrogation Videos Were Destroyed To Avoid Criminal Prosecution Of CIA Officers

(CBS/AP)  A well informed source tells CBS News the videotapes of U.S. interrogations of two high level al Qaeda operatives were destroyed to protect CIA officers from criminal prosecution, reports CBS News national security correspondent David Martin.

A day after CIA Director Gen. Michael Hayden told agency employees the tapes were destroyed in 2005, members of Congress, human rights groups and lawyers for accused terrorists said the tapes may have been key evidence that the U.S. government had illegally authorized torture.

Angry congressional Democrats are demanding that the Justice Department investigate why the CIA destroyed videotapes of the interrogation of two terror suspects.

The Senate's No. 2 Democrat, Dick Durbin, said Attorney General Michael Mukasey should find out "whether CIA officials who destroyed these videotapes and withheld information about their existence from official proceedings violated the law."

Democratic Sen. Edward Kennedy accused the CIA of a cover-up. "We haven't seen anything like this since the 18½-minute gap in the tapes of President Richard Nixon," he said in a Senate floor speech. The gap, which Nixon's secretary attributed to an accidental erasure, played a major role in the loss of support that resulted in Nixon's resignation.

The Democratic chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, Carl Levin, told reporters the CIA's explanation that the tapes were destroyed to protect the identity of agents is "a pathetic excuse," adding: "You'd have to burn every document at the CIA that has the identity of an agent on it under that theory."

Democrats on the House Judiciary Committee sent letters to CIA Director Gen. Michael Hayden and Mukasey asking whether the Justice Department gave legal advice to the CIA on the destruction of the tapes and whether it was planning an obstruction-of-justice investigation.

White House press secretary Dana Perino said Friday that President George W. Bush did not recall being told about the tapes or their destruction. But she could not rule out White House involvement in the decision to destroy the tapes, saying she had asked only the president about it, not others.

Perino refused to say whether the destruction could have been an obstruction of justice or a threat to cases against terror suspects. If the attorney general should decide to investigate, "of course the White House would support that," she said.

In a daily press briefing dedicated almost solely to the topic of the CIA tapes, Perino responded 19 times that she didn't know or couldn't comment.

At least one White House official, then-White House Counsel Harriet Miers, knew about the CIA's planned destruction of videotapes in 2005 that documented the interrogation of two al Qaeda operatives, ABC news reported Friday. Three officials told ABC News that Miers urged the CIA not to destroy the tapes. White House officials declined to comment on the report.

The spy agency destroyed the tapes in November 2005, at a time when human rights groups and lawyers for detainees were clamoring for information about the agency's secret detention and interrogation program, and Congress and U.S. courts were debating where "enhanced interrogation" crossed the line into torture.

Also at that time, the Senate Intelligence Committee was asking whether the videotapes showed CIA interrogators were complying with interrogation guidelines. The CIA refused twice in 2005 to provide the committee with its general counsel's report on the tapes, according to the committee's Democratic chairman, Sen. Jay Rockefeller.

Hayden told agency employees Thursday that the recordings were destroyed out of fear the tapes would be leaked to the press and reveal the identities of interrogators. He said the sessions were videotaped to provide an added layer of legal protection for interrogators using new, harsh methods. Bush had just authorized those methods as a way to break down the defenses of recalcitrant prisoners.

Destruction of the tapes came in the midst of an intense national debate about how forcefully prisoners could be grilled to get them to talk. Not long after the tapes were destroyed, Congress adopted the Detainee Treatment Act, championed by Republican Sen. John McCain, who was tortured while a prisoner of war in Vietnam. The law prohibits not only torture, but cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment of all U.S. detainees, including those in CIA custody.

[jackie0428]

Assembled dignitaries in Constantinople, Turkey today have discovered that "Islamophobia" is a serious, serious problem, that must be addressed at the government level. It doesn''t seem to have occurred to anyone there that Muslims might have any responsibility for the rise in "Islamophobia," if there has been such a rise, or that they can do anything themselves to eradicate it. No one seems to have realized how easy -- yes, easy! -- it would be to stamp out "Islamophobia" once and for all. Here''s how. If Muslims want to end "Islamophobia" instantaneously, here''s how they can do it:
1. Focus their indignation on Muslims committing violent acts in the name of Islam, not on non-Muslims reporting on those acts.
2. Renounce definitively not just "terrorism," but any intention to replace the U.S. Constitution (or the constitutions of any non-Muslim state) with Sharia even by peaceful means.
3. Teach Muslims the imperative of coexisting peacefully as equals with non-Muslims on an indefinite basis.
4. Begin comprehensive international programs in mosques all over the world to teach against the ideas of violent jihad and Islamic supremacism.
5. Actively work with Western law enforcement officials to identify and apprehend jihadists within Western Muslim communities.
If Muslims do those five things, voila! "Islamophobia" will vanish.

[readmy-2009]

I''ve been reading everything with one thought in mind:
Thank God i don''t live in America.
Let me explain. You''re Constitution is one of the most beautiful works ever written. It has been used as a guideline for others in establishing democracies. But it is no longer a working document in your country. You''re rights as citizens have slowly been eroded by a maniacal and moronic president under the guise of "protecting" you from evil-doers. Whilst your own C.I.A. and military, as recorded on tape, contain some the worst on the planet. Corporations make all the important decisions. Your health care system is a disgrace any evolved nation would have been rid of years ago. And your economy is in a shambles. All of these things can be fixed. but the loss of your inalienable rights as citizens is something you won''t change by discussing it. You''ll have to stand up...like you suggest so many other people do....and demand them...and fight for them...and wrest control of your destiny back from the Military-Industrial Complex. Quaint term, isn''t it.. now? Ike was right.
He warned you.

[readmy-2009]

erichsh: you poor misguided moron. when they begin rounding up citizens that have logged on to sites this...i hope you''re the first to go. and believe me chump..when they''re finished water-boarding you you''ll be confessing to being osama''s pimp. dumb sh*t.

[readmy-2009]

The C.I.A., as well as the White House and the Justice Department must think the American people are the most gullible nincompoops on the face of the earth. How many more times are we expected to believe fantasies and out-right lies? There is at present a dangerous "group denial" at work in the American politcal sphere, which states that "if we said it..it must be true. And if you don''t believe us, we''ll look into it." This has made America a laughing stock in the rest of the world. It began with a fraudulent Presidential election in which everyone was too afraid to ask the obvious. Who runs America?
I''m afraid to say...it isn''t the American people and it hasn''t been since the late fifties.
And it is no longer God Bless America.
It''s God Help America.

[dovv]

Support the Iraq Veterans Against the War
www.ivaw.org
www.bodyofwar.com

[jon2012-2009]

Make no mistake, we are witnessing the end of America as we knew it, and the installation of Fascism in it''s place. Democrat or Republican, it makes no difference, they are all Multimillionaire Errand Boys for their Corporate Owners.
Posted by veteran71 at 02:36 PM : Dec 08, 2007

I''ve seen this type of comment before. Even Democrats too? I''m not sure I buy that.

[abbe91]

"you might as well throw in Bush''''''''s connections with Ossama Bin Laden & Rudy Giuliani''''''''s connections with the Arab financeer of the Mastermind of 9/11"
..... definitely a MoveOn.org chump
Posted by userverify at 03:22 PM : Dec 08, 2007

First assertion: Bin Laden treated in an American hospital in Dubai two months before 9/11 ... The French "Le Figaro" ... Nothing to do with MoveOn
Second assertion: Giuliani''s ties with KSM are well documented.

Seems that the MSM do not always like to cover stories
which do not show the country in a nice role and it''s not new ... Google "Operation Northwoods" or "Prescott Bush+Thyssen" ...

[radiob-2009]

J go to the site and you will find the real authors of it.

[j-whitman]

radio,,,,, Chuckles Cheney isn''t alone on this --- Gonzales & Myers wrote the Executive Order.

[radiob-2009]

The torture authorization came from Cheney and Bush and can be found here at PBS.org. under FRONTLINE: cheney''s law. Harriet Myers at best was a dupe in this.

[j-whitman]

Radio,,, Did you notice, Harriet Myers is being dragged into it as an excuse ???? They say she authorized it. As if she had that authority, which she didn''t,, the CIA has it''s own lawyers.

Gonzales & Harriet Myers created this problem with torture they wrote the Executive Order, & now they say Harriet Myers wanted the CIA to hang on to them for possible investigation ????

--- LOL, these are the same Texas Bush lawyers who can''''t remember anything when it comes to laws they''''ve violated for Bush.

[j-whitman]

radio,,,, Yep, you''ld have to burn every single document they archive all the way back to WW2

[j-whitman]

userverify,,,, Speaking of Rudy ---- With all his immdediate family Mafia connections --- He could never pass a Background Investigation to obtain access to Top Secret intll he would need as President

[j-whitman]

userverify,,,, Nope --- I pay attention to the news & not the limited PNAC news or Murdoc''s Fox---- Never been to MoveOn.org or ever paid them any attention

[radiob-2009]

The Democratic chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, Carl Levin, told reporters the CIA''s explanation that the tapes were destroyed to protect the identity of agents is "a pathetic excuse," adding: "You''d have to burn every document at the CIA that has the identity of an agent on it under that theory."


Documents do not disclose photos in which a CIA operative can be matched up to a name. "If" there was torture involved and this is the reasoning behind destroying the tapes, then it is not the agents or the agency itself that should be investigated but those above who authorized the torture. The possibility of the "defense" using these photos to circumvent the prosecution and endanger the lives of the agents has to be considered.

[j-whitman]

userverify,,,, Who are you blaming now for the White House f-ck ups ??? Clinton & Tenet ???? ---- You go back that far, you might as well throw in Bush''s connections with Ossama Bin Laden & Rudy Giuliani''s connections with the Arab financeer of the Mastermind of 9/11

[erichsh]

This is a subject near and dear to hearts of the rabid moveon.org left-wingers and their MSM buddies. Knock yourself out ranting and moaning about how evil and bad Bush/US etc are.... The rest of us are grateful that the CIA were giving these creeps a run for their money and protecting America in the process, and frankly couldn''t give a *** about the terrorist detainees.

[j-whitman]

userverify,,,, Excuse me, None of them like it except for the Chuckels Cheney people who helped give us the spun Iraq War of Roses.

[red164]

"There are no sides. There''''s no Sunnis and Shiites. There''''s no Democrats and Republicans. There''''s only HAVES and HAVE NOTS."
-Sen. Charles F. Meachum
in the movie, "Shooter"


Posted by veteran71 at 03:05 PM : Dec 08, 2007



TRUE TRUE TRUE

[j-whitman]

userverify,,,, None of our people in the CIA like going any further than our military does on prisoner treatment & interrigations.