US Hid Tortured Detainees From International Red Cross
As McClatchy continues its excellent investigative series about the abominable US detainee detention system, there are two other ancillary articles that give more evidence about the criminal Bush administration and its felonious torture, denial of habeas corpus, and illegal prison system.
In the first, Warren Strobel writes: "The U.S. military hid the locations of suspected terrorist detainees and concealed harsh treatment to avoid the scrutiny of the International Committee of the Red Cross, according to documents that a Senate committee released Tuesday.
"We may need to curb the harsher operations while ICRC is around. It is better not to expose them to any controversial techniques," Lt. Col. Diane Beaver, a military lawyer who's since retired, said during an October 2002 meeting at the Guantanamo Bay prison to discuss employing interrogation techniques that some have equated with torture.
"A third person at the meeting, Jonathan Fredman, the chief counsel for the CIA's Counterterrorism Center, disclosed that detainees were moved routinely to avoid the scrutiny of the ICRC, which keeps tabs on prisoners in conflicts around the world.
"Officials in Rumsfeld's office and at Guantanamo developed the techniques they sought by reverse-engineering a long-standing military program designed to train U.S. soldiers and aviators to resist interrogation if they're captured.
"The program, known as Survival, Evasion, Resistance and Escape, was never meant to guide U.S. interrogation of foreign detainees.
"An official in Haynes' office sought information about SERE as early as July 2002, the documents show. Two months later, a delegation from Guantanamo attended SERE training at Fort Bragg, N.C. Levin said, "The truth is that senior officials in the United States government sought information on aggressive techniques, twisted the law to create the appearance of their legality and authorized their use against detainees."
"Regarding the ICRC, the United States long has complained that other countries such as China or the old Soviet Union prevented independent access to prisoners or made their conditions look better when outsiders were inspecting. The Bush administration appears to have engaged in similar practices, however."
And a second article is headlined: 'If the detainee dies you're doing it wrong"
"Following are excerpts from some of the documents released today by the Senate Armed Services Committee:
" . . . Any of these techniques that lie on the harshest end of the spectrum must be performed by a highly trained individual. Medical personnel should be present to treat any possible accidents. . . . When the CIA has wanted to use more aggressive techniques in the past, the FBI has pulled their personnel from the theatre.
" . . . if someone dies while aggressive techniques are being used, regardless of cause of death, the backlash of attention would be severely detrimental. Everything must be approved and documented."
The lies spewing from the mouths of Bush, Cheney and other administration officials about torture have been exposed. If they weren't torturing why hide detainees from the International Red Cross? The Bush administration is clearly a totalitarian, authoritarian regime like the old USSR and China that the US used to complain about and denounce.
All this is more evidence of the depravity and criminal behavior of the Bush administration which has dragged this country into torture and other unconscionable violations of human rights and the Constitution.
Why is impeachment still off the table?
In the first, Warren Strobel writes: "The U.S. military hid the locations of suspected terrorist detainees and concealed harsh treatment to avoid the scrutiny of the International Committee of the Red Cross, according to documents that a Senate committee released Tuesday.
"We may need to curb the harsher operations while ICRC is around. It is better not to expose them to any controversial techniques," Lt. Col. Diane Beaver, a military lawyer who's since retired, said during an October 2002 meeting at the Guantanamo Bay prison to discuss employing interrogation techniques that some have equated with torture.
"A third person at the meeting, Jonathan Fredman, the chief counsel for the CIA's Counterterrorism Center, disclosed that detainees were moved routinely to avoid the scrutiny of the ICRC, which keeps tabs on prisoners in conflicts around the world.
"Officials in Rumsfeld's office and at Guantanamo developed the techniques they sought by reverse-engineering a long-standing military program designed to train U.S. soldiers and aviators to resist interrogation if they're captured.
"The program, known as Survival, Evasion, Resistance and Escape, was never meant to guide U.S. interrogation of foreign detainees.
"An official in Haynes' office sought information about SERE as early as July 2002, the documents show. Two months later, a delegation from Guantanamo attended SERE training at Fort Bragg, N.C. Levin said, "The truth is that senior officials in the United States government sought information on aggressive techniques, twisted the law to create the appearance of their legality and authorized their use against detainees."
"Regarding the ICRC, the United States long has complained that other countries such as China or the old Soviet Union prevented independent access to prisoners or made their conditions look better when outsiders were inspecting. The Bush administration appears to have engaged in similar practices, however."
And a second article is headlined: 'If the detainee dies you're doing it wrong"
"Following are excerpts from some of the documents released today by the Senate Armed Services Committee:
" . . . Any of these techniques that lie on the harshest end of the spectrum must be performed by a highly trained individual. Medical personnel should be present to treat any possible accidents. . . . When the CIA has wanted to use more aggressive techniques in the past, the FBI has pulled their personnel from the theatre.
" . . . if someone dies while aggressive techniques are being used, regardless of cause of death, the backlash of attention would be severely detrimental. Everything must be approved and documented."
The lies spewing from the mouths of Bush, Cheney and other administration officials about torture have been exposed. If they weren't torturing why hide detainees from the International Red Cross? The Bush administration is clearly a totalitarian, authoritarian regime like the old USSR and China that the US used to complain about and denounce.
All this is more evidence of the depravity and criminal behavior of the Bush administration which has dragged this country into torture and other unconscionable violations of human rights and the Constitution.
Why is impeachment still off the table?
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