An Inside View On The Purpose And Implications Of The Torture Report

from the it's-about-facts dept

While some will, no doubt, be embarrassed by the Senate Intelligence Committee’s report on the CIA’s Detention and Interrogation program, as one of the staffers who helped make the case for the Committee’s investigation when it was initiated in 2009, I can tell you that was not its intention.

(For the record, all I did was help make the initial case for the investigation and maybe put out a press release or two. I am in no way taking credit for the tremendous work that Chairman Feinstein and her committee’s staff did on this report. By the way, I know those staffers did not trek out to the CIA site in Virginia — often in their free time — in search of our thanks and recognition, but I hope you will join me in giving it to them anyway. Because reports like this do not materialize from thin air.)

The dedicated SSCI staff — who spent tens of thousands of hours over the better part of five years researching, writing and editing this report — did so in order to ensure our nation’s interrogation programs would be grounded in what has, for too long, been missing from our nation’s interrogation debate: facts.

The interrogation techniques the CIA developed during the Bush Administration were not devised by behavioral experts with experience turning detainees into "long-term strategic sources of information." Rather, as the Department of Justice’s 2008 Inspector General’s report revealed, the FBI’s interrogation experts — with that experience — repeatedly refused to sign off on proposed interrogation plans, calling them "deeply flawed" and "completely ineffective."

The CIA’s interrogation program, instead, grew from the post-9/11 mentality that the U.S. would be best kept safe by those willing to go to the greatest extremes to protect it, or as former CIA agent Glenn Carle put it in his 2011 book The Interrogator, "Interrogating terrorists was no place for goddamn candy-asses."

FBI officials have described the interrogation-strategy sessions they observed as "circus-like."  I’ve personally been told by individuals who participated in high-level discussions of U.S. interrogation policy that — as disturbing as it sounds — these conversations were more often than not informed by the participants’ recollection of episodes of the TV show 24 than by an understanding of the psychology of interrogation. Meanwhile, defenders of the CIA’s Bush-era interrogation activities continue to cite the murder of nearly 3,000 Americans on September 11, 2001 as justification for their actions.

As Senator Feinstein writes in her introduction to the report:

The major lesson of this report is that regardless of the pressures and the need to act, the Intelligence Community's actions must always reflect who we are as a nation, and adhere to our laws and standards. It is precisely at these times of national crisis that our government must be guided by the lessons of our history and subject decisions to internal and external review.

The SSCI’s report was written to provide those lessons.

While some have and will likely continue to argue that President Obama settled the issue when he, as the president said in his statement today, "unequivocally banned torture when [he] took office," one might have argued that George Washington actually settled the issue 234 years earlier when he ordered that any American soldier who brought "shame, disgrace and ruin to themselves and their country" by causing injury to a British prisoner could be put to death.  Our "new country in the New World," Washington declared, "would distinguish itself by its humanity." And yet, two centuries after Washington gave that order, agents of the U.S. government subjected "at least five CIA detainees…to 'rectal rehydration' … without documented medical necessity."

President Obama’s executive order only settles the issue insofar as he remains president. As long as the belief persists that torture is an effective means of interrogation and anyone who doesn’t support ‘enhanced interrogation’ is a "candy ass" who lacks the necessary stomach to keep Americans safe, there is no assurance that a future president won’t take a different position than our current president.

Some have and will undoubtedly continue to argue that we shouldn’t discuss the efficacy of torture as an interrogation technique — even if it’s to prove that torture doesn’t work — because it suggests that if torture worked, it would be ok to torture people. I believe these people have a point.

The United States is more than a mass of land defined by geographic boundaries, it is a nation of people united by certain, principled beliefs, many of which our forefathers laid out at our nation’s founding. It is not enough to simply protect the people of the United States, one must also protect the principles that define the United States as a people; otherwise, there is no United States to protect. When the CIA and the Bush Administration sanctioned the torture of captured terrorists — regardless of their reasons — they made the United States something George Washington said we’d never be: a nation that tortures. One might argue that made us a little less American.

Some have and may continue to argue that making the CIA’s actions known puts Americans — particularly those serving overseas — in jeopardy. It’s worth noting that these arguments were made by people who know Senator Feinstein in an effort to persuade her not to make the committee report public. I say this is worth noting, because you do not need to know Senator Feinstein very well to know that there is nothing she wants less than to jeopardize the lives of American citizens, particularly those serving in harm’s way, and if there is an argument that would have given her second thoughts about releasing this report, that most likely would have been it.

If Americans are at risk, however, they are not at risk because the Senate Intelligence Committee is publicly acknowledging that the CIA tortured people during the Bush Administration. They’re at risk because the CIA tortured people during the Bush Administration.

The CIA put Americans at risk when they undermined the international agreements that protect Americans detained by foreign powers and sacrificed the moral authority we’ve long used to advocate for the humane treatment of detainees. They put Americans at risk when they made it harder — if not impossible — to prosecute known terrorists and keep them locked up. I'd also argue that defending the CIA’s actions, while refusing to come clean about what was done during the Bush Administration, not only fueled Al Qaeda’s hatred of Americans and put them at risk, it undermines the Obama Administration’s argument that the CIA no longer engages in torture.

Some have and may continue to argue that putting out this report will undermine morale at the CIA and derail its necessary work. Again, I'd argue that any hit to the CIA’s morale began when its agents were ordered to torture detainees without clear parameters and a solid legal foundation.

Some have and will no doubt continue to argue that an act taken to "prevent a threatened terrorist attack" is not as bad as an act taken "for the purpose of humiliation or abuse." I’d argue that torture is defined not by the torturer but by the person being tortured and that the laws governing torture were put in place because most people who engage in torture think they have a good reason.

There are some who have and will no doubt continue to argue — as they do about all things pertaining to national security — that this report shouldn’t have been made public. To respond to that I will quote directly from page 8 of the unclassified report:

The CIA's Office of Public Affairs and senior CIA officials coordinated to share classified information on the CIA's Detention and Interrogation Program to select members of the media to counter public criticism, shape public opinion, and avoid potential congressional action to restrict the CIA's detention and interrogation authorities and budget.

If the SSCI’s report demonstrates one thing, it’s that the CIA’s unfettered ability to keep information about it’s activities secret gives it virtually limitless ability to control everyone’s understanding of its activities: from the White House and Congress to Hollywood and the American people. I have no doubt they’d argue those actions were necessary to protect national security, because in their mind — it seems — national security is harmed by anything that could potentially limit their authority to do exactly what they want. Someone should really tell them that's not how we do things in the United States.

And finally there will be some who have and will continue to argue that the CIA’s actions were necessary to protect national security. Those people, I’m guessing, need to make those arguments to help them sleep at night. To them, I’d argue the path to redemption lies not in the perpetuation of that belief, but in its eradication.

Again, please thank the Senate Intelligence Committee.

---

Jen Hoelzer is the former Communications Director and Deputy Chief of Staff for Senator Ron Wyden.

Filed Under: cia, dianne feinstein, senate intelligence committee, torture, torture report

CIA Program Tortured Dozens To Produce Nearly Nothing In The Way Of Useful Intelligence

from the did-we-win-the-War-on-Terror-yet? dept

Perhaps the most disheartening aspect of the Torture Report [pdf link] is the fact that the CIA clearly knew the methods weren't producing usable intelligence but continued to use them anyway, all the while hiding the extent of its abuses from the rest of the goverment.

The Executive Summary is 525 pages of abusive activity, carried out under the pretense that no other approach would keep the US safe from further terrorist attacks. Dianne Feinstein's preamble addresses the incredible amount of work that went into the full report (which weighs in at over 7,000 pages). While it does point out that the CIA destroyed evidence and forced Senate staffers to work in a CIA-controlled environment while performing research, it curiously omits any mention of the CIA's spying on Senate staffers -- something that seemed to be a big deal a few months ago.

The introduction to the full report runs more than 20 pages, but even this limited sampling expands greatly on Feinstein's 6-page statement released in conjunction with the report. Contained within are more details of the futility of the CIA's torture program and the efforts it made to cover up both its extraterritorial rendition sites as well as the lack of usable intelligence it produced.

The thing is, the CIA's own records (what remains of them) point out the limited return on investment.

[A]ccording to CIA records, seven of the 39 CIA detainees known to have been subjected to the CIA's enhanced interrogation techniques produced no intelligence while in CIA custody. CIA detainees who were subjected to the CIA's enhanced interrogation techniques were usually subjected to the techniques immediately after being rendered to CIA custody. Other detainees provided significant accurate intelligence prior to, or without having been subjected to these techniques.

Torture produced useful intel less frequently than other methods. Information was volunteered even without the use of torture. But some who might have volunteered useful information were never given the chance, as the CIA showed a predilection for torturing first and asking questions later. And those who were tortured did what they could to end the torment.

While being subjected to the CIA's enhanced interrogation techniques and afterwards, multiple CIA detainees fabricated information, resulting in faulty intelligence. Detainees provided fabricated information on critical intelligence issues, including the terrorist threats which the CIA identified as its highest priorities.

A lack of useful intel wasn't enough to derail the CIA's torture plans. Agents ignored warnings from medical staff and continued to "break down" detainees. Medical personnel were asked to do whatever was needed to return detainees to torture-ready condition.

Detainees were subjected to waterboarding, ice water "baths," 180-hour stints of sleep deprivation, extended physical/mental abuse and being chained naked to cell floors. The CIA also made it personal, threatening detainees with a list of horrors their family members would be subjected to if they didn't cooperate.

CIA officers also threatened at least three detainees with harm to their families — to include threats to harm the children of a detainee, threats to sexually abuse the mother of a detainee, and a threat to "cut [a detainee's] mother's throat."

Some of this behavior was exacerbated by the CIA's active disinterest in ensuring it didn't create a playground for problematic agents in its employ.

Numerous CIA officers had serious documented personal and professional problems—including histories of violence and records of abusive treatment of others—that should have called into question their suitability to participate in the CIA's Detention and Interrogation Program, their employment with the CIA, and their continued access to classified information. In nearly all cases, these problems were known to the CIA prior to the assignment of these officers to detention and interrogation positions.

The agency callously turned over detainees to these agents and continued with its unproductive "intelligence gathering." The program veered from merely useless to borderline psychopathy on several occasions. Detainees who should never have been detained were subjected to torture, including one who was held simply to coerce information out of undetained relatives.

Of the 119 known detainees, at least 26 were wrongfully held and did not meet the detention standard in the September 2001 Memorandum of Notification (MON). These included an intellectually challenged" man whose CIA detention was used solely as leverage to get a family member to provide information…

In addition, the CIA apparently tortured its own, thanks to its torture-first policy.

...two individuals who were intelligence sources for foreign liaison services and were former CIA sources...

And bad intel obtained via torture led to even more torture of individuals who never should have been detained.

...and two individuals whom the CIA assessed to be connected to al-Qa'ida based solely on information fabricated by a CIA detainee subjected to the CIA's enhanced interrogation techniques.

The program was such a fiasco that it actually harmed US counterterrorism efforts.

The CIA, in the conduct of its Detention and Interrogation Program, complicated, and in some cases impeded, the national security missions of other Executive Branch agencies, including the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), the State Department, and the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI). The CIA withheld or restricted information relevant to these agencies' missions and responsibilities, denied access to detainees, and provided inaccurate information on the CIA's Detention and Interrogation Program to these agencies.

But the agency still believed -- or at least wanted to believe -- it was fighting the good fight. The Office of Legal Counsel intervened on its behalf, redefining "torture" as acceptable "under the current circumstances."

Having reviewed information provided by the CIA, the OLC included the "necessity defense" in its August 1, 2002, memorandum to the White House counsel on Standards of Conduct for Interrogation. The OLC determined that "under the current circumstances, necessity or self-defense may justify interrogation methods that might violate" the criminal prohibition against torture.

Two consecutive CIA directors further insulated the program by pursuing actions to lock out the Office of the Inspector General. In 2005, CIA Director Goss requested that no further reviews be initiated until the faulty 2004 review was complete. In 2007, Director Michael Hayden vindictively ordered a review of the OIG itself, deterring it from pursuing further investigations of the CIA's interrogation programs. The "faulty" 2004 review was the direct result of the CIA feeding bad info to the OIG in order to cover up its rendition and interrogation programs.

Not only was the OIG eventually locked out, but the CIA's activities were so "dirty" and its gathered intel so questionable that the FBI and Dept. of Defense distanced themselves from the program, refusing to participate in any way. Anything usable was ignored along with anything useful the CIA obtained from its detainees. To further complicate things, the CIA denied requests for access from FBI director Mueller and compartmentalized its intelligence, walling itself off from other intelligence and investigative agencies.

Further details contained in the report point to the fact that the CIA program was never properly documented nor was it ever under any proper oversight.

This program, which was hidden by its participants, lied about to multiple layers of supposed oversight (including the President), and produced little to no usable intelligence, is the same program that is now being defended by former officials as something that "saved" American lives. If it has, there's no evidence of it in here. What it looks like is a post-terrorist-attack reaction being allowed to indulge in its own excesses, using justifications like "under the current circumstances" and "ticking time bombs" to excuse the abysmal depths of its ultimately futile depravity.

Filed Under: cia, dianne feinstein, senate intelligence committee, torture, torture report

Feinstein's Summary Paper On CIA's 'Interrogation Program' Report Contains Plenty Of Torture

from the using-bullshit-ends-to-justify-the-means dept

The Senate Torture Report has officially been released. Accompanying it is a 6-page statement containing "highlights" from the 525-page "Executive Summary" of the (obviously much larger) full report. (We'll have more once we've dug through the larger report.)

The statement [pdf link], put together by Sen. Feinstein's office, opens with this quote from the Senate Intelligence Committee head:

This document examines the CIA’s secret overseas detention of at least 119 individuals and the use of coercive interrogation techniques—in some cases amounting to torture.

The delineation between "torture" and "coercive interrogation techniques" will be left up to many, many dissemblers. Those who defend the CIA's actions will opt for the former, presumably in long opinion pieces hosted at CIASavedLives.com, a website created solely for countering the negative press that will follow the release of the Torture Report. The site is still mostly dead at this point, occasionally humming to half-life with a bit of pre-emptive flag waving. (LITERALLY)


But the actions contained in this short summary certainly meet any reasonable definition of the word "torture."

In November 2002 a detainee who had been held partially nude and chained to a concrete floor died from suspected hypothermia at the facility.

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Sleep deprivation involved keeping detainees awake for up to 180 hours, usually standing or in painful stress positions, at times with their hands shackled above their heads. The CIA led several detainees to believe they would never be allowed to leave CIA custody alive, suggesting to one detainee that he would only leave in a coffin-shaped box.

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CIA detainees at one detention facility, described as a “dungeon,” were kept in complete darkness and constantly shackled in isolated cells with loud noise or music and only a bucket to use for human waste.

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Contrary to CIA representations to the Department of Justice, the waterboarding technique was physically harmful, inducing convulsions and vomiting. During one session, Abu Zubaydah became “completely unresponsive with bubbles rising through his open full mouth.” Internal CIA records describe the waterboarding of Khalid Shaykh Mohammad as evolving into a “series of near drownings.”

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[T]he CIA instructed personnel that the interrogation of Abu Zubaydah would take “precedence” over his medical care, resulting in the infection and deterioration of a bullet wound Abu Zubaydah incurred during his capture.

---

At least five CIA detainees were subjected to “rectal feeding” or “rectal hydration” without documented medical need.

All of this (and there's much more documented in the full report) and for what? To save lives, as the URL goes? But there's no evidence this torture resulted in usable intelligence.

The committee reviewed 20 of the most frequent and prominent examples of purported counterterrorism “successes” that the CIA has attributed to the use of its enhanced interrogation techniques. Each of those examples was found to be wrong in fundamental respects. In some cases, there was no relationship between the claimed counterterrorism “success” and any information provided by a CIA detainee during or after the use of the CIA’s enhanced interrogation techniques. In the remaining cases, the CIA inaccurately represented that unique information was acquired from a CIA detainee as a result of the CIA’s enhanced interrogation techniques, when in fact the information was either (a) acquired from the CIA detainee prior to the use of the CIA’s enhanced interrogation techniques or (b) corroborative of information already available to the intelligence community from sources other than the CIA detainee, and therefore not unique or “otherwise unavailable...”

The CIA took these lies went all the way to the top.

In an attempt to justify the use of the CIA’s enhanced interrogation techniques, the CIA provided examples of supposedly “thwarted” terrorist plots and the capture of specific terrorists that the CIA attributed to the use of its techniques. The CIA representations were inaccurate and contradicted by the CIA’s own records. The CIA’s internal Panetta Review also identified numerous inaccuracies in the CIA’s effectiveness representations—including representations to the President.

And when the CIA wasn't lying about the techniques being necessary to stay ahead of "ticking time bombs," it was lying about its methods.

Records do not support CIA representations that the CIA initially used an “an open, non-threatening approach,” or that interrogations began with the “least coercive technique possible” and escalated to more coercive techniques only as necessary. Instead, in many cases the most aggressive techniques were used immediately, in combination and nonstop.

It's not just the US that will have to weather this debacle -- one that gives lie to the government's view that it holds itself to higher standard than its enemies -- it's every other country that participated in the CIA's extraordinary rendition program.

These are the countries that will be worried by the CIA 'torture' report http://t.co/xx9vii1aFZ pic.twitter.com/g23OHBK3Cw

— The Independent (@Independent) December 9, 2014

The real question following the release of this report is whether anyone will be held accountable for these deplorable actions. There needs to be meaningful punishments handed down. If not, then the rest of the world will know how much we're willing to let our agencies get away with during this neverending War on Terror. Failing to do so will only open the door for further abuse.

Filed Under: cia, dianne feinstein, senate intelligence committee, torture, torture report

Rogers, Hayden Claim Release Of CIA Torture Report Will Be The Tipping Point For Enemies Of The US

from the you-know,-rather-than-everything-else-we've-done-to-piss-them-off dept

The NSA's many, many surveillance programs. The TSA's security theater. "See something, say something." The DHS and its "Fusion Centers," in which First Amendment-protected activity is viewed as inherently suspicious. The distribution of armored vehicles and high-powered weapons to law enforcement agencies. The FBI's constantly expanding investigative scope and powers. The NYPD's "Demographics Unit." These are all things we do because of terrorism.

Those who believe the threat of terrorism can justify nearly anything are now claiming the threat of terrorism justifies NOT doing something. Daniel Drezner rounds up quotes from current and former officials who believe that the safety of our nation now hinges on not releasing the long-delayed "Torture Report." Joining John Kerry in his statement that the release could have negative effects on "foreign policy" are a host of familiar names, starting with House Intelligence Committee head Mike Rogers.

"I think this is a terrible idea," Rogers said. "Our foreign partners are telling us this will cause violence and deaths. . . . Foreign leaders have approached the government and said, 'You do this, this will cause violence and deaths.' Our own intelligence community has assessed that this will cause violence and deaths."

Michael Hayden, former director of the CIA, echoes Rogers' concerns.

"...[T]his will be used by our enemies to motivate people to attack Americans and American facilities overseas."

As Drezner points out, the narrative these men are pushing makes no sense. According to Hayden, Rogers and (to a lesser extent) Kerry, the release of this report will be the tipping point for our enemies, rather than two lengthy, unending military efforts in Iraq and Afghanistan… or years of drone strikes… the United States' constant support of Israel… the revelations of torture occurring at Abu Ghraib…

According to this narrative, terrorists will be more outraged by a damning Senate report than by the previous decade-plus of actions in response to the 9/11 attacks.

I'm sorry, but this is just nuts. There is no shortage of US foreign policy actions and inactions in the region to inflame enemies. The Senate report is small potatoes compared to that.

The release of the report could actually be a net win for the US. Its reputation has taken several hits over the past year, and exposing its flaws to the world -- in hopes of preventing this behavior from repeating itself -- will show our allies, and our enemies, that the nation is stronger than its weakest moments. Delaying the release of the report, or rendering it meaningless via over-redaction, won't send the same message. Instead, it will confirm our enemies' (and allies') worst suspicions: that the US government cares more about maintaining a facade than actually making an effort to rebuild its damaged reputation. Doing what Kerry, Rogers and Hayden suggest -- bury the report until whenever (and at what point will we not have enemies?) -- could actually provide more motivation to terrorists than being open, honest and contrite about the CIA's actions.

Filed Under: cia, foreign policy, john kerry, michael hayden, mike rogers, surveillance, terrorists, torture, torture report

Ridiculous: John Kerry Asks Dianne Feinstein Not To Release CIA Torture Report After Agreement Was Reached To Release On Monday

from the paging-mark-udall dept

Okay, this is just getting ridiculous. We've written plenty about the Senate Intelligence Committee's massive $40 million, 6,000 page torture report, detailing a variety of failures related to the CIA's torture program after 9/11. While the Committee voted (overwhelmingly) to release a redacted 480 page executive summary of the document, and the White House insisted it wanted to do so as well, since then it's become clear that the White House was going to do everything to block it from actually getting out.

Yesterday it came out that an agreement had finally been reached on the redactions and that it would finally be released on Monday. Apparently, the CIA/White House won the battle over the question of redacting pseudonyms -- which was a key fight. Basically, those who have seen the report say that if you redact the pseudonyms, important parts of what happened are greatly distorted (such as who is doing what). But apparently, that's what was agreed to anyway.

However, after everyone started gearing up for the release on Monday, Secretary of State John Kerry apparently called Senator Dianne Feinstein to argue that she should "delay" the release of the report, claiming that the timing is "sensitive" and that the US is worried it may mess up a variety of things:

“What he raised was timing of report release, because a lot is going on in the world -- including parts of the world particularly implicated -- and wanting to make sure foreign policy implications were being appropriately factored into timing,” an administration official told me. "He had a responsibility to do so because this isn’t just an intel issue -- it’s a foreign policy issue."

To put it simply, this is a complete bullshit argument. There's always going to be "a lot going on in the world" especially in areas who are going to be upset by the report. There's never going to be a "good" time to release a report that details just how screwed up the CIA's torture program is -- but it's the only way to actually start the process of making things right and making sure that we, as a country don't do that kind of thing again.

In fact, if the government is so damn concerned about the reaction to the release of the report, here's an idea: don't let the government do stuff that leads to a report that will create such a reaction!

Furthermore, the argument that a "delay" is necessary makes no sense either. Beyond the fact that there's always something going on in the world, in this case, they've known that this report was coming for months. To argue they haven't had enough time to prepare is clearly bogus. Back in April the State Department was whining about this as well, but now it's had months to prepare and it's still whining?

Finally, the claims by the State Department that it's just asking for a delay, rather than to shelve the whole report ring hollow. One of the reasons that it's coming out next week is because, after that, the Republicans are back in control, and they've indicated that they'll bury the report entirely. At this point, if Feinstein gives in to Kerry, it seems like the only viable option for getting the report out to the world is to have outgoing Senator Mark Udall release it himself on the floor of the Senate.

Filed Under: cia, cia torture, dianne feinstein, john kerry, mark udall, state department, torture report

Senators Hoping To Keep CIA From Destroying Most Of Its Employees' Emails

from the agency-replacing-'delete'-buttons-faster-than-ever dept

The CIA and Senate have found more to fight about. With the "Torture Report" mostly in the hands of the White House at this point, the two are now battling over the CIA's planned alterations to its email retention policies.

Key senators are pushing back against a CIA plan to destroy older emails of “non-senior” agency officials.

The heads of the Senate Intelligence Committee on Wednesday sent a letter opposing the proposal, under which only the highest ranking CIA workers would have their email correspondence permanently saved.

The plan “could allow the destruction of crucial documentary evidence regarding the CIA’s activities that is essential for Congress, the public and the courts to know,” Chairwoman Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) and Vice Chairman Saxby Chambliss (R-Ga.) wrote to the National Archives...

The senators are asking the National Archives to step up and somehow prevent this from happening -- most likely by declaring "non-senior" emails to be retainable records that must be turned over rather than destroyed. The CIA would prefer to destroy the emails of all but the top 22 employees three years after they leave, or when "no longer needed, whichever is sooner." Unfortunately for the senators making this request, the National Archive has already signaled its agreement with the CIA's proposed retention schedule changes.

In tentatively approving the request, the National Archives noted that the emailed information “is unlikely” to exist in other forms that will be marked for permanent storage.

Any information not found in those other files likely “has little or no research value,” it added.

Senators Feinstein and Chambliss -- in rare agreement with transparency and government accountability activists -- disagree with the National Archives' assessment.

“In our experience, email messages are essential to finding CIA records that may not exist in other so-called permanent records at the CIA,” Feinstein and Chambliss wrote.

Longer retention is needed, especially for an agency as secretive as the CIA. The standard wait period for sensitive document declassification is 25 years. Correspondence related to declassified documents will be long gone by that point.

Even in terms of normal FOIA requests, three years is cutting things close. Rarely does an FOIA-worthy event come to light within days or weeks of its occurrence. It's generally weeks, months or years down the road. By the time documents are requested, ignored by the CIA's FOIA staff and finally pried free by a federal lawsuit*, responsive documents may already have been destroyed. Without a doubt, the CIA knows this is a distinct possibility and any trimming of retention periods only makes it more likely that relevant communications will be permanently removed from circulation.

*YMMV

Filed Under: archives, cia, email, email retention, foia, history, records, senate, torture report

White House Apparently Doing Everything To Stop Release Of CIA Torture Report

from the the-fight-is-on dept

On Tuesday evening, Senator Dianne Feinstein had told reporters that the Senate Intelligence Committee and the White House were finally close to an agreement to finalize the release of the declassified executive summary of the CIA torture report. As we've been discussing for months, back in April the Senate Intelligence Committee agreed to declassify the 480-page executive summary of the 6,300-page report (which cost $40 million to put together). As we'd noted, the CIA and White House first offered up redactions that made the whole thing "incomprehensible" according to some in the Senate.

The main fight had come down to pseudonyms. The White House and CIA were demanding that pseudonyms be redacted, even though they were already pseudonyms. The concern, from the CIA, was that by identifying which individuals are the same throughout the report, it would provide enough information for people to figure out who some of the people were. However, as Senator Wyden noted, this is both ridiculous and unprecedented, as plenty of previous such reports have used pseudonyms without a problem.

Either way, it appears that the Senators finally gave in and agreed to "meeting [the White House/CIA] more than halfway", and the response from the White House was to reject even this compromise.

Now even after Senate Democrats agreed to remove some pseudonyms at White House request, the Oval Office is still haggling for more redactions.

"The White House is continuing to put up fierce resistance to the release of the report," said one knowledgeable Senate aide. "Ideally, we should be closing ground and finalizing the last stages right now so that we can release the report post-Thanksgiving. But, despite the fact that the committee has drastically reduced the number of pseudonyms in the report, the White House is still resisting and dragging this out."

It appears that many people are reasonably wondering if the White House is just trying to drag this out until the Republicans are in charge of the Senate and they can bury the report. Of course, that only increases the chance that Mark Udall reads the report into the record. However, I've seen some suggestions that if this is the real sticking point, he can just leak the pseudonyms...

Either way, it looks like this stupid political fight is ongoing...

Filed Under: cia, dianne feinstein, torture report

Mark Udall's Open To Releasing CIA Torture Report Himself If Agreement Isn't Reached Over Redactions

from the putting-the-pressure-on dept

As we were worried might happen, Senator Mark Udall lost his re-election campaign in Colorado, meaning that one of the few Senators who vocally pushed back against the surveillance state is about to leave the Senate. However, Trevor Timm pointed out that, now that there was effectively "nothing to lose," Udall could go out with a bang and release the Senate Intelligence Committee's CIA torture report. The release of some of that report (a redacted version of the 400+ page "executive summary" -- the full report is well over 6,000 pages) has been in limbo for months since the Senate Intelligence Committee agreed to declassify it months ago. The CIA and the White House have been dragging out the process hoping to redact some of the most relevant info -- perhaps hoping that a new, Republican-controlled Senate would just bury the report.

The arguments for not leaking the report -- or just putting it into the Congressional record -- is not a legal one. Members of Congress are allowed to put whatever they want in the Congressional record without fear of legal repercussions. However, it could lead to other problems, including being kicked off of the Intelligence Committee, which would have led to less ability to oversee what was going on in the future. But since he's leaving anyway... As Timm notes:

But Udall’s loss doesn’t have to be all bad. The lame-duck transparency advocate now has a rare opportunity to truly show his principles in the final two months of his Senate career and finally expose, in great detail, the secret government wrongdoing he’s been criticizing for years. On his way out the door, Udall can use congressional immunity provided to him by the Constitution’s Speech and Debate clause to read the Senate’s still-classified 6,000-page CIA torture report into the Congressional record – on the floor, on TV, for the world to see.

There’s ample precedent for this. In 1971, former Senator Mike Gravel famously read the top-secret classified Pentagon Papers for three hours before almost collapsing and then entering thousands of pages more into the record after he couldn’t speak for any longer from exhaustion.

In fact, Gravel is now urging Udall to do exactly that, in an interview he gave to Dan Froomkin.

“If Udall wanted to do this, he could do the same thing.” Gravel said. “Hell, I’d fly into Washington and help him pass it out.”

If it’s more convenient, Gravel said, he’ll be in Udall’s home state of Colorado in a couple weeks. “If he wants to, we can get together over Thanksgiving weekend, and talk this thing out so he feels comfortable.”

The two biggest reasons not to do it, Gravel said, are no longer relevant. “The biggest fear you have is peer pressure. What are my members of the Senate going to think of me? But I’ve got to say, if you lose office, like he has, he’s got no more peer pressure.”

Udall himself had been rather quiet about all of this over the past few weeks, but has now told the Denver Post that all options are on the table, but he's still hopeful that a deal may be reached.

“I’m going to keep all options on the table to ensure the truth comes out,”

In an odd way, his loss may actually put extra pressure on the CIA to agree to fix the retraction problem, since they now know that Udall can just go around them entirely. Suddenly, the "fallback" position isn't such a good situation. In the past, the CIA could stall under the likelihood that no one could really do much about it. But that calculus has changed, meaning that the CIA no longer has the upper hand here. Still, it would be something if Udall decides that the only way to get this info out is to put it out himself, in part, because he could release a lot more than just the executive summary. Who knows if he'd go that far, but it's good to hear that he's at least open to the option.

Filed Under: cia, mark udall, privilege, torture report

Part Of CIA Torture Report May Finally Be Released Next Week, As More Details Leak

from the it's-a-start dept

Jason Leopold has a big article at Vice detailing some more of what's in the Senate Intelligence Committee's CIA torture report, but the bigger news is that the long fought over, somewhat redacted executive summary may be released next week:

... the Senate committee is hoping to release its report as early as next week, when the US sends a delegation to Geneva, Switzerland where it will submit a report on compliance with the International Convention Against Torture. The release of the executive summary would be an effort to show "some form of accountability," one person familiar with the declassification negotiations said.

Of course, it also notes that the fight over redacting pseudonyms still isn't settled, and that may muck things up. And, really, why wouldn't the CIA keep pushing back? Now that the GOP has won the Senate, it knows that if it can just stall until January, the whole report may get buried.

As for the other leaks about the report, many of them confirm what had previously leaked about the report, but also go deeper into each of those areas. For example, earlier leaks had already talked about how the torture techniques used by the CIA went beyond what was approved, how the CIA tortured more people than previously admitted (and then hid those details), and then lied to Congress claiming that the torture was effective when it was not. Leopold has some more details about all of those, including how the CIA is responding to and challenging some of those findings.

However, Leopold also highlights a variety of ways in which the report does appear to fall short, choosing to pull punches and avoid blaming top administration officials like former Vice President Dick Cheney (despite his previous admissions that he okayed the program), and also carefully avoiding placing any blame on a high-ranking CIA official who is described as "Feinstein's boy":

Although he is identified in the Senate report, the committee did not level any criticism against Stephen Kappes, who was deputy director of the CIA while the interrogation program was up and running. Kappes allegedly played a role in covering up the death of a detainee who froze to death in 2002 at a CIA operated prison in Afghanistan called the "Salt Pit." The death of the detainee is highlighted in the Senate report.

Kappes had been Feinstein's choice to head the CIA after Barack Obama was sworn in as president in 2009. Feinstein is on record stating she would not support Panetta's nomination unless Kappes was named as his deputy, a position he served in until 2010. One former CIA official said Kappes is "Feinstein's boy," suggesting that he was spared criticism because of his close relationship with the Intelligence Committee chairwoman.

As for Cheney:

The Senate report promotes the narrative that the CIA deceived the Bush White House into permitting the agency to use the controversial interrogation techniques against certain captives. This, despite the fact that former Vice President Dick Cheney admitted in 2008 that he personally "signed off" on the waterboarding of alleged 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and two other high-value captives because he "thought that it was absolutely the right thing to do."

"This is why the SSCI [Senate Select Committee on Intelligence] report is flawed and is not a full historical overview of the EIT program," said one person familiar with it. "Who in their right mind would believe that Dick Cheney does not bear any responsibility here?"

Perhaps even more troubling is that the report does not say that the "enhanced interrogation techniques" were actually torture. We've questioned in the past why Senator Feinstein won't call torture "torture" and apparently that linguistic game continues in this report:

However, the Senate report does not conclude that the CIA violated any domestic or international laws prohibiting the use of torture, contradicting Feinstein's public statements. People familiar with the document say the Senate didn't even use the word "torture" to describe the techniques to which detainees were subjected.

In fact, Leopold claims that the report focuses on the "efficacy" of the torture program and doesn't even touch the questions of legality (or morality).

The report also, apparently, skips over George Tenet's leadership in the CIA, but instead focuses a lot of Michael Hayden:

The committee's executive summary, however, singles out Michael Hayden, who became CIA director in 2006 and is a staunch defender of the use of EITs. He is accused of lying to the panel during a briefing nearly a decade ago when he sought to revamp the CIA's interrogation program.

People familiar with the executive summary said the committee obtained records about Hayden's briefings and carefully reviewed what he told committee members. The report concludes that the former CIA director erroneously told the committee that there were fewer than 100 detainees held captive by the CIA when in fact that number was higher. (The committee's full report says the CIA detained 119 men). Hayden is also criticized for telling the committee that the enhanced interrogation program was "humane." The committee's report concludes that Hayden misrepresented the scope of the program and was not being truthful.

This probably explains why Hayden has been the most vocal and stringent critics of this report. He claimed that Feinstein was "too emotional" to judge the CIA's torture program, and also insisted that it was just a partisan attack.

Still, Leopold's report also highlights how the CIA and its defenders are likely to hit back on the claims about the torture program not being effective. They're going to argue that the torture was the "bad cop" aspect of a "good cop/bad cop" scheme, and the useful information came out when the "good cop" was in the room, but wouldn't have happened without the "bad cop" (i.e., the torture).

Retired Air Force psychologist James Mitchell, who has been credited with being the architect of the CIA's enhanced interrogation program — he's bound by a non-disclosure agreement he signed with the government and does not confirm, deny, or discuss his role in the program — said that his understanding of "the purpose of the enhanced interrogation program was to get the detainee to be willing to engage with a debriefer or a targeter who was asking a question, and that it wasn't designed so that you would ask questions about actionable intelligence… while the detainee was experiencing the enhanced interrogation program."

In other words, Mitchell is saying the enhanced interrogation program was akin to a good cop, bad cop act. For example, a "bad cop" might use EITs on a detainee, then leave the room. A "good cop" might then enter the room and, without the use of any kind of force, get answers from the detainee, who had just been subjected to EITs. If the bad cop and good cop submit separate reports, it would appear on paper that the EITs were ineffective because the bad cop didn't get the answers — the good cop did.

And the Senate would have used that intel in compiling its report.

"If you could go in and read the individual pieces of intel that were written as a result of the debriefings and the interrogations, what would that look like in the database?" Mitchell says. "What that would look like is that all the actionable intelligence came from the good cop just like you would expect, and you wouldn't see a lot of actionable intelligence leading to things like capturing bin Laden coming from the enhanced interrogation program because it wasn't designed to do that."

Still, from previous leaks, even that explanation seems questionable -- as it appears that much of the useful information came from people who weren't being tortured or before they were tortured, suggesting that argument is bunk. And, even if it were true, that doesn't magically make torture right in any way (legally or morally).

Either way, all this speculation is getting ridiculous. The Senate should just release the damn report already.

Filed Under: cia, dianne feinstein, michael hayden, senate, senate intelligence committee, torture, torture report

Will The CIA Treat Amazon's Cloud The Same Way It Treated Drives It Shared With The Senate?

from the we-steal-working-documents dept

The US intelligence community's $600 million cloud computing deal with Amazon was finalized roughly a year ago, but recent revelations about the CIA's behavior in shared virtual spaces is raising questions about the government's move to virtual computing.

Two organizations -- RootsAction.org and ExposeFacts.org -- have just planted the following billboard at the doorstep of Amazon's Seattle headquarters.

While there are 17 total intelligence agencies being connected through Amazon's services, the CIA is the one generating the most concern at the moment. Marcy Wheeler (of emptywheel) asks some perfectly valid questions.

Marcy Wheeler — who writes widely on the legal aspects of the “war on terror” and its effects on civil liberties including her “Right to Know” column for ExposeFacts.org — said Wednesday that Amazon should answer a number of key questions before its customers and the general public can be assured that personal information from the company’s commercial operations is not finding its way into the CIA’s hands.

For instance, she said, Bezos and Amazon should answer the question: “Will there be any overlap between the physical hardware serving Amazon’s commercial cloud service and what is provided to the CIA?”

Referring to the CIA’s machinations over the still-unreleased Senate torture report, she added that Bezos should also be asked: “The CIA has admitted accessing documents made available to the Senate Intelligence Committee on shared space — what provisions have you made to prevent similar spying on Amazon’s commercial customers?”

If you'll recall, accusations that the CIA "impersonated" Senate personnel in order to access Torture Report-related documents came to light late last month. Unnamed sources close to the action presented the CIA's moves as the misuse of Senate staffer credentials to obtain in-progress documents related to the still-unreleased Torture Report. Another unnamed source closer to the intelligence side of things spun the agency's alleged impersonation this way:

“CIA simply attempted to determine if its side of the firewall could have been accessed through the Google search tool. CIA did not use administrator access to examine [Intelligence Committee] work product,” the source said.

Peering back "in" using borrowed credentials is a good way to check for leaks, but it also allows the agency to look "out" at anything else stored on shared drives. It's a very handy excuse, and one Marcy Wheeler thinks the agency might be tempted to deploy again within Amazon's cloud service.

How thick is the wall separating the intelligence community and private businesses? Does this wall even exist outside of virtual barriers? Intelligence officials seem to be sold on Amazon's ability to protect its assets from outsiders, but don't appear to be nearly as concerned about internal compartmentalization. Will the IC's servers be physically or virtually shared with the general public?

Amazon's not saying. And quite obviously, neither are intelligence officials. Adding to the opacity is the fact that Amazon is one of the few tech companies not issuing periodic transparency reports detailing the frequency and number of requests for customer data by law enforcement and intelligence agencies.

Amazon continues to seek more government contracts, which will result in even more potential intermingling of public and private data in shared virtual spaces. The company hasn't exactly been forthcoming on these government deals, and its ongoing lack of a transparency report isn't much of a confidence builder.

Filed Under: cia, cloud, privacy, shared servers, surveillance
Companies: amazon