More Documents Show White House Responsible for Torture

[I]n the name of correcting the record, and thanks, ironically, to the CIA’s own effort to defend itself, I want to place blame where it rightly belongs – with the CIA, to be sure, but also with specific high-level officials and lawyers outside the agency who were directly involved in reviewing the CIA’s tactics, and either said yes or failed to say no.

[...]

Had it not been for the SSCI investigation, it is likely that these documents would remain classified to this day.  [...] The CIA’s interest in declassification is clear. It wants to show that it repeatedly sought – and received – legal assurances from higher-ups that its actions were legal and authorized.

[...]

They recount in detail multiple meetings and communications, in which White House and DOJ officials repeatedly gave the CIA a green light to torture.

[...]

The declassified documents also reveal that Condoleezza Rice, National Security Adviser, and John Bellinger, her lawyer, both of whom many years later sought to restrict use of the CIA’s techniques, were personally and intimately involved in the initial approval of the tactics.

[...]

[I]n a meeting with Rice, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, Secretary of State Colin Powell, Vice-President Dick Cheney, and Haynes [...] “Everyone in the room evinced understanding of the issue. CIA’s past and ongoing use of enhanced techniques was reaffirmed.

[...]

Another declassified document shows that CIA Director George Tenet sent a memo to Rice requesting express reaffirmation of the CIA’s program. Later that month, Tenet met with, among others Attorney General Ashcroft, DOJ lawyer Patrick Philbin, Rice, Gonzales, Bellinger, and Cheney to review the program. Ashcroft, backed by a full explication by Philbin, “forcefully reiterated the view of the Department of Justice that the techniques being employed by the CIA were and remain lawful and do not violate the Convention Against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman and Degrading Treatment.” [...] Cheney, Rice, and Ashcroft all confirmed that the CIA was “executing Administration policy.”

[...]

[A]t a meeting in July 2004 with Rice, Ashcroft, Gonzales, Bellinger, and Deputy Attorney General James Comey, Rice said that the CIA’s techniques were in her view humane, and Ashcroft reaffirmed their legality (apart from waterboarding, which the DOJ was then reevaluating).

[...]

In short, the declassified documents reveal that the CIA was very nervous about the legal authority for its interrogation program – even after DOJ and White House officials had repeatedly given the program their blessings. [...] Above all, it seems, the agency wanted to make sure it had legal cover.

  David Cole

Which seems strange to me. Of all the things the CIA does and has done, it kind of surprises me that they cared whether they had legal cover. Perhaps they were thinking of their ability to travel internationally if the Hague got involved.

Beyond that, then CIA director George Tenet asked the White House to stop saying publicly that the US government was treating detainees humanely. Again, I don’t know why they cared whether the White House was lying to the public.

In a July 29, 2003, White House meeting that included Vice President Dick Cheney and National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice, CIA Director George Tenet went so far as to ask the White House “to cease stating that US Government practices were ‘humane.’” He was assured they would.

[...]

Apparently the CIA, like many others, couldn’t believe the White House was flat-out lying.

Tenet, in a July 3, 2003, letter to Rice, requested that White House officials reaffirm that waterboarding and other so-called “enhanced interrogation techniques” were being done on their orders.

[...]

Tenet cited, as an example, a June 2003 Washington Post story headlined, “U.S. Pledges Not to Torture Terror Suspects.”

According to the CIA memo that documented the July 29 meeting, Cheney “asked how the press could have gotten such an impression.”

CIA general counsel Scott Muller responded to Cheney by mentioning the February 2002 memo issued under George W. Bush’s name, titled “Humane Treatment of al Qaeda and Taliban Detainees,” which directed, “As a matter of policy, the United States Armed Forces shall continue to treat detainees humanely, and, to the extent appropriate and consistent with military necessity, in a manner consistent with the principles of Geneva.”

  The Intercept

How, indeed.

Muller also reminded Cheney of the time in June 2003 when deputy White House press secretary Scott McClellan, on the occasion of Bush’s obligatory proclamation on United Nations International Day in Support of Victims of Torture, had told reporters that “detainees are treated humanely and consistent with our values and consistent with our laws and consistent with our treaty obligations.”

So, really, they just needed to drop the “humanely” part.

The DCI [Director of Central Intelligence] stated that it was important for the White House to cease stating that US Government practices were ‘humane’ as that term is easily susceptible to misinterpretation. Bellinger undertook to insure that the White House press office ceases to make statements on the subject other than that the US is complying with its obligations under US law.”

Which is exactly what they did. Never mind that some laws had to be written after the fact to cover what was being done.

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.