Eric Umansky

"We will make you see death": A Window into Rendition

We've known for years that the administration cleared the way for torture.  The facts were there well before the Abu Ghraib photos turned it into a scandal.  But I plenty of realities of what has happened have yet to come out. One area where we still don't know many details is rendition, the practice of shipping suspects to other countries who know...how to take of them.

A new report from Human Rights Watch sheds a little more light on the practice.  Here's one prisoner's secret notes from his time in a Jordanian secret prison:   

"They beat me up in a way that does not know mercy," Sharqawi wrote, referring to his Jordanian captors, "and they're still beating me. They threatened me with electricity, with snakes and dogs ... [They said] we'll make you see death."

Sharqawi described his interrogations, explaining that the Jordanians were feeding his responses back to the CIA. "Every time that the interrogator asks me about a certain piece of information, and I talk," Sharqawi said, "he asks me if I told this to the Americans. And if I say no he jumps for joy, and he leaves me and goes to report it to his superiors, and they rejoice."

But was  the U.S. really involved this guy's alleged detention and treatment?  Well, you know where the Jordanians sent him to after his stint there: Gitmo.

Lame Line of the Day

"No Pentagon investigations have found that any senior Bush administration officials were complicit in the abuse at Abu Ghraib." - NYT.

One potential reason no Pentagon investigation has any senior administration officials complicit in torture: No Pentagon investigation has ever been allowed to look into it.

Torture, Part MCMXI

From the NYT:

WASHINGTON — President Bush on Wednesday renominated Steven G. Bradbury to be an assistant attorney general in a move certain to be controversial because of Mr. Bradbury’s link to Justice Department memorandums authorizing the harsh interrogation of terrorism suspects.

Mr. Bradbury, who is from Maryland, has been serving as acting head of the Office of Legal Counsel in the Justice Department, in effect the department’s lawyer. If confirmed, he would become the office’s permanent head.

In his capacity as acting head, Mr. Bradbury came under intense scrutiny last fall when it was disclosed that he was the author of a pair of secret legal opinions that endorsed rough techniques for suspects in the custody of the Central Intelligence Agency.

Keep in mind, Bradbury wrote these greenlight-for-torture memos after the Abu Ghraib broke and after the administration had publicly (and lying -ly) disavowed the previous pro-torture memos, calling them "abhorrent."

Also, note to NYT: "rough techniques"?  It's not like Khaled Sheikh Mohamed got sent for some special time with an S&M hooker.

The Tell (Thank you for Doing our Dirty Work, Dept.)

NYT has yet another piece on the CIA erasing those interrogation tapes. A CIA official named Jose Rodriguez ordered their destruction, and here's pretty all you need to know:

[I]t appears that Mr. Rodriguez was never reprimanded.

U.S.'s Top General Supports McCain Amendment

I don't know if the new Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Peter Pace, has spoken about it before. But check this exchange from PBS's Newshour earlier tonight:

But check out this exchange from PBS's Newshour earlier tonight:

JIM LEHRER: Sen. McCain has been - the Senate has passed - it has yet to be approved by the House, a legislation that would use the Army manual as the rules for how to treat prisoners, detainees. ...Do you support what he is doing? Do you support the legislation to make the Army manual the rules and so everybody knows you don't beat up on people, you don't torture them, et cetera?

GENERAL PETER PACE: I would say that the members of the US armed forces understand clearly what they are allowed to do and what they are not allowed to do with regard to treatment of prisoners and detainees and they understand that they are to treat them humanely.

Having said that, it is perfectly fine to have the Army field manual for the detention of individuals, as the bible, so to speak, of how we are supposed to be doing business. That's exactly what it is. And for the senator to say that we should be following our own rules certainly makes sense.

I'm not suprised Pace thinks that. But  I am surprised he spoke up. Kudos to him. And frankly,  another sign of increasing Bush/Cheney isolation.

Detainee Deaths and the Lax Investigations

About a year ago, the ACLU get ahold  of records of investigations into detainee abuse. As the LAT put it, the records showed that "internal army investigations into the suspicious deaths of several Iraqi detainees were cut short when authorities lost records, failed to conduct autopsies and contaminated evidence."  I was reminded of that by a new report by Human Rights First that looks at the "27 homicides of detainees in U.S. custody."

HRF on one of investigations:

In one of the more well-known cases, Mohammad Munim al-Izmerly, a 65-year-old chemical scientist, was detained at the Camp Cropper high value detainee facility in April 2003; his family was allowed to visit him once. Within a few weeks of their visit in January 2004, al-Izmerly was dead. U.S. forces retained al-Izmerly’s body for 17 days after his death, and did not inform Army criminal investigators that al-Izmerly had died in U.S. custody until after his body was released.

The family only learned of his death after U.S. forces delivered al-Izmerly’s body to an Iraqi hospital, accompanied by a death certificate stating that al-Izmerly had died of a “sudden brainstem compression,” without any explanation of its cause.

The family asked the director of Baghdad hospital’s forensic department to autopsy Al-Izmerly’s body; according to press reports, the autopsy found that Izmerly died from a “sudden hit to the back of his head” and that the cause of the death was blunt trauma. The forensic department director told the press that al-Izmerly “died from a massive blow to the head. We don’t disagree with the coalition’s report, but it doesn’t explain how he got his injuries in the first place.”

The initial, inconclusive investigation into the case was closed, and only appears to have been reopened after press accounts of al-Izmerly’s death. The Army Criminal Investigation Command listing for al-Izmerly’s death is “undetermined cause,” because the body was released and no U.S. autopsy was performed. The family reportedly filed a wrongful death claim for $10,000, but the Army dismissed it, saying the family had presented no evidence of wrongdoing by U.S. personnel. The re-opened investigation into al-Izmerly’s death remains pending; to date, no charges are reported to have been brought.

Hypothermia and Detainees

A few days ago, I mentioned a former U.S. interrogator's allegations that while he served in Iraq, soldiers put some detainees in ice water and "kept them hovering on hypothermia." As the interrogator recounted on PBS's Frontline, soldiers would  take a detainees'  "rectal temperature to make sure he didn’t die ."

As I mentioned, it doesn't seem like that interrogator actually saw the techinque in action. So maybe it was just a rumor. But that "hypothermia" reference kept ringing a bell. Then I remembered: In late 2002,   an Afghan prisoner at the Salt Pit--a CIA-run but Afghan-flagged prison north of Kabul--was chained, doused with cold water, and then  left overnight in an unheated cell without blankets.  He died a few hours later. The official  cause of death: "hypothermia."

The case is, reportedly, being investigated by the CIA--no charges  have been filed.

More on Torture

PBS's Frontline is airing  a fine report tomorrow night on the lead-up to Abu Ghraib. It offers a good summary  how the administration loosened  detention policies after 9/11 and how that helped create a culture where mistreatment accepted. Apart from that worthwhile overview, two smaller bits also stuck out to me:

1) Frontline spoke to three interrogators who all have worked in Iraq (including one who is still on active duty) and who all talked about abuse.

Here's a snippet from the transcript (which Frontline kindly gave me a peek it; it should be posted soon on their site):

IN THE SPRING OF 2004…TONY LAGOURANIS HAD LEFT ABU GHRAIB AND WAS WORKING IN MOSUL.

SPC. ANTHONY LAGOURANIS (RET.) Interrogator, U.S. Army
I remember the Chief Warrant Officer in charge of the interrogation facility.  He’d heard about how the SEALs were using just ice water to lower the body temperature of the prisoner.  And they would give him—they would take his rectal temperature to make sure he didn’t die; they would keep him hovering on hypothermia.

LAGOURANIS’ UNIT WAS USING A SHIPPING CONTAINER AS AN INTERROGATION CELL…

SPC. ANTHONY LAGOURANIS (RET.) Interrogator, U.S. Army
We were keeping them hovering around hypothermia in this environment of what they call ‘environmental manipulation’ with the music and strobe lights.  And then we would bring in military working dogs and use those on the prisoners.  Even though it was controlled; like the dogs were muzzled, they were being held by a handler.  But the prisoner didn’t know that because he was blindfolded.

Now, it doesn't seem he actually saw the "icing." But worth  investigating no?

2)  Frontline flags  Rumsfeld's little-noticed and misleading rejoinder to Captain Ian Fishback's (and some sergeants')  allegations of abuse. "My recollection in this case—it’s all secondhand information," said Rumsfeld in a press conference.

Let's see if we can help Rummy with his recollection.  Human Rights Watch first detailed the allegations in lengthy interviews with Fishback and the two sergants.

Fishback told HRW, "I witnessed violations of the Geneva Conventions that I knew were violations of the Geneva Conventions when they happened but I was under the impression that that was U.S. policy at the time."

Now, in fairness to Rumsfeld, Fishback is unclear on whether he witnessed soldiers actually beating detainees. "There was a case where a soldier took a baseball bat and struck a detainee on the leg hard," he said. "This is all stuff that I’m getting from my NCOs."

OK, so Fishback says he saw Geneva violations but probably not actually beatings. So how about the two sergeants, alas unnamed, who also spoke to HRW? When Rummy blew off the reports as "secondhand," he was responding to a question about allegations from "three former members of the 82nd Airborne Division," i.e. the sargents' allegations too. So did they not actually see anything either?

Here's one sergeant:

The “Murderous Maniacs” was what they called us at our camp because they knew if they got caught by us and got detained by us before they went to Abu Ghraib then it would be hell to pay.  They would be just, you know, you couldn’t even imagine.  It was sort of like I told you when they came in it was like a game.  You know, how far could you make this guy goes before he passes out or just collapses on you.  From stress positions to keeping them up fucking two days straight, whatever.  Deprive them of food water, whatever.

To “Fuck a PUC” means to beat him up.  We would give them blows to the head, chest, legs, and stomach, pull them down, kick dirt on them.  This happened every day.

To “smoke” someone is to put them in stress positions until they get muscle fatigue and pass out.  That happened every day.  Some days we would just get bored so we would have everyone sit in a corner and then make them get in a pyramid.  This was before Abu Ghraib but just like it.  We did that for amusement.

Here's the other sergeant:

As far as abuse goes I saw hard hitting.  I heard a lot of stories, but if it ain’t me I wouldn’t care.  I was busy leading my men.  I did hear about [a sergeant] breaking PUC bones.  Stories came out on mission. Guys were always talking about what they did to the PUCs.  Guys mentioned stuff but I couldn’t care less what happened at the PUC tent a week ago.  Putting guys with frustration in charge of prisoners was the worst thing to do.

I also saw smoking.  They would get the PUCs to physically exert themselves to the limit.

Torture 'R' Us

Law Prof. Marty Lederman nails the larger  point about the relevations in the Wash Post that an Iraqi general was tortured by a series of interrogators, including GIs as well as a CIA-led unit of Iraqi exiles:

[T]his was a concerted, planned, systematic and extended series of brutal interrogations, carried out by numerous persons and entities, within the military and the CIA, in a manner that they all considered to be authorized. No rotten apples.  No nightshift.

Lederman wonders how soldiers could have possibly thought torture was OK. One likely explanation: The Pentagon--following the White House--redefined torture downward, such that "abusive and "degrading" treatment could be OK, so long as it wasn't "unhumane." Get it? Abusive treatment is not neccesarily inhumane and thus A-OK.

The  White House--and later the Pentagon--obviously seems to have followed a  policy of strategic ambiguity, not explicitly ruling out torturous tactics and leaving it to local commanders to 'get the job done.'  The exact details of who ordered what, when, and where are still murky. But one thing that's clear is that the U.S. needs to uncover those details. That's what a democracy does, or at least should do. Which is why for me the most depressing part of the whole torture scandal is that the White House--aided by  top Republicans--have succesfully opposed an independent commission to investigate abuses.

"No President has ever done more for human rights than I have," Bush once told the NYer. I'm sure he thinks that.  

ABU GHRAIB TACTICS ARE 'AUTHORIZED' BY GENEVA CONVENTIONS, BUSH ADMIN CONCLUDES

That's the headline law prof blogger Marty Lederman says would be  most accurate for the partial release yesterday of the latest investigation of Gitmo. Marty's post is extraordinary:

The Schmidt Summary explains in great detail that certain interrogation techniques approved and employed at GTMO—particularly those used on Mohammed al-Qahtani, which I've previously described, were "abusive" and "degrading," and further reveals that the interrogation of another "high-value" detainee included unlawful threats against the lives of the detainee and his family. And yet then the Report somehow, and without any explanation whatsoever, concludes that all treatment at GTMO was "humane"—indeed, that the investigators found "no evidence" of any "inhumane treatment" at Guantanamo!

Abusive and degrading . . . yet humane.  Speaks volumes, doesn't it?

That is not, however, the most alarming thing about the Schmidt Report. More disturbing still is the Report's repeated assertions that the techniques in question —which included, for example, having female interrogators physically seduce and taunt a Muslim detainee; forcing him to wear a bra and placing a thong on his head during interrogation; tying him to a leash, leading him around the room and forcing him to perform a series of dog tricks; stripping him naked; and pouring water on his head during interrogation 17 times—  are not only "humane," but also are authorized by Army Field Manual 34-52.  Field Manual 34-52 has, since the 1960's, defined the interrogation techniques that are acceptable within the military even for POWs who are entitled to the protections of the Geneva Conventions.

[I]f, as the Schmidt Report concludes, the techniques used at GTMO are authorized by the Army Field Manual itself, it then follows that the military may use those techniques on any detainees, including POWs, anywhere in the world, in any conflict.

In other words, the remember all those disgusting things at Abu Ghraib which were just done by a few bad apples? The report says they were authorized techniques and asserts that they're still legit. As Andrew Sullivan puts it today--in one of a series of valuable posts:

Abu Ghraib is and was policy - just policy absorbed by ill-trained, unprofessional hoodlums. But those hoodlums didn't get their ideas from thin air. They got them from the Pentagon and the White House.

By the way, I can't emphasize enough the degree to  which the  NYT  booted this  one. Their headline on  the report is a study in know-nothingness:  "REPORT DISCREDITS F.B.I. CLAIMS OF ABUSE AT GUANTÁNAMO BAY."