CBS Report: Rumsfeld OK'd Prison Rules

[Tellurian]

...Is Rummy taking the fall for Bush?

CBS/AP) Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld approved interrogation methods for Guantanamo Bay detainees including the use of "stress positions" for up to four hours, "fear of dogs" and "mild non-injurious" physical contact, a newspaper reports.

The Wall Street Journal reports Rumsfeld approved the tactics in December 2002. When military lawyers complained about the tactics being used, officials re-examined the techniques and implemented new rules in an April 2003 memo.

It is not known what tactics were approved in the April 2003 memo, but a March 2003 draft of that memo — revealed earlier this week — contained a legal argument that neither President Bush, nor agents acting on his orders, could be held liable for violating anti-torture laws in the war on terrorism.

USA Today reports that lawyers for Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Gen. Richard Myers were worried that tactics included in the April 2003 memo could make the chairman a target for prosecution under laws governing prisoner treatment.

more-much more!

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2004/04/30/iraq/main614905.shtml?cmp=EM8706