Thursday, June 17, 2004
This story could go on for years. Every day, new material. Today, the New York Times hits with the headline Rumsfeld Issued an Order to Hide Detainee in Iraq. As though that were not enough...
Not only did they hide him (and others) from the Red Cross, holding him in secret by keeping his name off any list, they then forgot about him and didn't even interrogate the guy for 7 months!
"Once he was placed in military custody, people lost track of him," a senior intelligence official conceded Wednesday night. "The normal review processes that would keep track of him didn't.... the C.I.A. inquired about the detainee's status in January, but was told that American jailers in Iraq could not find him."
You can't use the normal processes because the normal processes were intentionally broken! Friggin' geniuses here. Our war for hearts & minds looks more and more like Night of the Living Dead. Miiiiinds... miiiiiinds... AARrrgh!
"In July 2003, the man suspected of being an Ansar al-Islam official was captured in Iraq and turned over to C.I.A. officials, who took him to an undisclosed location outside of Iraq for interrogation. By that fall, however, a C.I.A. legal analysis determined that because the detainee was deemed to be an Iraqi unlawful combatant - outside the protections of the Geneva Conventions - he should be transferred back to Iraq."
Obviously you have to be schizoid to be a CIA lawyer. They say that since this guy is unprotected, they should send him back. What about all the "enemy combatants" in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba? They aren't protected by the Geneva Convention either, in the .mil rationale, but they don't get sent home. They sure ain't from Cuba.
Most striking about this story is that the command to hide (at least) one prisoner is known to have passed from Donald Rumsfeld himself and all the way down the chain of command:
"Mr. Tenet made his request to Mr. Rumsfeld - that the suspect be held but not listed - in October. The request was passed down the chain of command: to Gen. Richard B. Myers, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, then to Gen. John P. Abizaid, the commander of American forces in the Middle East, and finally to Lt. Gen. Ricardo S. Sanchez, the ground commander in Iraq. At each stage, lawyers reviewed the request and their bosses approved it."
Not only did they hide him (and others) from the Red Cross, holding him in secret by keeping his name off any list, they then forgot about him and didn't even interrogate the guy for 7 months!
"Once he was placed in military custody, people lost track of him," a senior intelligence official conceded Wednesday night. "The normal review processes that would keep track of him didn't.... the C.I.A. inquired about the detainee's status in January, but was told that American jailers in Iraq could not find him."
You can't use the normal processes because the normal processes were intentionally broken! Friggin' geniuses here. Our war for hearts & minds looks more and more like Night of the Living Dead. Miiiiinds... miiiiiinds... AARrrgh!
"In July 2003, the man suspected of being an Ansar al-Islam official was captured in Iraq and turned over to C.I.A. officials, who took him to an undisclosed location outside of Iraq for interrogation. By that fall, however, a C.I.A. legal analysis determined that because the detainee was deemed to be an Iraqi unlawful combatant - outside the protections of the Geneva Conventions - he should be transferred back to Iraq."
Obviously you have to be schizoid to be a CIA lawyer. They say that since this guy is unprotected, they should send him back. What about all the "enemy combatants" in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba? They aren't protected by the Geneva Convention either, in the .mil rationale, but they don't get sent home. They sure ain't from Cuba.
Most striking about this story is that the command to hide (at least) one prisoner is known to have passed from Donald Rumsfeld himself and all the way down the chain of command:
"Mr. Tenet made his request to Mr. Rumsfeld - that the suspect be held but not listed - in October. The request was passed down the chain of command: to Gen. Richard B. Myers, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, then to Gen. John P. Abizaid, the commander of American forces in the Middle East, and finally to Lt. Gen. Ricardo S. Sanchez, the ground commander in Iraq. At each stage, lawyers reviewed the request and their bosses approved it."
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