Wednesday, April 22, 2009

The Armed Service Committee has posted their INQUIRY INTO THE TREATMENT OF DETAINEES IN U.S. CUSTODY

What I found most interesting was the degree of resistance within the military itself, particularly by military lawyers, to the enhanced interrogation techniques aka torture.

The abuse of detainees in U.S. custody cannot simply be attributed to the actions of "a few bad apples" acting on their own. The fact is that senior officials in the United States government solicited information on how to use aggressive techniques, redefined the law to create the appearance oftheir legality, and authorized their use against detainees. Those efforts damaged our ability to collect accurate intelligence that could save lives, strengthened the hand of our enemies, and compromised our moral authority.
US Government reports tend to be somewhat dry and dull. Nonetheless they are often good for a chuckle or two.

During his interview with Committee staff, Lt Col Kleinman described the interrogation of an Iraqi man who had been detained by U.S. forces because interrogators believed he had useful intelligence because he knew about "bridges." Lt Col Kleinman said that it later became clear that the man was a dental technician. (p. 173)

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