CIA Program: Reckless or Tightly Governed?

Newly Released Documents Show Prisoner Interrogations Were Highly Regulated

(CBS)  The report detailing the CIA's secret interrogation program shows the detention of terror suspects was governed by a strictly kept set of rules, a New York Times analysis finds.

While most of the attention rests on reports of interrogators' possibly criminal techniques, such as mock executions and threatening to kill an inmate's family, the report reveals a tightly regulated system that proponents say was designed to keep the program safe and legal.

But critics say the newly released documents only show that the pattern of reckless disregard for human rights extended well beyond low-level interrogators into the upper reaches of the Bush administration.

According to the documents, doctors and lawyers were highly involved with setting up the program's parameters and monitored prisoner treatment throughout, including interrogation sessions. Rules governed how time detainees could be exposed to so-called enhanced interrogation techniques, from enforced nudity to waterboarding.

The prisoner treatment at secret detention facilities began with putting them in diapers, shaving their heads and face, stripping and photographing them before starting a sleep deprivation program.

Read more about the CIA secret interrogation program:

CIA Probe Angers Those on Right and Left
2 Administrations, 2 Views of CIA Report
Inside the CIA's Haphazard Interrogations
CIA Threatened to Kill Suspect's Children
Did CIA Violate Torture Law?
10 Things About the CIA's Bad Day
Holder Taps Prosecutor to Probe CIA Abuses
Unplugged: Uncovering CIA Interrogations
New Unit Will Question Key Terror Suspects
Expert: CIA Techniques Were Torture

The documents show interrogations were supposed to begin with the "least coercive" measures before moving on to harsher treatment, which culminated in waterboarding, or simulated drowning.

Throughout the program, lawyers in the Justice Department and White House counsel's office kept close tabs, receiving psychological reports on inmates and refining guidelines for interrogation techniques.

Now, current Attorney General Eric Holder is considering whether to prosecute interrogators who overstepped the bounds and engaged in what is now regarded as torture.

Proponents of the program say the tightly controlled practices show the program wasn't a haphazard effort at interrogation.

"Elaborate care went into figuring out the precise gradations of coercion," David B. Rivkin Jr., a lawyer for both the Reagan and George H. W. Bush administrations told the New York Times. "Yes, it’s jarring. But it shows how both the lawyers and the nonlawyers tried to do the right thing."

But critics say they only prove how endemic the disregard for human rights was.

"They show how deeply rooted this new culture of mistreatment became," Tom Parker, policy director for counterterrorism and human rights at Amnesty International, told the Times.

[hungry1968-16]

by ClarkeGrissom August 26, 2009 6:13 PM EDT
How many of the 9/11 hijackers were tortured? None. They all died with the 1000's of people they murdered. How many terrorists or al queada operatives did we torture that aided them? Again the answer is...none. Because torture, because torture as defined by the US Code wasn't used as an EIT to get them to provide information. How many terrorists have we killed or attacks have been averted, and therefore American et. al. lived saved due to the intelligence gathered? Many. You actually think they bothered to use EIT's on all the enemy combatants held in Guantanamo? 550+? You're misinformed.







In your bizarre post from 5:15, you justified torture because 3,000 people were killed on 9/11, even though the "killers" were dead, you STILL think that we should have tortured SOMEONE anyway, whether they were involved or not?

That's like saying, "Some hispanic kid just shot someone, so let's round up ALL HISPANIC KIDS, and torture them to make ourselves feel better!"

And you think that you can define or redefine torture, or call torture "enhanced interrogation techniques", but EVERYONE that has EVER been subjected to water boarding will tell you that -- YES -- it IS torture. They have NO QUESTION in their mind, and I have no reason to doubt what they say.

How many attacks were averted because we tortured someone? NONE. Everyone that I've seen talking about it, says that ALL of the information we got, we got BEFORE we tortured them. And when we DID start torturing them, they either shut up, or gave bogus information that later was proven to be untrue.

Do I think that they used torture on the whole 550+ that were released? No. But they DID use it on ANYONE that wouldn't start talking right away.

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2009/08/26/eveningnews/main5267194.shtml

"Those detainees who did not immediately provide information on threats and other terror suspects went straight to harsh interrogations."



http://www.aclu.org/torturefoia/released/082409/olcremand/2004olc97.pdf

(page 4)

[hungry1968-16]

by ClarkeGrissom August 26, 2009 5:15 PM EDT
Just like 3000 people died on 9/11/01 of 'man made disaster'? selective memory is a b!tch isnt it?

The report states one death... in Afghanistan...at the hands of contractor. Read and fact check first before you look well...dumb, maybe that's your problem? lol.






One died in Afghanistan, and two died in Iraq. And whether they died at the hands of a CIA agent, or at the hands of a contractor acting on the orders of the CIA, it's STILL "killing a human being through torture".

Fighting evil, with evil, only assures that "evil" wins. We do not torture - we are above that.




Now tell me how many of the 9/11 hijackers you think that we tortured? The Bush regime released 550+ prisoners that were held amd tortured in Gitmo, Iraq, and Afghanistan. Are we normally in the practice of releasing guilty terrorists, or did we actually torture innocent people?

[ClarkeGrissom]

How many of the 9/11 hijackers were tortured? None. They all died with the 1000's of people they murdered. How many terrorists or al queada operatives did we torture that aided them? Again the answer is...none. Because torture, because torture as defined by the US Code wasn't used as an EIT to get them to provide information. How many terrorists have we killed or attacks have been averted, and therefore American et. al. lived saved due to the intelligence gathered? Many. You actually think they bothered to use EIT's on all the enemy combatants held in Guantanamo? 550+? You're misinformed.

[credibility2]

This CIA item and that of Bernanke getting reappointed by the president (his term wasn't up until 2010, so what was his rush?) were conveniently timed to distract people from sinking their teeth into the really bad economic news about the deficit, which this administration miscalculated by some two trillion dollars. That bit of news was also revealed yesterday, but also conveniently buried in the lesser important news items of the day so as not to embarrass the president. It would also put more pressure on him not to pursue his grandiose health care "reform", since we don't have the money to pay for its lofty provisions. I guess the kids running the candy store also ran out of dried beans and digits to count.

[hungry1968-16]

by the_majesty August 26, 2009 3:52 PM EDT
3 died from natural causes.







A heart attack is a natural cause.

A heart attack brought on by the stress that water boarding places on the body, or by repeated electric shocks, isn't considered to be "natural causes".

At least not by anyone with the ability to think. Maybe that's your problem?

[ClarkeGrissom]

Just like 3000 people died on 9/11/01 of 'man made disaster'? selective memory is a b!tch isnt it?

The report states one death... in Afghanistan...at the hands of contractor. Read and fact check first before you look well...dumb, maybe that's your problem? lol.

[brianbwb-2009]

ClarkeGrissom

Selective memory on your part, how many Iraqis were among the perpetrators? None. You war-mongers love to scream "9/11", as if Iraq had anything to do with it, but then clam up when challenged to show proof that they were.

Obviously the 3,000 dead Americans mean nothing at all to you, other than as an excuse to pursue your penchant for mass murder against people who had nothing to do with it.

Check your own facts, then show how Iraqis were involved in the attack for which you blame them, as justification for your enjoyment of torturing people.

[woeisme1]

by the_majesty August 26, 2009 3:41 PM EDT
These were ruthless killers.
The CIA was trying to get information
that could save thousands of
American lives. You can't do that
by saying please and thanks.
No prisoners were physically
harmed. This is all a political
stunt by the Obama tyrants.
I hope it backfires.
-----------------------------

You mean like your lies about healthcare reform are gonna backfire (and are already actually)?

[the_majesty]

woeisme1 ... I am a man of truth and honor.
As such, my word is beyond reproach.
Time will tell about health care reform.
Most of the American people are against ObamaCare.
We saw that at the town hall meetings.

[ToolMangler1]

by the_majesty August 26, 2009 4:37 PM EDT
"Most of the American people are against ObamaCare.
We saw that at the town hall meetings."


Yes they are since that is the Republican version that Palin is touting.

Since there is 'NO BILL' that has been passed "By the house and Senate", anyting that the president wants to do will be attacked by the GOP so that Obama will not be re-elected and then the GOP will present the same reforms under a different name so 'They' get the credit for it.

I am sick and tired of my healthcare and life being made a political football. (FIX IT NOW!!!!!!!!) I would like to be healthy til I die of 'natural causes'. (at the age of 135) ;)

[woeisme1]

I meant to comment yesterday on Obama's plan to involve the WH in interrogations.

That is just wrong Obama. That is a hugh mistake. The WH has absolutely no business doing the CIA's job.

I support you but this is a very danegerous precedent and should be reconsidered for all the reasons I indicated in my e-mail.

Not good at all. I hope Americans express their concerns about this to Obama directly, like I did. I am just very very opposed to this.

[jamer32539]

As much as I dislike what the CIA did to prisoners, I do respect the outcome. No one can argue that since 911 we have been kept safe from another attack. After 911, the entire nation was demanding that the government do whatever is necessary to prevent another attack from happening. No one cared how, just prevent it. Now that the way it was done comes out, everyone is up in arms as to how the information was gained.

President Obama stated that the past is the past and we as an administration and as a nation must move forward and the CIA tapes would remain sealed.. Now the Attorney General released the CIA tapes anyway. Why?

1- Obama lied to the American people in the first place and had no intention of keeping them sealed.
2- The Attorney General does whatever he wants to do regardless of what the President says. (Who works for who?)
3- It is a convenient smoke screen to divert our attention off of the health care debate.

[ToolMangler1]

The CIA quit protecting America the moment they became a tool for political purposes and started behaving like the people they are suppose to "give the President and the Military information about) IE. Spying on Americans (in America), torturing and killing the opposition themselves and not letting the Military handle it. The CIA is supposed to be a research and archival agency, not a Military entity outside the view of the Government of the USA.
(posted earlier)



The moment an agency oversteps its bounds and gets away with it, it puts America one more step closer to "Big Brother" in 'all' its Orwellian 'Gorey' Status. I would rather give up another Tower (with me in it) than let America lose anymore of our 'Perception of Justice' or behave as the Mid Eastern countries do, (No honor, because they are dealing with us 'infidels')....

There is a scripture that covers my feelings, "What does it profit a man (Nation) to gain the whole world and lose his/its own soul/reason for being"..... (my apologies to GOD for my rearrangement of his words.)

[hungry1968-16]

by the_majesty August 26, 2009 3:41 PM EDT
These were ruthless killers.
The CIA was trying to get information
that could save thousands of
American lives. You can't do that
by saying please and thanks.
No prisoners were physically
harmed. This is all a political
stunt by the Obama tyrants.
I hope it backfires.






550 out of the 725+ prisoners were released by the Bush regime, without EVER being charged with a crime, because they NEVER COMMITTED a crime.

Last I checked, you have to actually KILL SOMEONE to be considered a "ruthless killer", don't you?

By the way, at least 3 DIED from torture, so how in the hell can you say, "no one was physically harmed"?

[the_majesty]

3 died from natural causes.

[brianbwb-2009]

To the_majesty

Right, one froze to death in a sub tropical country. Son, all death is natural, the cause in these cases still remains the responsibility of the US, they were in US custody at the time.

Play with words all you want, US and international law is solidly against you.

[brianbwb-2009]

To the_majesty

Right, one froze to death in a sub tropical country. Son, all death is natural, the cause in these cases still remains the responsibility of the US, they were in US custody at the time.

Play with words all you want, US and international law is solidly against you.

[ClarkeGrissom]

What James Bond do? Man just think if everytime he took out the bad guy, or hung a Spectre dude off a building by his necktie to get him to talk he would prosecuted for torture. The 'he was a clumsy chap' defense wouldn't work very well with our DoJ.

Like Bond, all this is fiction, there won't be any prosecutions because there wasn't any torture as defined by the US Code...and Obama Administration has changed nothing! Haha, the army field manual that is now the Obama Administration official playbook for interogating prisoners highlights 8 of 10 techniques employed previously, the funny thing is that all this previous alledged torture was done on high value targets after 9/11 in 2002-2003. The Obama Administration has JUST made it policy to use the Army Field Manual starting this week and going forward...I guess with Afghanistan heating up they got some interogating they're planning to do? Hmmm? Will the same nutcases be screaming about sending their man to the Hague?

[hungry1968-16]

by Joe_NY_15 August 26, 2009 2:11 PM EDT

The only thing Hungry should "get" is lost







If I were you, I would want me to get lost too.

Then you could post your silly nonsense ad nauseum with no one EVER calling you on your simple minded BS, and making you look like a fool.

But sorry, I'm not going anywhere anytime soon.

[notblue]

Hungry, the report states these policies were tightly governed, when these policies were instituted right after 911, EVERY senator including Pelosi felt they weren't strong enough, since there institution the high ranking dems were briefed no less than on forty different occassions and now that screaming child leftwingers like yourself are clammering to prosecute the hated Bush administration five years later, a "collective amnesia" has spread like widfire! What possible benefit could this latest witch and waste of time be for America? It will do nothing more than to polarize the intelligence community and every yet to be electyed president knowing when the winds of politics change renewed politcally driven scrutiny and prosecution can follow! Complete idiocy and a complete waste of taxpayers money not including the blow to security itself, but I guess you libs have always stated that the lives of tens of thousands of Americans are not as important as the comfort of one enemy combatant even when that prisoner was in the process of killing those innocents.

[woeisme1]

notblue....not all of your facts are right. Reading a little more will help that.

[brianbwb-2009]

To notblue

If you do not understand what good bringing people who committed treason, war crimes, and crimes against humanity to justice would be for the country, I offer this.

If one American is allowed to so blatantly abrogate the constitution, then the constitution itself is meaningless, get ready for roving gangs of anarchy-motivated thugs to pay you and yours a visit.

I doubt your small cache of weapons will stop a couple hundred people from pillaging in your area.

When another country decides to follow the precedents set by Bush, and kidnap innocent Americans for torture, and detention without charges, you can try to explain how it was OK for Bush to do it, but not OK to them.

The intelligence community needs to have boundaries set, and must be punished for exceeding those, otherwise you and yours may be the next victims.

Any president so ordering the minions of the intelligence community to exceed those boundaries is just as pesponsible for the crimes as those who physically committed them.

Remember, they are supposed to work for us, not above us, and not against us.

If you are so quick to dismiss these crimes as something that happened five years ago, go then and tell the Americans who lost soldiers because of Bush's lies that the death of their loved ones is of no importance because it happened five years ago.

Then you can go tell the millions of harmed Iraqis, who are innocent of any attacks on us, the same thing.

[the_majesty]

These were ruthless killers.
The CIA was trying to get information
that could save thousands of
American lives. You can't do that
by saying please and thanks.
No prisoners were physically
harmed. This is all a political
stunt by the Obama tyrants.
I hope it backfires.

[element51]

The actions of the CIA and the United States Government around the world have been, to put it mildly, questionable for many years. In one country after another we have removed democratically elected leaders deposed or eliminated only to be replaced with despots who were under the direction of the US. Why? So the corportracy could exploit the natural resources and the populations of said countries. There have been quite a number of Central and South American leaders who have met with unfortunate accidents because they refused to cave in to the US and wanted to improve the lot of their citizens. In many cases we have labeled the uncooperative leaders "marxists" and "communists" when in reality they were not. If our government declares that someone is a communist then we, the American people, accept that as fact. It comes as no surprise that the CIA would take whatever action they deemed acceptable as they have no one to oversee their actions. At the present time there is a buildup of American troops in Columbia and I look for tensions to increase with Chavez and possibly some other South American leaders. The big oil companies desperatly want to sieze control of the oil in Venezuela and it will be necessary to remove Chavez to do so. Watch the news for developments as they happen. If I were Chavez I would not travel anywhere by air. Plane crashes seem to happen very often in South America.

[pensacola8-2009]

Unreliable intelligence is the complaint that most have against the CIA. Enhanced interrogations didn't produce reliable intelligence. President Bush wasn't provided with reliable intelligence before creating a justification to invade Iraq.

The more time that passes, the more doubt becomes created that leads citizens of this nation to believe that the CIA is not a reliable source to provide intelligence. Many can believe that some areas of intelligence reporting is reliable, while others are not. The question is whether in the case of another national crisis, the CIA will have reliable intelligence to provide to Congress and the President. At this time, grave doubts do exist and the impacts to our economy can be directly traced to a prolonged war that drained financial resources of this country as a result of a military invasion acted upon with faulty intelligence.

Operation of intelligence gathering does come with inherent risk to be incomplete or inaccurate and it is human nature to only question ourselves only when things are not going as well as planned.

The real question that needs answering, is whether intelligence was misapplied for the specific challenge that fell under the commander in chief at the time.

All of us know that no one in the CIA is ever going to publicize that they aren't providing reliable intelligence when a national crisis occurs.

During WWII when Britan was bombed relentlessly, and was within one week of being completely unable to defend itself from German bombing, the world saw a reversal of misfortune transfer from Britan to Germany over a charactar flaw of the leaders.

Today, many question whether it is a charactar flaw that influences the conduct of existing wartime operations. Legal questions are a good place to start and honest answers are this country's best hope for surviving our challenge.

[brianbwb-2009]

During the run-up to hostilities, the US government did have reliable information, but as Condoleeza Rice itself admitted, they had accurate intel as well as inaccurate intel, which most likely did not come from the CIA. They CHOSE (her own word) to act on the false intel, as it better suited their agenda.

For example, the "intel" about Iraqi WMDs was largely drawn from a thesis written ten years previously, by an Indian student at Berkley University. How it became "intel from the British" is sleight-of-hand that most likely was outside of the CIA.

Accepting Bush's assertion (read, lie) that it was given faulty intel by the CIA is accepting his attempt to deflect responsibility away from himself, and onto others.

As far as torture-obtained intel, this is after the fact, whatever info came from the torture is irrelevant, as well as unreliable. The torture was committed to force people to "confess", after the fact, to the lies advanced by the Bush team, and had nothing to do with obtaining accurate information about "threats" to the US.

In short, this is not about the "quality" of intel from the CIA, it is about Bush and his klan using the CIA to provide cover for their crimes against humanity, war crimes, and treason.

[calgal4]

Well, I dislike your comments intensely, but I don't hate you. I just disagree with you.

[calgal4]

I'm wondering how the people who carried out these tortures are able to live with themselves. I'd go AWOL before I'd harm another person deliberately!

[ToolMangler1]

I agree somewhat, I will kill if I am opposed by an armed enemy. the only way he/she can stop me from killing He/her is to surrender. After surrendering and my prisoner, I will lay down my life to protect them from others that would kill them. (unless the former prisoners turn on me, then I will kill them, then report my actions.)

[brianbwb-2009]

To ToolMangler1

This is because you are educated, intelligent, and possess a sense of empathy and compassion. as well as at least a human degree of logic.

But as you can see in some of these posts, too many don't.

[stevex47]

Um, lets enter reality here...the boosh gang didn't govern ANYTHING tightly or loosely, reckless and incompetent was their only way of opereating.

[ClarkeGrissom]

Yeah it was so illegal they printed up reports for it..."OMG! See they're 'criminals'! Just look at page 14." The only things this does is make us less safe in our homeland by causing people whose dangerous job is to protect your cushy liberal lifestyles to second guess whether or not some ACLU lawyer is going to show his picture and give his name to terrorists.

[ToolMangler1]

If you are doing a 'legal' job, you know it. The Constitution will have no rules against it, nor will the Governing body in Congress. "IF" you have to ask the President to write a legal 'memo' (or whatever his name for it was) on it, then it most likely isn't legal....

[brianbwb-2009]

To ClarkeGrissom

Your problem, like the rest of your ilk, is that anyone who does not agree with your agenda is a "terrorist".

Invade their land, kill their citizens, and take the oil, anyone who resists is a "terrorist".

Torture them, commit rape, just be as sadistic as you want, all on the basis of lies, because the victims are all "terrorists".

Just like you called Dr. King a militant, just like your grandparents called all the native Americans "savages", the latest hot button word to justify mass murder is "terrorist".

What is happening in Iraq, has absolutely nothing to do with "protecting" any American's cushy job, unless you are oil company management, and you also "forget" that we are constitutionally obligated to honor an international treaty, signed by Reagan itself, which says,

"...Article 2

1. Each State Party shall take effective legislative, administrative, judicial or other measures to prevent acts of torture in any territory under its jurisdiction.
2. No exceptional circumstances whatsoever, whether a state of war or a threat or war, internal political instability or any other public emergency, may be invoked as a justification of torture.
3. An order from a superior officer or a public authority may not be invoked as a justification of torture...

...Article 4

1. Each State Party shall ensure that all acts of torture are offences under its criminal law. The same shall apply to an attempt to commit torture and to an act by any person which constitutes complicity or participation in torture.
2. Each State Party shall make these offences punishable by appropriate penalties which take into account their grave nature. "

Funny how the "rule of law" means nothing to the war-mongers, when their own personal agenda is opposed by it.

[Joe_NY_15]

"The CIA's secret interrogation program shows the detention of terror suspects was governed by a strictly kept set of rules"

"The report reveals a tightly regulated system that proponents say was designed to keep the program safe and legal"

[misha256]

In fact actual reports (including a frozen prisoner among the dead prisoners) indicate a program with a total lack of the governance you claim. A disturbing and reoccurring trait of the Bush administration as far as just about any activity they conducted as exposed in numerous IG reports including those from Iraq.

[brianbwb-2009]

To misha256

Unless the dead victim was intentionally allowed to freeze to death, and in a sub-tropical country like Cuba, it is highly unlikely that hypothermia was a natural occurrence.

[misha256]

by brianbwb-2009 August 26, 2009 8:43 PM EDT

Try afghanistan chained to the floor naked ===

[brianbwb-2009]

Correct, but had he been chained to the floor in Cuba, the evidence of torture might very well not exist, even though it did occur, that was my point.

[trigs_8]

It's fine to spend $40 million on a Clinton BJ but lets not look into torture or the disregard for American laws. I don't understand how the Republican party can be so short sighted.

[mjlewis6]

It is apparent from this article there was no level of cooperation from a detainee as to when they would NOT receive torture.

So, the threshold level for ceasing torture was.....????
When VP Cheney said to stop it after being advised of no progress? Perhaps those emails and level of discussions were all oral?

Perhaps Lewis Scooter Libby could enlighten the prosecutor on this separate issue as to what he knew and when he knew it regarding Mr. Cheney and the CIA. Perhaps Scooter could deliver information under the same circumstances of stressed interrogation promulgated by his former boss and under an indefinite detention with sensory deprivation.