USA - The Torture Memos

Obama Releases Bush-Era Memos Authorizing Torture Techniques, Rules Out Prosecuting CIA Interrogators who Carried Them Out
-

The Obama administration has released four memos from the Bush-era Justice Department that approved and provided the legal basis for the CIAs use of torture. While President Obama has said he will not pursue prosecutions of CIA employees, he did not explicitly address the question of prosecuting the former Justice Department lawyers who authored the memos. The memos release comes as a Spanish court is considering bringing indictments against six Bush-era lawyers. We get analysis from human rights attorney Scott Horton.

Scott Horton, New York attorney specializing in international law and human rights. He is also a legal affairs contributor to Harpers Magazine and a writer at The Daily Beast.




Right now were talking to Scott Horton, the human rights attorney and blogger. Were talking about the latest news on President Obama releasing four lightly redacted memos from the Bush-era Justice Department, but saying that CIA officials need not fear prosecution. I wanted to go for a minute to what former CIA director Michael Hayden had to say on MSNBC Thursday. This is before the release of the memos. MICHAEL HAYDEN:
On balance, the agencys view, certainly my view, is that on balance, the release of the memos harms American security, and therefore I think the best course of action would have been to have kept them classified.

The President, when he issued his executive order tying all American agencies to the Army Field Manual, also launched a six-month study to determine whether or not the Army Field Manual and the techniques, the nineteen techniques contained therein, are sufficient in all cases facing the republic.

The degree to which we make these techniques public, that we tell our enemies the outer limits of American interrogation techniques, it moots the study that the President directed, because it will effectively take these techniques off the table, because our enemy will know all of our approaches to him. So there are a variety of reasons that I think it would have been best to keep the techniques secret. Thats just one of them.
----------

I think if we have a little bit more candid Michael Hayden, wed hear him saying something else. In fact, it was reported in Bart Gellmans book Angler that around the time of the 2004 elections, he had a very, very strong focus on and fear of prosecution, if the things he was involved with should become public, a matter of public knowledge. And I think thats whats in the back of his mind here. I dont think its national security at all.

In fact, these techniques are very well known. The Red Cross report, which was published—you had Mark Danner on your show talking about it—described all these techniques in terrific detail. I mean, so it was in a sense no surprise when we saw these memos. They were describing the techniques we knew and we anticipated based on the Red Crosss own report—so no surprise, no news—and concerns by General Hayden for his own hide.

Category:

News & Politics

Tags:

• USA
• America
• American
• Bush
• Cheney
• Rumsfeld
• Neocon
• Republican
• Obama
• Democratic
• Democracy
• CIA
• Torture
• Memos
• Suffering
• Pain
• Hurt
• Waterboarding
• Insects
• Sleep
• Guantanamo
• Perception
• Management
• Army
• Field
• Manual
• Media
• Manipulation
• Hayden
• Spain
• Prisoner
• Abuse
• Government
• Violation
• Human
• Rights
• Red
• Cross
• Report
• War
• Terror
• Lies
• Ignorance
• Crisis
• Geneva
• Conventions
• Nazi
• Executive
• Order
• Jesus
• Chomsky