FBI complained of torture in Guantanamo in 2002

[thebullet]

By PAISLEY DODDS, Associated Press Writer

SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico - FBI (news - web sites) agents
witnessed "highly aggressive" interrogations and
mistreatment of terror suspects at the U.S. prison
camp in Cuba starting in 2002 — more than a year
before the prison abuse scandal broke in Iraq (news -
web sites) — according to a letter a senior Justice
Department (news - web sites) official sent to the
Army's top criminal investigator.

In the letter obtained by The Associated Press, the
FBI official suggested the Pentagon (news - web sites)
didn't act on FBI complaints about the incidents,
including a female interrogator grabbing a detainee's
genitals and bending back his thumbs, another where a
prisoner was gagged with duct tape and a third where a
dog was used to intimidate a detainee who later was
thrown into isolation and showed signs of "extreme psychological trauma."


One Marine told an FBI observer that some
interrogations led to prisoners "curling into a fetal
position on the floor and crying in pain," according
to the letter dated July 14, 2004.


Thomas Harrington, an FBI counterterrorism expert who
led a team of investigators at Guantanamo Bay, wrote
the letter to Maj. Gen. Donald J. Ryder, the Army's
chief law enforcement officer who's investigating
abuses at U.S.-run prisons in Afghanistan (news - web
sites), Iraq and at Guantanamo.


Harrington said FBI officials complained about the
pattern of abusive techniques to top Defense
Department attorneys in January 2003, and it appeared
that nothing was done.


Although a senior FBI attorney "was assured that the
general concerns expressed, and the debate between the
FBI and DoD regarding the treatment of detainees was
known to officials in the Pentagon, I have no record
that our specific concerns regarding these three
situations were communicated to the Department of
Defense (news - web sites) for appropriate action,"
Harrington wrote.


Harrington told Ryder he was writing to follow up a
meeting he had with the general the week before about
detainee treatment, saying the three cases demonstrate
the "highly aggressive interrogation techniques being
used against detainees in Guantanamo."


"I refer them to you for appropriate action,"
Harrington wrote.


Brig. Gen. Jay Hood, the current commander of the
mission in Guantanamo, said allegations of
mistreatment and abuse are taken seriously and
investigated.


"The appropriate actions were taken. Some allegations
are still under investigation," Hood told the AP.
"Once investigations are completed, we report them immediately."


None of the people named in the letter are still at
the base, a Guantanamo spokesman said, but it wasn't
clear if any disciplinary action had been taken. The
letter identified the military interrogators only by
last name and rank, and mentioned a civilian
contractor.


Lt. Col. Gerard Healy, an Army spokesman, confirmed
the authenticity of the FBI letter, as did the FBI.
Healy said the female interrogator — identified only
as Sgt. Lacey in the letter — is being investigated,
but the Army would not comment further or fully
identify her.


The U.S. military says prisoners are treated in
accordance with the Geneva Conventions, which prohibit violence, torture and humiliating treatment of combatants. Still, at least 10 incidents of abuse have been substantiated at Guantanamo, all from 2003 or this year. They range from a guard hitting a detainee to a female interrogator climbing on a prisoner's lap.



Those incidents pale in comparison to alleged abuse at
the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq, a scandal that erupted
when photographs surfaced of U.S. troops forcing Iraqi prisoners to strip and pose in sexually humiliating positions. Some prisoners were bound and hooded.


At Guantanamo, some detainees have been held without
charge and without access to attorneys since the camp
opened in January 2002 at the remote U.S. Naval base
on Cuba's eastern tip. The United States has
imprisoned some 550 men accused of links to
Afghanistan's ousted Taliban regime or the al-Qaida
terror network; only four have been charged.


No detailed incidents of abuse from 2002 have publicly
surfaced until this FBI letter.


None of the three 2002 cases cited were detailed in
any of 5,000 documents received by the New York-based
American Civil Liberties Union (news - web sites)
under two Freedom of Information Act requests, said
Anthony Romero, the union's executive director.





"Despite the government's statements, there seems to
be increasingly little doubt that torture is occurring
at Guantanamo," said Romero.

He said the information in the FBI letter "raises
questions about the government's willingness to be
forthcoming in these legal proceedings and shows that
even the FBI has been uncomfortable with some of the
tactics used at Guantanamo."

One of the documents the ACLU received was a letter
from an FBI agent to Harrington and dated May 10. It underscored the friction between the FBI and the military, mentioning conversations that were "somewhat heated" over interrogation methods.

"In my weekly meetings with the Department of Justice
(news - web sites) we often discussed techniques and
how they were not effective or producing intelligence
that was reliable," according to the exchange, which
was heavily redacted to remove references to dates and
names.

"I finally voiced my opinion ...," the FBI agent says.
"It still did not prevent them from continuing the ... methods."

Three of the four incidents mentioned in the letter
obtained by the AP occurred under the watch of Gen.
Geoffrey D. Miller, who ran the Guantanamo camp from
October 2002 to March 2004, and left to run Abu Ghraib
prison. Last month, Miller was reassigned to the
Pentagon, with responsibility for housing and other
support operations.

According to the letter, in late 2002 an FBI agent
observed an interrogation where Sgt. Lacey whispered
in the ear of a handcuffed and shackled detainee,
caressed him and applied lotion to his arms. This
occurred during Ramadan, Islam's holy month when
contact with females is considered particularly
offensive to a Muslim man.

Later, the detainee appeared to grimace in pain, and
the FBI agent asked a Marine who was present why. "The
Marine said (the interrogator) had grabbed the
detainee's thumbs and bent them backward and indicated
that she also grabbed his genitals. The Marine also
implied that her treatment of that detainee was less
harsh than her treatment of others by indicating that
he had seen her treatment of other detainees result in detainees curling into a fetal position on the floor and crying in pain," Harrington wrote.

In September or October of 2002, FBI agents saw a dog
used "in an aggressive manner to intimidate a
detainee," the letter said.

About a month later, agents saw the same detainee
"after he had been subjected to intense isolation for
over three months ... totally isolated in a cell that
was always flooded with light. By late November, the
detainee was evidencing behavior consistent with
extreme psychological trauma ... talking to
nonexistent people, reported hearing voices (and)
crouching in a corner of the cell covered with a
sheet," the letter said.

In October 2002, another FBI agent saw a detainee
"gagged with duct tape that covered much of his head"
because he would not stop chanting from the Quran.

 

[cantdog]

Now, now. Joe says it's all very scientific. And he says the simple infliction of pain is not really what it is like. It's about trust, he says. You're picturing the wrong thing.

Civilian contractor.

 

[thebullet]

Now, now. Joe says it's all very scientific. And he says the simple infliction of pain is not really what it is like. It's about trust, he says. You're picturing the wrong thing.

Of course you are correct, Cantdog. What the hell was I thinking of? I'm sure that sticking a broomstick up someone's ass is the quintessential way to gain their trust.

 

[cantdog]

You'd know what you could trust them to do, at least.

Remember Patty hearst? The Stockholm syndrome? People are very odd creatures, but they are primates, with a primate social system. When other more refined and artificial, rational systems of authority are gone, house apes fall back on the Original System: personal authority. You would imagine that you need one guy to rape with broomsticks and some other to be the trusted one, but it is not so simple.

Authority goes to the strongest. People worship a despot because a despot can kill. Kill, and worse. We all have the instinct for it in us.




The thing is, to me, torture is very much like nuclear weapons. Both work, both inspire others to retaliate. Neither should be used, ever; yet both have been.

People who do the torture have things in common with each other. Have a look at the wide, wide, triumphant grin of the American servicemen in the Abu Ghraib photos. That is what impunity looks like in the face of a person who has it. Impunity, absolute license to do What Ever You Want.

I saw it on the faces of bullies as a child, and the faces at Abu Ghraib are even more so. Look at it and empathize once. What a fine smooth glistening freedom!

It is sheerest poison to practice this. How many civilian contractors and helpful aides like these people have we made of what were once angelic babies at their mother's breast?

 

[Virtual_Burlesque]

Documents point to more prisoner abuse
Letter details conduct, threats against agents in Iraq who saw it.

SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER NEWS SERVICES
Wednesday, December 8, 2004

WASHINGTON -- Members of a U.S. special operations task force punched and abused prisoners in Iraq in front of Defense Intelligence Agency agents and then threatened the agents to try to keep them quiet, according to government documents made public yesterday.

A letter from the head of the agency to a senior Pentagon intelligence official, which detailed previously unknown incidents of abuse by U.S. forces on prisoners in Iraq, said the agents also saw detainees with burn marks and bruises.

The agents reported the abuses several weeks after photographs of U.S. soldiers abusing prisoners at Abu Ghraib jail near Baghdad created a worldwide uproar and undercut U.S. credibility as it sought to stabilize Iraq amid a bloody insurgency after last year's invasion.

The new revelations of abuses elsewhere were included in a June 25 letter from Navy Vice Adm. Lowell Jacoby, director of the DIA, to Stephen Cambone, undersecretary of defense for intelligence.

The letter was one of numerous U.S. government documents released by the American Civil Liberties Union, which obtained them under the Freedom of Information Act.

Other memorandums disclosed this week showed that the interrogation and detention system at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, drew strong objections from the Federal Bureau of Investigation, which argued that the coercive techniques used there were unnecessary and produced unreliable information.

The Associated Press reported Monday that one FBI official had written of witnessing coercive procedures at Guantanamo, including a female interrogator squeezing the genitals of a detainee and bending back his thumbs painfully.

Jacoby wrote that two unidentified DIA agents, who worked as interrogators and debriefers at a detention facility in Baghdad, saw task force officers "punch a prisoner in the face to the point the individual needed medical attention."

One of the DIA agents took pictures of the injuries and showed them to his supervisor in the task force, "who immediately confiscated them," Jacoby wrote.



Complete Article

 

[Joe Wordsworth]

Originally posted by cantdog
Now, now. Joe says it's all very scientific. And he says the simple infliction of pain is not really what it is like. It's about trust, he says. You're picturing the wrong thing.

Civilian contractor.

Joe said that torture was more complicated than simply injuring someone--which was all anyone seems to be willing to mention when we were talking about torture. Its not about the injury, its about what that injury affects, sometimes its not about hurting them at all, including things like psychological torture (which this article does mention). If we're going to belittle my ability to make a point, or the point itself, we could at least do me the favor of being accurate about it.

 

[Joe Wordsworth]

Originally posted by thebullet
Of course you are correct, Cantdog. What the hell was I thinking of? I'm sure that sticking a broomstick up someone's ass is the quintessential way to gain their trust.

When constantly pairing an instance of suffering with a sense of resistance, then training in instances of positive human interacting with cooperation... yes, you can gain someone's trust by making evident an alternative of pain.

Extremely... basic... behavioral... psychology. If you don't know it, please don't insult it.

I'm not being dismissive of anyone, I'd really appreciate it if that was extended.

 

[thebullet]

Joe W. said:
When constantly pairing an instance of suffering with a sense of resistance, then training in instances of positive human interacting with cooperation... yes, you can gain someone's trust by making evident an alternative of pain.

What we have here is a 'debate' where the two sides of the argument are basically not debating the same issue. Joe is really more interested in a philosophical discussion of the means and uses of torture. He acknowledges that torture is 'wrong', but sees no problem with talking about it in an intellectual way.

The other side of this 'debate' are simply horrified that the United States government and armed forces are now routinely torturing prisoners both in terrorist prisons around the world and in county jails inside our own borders. It is difficult to keep the kind of 'open' mind that Joe apparantly is able to keep in the face of such incredible evil.

Is this a great country, or what?

 

[cantdog]

It's not particularly incredible, this evil, bullet. Torture is often done in the context of interrogation, but it is also done simply for spite, vindictively, to punish. Thousands and thousands of people every year, all over the world, wake up to a day or a night of torture. After a while, you lose the sense of shock and you can't find it incredible.

Joe, if you'll read my posts, I think you'll find somewhat less hostility than you seem to be picturing. But if you like your contempt of us than you are welcome to stew in it. I suggest letting it go, since carrying a grudge is self-destructive. Basic fuckin psychology.

This process, of prying the documents loose with cadres of lawyers, publicizing the acts themselves, printing the names, writing to the commanders of these places and the people in government who are putatively in charge-- this is the way in which we have to fight torture.

The people doing it may be practicing basic fuckin behavior modificafuckingcation, which we don't understand. But they are ashamed of themselves just the fuckin same. They always layer it in secrecy, and they deny it, and they cover it, and distance themselves from the responsibility.

Odd attitude to take about the simple practice of science? Hmm.

Still, the light of day is the best way to fight this. Oh, they'll find another dark hole, or found one, somewhere, and spirit people away to be tortured in it, but you can let none of it go once you glimpse it. You have to spend the time, the words, the money, and doggedly open the locks and shine the sun in on them.

Exposure of the torturer will do it. Usually too late for hundreds of people. It is not futile, but it is a very discouraging business.

Joe is not on another side of this debate. Rumsfeld is. Our new attorney general is. I'm not interested in the explanations, particularly. They hide, they lie, and they cover when they do it. They excuse it because of their nationalism. I don't.

 

[cjh]

When constantly pairing an instance of suffering with a sense of resistance, then training in instances of positive human interacting with cooperation... yes, you can gain someone's trust by making evident an alternative of pain.

Extremely... basic... behavioral... psychology. If you don't know it, please don't insult it.

I'm not being dismissive of anyone, I'd really appreciate it if that was extended.

The FBI not only questioned the effectiveness of the torture witnessed, but questioned the reliability of the resulting information.

The Los Angeles Times also obtained copies of emails Mr Harrington sent to other FBI officials suggesting that agents told military authorities at Guantanamo Bay there were proven nonviolent methods for extracting information from prisoners.

In one message, Mr Harrington said the military was using "interrogation strategies we not only advised against, but questioned in terms of effectiveness" and that the military often was "producing information that was not reliable".

Mr Harrington added that he visited the prison as a senior counterterrorism official.

"I voiced concerns that the intelligence produced was nothing more than what FBI got using simple investigative techniques [that did not involve violence]," he wrote.

http://smh.com.au/news/World/FBIs-c...d/2004/12/07/1102182296434.html?oneclick=true

*edit - this link does not require registration
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6663351/

 

[cantdog]

Efficacy is not the point. It doesn't signify. I don't care if it produces emanations which extend everyone's life three years. I don't care if it works for any purpose whatsoever. It militates to totalitarianism. It does not belong in a free society. It affects us all negatively, all who tolerate it, all who practice it, all who endure it. It's not a lot of fun to fight it, either.

Bringing the perpetrators and their superiors to justice is the point. They obviously didn't intend to follow the law, but they allowed the law to be passed. It's illegal. It remains to be enforced.

cantdog

 

[cjh]

<snip>It militates to totalitarianism. It does not belong in a free society. It affects us all negatively, all who tolerate it, all who practice it, all who endure it. It's not a lot of fun to fight it, either.
cantdog

funny you should mention that. that is just what the solicitor general's office suggested to the united states supreme court when asked about torture at gitmo during the padilla hearing:

here's a link regarding the administration's assurance to the u.s. supreme court that it would never condone the use of torture:

During the oral argument in the Guantanamo detainees cases, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg posed a hypothetical to the lawyer arguing the Bush administration’s case, Deputy Solicitor General Paul Clement.

"Suppose the executive says, `Mild torture, we think, will help get this information,’” Ginsburg said to Clement. “Some systems do that to get information.”

“Well, our executive doesn't,” Clement replied. “And I think the fact that executive discretion in a war situation can be abused is not a good and sufficient reason for judicial micromanagement in overseeing of that authority. You have to recognize that in situations where there is a war, where the government is on a war footing, that you have to trust the executive.”

http://www.cageprisoners.com/articles.php?aid=2250

of course, now the administration contends that such evidence, extracted illegally under the geneva convention and in a manner completely at odds with due process, can be used to justify continued detention of some detainees.

 

[Joe Wordsworth]

Originally posted by cantdog
Joe, if you'll read my posts, I think you'll find somewhat less hostility than you seem to be picturing. But if you like your contempt of us than you are welcome to stew in it. I suggest letting it go, since carrying a grudge is self-destructive. Basic fuckin psychology.

It's not contempt. It was "having a bad day, checking lit, and OH more trivialization". It it came across to gruff, I am sorry. It wasn't really meant to be.

incidentally, basic psychology would say that its possible that carrying a grudge is self-destructive, but as it could also be constiructive... inconclusive without more factors.

 

[cantdog]

My bad, then, in my experience revenge is a dish best never served at all. Others disagree, of course, and ram stolen airplanes into things. I think they're mistaken.

 

[Joe Wordsworth]

Originally posted by cantdog
My bad, then, in my experience revenge is a dish best never served at all. Others disagree, of course, and ram stolen airplanes into things. I think they're mistaken.

That's a hard one. I disagree, and I've never rammed a plane into a building. I'd not have achieved any of the great things I have were it not for the nurturing of revenge.

That's just me, though.

 

[cantdog]

Any idee fixe will sustain a person in a lifeboat situation, but I don't see it as an exception. People with destroyed legs have rescued themselves from the deep woods because they had some goal, something they "had" to do. As a motivator, a revenge idea is as good as any, but because of that, you can't recommend it over some other kind of idea. The important thing seems to be to acquire, in such a place, a determined goal of any kind, since becoming discouraged often results in death.

In situations or more normal risk, I believe I'd advise a person to choose some motivator less hostile.

 

[Joe Wordsworth]

Originally posted by cantdog
Any idee fixe will sustain a person in a lifeboat situation, but I don't see it as an exception. People with destroyed legs have rescued themselves from the deep woods because they had some goal, something they "had" to do. As a motivator, a revenge idea is as good as any, but because of that, you can't recommend it over some other kind of idea. The important thing seems to be to acquire, in such a place, a determined goal of any kind, since becoming discouraged often results in death.

In situations or more normal risk, I believe I'd advise a person to choose some motivator less hostile.

Oh, I don't believe it preferential to less hostile motivations... just that it, naked in analysis and without predication (like "verses some other strong motivation"), its entirely useless or inadvisable prima facia.

 

[rgraham666]

Revenge is a double edged sword. It cuts not only its victim, but also its perpetrator.

 

[cjh]

Revenge is a double edged sword. It cuts not only its victim, but also its perpetrator.

i keep culling quotes, but they state the points made so gracefully.

It has become a cliché of the Global War on Terror—the GWOT, as these reports style it—that at a certain point, if the United States betrays its fundamental principles in the cause of fighting terror, then "the terrorists will have won." The image of the Hooded Man, now known the world over, raises a stark question: Is it possible that that moment of defeat could come and go, and we will never know it?

http://www.president-bush.com/torture-regime.html

 

[Joe Wordsworth]

I'm not entirely sure the quote is all that accurate. What of revenge that doesn't injure the revenger at all, or in any significant way (by injury, I'm not just talking physicall, obviously)? For instance, if we're to be analogous:

What if it slices the other person in two and leaves a papercut on the other "edge"?

 

[cjh]

i think the answer to that question hinges on whether you believe that revenge, rather than prevention or rehabilitation, is a proper motive. i, personally, do not believe that it is. i think that revenge is barbaric, and that we reduce ourselves to a lower denominator by doing so. in doing so, we "cut" ourselves.

i suppose, to a large degree, it depends upon whether your philosophy regarding punishment (regardless of your religious beliefs) is more closely aligned with the new or the old testament.

needless to say, i personally disagree with the lex talonis, that is, the principle of an eye for an eye.

 

[Joe Wordsworth]

Originally posted by CrackerjackHrt
i think the answer to that question hinges on whether you believe that revenge, rather than prevention or rehabilitation, is a proper motive. i, personally, do not believe that it is. i think that revenge is barbaric, and that we reduce ourselves to a lower denominator by doing so. in doing so, we "cut" ourselves.

i suppose, to a large degree, it depends upon whether your philosophy regarding punishment (regardless of your religious beliefs) is more closely aligned with the new or the old testament.

needless to say, i personally disagree with the lex talonis, that is, the principle of an eye for an eye.

But that raises the question "how is it a necessary lowering?"

Personally, I'm unsure on the merit of revenge--in general. I cannot deny that its effective, for one. Nor can I show that its absolutely corrupting.

 

[rgraham666]

But revenge never stops.

Person B is insulted by person A and kills A for it.

Person C, related to A, kills B for that.

Person D, related to B, kills C for that.

And on and on.

In the words of Delenn, "So wouldn't your way leave the universe eyeless and toothless."

Torture requires an extreme level of emotion and belief to carry out. Extreme levels of emotion and belief are not good for the soul.

 

[Joe Wordsworth]

Originally posted by rgraham666
But revenge never stops.

Person B is insulted by person A and kills A for it.

Person C, related to A, kills B for that.

Person D, related to B, kills C for that.

And on and on.

In the words of Delenn, "So wouldn't your way leave the universe eyeless and toothless."

Torture requires an extreme level of emotion and belief to carry out. Extreme levels of emotion and belief are not good for the soul.

What is there is no Person C--or there are Persons C, but they don't know about Person A, or don't care?

Past that, I'm not sure Torture can only be done by extreme emotion at all. A fair number of torturous acts are done by sociopaths who, generally, don't have much in the way of emotion.

 

[rgraham666]

My understanding is that sociopaths have no conscience. Emotion they have plenty of.

And very few people are so unconnected to the world that a chain of revenge would stop at B.