Gitmo interrogations spark battle over tactics

[sabra]

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/15361458/

Gitmo interrogations spark battle over tactics
The inside story of criminal investigators who tried to stop abuse

Speaking publicly for the first time, senior U.S. law enforcement investigators say they waged a long but futile battle inside the Pentagon to stop coercive and degrading treatment of detainees by intelligence interrogators at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

Their account indicates that the struggle over U.S. interrogation techniques began much earlier than previously known, with separate teams of law enforcement and intelligence interrogators battling over the best way to accomplish two missions: prevent future attacks and punish the terrorists.

In extensive interviews with MSNBC.com, former leaders of the Defense Department’s Criminal Investigation Task Force said they repeatedly warned senior Pentagon officials beginning in early 2002 that the harsh interrogation techniques used by a separate intelligence team would not produce reliable information, could constitute war crimes, and would embarrass the nation when they became public knowledge.

The investigators say their warnings began almost from the moment their agents got involved at the Guantanamo prison camp, in January 2002. When they could not prevent the harsh interrogations and humiliation of detainees at Guantanamo, they say, they tried in 2003 to stop the spread of those tactics to Iraq, where abuses at Abu Ghraib prison triggered worldwide outrage with the publishing of graphic photos in April 2004.

[The Stranger]

1. There is a vile, insidious sickness and disease plaguing the nation.

Torture for torture's sake is of the worst symptoms.

[BootinUp]

2. looks like a great article

I haven't read every word, but this is a very important debate that went on and people need to read about it.

[Rose Siding]

3. I wonder how long msnbc had this story.

In terms of accountability, it's all moot now that the law has passed.

[BootinUp]

4. not 100% clear

that the law will not be stuck down by the Supreme Court, imo. I haven't read to much opinion on that though so maybe I am overoptimistic.

[Rose Siding]

5. I'm afraid it could go either way.

http://www.realcities.com/mld/krwashington/15810630.htm

In Hamdan, some specific criteria were noted about Congress needing to legislate tribunals. If the law was written with those specifics in mind, Justice Kennedy could fold.

[Supersedeas]

6. This was done in our name.