SASC Hits Paydirt: Full Story on SERE Torture Timeline Emerges

I have not had enough time to digest the wealth of new documents recently declassified by the Senate Armed Services Committee, in conjunction with their hearings today constituting Part II of an investigation into the organization of torture and abuse of detainees in Bush's "war on terror." Today's hearing concentrated on the migration of these techniques to Iraq.

The number of revelations is already startling, and it's hard to know where to begin. Since I took Senator Carl Levin to task for his rendition of the torture timeline as presented after Part I of the hearings, I think it's fair to give Sen. Levin the chance to describe the fuller story as it is now emerging. This is from his opening statement today. Noting, first, that the first set of hearings established that techniques from the Defense Department's Survival, Evasion, Resistance, Escape (SERE) program had been reverse-engineered by military psychologists into an "exploitation" or torture program of purported interrogation techniques, Levin continued:

While some have claimed that detainee abuses at Abu Ghraib and elsewhere were simply the result of a few bad apples acting on their own, at our June hearing we heard that as far back as December 2001, senior Department of Defense officials, including from General Counsel William J. “Jim” Haynes’s office, sought out information from the Joint Personnel Recovery Agency (JPRA), the DoD agency responsible for overseeing SERE training. We heard how, when he later reviewed a request from Guantanamo Bay (GTMO) to use techniques similar to those used in SERE training, Mr. Haynes ignored strong concerns from the military services that some of the techniques were illegal, cut short an effort by the Legal Counsel to the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff to conduct a legal and policy review of the techniques, and recommended that the Secretary of Defense approve most of them for use against detainees. In December 2002, Secretary Rumsfeld approved Mr. Haynes’s recommendation, sending the message that stripping detainees, placing them in stress positions, and using dogs to intimidate them was acceptable. Policies authorizing some of those same abusive techniques in Afghanistan and Iraq followed the Secretary’s decision. We’ll hear this morning how one military commander in Iraq sought and obtained interrogation support from JPRA, an agency whose expertise, again, is in teaching soldiers to resist abusive interrogations conducted by our enemies.

"Strong concerns" from some in the military about the illegality of the techniques; the spiking of an internal legal and policy review; the migration of SERE techniques to Iraq, demolishing the official narrative that the torture at Abu Ghraib was the work of a few bad apples; these are only some of the juicy items awaiting reporters and other intrepid investigators who pursue the documents coming out of today's hearing.

"We stand ready to assist..."

Of course, I was pleased to see that my insistence on taking the Bush Administration's torture timeline back to December 2001, following upon Lt. Col. (Ret.) Baumgartner's revelations at the last SASC hearing, is gratifying. I will not, however, dwell upon this too long. Whatever reason the committee was not able to emphasize this earlier is far secondary to the truth as it is now emerging.

But the one document produced from the December 2001 contact -- a fax cover sheet from the Pentagon's Joint Personnel Recovery Agency (JPRA), sent from "Lt. Col. Dan Baumgartner" to "Mr. Richard Shiffrin," who worked for Haynes's in Rumsfeld's DoD General Council office -- introduces a theme of aggressive courting by JPRA/SERE personnel to take on the interrogations/exploitation task:

Mr. Shiffrin --
Here's our spin on exploitation. If you need experts to facilitate this process, we stand ready to assist. There are not many in DoD outside of JPRA that have the level of expertise we do in exploitation and how to resist it.

This theme of JPRA pushing SERE expertise surfaces in Iraq a little less than two years later. A September 9, 2003 email from Col. Randy Moulton, Commander of JPRA to Col. Mike Okita and a redacted addressee (could this be Maj. Gen. Geoffrey Miller, who, coming from his command in Guantanamo, on September 9 was just concluding his evaluation of interrogation procedures in Iraq) again makes the same point about JPRA "expertise". (For a sample of this expertise, check out my earlier essay, "Nuts & Bolts: How U.S. Organized Torture Program.")

There is a strong synergy between the fundamentals of both missions (resistance training and interrogation). Both rely heavily on environmental conditions, captivity psychology, and situation dominance and control. While I think this probably lies within DHS responsibility lines, recent history (to include discussions with DHS, USSOCOM, CIA) shows that no DoD entity has a firm grasp on any comprehensive approach to strategic debriefing/interrogation. Our subject matter experts (and certain Service SERE psychologist) have the most knowledge and depth within DoD on the captivity environment and exploitation.

I would remind my readers here that SERE exploitation famously includes the use of physical assault, stress positions, forced nudity, sleep deprivation, sensory overload, and other forms of physical and psychological torture.

The treasure chest of interviews and documents that came out of the today's hearings will keep me and other investigators plenty busy in days to come. I'm certain I, for instance, will have more to say about this "certain Service SERE psychologist" in the near future. (Is he Bruce Jessen, implicated in earlier investigations as propagating SERE techniques to interrogators, and as a then-member of JPRA, a recipient of an April 2002 email from Moulton?)

Stay tuned.

How the Mainstream Press Covered Today's Hearings

Meanwhile, the New York Times and the Washington Post both already have their own stories out on today's hearings.

From the NY Times piece, written by Mark Mazzetti:

WASHINGTON — Senior White House officials played a central role in deliberations in the spring of 2002 about whether the Central Intelligence Agency could legally use harsh interrogation techniques while questioning an operative of Al Qaeda, Abu Zubaydah, according to newly released documents....
The meetings were led by Condoleezza Rice, then the national security adviser, and attended by Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, Attorney General John Ashcroft and other top administration officials....
Mr. Levin, a Michigan Democrat, said the new documents showed that top Bush administration officials were more actively engaged in the debate about the limits of lawful interrogation than the White House had previously acknowledged.

“So far, there has been little accountability at higher levels,” Mr. Levin said.

The Washington Post story, written by Joby Warrick, amplifies this aspect of the story:

The details of the controversial program were discussed in multiple meetings inside the White House over a two-year period, triggering concerns among several officials who worried that the agency's methods might be illegal or violate anti-torture treaties, according to separate statements signed by Rice and her top legal adviser.

"I expressed concern that the proposed CIA interrogation techniques comply with applicable U.S. law, including our international obligations," John B. Bellinger III, legal adviser to Rice at the State Department and formerly her top legal aide at the National Security Council, said in written answers to questions from the Senate Armed Services Committee....

The written accounts specifically name former attorney general John D. Ashcroft and former defense secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld as participants in the discussions...

The noose is tightening around the criminals who brazenly thought they could get away with torturing individuals with impunity. I am heartened by today's hearings that moral elements within both civil and military departments of government, and in society generally, will not let this terrible blot on our country go unanswered. To do so would be to fall into the abyss. We've looked into that deep, dizzying vortex lately, and I don't think any of us likes what we see.

More Cover-up? Senate Committee Renews Hearings on SERE Torture

There will be a meeting of the Senate Armed Services Committee [SASC] this Thursday, September 25, 9:30 AM in Room SD-106, Dirksen Senate Office Building. The meeting represents "Part II of the Committee's inquiry into the treatment of detainees in U.S. custody." The full committee, in open hearing, will "receive testimony on the authorization of Survival Evasion Resistance and Escape (SERE) techniques for interrogations in Iraq."

My readers will remember that in the Part I of the SASC SERE-related hearings last June, Lt. Col. Daniel Baumgartner revealed in his prepared statement that Richard Shiffrin, a Deputy General Counsel in the Department of Defense, had approached him in his capacity as Chief of Staff, Joint Personnel Recovery Agency (JPRA), in December 2001. Mr. Shiffrin apparently asked the now-retired Baumgartner for information related to "exploitation" processes, and the effects of captivity upon prisoners.

For those unfamiliar with this controversy, and the cast of characters involved, JPRA is the umbrella organization with the Pentagon for dealing with captured military personnel. The SERE program -- standing for Survival, Evasion, Resistance, Escape -- operates in all branches of the military to train soldiers how to withstand torture and abusive detention. The SERE program has been accused of sending psychologists to train special operations, prison psychologists and psychiatrists, military psychologists and god knows who else how to mistreat and even torture prisoners in order to gain information. Such techniques include "fear up harsh," forced nudity, stress positions, hooding, slapping, sleep deprivation, sexual humiliation, sensory overload, and even waterboarding. This was made clear in a memo that accompanied the SERE Standard Operating Procedures manual at Guantanamo in 2002 (emphasis added):

The premise behind this is that the interrogation tactics used at U.S. military SERE schools are appropriate for use in real-world interrogations. These tactics and techniques are used at SERE school to "break" SERE detainees. The same tactics and techniques can by used to break real detainees during interrogation operations.

Timelines and Smokescreens

The timeline regarding when Shiffrin contacted Baumgartner regarding information that could be used to abusively treat prisoners is crucial. Senator Carl Levin concentrated on a later contact between Shiffrin and JPRA, in late July 2002. The vast majority of the media followed suit. Even stalwart Mark Benjamin at Salon.com, who has reported so well on much of the torture controversy, followed Levin's emphasis when constructing his own "Timeline to Bush Government Torture."

But Baumgartner says that SASC staff convinced him with documentary proof that he talked to Shiffrin about these issues approximately eight months earlier!

This places DoD interest in possibly reverse-engineering of SERE techniques prior to the January 9 memo by John Yoo providing legal cover to Bush administration assertions that the Geneva Conventions did not apply to detainees held in the new war in Afghanistan. In addition, it predates the January 25 memo by Alberto Gonzales, then a presidential counsel, approving the Yoo argument, and stating that when it came to interrogation of enemy prisoners, the Geneva conventions' "strict limitations on questioning" such prisoners was now obsolete.

Why does this matter? Because if DoD, and by implication Rumsfeld, Cheney, Bush, Rice, or whomever, were seeking guidance on torture before even their poorly-written and largely derided cover-your-ass memos were written, supposedly allowing torture or cruel, inhumane treatment of detainees, then DoD/Rumsfeld/Bush/et al. have no defense any more. They are war criminals in violation of both international and federal law. One would almost have to prosecute them, if the system is to have any credibility at all. Bush would have to be impeached.

But, the general response to these revelations has been... silence. When I was able to ask Senator Levin why the documents related to Baumgartner's Dec. 2001 discussions with Shiffrin were not made public, he replied (via Firedoglake "liveblog" discussion):

Lt. Col. Baumgartner did so testify at our hearing. However information relating to his discussions with Shiffrin remains classified. When our report is finalized we will press the DoD to declassify this matter.

I say these documents are too important to wait to ask nicely for declassification. They represent potential evidence of a serious felony and war crime.

This Thursday, the witnesses are Colonel Steven M. Kleinman, USAFR, the Former Director of Intelligence, JPRA; and Colonel John R. Moulton II, USAF (Ret.), former Commander, JPRA. These witnesses should be asked specifically about their knowledge of any and all contacts between DoD, the CIA, or the White House and JPRA or SERE regarding "exploitation" of detainees. They should be specifically asked about the December 2001 calls from Shiffrin.

The Lindh Connection

It seems very possible that the requests from Shiffrin in late 2001 were related to the interrogation of John Walker Lindh, a young American captured with Taliban forces in late November 2001. According to a June 2004 Los Angeles Times report, Lindh was interrogated for days, naked and tied to a stretcher, confined in a large metal container, and subjected to sleep and food deprivation. His wounds were not treated. Military intelligence officers were not freelancing Lindh's interrogation, however, but getting instructions, sometimes hourly, from Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld's office.

According to the LA Times report:

The instructions from Rumsfeld’s legal counsel in late 2001, contained in previously undisclosed government documents, are the earliest known evidence that the Bush administration was willing to test the limits of how far it could go legally to extract information from suspected terrorists....

The documents, read to The Times by two sources critical of how the government handled the Lindh case, show that after an Army intelligence officer began to question Lindh, a Navy admiral told the intelligence officer that “the secretary of Defense’s counsel has authorized him to ‘take the gloves off’ and ask whatever he wanted.”

The memos regarding Lindh and the Baumgartner Dec. 2001 documents all remain classified. Jesselyn Radack has said in her book, The Canary in the Coalmine, that she has a copy of the Lindh memo, but nothing has been made public yet.

[Adding to the mystery, Ms. Radack's website promoting her book has gone off line or been purchased by someone else. Here's the cache of the page promoting her book; here's the current (broken) link. The book is not available or even listed at Amazon.com, either. This sudden disappearance comes only weeks after I ordered my own copy of Radack's book online at her website. Hmmm....]

I don't hold out much hope that anything but a sanitized version of the truth awaits us at September 24 hearings, but that doesn't mean we shouldn't put the heat on. But we'll have to have a better showing from the press than we have had thus far, if anything is to come from all this "investigation" but more cynicism and despair.

"The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars,
But in ourselves, that we are underlings."