Guantanamo Psychologist "Ban" Incomplete, Evidence of FBI Torture Ignored

While it is certainly a victory, or partial victory, to have psychologists removed from national security interrogations at Guantanamo, as James Risen reports in The New York Times, it turns out psychologists are not actually completely removed from that Cuban-based prison facility.

Note the careful wording of Risen's story (bold emphasis added):

The United States military has sharply curtailed the use of psychologists at the prison at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, in response to strict new professional ethics rules of the American Psychological Association, Pentagon officials said.

Gen. John F. Kelly, the head of the United States Southern Command, which oversees Guantánamo, has ordered that psychologists be withdrawn from a wide range of activities dealing with detainees at the prison because of the new rules of the association, the nation’s largest professional organization for psychologists. The group approved the rules this past summer.

Risen's article relates a statement by SOUTHCOM spokeswoman, Navy Cmdr. Karin Burzynski, which explains that the removal of psychologists was due to APA's new policy about psychologists and national security interrogations, and the military was concerned about possible licensing or ethics board charges for military psychologists.

Those new APA rules state: "in keeping with Principle A (Beneficence and Nonmaleficence) of the Ethics Code to 'take care to do no harm,' psychologists shall not conduct, supervise, be in the presence of, or otherwise assist any national security interrogations for any military or intelligence entities, including private contractors working on their behalf, nor advise on conditions of confinement insofar as these might facilitate such an interrogation. This prohibition does not apply to domestic law enforcement interrogations or detention settings that are unrelated to national security interrogations."

Hence, in my reading it seems as if psychologists could be allowed at Guantanamo, in order to advise on conditions of confinement insofar as such advice does not "facilitate" interrogation. Perhaps that is what General Kelly is referring to when Risen quotes him as ordering psychologists withdrawal from "a wide range of activities dealing with detainees," i.e., not from all activities dealing with detainees.

As almost a side note, Risen quotes DoD's Burzynski as saying that all interrogations have now ceased at Guantanamo, except so-called "voluntary interviews" detainees wish with make to officials. No one questions how, at a facility under total control by the military, with detainees kept under conditions of indefinite detention (which themselves constitute torture), such "voluntary interviews" can be offered.

According to Risen, APA officers will meet with administration officials from the Pentagon and the High-Value Detainee Interrogation Group (HIG) later this month. In Risen's article, APA's Senior Policy Adviser Ellen Garrison seems to stand up to the Pentagon, and tell them APA will not change its policy to please them.

But back in 2008, when the APA membership voted on a petition to ban psychologists from sites like Guantanamo, Ms. Garrison worked with now-resigned Ethics chair Stephen Behnke to craft a "con" statement calling for defeat of the petition. It will be interesting to see how the old guard APA bureaucracy, now working with some of its former opponents on the interrogation issue, will address outstanding issues surrounding implementation of the new "ban."

But, no one is arguing for a total "ban" of psychologists from Guantanamo. Furthermore, it remains to be seen how anyone will be able to tell if the Pentagon stands by its word, not to mention how anyone will monitor the CIA for adherence to APA's new policy.

"Banned" psychologists and paper opposition

Risen's NYT article states, "Psychologists will still provide mental health care for American military personnel who work at the prison, which is allowed under the association’s rules."

Such psychologists apparently will continue to serve in a clinical function for troops or other U.S. personnel serving at the base, and presumably, the prison. This is indeed in line with the letter and spirit of "Resolution 23B," which mandated the new association rules (PDF), including a provision that psychologists could remain "at the Guantánamo Bay detention facility, 'black sites,' vessels in international waters, or sites where detainees are interrogated under foreign jurisdiction" if "providing treatment to military personnel."

That particular exception was a weakness with the resolution. Nevertheless, the resolution passed overwhelmingly by the APA's Council of Representatives last August was supported by anti-torture psychologists, such as those at Coalition for an Ethical Psychology and Psychologists for Social Responsibility (PsySR). But the resolution's "ban" still allows for Guantanamo to function, and for psychologists to work there if "providing treatment to military personnel." I believe that aspect was a compromise made to get support for the resolution as a whole, and has been a matter of compromise between pro-participation and anti-participation forces within APA for some years now. But with the new resolution passed changing rules on interrogations, there is no reason not to take up this broader issue now.

It is disturbing to see the responses to this development by press and anti-torture activists and not see any condemnation of the American Psychiatric Association (APsyA) or the American Medical Association (AMA) for their paper opposition to use of their membership in interrogations, as apparently psychiatrists (along with other nurses and technicians) are to replace psychologists in detainee interrogation, detention and/or detainee clinical matters.

Indeed, I've searched high and low to find any mainstream critic of U.S. interrogation policy or torture denounce the hypocrisy of APsyA or AMA in this matter. One partial exception is Stephen Miles, author of Oath Betrayed: America's Torture Doctors. Miles has called out AMA for a lack of leadership on the question of doctors working for the CIA interrogation program, and in general has assailed the field for its silence on medical participation in or planning of torture. But I have not seen a similar criticism by anyone of APsyA's failure to enforce its own policy banning psychiatrists from work at Guantanamo.

The fact remains, to date, no U.S. medical professional has ever been held accountable for their role in the "war on terror" torture scandal.

FBI interrogations and torture

Nor does the new policy stated by DoD have any bearing on interrogations conducted by CIA, foreign intelligence services, or the FBI. Obama's 2009 reforms of the Bush-Cheney era torture interrogations meant shutting down CIA's long-term black sites, and resting interrogation policy on the relevant Army Field Manual and ongoing reliance on rendition of "terror" suspects to interrogation and detention by foreign intelligence services ("extraordinary rendition").

But the Army Field Manual has been condemned by the UN's Committee Against Torture as containing abusive forms of interrogation, even as Congress has enshrined it in U.S. law. And human rights groups and legal groups have assailed the empty "assurances" of foreign governments that renditioned prisoners will not be tortured or abused.

Meanwhile, the role of the FBI in coercive interrogations is something that has been completely passed over. Previously, there were reports of torture of renditioned prisoners in the aftermath of the 2010 World Cup bombing in Kampala, Uganda. The FBI's activity in the latter investigation was said to be the largest between that time and 9/11. A number of prisoners renditioned from Kenya and Tanzania have accused the FBI of torture under interrogation in Uganda, including death threats and physical abuse by FBI agents.

One such affidavit of torture in my possession, by Kenyan national Yahya Suleiman Mbuthia, details such alleged FBI torture. The claims are consistent with charges by other prisoners also interrogated in the Kampala bombing.

"... [FBI] officers said, "Don't lie to us -- we know everything about you. We will finish your family -- first your wife and then your two kids..."

"... one (1) FBI officer, with blue eyes, cocked his gun as if he were going to shoot me, saying that there was a bullet inside with my name on it.... the same officer told me he would kill me or leave me to rot in Luzira."

"... I was severely ill-treated during interrogation, including having an FBI officer standing behind me hitting me on the back of the head with his fist... when the FBI wanted to do their dirty work, they would ask the Ugandans to leave, and by dirty work I mean beating, forcing me to sign papers and threatening me...."

"... during interrogation, if I refused to do something, I would be hooded for 30 minutes to an hour, during which time FBI officers would cock their guns as if they were about to shoot me..."

In a separate affidavit, another Kenyan national, Idris Magondu, who also was renditioned to Uganda and interrogated by both Ugandan police and FBI, wrote, "after the Court appearance at which I was not represented by legal Counsel, I was ordered to be remanded to Luzira Upper Prison where the FBI officers interrogated me several times... during the interrogations, the FBI officers shouted and threatened me, telling me that President Museveni had ordered his army to kill me, and the officers were banging on the table and were very aggressive."

According to Magondu, "one of the FBI officers had a pistol which he kept drawing my attention to."

In November 2012, Open Society Justice Initiative released a report on human rights abuses by the FBI in the wake of the World Cup bombing. In June 2013, the FBI responded to the OSJI report: "The FBI has found these claims to be without merit, because no evidence was identified by the FBI or any other independent entity to support them. The type of abuse alleged is wholly contrary to the FBI’s policy on interrogating suspects in foreign countries. The FBI’s policy is consistent with internationally recognized standards of conduct such as those set forth in Common Article 3 of the Geneva Conventions."

OSJI noted in its own response, "the FBI has not provided sufficient detail regarding its investigation of the allegations of detainee abuse by the FBI in Uganda or its basis for the conclusion that the allegations are without merit."

FBI and Mitchell-Jessen

FBI officials also figured prominently in the APA-initiated "independent" review of APA's activities around the interrogation-torture scandal. The report produced by Chicago attorney David H. Hoffman (large PDF), despite mainstream accolades, was a limited hangout on the torture issue, as it minimized or explained away for top U.S. psychologists collaboration with the CIA. Such minimization included the fact a former APA president had been part of the partnership of Mitchell-Jessen and Associates, contractors to the CIA's torture machine. Hoffman found this fact unworthy of further investigation in relation to APA's ethics.

But Hoffman and his investigators uncovered a wealth of new information which APA subsequently has posted on its website. This material shows what the report only covers tangentially, that is, that top FBI psychologists worked closely with APA, CIA and the military in discussing interrogation matters, including detection of deception that could affected by use of sensory overload or use of drugs in interrogation.

At the close of 2004 report on a July 2003 APA-CIA-RAND workshop, "The Science of Deception: Integration of Theory and Practice," there is a list of participants, and we can see that top FBI psychologists, such as then-FBI Behavioral Science Unit Chief Stephen Band and Anthony Pinizzotto, attended along with other academics and CIA officers, including psychologist Kirk Hubbard and psychiatrist Andy Morgan, and CIA contractors James Mitchell and Bruce Jessen.

The report was marked "Not for distribution."

"Research challenges" discussed at the 2003 meeting included "What pharmacological agents are known to affect apparent truth-telling behavior?" and "How might we overload the system or overwhelm the sense and see how it affects deceptive behaviors?"

Participants also discussed how to manipulate or increase subjects's anxieties. They also proposed research to discover "how interrogators might take advantage of some of the transference and counter-transference strategies used by psychotherapists."

A fuller analysis of this document awaits, but who will attempt it?

Hoffman passed without comment over this material. APA anti-torture activists (including former APA members who quit over the APA's interrogation policy) have not seen fit to comment either on the documented collaboration of the APA with key FBI officials, or on the release of this document. Even when it was revealed that James Mitchell had been invited as an expert to February 2002 FBI conference at its Quantico headquarters, links between FBI and the CIA torture program have been ignored. (Mitchell's invite came almost two months before he went to the CIA black site in Thailand and helped initiate the CIA's "enhanced interrogation" torture program.)

Part of the issue is that the mainstream narrative is that FBI agents, such as Ali Soufan, blew the whistle on CIA torture. While some FBI agents were queasy about torture techniques used by both the Department of Defense and the CIA, it seems there's a lot of house cleaning to do within the agency itself.

Even the story of Soufan's protest at Mitchell and Jessen's intervention in the interrogation of Abu Zubaydah is more nuanced than normally reported. For instance, Soufan told a Senate panel in May 2009 that his interrogation techniques with Zubaydah were not compliant with Geneva Common Article 3. In fact, Soufan said none of the FBI's interrogations were so compliant after 9/11. (See video of back and forth between Soufan and Sen. Lindsey Graham, beginning at 2:17, downloadable at this link.)

Doctors who said "no"

During the Vietnam War, there were doctors who refused to serve a corrupt and evil military regime. Navy doctor, Captain Howard Levy was court-martialed, not because he refused to torture, but to even serve as a trainer for Special Forces personnel. According to a follow-up story from 2002 in the New York Times, Levy survived his court-martial to carve out a career in medicine.

How was Levy's refusal to serve the military fighting an imperialist war in Vietnam any different really from the question of whether or not doctors or psychologists or nurses should refuse to serve in Guantanamo or other black sites? Capt. Levy charged (according to a legal look at his case) "that had he trained the [Special Forces] aidmen he would have been complicitous in war crimes committed by Special Forces."

Nor was Levy alone. An essay from the book Military Medical Ethics documents that more than 300 U.S. medical students and young doctors signed a pledge not to serve in the Armed Forces in Vietnam during that conflict.

Will APA, which is rumored to be assembling a new ethics panel to consider future ethics policy, continue to allow psychologists to still serve military forces at Guantanamo or other interrogation sites? It would seem so, if one considers recent activities around reforming psychological ethics.

[Note on personal connection to this subject: I have at times been a member of PsySR, and remain active on their listserv.]

Senate Amendment Calls for a Return to Bush-Era Torture

Originally posted by Jeffrey Kaye at Truthout

Ayotte amendment on secret torture overshadows abuse problems with "Army Field Manual."

An amendment by Sen. Kelly Ayotte (R-New Hampshire) to the current Defense Authorization Bill (SA 1068) now before Congress would roll back the 2009 Obama executive order against torture by re-establishing a secret "classified" set of interrogation techniques and then attaching them to the current "Army Field Manual" on human intelligence collection. But whether the amendment passes or not, the existence of certain interrogation techniques as used currently by the US military and intelligence services in the "Manual" do not comply with international norms, such as the Geneva Conventions.

A recent United Kingdom high court ruling on the use of hooding prisoners as a detention or interrogation technique indicated that use of any form of sensory obstruction, such as use of blindfolds, goggles or earmuffs, in place of hooding, which is outlawed, could only be temporary and "only for the time and extent necessary to preserve operational security." British military and security officers are directed not to work with governments that do not observe these rules.

Yet currently, use of goggles and earmuffs as a form of sensory deprivation used on prisoners is part of "Appendix M" of the "Army Field Manual." Their use is part of something called "Field Expedient Separation," and only to be used on "war on terror" detainees, who are deemed not subject to Geneva Conventions protections. Their purpose is beyond "operational" or security based and is meant to "Prolong the shock of capture ... and foster a feeling of futility."

The abusive use of sensory deprivation through use of blinding goggles and earmuffs is made even more explicit in the "Appendix M" discussion of the 12-hour time limitation on "field expedient separation," wherein such "limit on duration does not include the time that goggles or blindfolds and earmuffs are used on detainees for security purposes during transit and evacuation," i.e., the time limits concern use of goggles/blindfolds/earmuffs for purposes of psychological derangement. In addition, the technique cannot be applied without medical staff present, because of the dangers involved.

Sensory deprivation studies have shown that psychological symptoms, including panic and hallucinations, can be produced within hours of the application of such techniques.

A "Hooding" Substitute

In a "Statement on Hooding," written by the International Forensic Experts Group (IFEG) of the International Rehabilitation Council for Torture Victims and presented to the UK high court in its deliberations, hooding was described as "a form of torture and/or cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment or punishment (CIDT) [recognized] by a number of international and regional human rights bodies," and "a form of sensory deprivation that is associated with a number of physical and psychological effects and also may have significant adverse legal consequences."

The effects include psychological symptoms such as anxiety and claustrophobia. Hooding also "increases the likelihood of severe physical pain, injury and subsequent disability as it increases an individual's vulnerability to other methods of torture by preventing the anticipation of harm such as kicks and punches and subsequent defensive response."

While the US "Army Field Manual" forbids the use of hooding, it appears to have merely substituted parallel forms of abuse, as Field Expedient Separation mimics the effects of hooding. Indeed, the IFEG notes, "Hooding in this statement also refers to other equivalent forms of sensory deprivation such as the use of goggles or blindfolds and earmuffs."

Dr. Vincent Iacopino, the lead author of the IFEG statement, told Truthout in an email, "Although the DoD [Department of Defense] may not consider the use of goggles and earmuffs as a form of sensory deprivation, the IFEG Statement does.... Since the IFEG Statement makes clear that the use of goggles and earmuffs is a form of sensory deprivation, equivalent to hooding, that constitutes CIDT and, under some circumstances, torture, it should be clear that we consider the DoD's use of goggles and earmuffs a form of CIDT and/or torture as well." (Emphasis added.)

Interestingly, when the "Army Field Manual" was being rewritten in 2005 and 2006, the procedures used in its "Appendix M," which also includes use of solitary confinement (isolation up to 30 days or more), sleep deprivation and manipulation of "environmental conditions, were initially meant to be included in a "secret annex" to the manual. Apparently, there are some in the military or intelligence services who wish the decision to make "Appendix M" public had never been made. In fact, there is no indication as to what the fate of this little known appendix would be should Ayotte's amendment pass.

Secret Torture and "Enhanced Interrogation"

There is little question that the proposed "classified annex" would mean a return to the "enhanced interrogation" torture (EIT) practiced by the Bush administration, including use of waterboarding, water dousing (induction of hypothermia), stress positions, extreme sleep deprivation, various forms of physical abuse, confinement in a box, and more. Sen. Lindsay Graham, one of three Republican senators co-sponsoring the Ayotte amendment, hinted as much in a November 11 article at the National Review where he labeled President Obama's executive order stopping the EITs a "major mistake."

Graham called the EITs "consistent with our national values," and lauded the fact they "remain unknown to our enemies." (In fact, the EITs were later exposed and are as available online as the "Army Field Manual" is. See here and here.) But some veteran interrogators and a number of former military officers have expressed their opposition to Ayotte's amendment, this despite the fact that Ayotte ties the new secret interrogation rules to use by Obama's High-Value Interrogation Group (HIG), a fact little mentioned in press accounts.

Former interrogator Matthew Alexander, author of "How to Break a Terrorist," told Truthout in an email exchange that he was unaware of any secret annex on interrogation related to the HIG. Additionally, he added,  "I'm against a secret annex and sensory deprivation outside of transport," he said, adding he believes "more, in-depth cultural training [of interrogators] is needed to eradicate prejudice."

Alexander noted, "I have been searching for a Muslim interrogator in the Army for five years and have yet to find one (compared to WW II where about 70% of interrogators were ethnic Americans - Japanese, German, Italian, Austrian, etc.)," noting he supports an "emphasis on what is now being called the Informed Interrogation Method, which Ali Soufan has advocated."

In an exchange of op-eds with Mr. Alexander at The New York Times in January 2010, Sen. Dianne Feinstein indicated that the Obama administration was reviewing the varied complaints against "Appendix M." No public result of this review was ever released and a recent query to Senator Feinstein's office by Truthout regarding the fate of the review was not answered.

What Kind of Standard Is the "Army Field Manual"?

While the Ayotte amendment represents an appetite by some in government to return to a more unbridled form of torture, the current "Army Field Manual" is not "a respected standard that put an end to torture as an interrogation practice," as it was described recently in a column opposing the Ayotte amendment by Rev. Richard Killmer of the National Religious Campaign Against Torture (NRCAT). In a recent emailing to supporters, also opposing Ayotte's amendment, Physicians for Human Rights (PHR) referred to the "Army Field Manual" as the "gold standard" for interrogation.

Yet, both NRCAT and PHR have openly criticized the "Army Field Manual" and its "Appendix M" at other times in the past (see here and here), as have other human rights groups, including Human Rights First, Center for Constitutional Rights, Amnesty International, and others. It is an indication of how far the interrogation discussion has drifted to the right that criticism of the manual has been dropped in order to defend it against a likely return to the days of secret interrogation techniques used by the Bush/Cheney White House, DoD and the CIA.

Kathleen Long, a spokeswoman for the Senate Armed Services Committee, told Truthout, "We expect strong opposition to the amendment" in the Senate. Senator Ayotte has complained that her critics do not notice that any proposed classified techniques stemming from her amendment must abide by the laws against torture, including those in the UN Convention Against Torture treaty and the 2005 Detainee Treatment Act. But these laws have been interpreted in such a fashion that the definitions of torture and cruel, inhumane and degrading treatment have been eviscerated from their original meanings.

Dr. Stephen Miles, professor and Maas family endowed chair in bioethics, Center for Bioethics at the University of Minnesota, and a noted anti-torture author and activist, told Truthout, "The Army Field Manual is not an authoritative reference work on torture. The United States has adjusted its definitions of terms in international law to make its practices appear to comply with international law even in instances where we have called such acts 'torture' or unacceptable (i.e., cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment) when practiced by other nations. The United States is out of compliance with numerous conventions pertaining to the treatment of prisoners."

This work by Truthout is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 3.0 United States License.

U.S. Government Suppressing Reports of Prisoner Deaths

DoD has completely suppressed prisoner death reports from Afghanistan since 2004 and adopted a similar policy for Iraq in 2008.

This is the conclusion of Dr. Steven Miles in an not-yet released article in the American Journal of Bioethics. The quote comes from an important story by Daphne Eviatar in today's Washington Independent.

The New York Times also reported back in 2004 that the Defense Department had provided incomplete or inaccurate information about deaths of prisoners in its custody.

I’ve asked several different spokesmen at the Department of Defense over the last few days to respond to this charge, to explain its policy for reporting detainee deaths, and to explain if that policy has changed since 2003. So far, I have received no response.

But Devon Chaffee, Advocacy Counsel at Human Rights First, which reported in 2006 on about 100 deaths in U.S. custody since 2002 that it was able to learn about, was not surprised.

“Our report found that commanders failed to report deaths in custody. Sometimes they reported them days or weeks later. But there clearly was a reporting problem. Some were simply not reported at all,” she added, although Army regulations require that any deaths in U.S. custody be reported within 24 hours.

Dr. Miles, author of “Oath Betrayed: Torture, Medical Complicity and America’s War on Terror, has been tracking the issue of prisoner deaths for years. In his new article, he will report that by the end of 2008 over 50% of known decedents in Iraqi prisons were unnamed, and less than a quarter even had a death certificate. Now, reports have stopped. Eviatar notes that Obama's Department of Defense has not "resumed regular reporting on the deaths of prisoners in custody."

What kind of barbarous country is the United States? Prisoners who die must remain anonymous, ghostly, invisible witnesses to an imperial policy of war and conquest. And back home? The President of the United States says that when it comes to crimes like torture, the country should "look forward," and forgive those who thought they were only following orders. While I am a total supporter of the need for 100% socialized medicine and health care, the population is so insensate that the worst sort of inhuman crimes and policies pass by unremarked, as the population remains fixated on the difficult health care struggle, as if it couldn't pay attention to much else or its ability to think or act politically on more than one thing would cause their heads to explode.

No treaty is too sacrosanct that it can't be ignored. No crime is too great, if committed under the red, white and blue. No issue carries any importance if it doesn't touch the sacred lives of Americans.

"Bad Apples"? The Interrogation of Abu Ghraib Internee #151363

The following is an example of the requested approval for exceptions to the interrogation policy at Abu Ghraib, in this case made on behalf ofthe interrogation plan for internee #15163, a (presumably young) Syrian male. Such requests meant that extraordinary means were to be used, i.e., torture, and needed, per Pentagon policy, approval by the higher ups. This request was made by Col. Thomas Pappas, commander of the 205th Military Intelligence Brigade, Iraq, to Lt. Gen. Ricardo Sanchez.

The version here comes from scvhistory.com. A big H/T for my finding this document goes to Dr. Steven Miles, where a large excerpt and analysis of the document can be found on pp. 56-57 of his excellent book, Oath Betrayed: America's Torture Doctors (UC Press, 2009).

Miles notes:

It is reasonable to infer that a behavioral scientist helped design this proposal. At the time is was written, the Abu Ghraib BSCT [Behavioral Science Consultation Team] was functional and psychological monitoring of interrogations was being done. The plan contains a psycho-cultural approach to exploiting a prisoner's religion.

As you read, note the integration of MPs into the interrogation "plan." When the guards said they were instructed by military intelligence and others to "soften up" the prisoners, they were given short shrift by the media and the public. Here is documentary proof of planning of the Abu Ghraib torure from high up, and only months before the scandal over it broke.

In the following document, I have taken the liberty of emphasizing some text in bold.

MEMORANDUM THRU Commander, CJTF- , ATTN: C2 (AETV-CJ2), BG(P) Fast, Victory Base, Iraq, APO AE 09342

Commander, CJTF- , ATTN: StaffJudge Advocate (AETV-JA), COL Warren, Victory Base, Iraq, APO AE 09342

FOR Commander, CJTF- 7, LTG Sanchez, Victory Base, Iraq, APO AE 09342

SUBJECT: Request for Exception to CJTF- 7 Interrogation and Counter Resistance Policy

1. Request exception to the CJTF - 7 Interrogation and Counter Resistance Policy to authorize the Joint Interrogation and Debriefing Center (JDIC) interrogator to be authorized to use the Fear up Harsh and isolation approaches during interrogations with the following detainee.

a. Name: J[redacted] K[redacted]

b. ISN: 151363

c. Date request employment of approach: As soon as possible.

d. Circumstances of capture: Detainee is a Syrian male [redacted] years of age, captured in an attempted IED attack in Baghdad, IZ. Detainee is an admitted foreign fighter who came to commit Jihad against Coalition Forces in Iraq. He was captured with [approx. four words redacted] and [approx. three words redacted] while attempting to set up an IED.

e. Assessment of detainee: Detainee is at the point where he is resigned to the hope that Allah will see him through this episode in his life, therefore he feels no need to speak with interrogators. Detainee will not answer open ended questions, has a smug attitude and is running counter approaches on interrogators. Detainee needs to be put in a position where he will feel that the only option to get out of jail is to speak with interrogators.

f. Potential information: Detainee can provide information related to safe houses facilitators, financing, recruitment and operations of foreign fighter smuggling into Iraq. Detainee can also potentially provide names and target information of local facilitators in Ar-Ramadi. Detainee can also confirm information provided from others captured with him.

g. Limitations of approach: Detainee will be interrogated in the Camp Vigilant Steel site. Detainee argues that Allah is the only one that can decide his fate. Interrogators will establish control of detainee by allowing detainee to take this stance then implement a Fear up harsh approach. Interrogators will reinforce the fact that we have attempted to help him time and time again and that they are now putting it in Allah' s hands. Interrogators will at a maximum throw tables, chairs, invade his personal space and continuously yell at the detainee. Interrogators will not physically touch or harm the detainee, will take all necessary precautions that all thrown objects are clear of the detainee and will not coerce the detainee in any way. If the detainee has not broken yet, interrogators will move into the segregation phase of the approach. Interrogators will coordinate with Military Police guards in the segregation area prior to initiation of this phase. For the segregation phase of the approach the MPs will put an empty sandbag onto the prisoners head before moving him out of Vigilant B. This measure will be for force protection purposes and transporting the detainee to the segregation area by HMMWV. MPs will be transporting the detainee with the interrogators present. During transportation, the Fear up Harsh approach will be continued, highlighting the Allah factor. Interrogators will take all necessary precautions in conjunction with the MPs to ensure detainees safety during transport. Upon arrival at site, MP guards will take him into custody. MP working dogs will be present and barking during this phase. Detainee will be strip searched by guards with the empty sandbag over his head for the safety of himself, prison guards, interrogators and other prisoners. Interrogators will wait outside the room while detainee is strip searched. Interrogators will watch from a distance while detainee is placed in the segregation cell. Detainee will be put on the adjusted sleep schedule (attached) for 72 hours. Interrogations will be conducted continuously during this 72 hour period. The approaches which will be used during this phase will include, fear up harsh, pride and ego down, silence and loud music. Stress positions will also be used in accordance with CJTF- 7 IROE in order to intensify the approach.

2. The approval for this approach is essential due to the information this detainee possesses. It will greatly enhance and expedite the collection effort in support of CJTF - 7 Intelligence requirements and could potentially save countless lives of American soldiers in the future.

3. POC for this action is CPT Fitch, 205th MI Bde SJA at DNVT 302-559-4031 or via SIPR at c5cm205misia@205mi.c5.army.smil.mil or CPT Wood, JIDC Interrogation OIC, at DNVT 302-559- 1764 or via SlPR at Carolyn.wood@us.army.smil.mil.

THOMAS M. PAPPAS
COL, MI
Commanding

Exception to the CJTF- 7 Interrogation and Counter Resistance Policy is granted/not granted.

AETV-MI
SUBJECT:
Request for Exception to CJTF - 7 Interrogation and Counter Resistance Policy

RICARDO S. SANCHEZ
LTG, USA
Commanding

This document totally destroys the "bad apple" theory of the torture, if it hasn't been adequately destroyed already. But sometimes documents speak their own tremulous truth, in ways that even well-written journalism cannot.

Feel free to pass this one around.

How APA Made a Pact with DoD & CIA over Torture Interrogations

Also posted at Firedoglake

Author's note, 4/29/09: This post's text contains five editorial corrections, two by strikeout, and three by adding a small amount of additional text (in brackets). The corrections were made after feedback from Dr. Jean Maria Arrigo, relating to mischaracterizations I made regarding a few facts about her actions and background. I regret any discomfort this may have caused Dr. Arrigo.

Dr. Steven Miles, the author of Oath Betrayed - America's Torture Doctors, and a prominent bioethicist at the University of Minnesota, has released the text of an open letter he has written to Dr. Stephen Behnke, Ethics Director of the American Psychological Association (APA), and Dr. Gerald Koocher, 2006 APA President.

Miles asks Behnke and Koocher "to publically urg[e] the APA to conduct a transparent review of how" it came to give a platform to "senior Department of Defense officials who were intimately involved in the support, protection, and implementation of corrupted interrogation standards." Behnke and Koocher are singled out as having "leadership roles in the APA’s relationship to... [torture] interrogations."

Miles is speaking most specifically about the PENS Task Force, established by the American Psychological Association in Spring 2005. PENS stands for Psychological Ethics and National Security. The Task Force was formed by the APA bureaucracy, with the following charge:

[E]xamine whether our current Ethics Code adequately addresses [the ethical dimensions of psychologists’ involvement in national security-related activities], whether the APA provides adequate ethical guidance to psychologists involved in these endeavors, and whether APA should develop policy to address the role of psychologists and psychology in investigations related to national security.

Dr. Miles asks Koocher and Behnke:

What were the formative contacts between DoD and APA that led to the creation of the PENS Task Force?

Who nominated and selected the members of the PENS Task Force?

What were the back channel communications between APA and DoD officials as the PENS Task Force Report was drafted and modified?

The answers to these questions cannot undo the damage but they are needed for those who can work to prevent such recruitment of a health professional organization in the future.

Miles has called for the APA to form its own "Truth Commission," joining the call of Psychologists for Social Responsibility for an investigation into the use of SERE, DoD, and CIA psychologists for Bush's torture program, and ties between APA and the implementation of the controversial interrogations policy.

PENS' Role in the Interrogation Scandal

The APA and the PENS Task Force may be a linchpin between the use of psychologists in the torture program and the higher-ups who were determined to implement such a program. In a way, DoD showed their hand, anxious to stamp down any dissent within the ranks of organized psychology, by stacking the composition of the PENS Task Force with military personnel, with Koocher and Behnke their willing accomplices. In the end, six of the nine members of the PENS TF were related to military activities, a clear majority.

One of military PENS participants was showcased in the Senate Armed Services Committee Report released last week. Lt. Col. Louie "Morgan" Banks, in 2002, the Chief Psychologist for U.S. Special Forces Command, was writing emails warning about the dangers of using SERE techniques in actual interrogation situations (see email from Banks to Major Paul Bruney at Gitmo, 10/2/02), even as only a month before, Banks was a key figure in organizing a training for Guantanamo psychologists and interrogators to learn SERE techniques!

At the time of the PENS meetings, Banks was also the senior SERE psychologist, and, as the internal opposition to official APA interrogations policy, the Coalition for an Ethical Psychology (CFEP) noted, "responsible for the training and oversight of all Army SERE Psychologists." It seemed strange at the time, but further revelations have made the appointment of Banks to the APA task force studying the appropriateness of psychologists participating in DoD interrogations more than simply suspicious.

Banks was not the only suspect member of the task force. In an FAQ on the subject, CFEP discussed another prominent PENS participant:

Scott Shumate, Ph.D. was, at the time of PENS, the chief psychologist for the Counterintelligence Field Activity (CIFA), the intelligence arm of the DoD. From April 2001 until May of 2003 he was the chief operational psychologist for the CIA’s Counter Terrorism Center (CTC), and held that position during the period when [James] Mitchell and [Bruce] Jessen were contracted by the CTC to introduce SERE-based techniques into CIA counterterrorist operations.

The cast of dubious participants only grows, and the suspicion that the fix was in grew even upon the few non-military members of the PENS group. Looking around them, they started to feel uncomfortable, seeing the likes of Banks; Shumate; Col. Larry James (former Chief Psychologist for the Joint Intelligence Group (JIG) at Guantánamo, Jan-May 2003); former SERE psychologist/trainer, Captain Bryce Lefever, who had worked as a consultant to Special Forces in Afghanistan during the 2002 invasion; and Robert A. Fein, Ph.D., who worked as a consultant to Counterintelligence Field Activity (CIFA) on "effective" interrogation methods, and was a subordinate of Shumate's. (See bios for all PENS members here.)

The whole set-up felt wrong to two of the non-military members of the task force. When one of them, Dr. Jean Maria Arrigo, heard that no one would be allowed to take written notes at the PENS meetings, she secretly wrote notes on napkins [was rebuked by Scott Shumate for taking notes on the first day of meetings, she continued taking some notes anyway,] and made efforts to secure the communications from the TF's list-serv, which she deposited later at the Hoover Institution, and gave copies to the Senate Armed Services Committee, and apparently selected human rights groups, activists, and reporters.

What kind of material was discussed behind the scenes by the PENS participants? Well, here's one example, a message from Dr. Koocher to the PENS group:

May 6, 2005: “In many of the circumstances we will discuss when we meet the psychologist’s role may bear on people who are not ‘clients’ in the traditional sense. Example, the psychologist employed by the CIA, Secret Service, FBI, etc., who helps formulate profiles for risk prevention, negotiation strategy, destabilization, etc., or the psychologist asked to assist interrogators in eliciting data or detecting dissimulation with the intent of preventing harm to many other people. In this case the client is the agency, government, and ultimately the people of the nation (at risk). The goal of such psychologists’ work will ultimately be the protection of others (i.e., innocents) by contributing to the incarceration, debilitation, or even death of the potential perpetrator, who will often remain unaware of the psychologists’ involvement.”

"Even the death of the potential perpetrator"! "The debilitation"! One should remember, these are the pronouncements of the President of the American Psychological Association to his blue-ribbon (DoD-stacked) panel. They are also the words of someone undergoing a profound moral degeneration. This was amplified when, after Dr. Arrigo went public with her criticisms, Koocher labeled her actions "the sad emotional aftermath of a troubled upbringing complicated by the suicide of a parent who engaged behaviors she now abhors."

Of course, [I cannot know if Dr. Arrigo had a "troubled upbringing."] Dr. Arrigo had no "troubled upbringing." Her father was no criminal, nor was he even dead! I guess when you are caught out, your own actions can go to some fairly hysterical places. [Dr. Arrigo adds that at the time Dr. Koocher made his allegations, she was in "cordial contact" with her father.]

Another PENS participant, Dr. Michael Wessels, Professor of Clinical Population and Family Health at Columbia University, ultimately resigned from PENS Task Force itself, the only member to do so. In a letter to PENS chair Olivia Moorehead-Slaughter, he explained:

Out of ethical concerns, I have decided to step down from the PENS Task Force because continuing work with the Task Force tacitly legitimates the wider silence and inaction of the APA on the crucial issues at hand. At the highest levels, the APA has not made a strong, concerted, comprehensive, public and internal response of the kind warranted by the severe human rights violations at Abu Ghraib and Guantánamo Bay. The PENS Task Force had a very limited mandate and was not structured in a manner that would provide the kind of comprehensive response or representative process needed.

There was plenty more evidence of high-level APA and governmental interest in keeping the lid on the PENS process, such that the conclusion of the PENS Task Force was foreordained: there was nothing unethical about psychologist participation in the interrogations process then underway at various DoD sites. In fact, psychologist participation was about securing safety for the prisoners, and giving expertise to the process.

This must have been good news to the various mucky-mucks who attended the PENS sessions in order to observe. These unofficial attendees included the Director of the APA Practice Directorate, Russ Newman; as well as four members from the APA's Science Policy or Science Directorate, Susan Brandon, Steven Breckler, Heather Kelly, Geoff Mumford, among others. According to Arrigo, it was unusual to have as observers "lobbyists on issues that overlapped with the mission of the Task Force."

Newman's presence raised some eyebrows, as his wife was Dr. Debra Dunivin, an active duty SERE psychologist working with Banks and James at Guantanamo. Conflict of interest anybody?

As Lt. Col. Banks wrote on the PENS Listserv on August 8, 2005, after the report was rushed through and approved:

Last Friday, I spent eight hours with the Army's Surgeon General, LTG Kiley, along with Larry James, Debra Dunivin, and several others. We were trying to establish the doctrinal guidelines and training model for psychologists performing this job. The TF [Task Force] report provided, again, a solid anchor to use in our deliberations.

The Army Surgeon General was involved, too? How far does the cast of characters of this incestuous menagerie extend?

Beyond PENS: The Bigger Picture of APA Subservience to National Security Programs

The appearance of the "observers" from the Science Directorate was notable, as these psychologists were key figures in APA lobbying of Defense Department funds. One of these figures, Susan Brandon, was working at the time of the PENS process for the White House Office of Science & Technology Policy. She has also worked for Mitre Corporation, and was once Senior Scientist at APA, as well as Program Officer for Affect and Biobehavioral Regulation at NIMH.

Brandon also has the dubious distinction of being one of the chief organizers of a CIA/RAND/APA workshop entitled the "Science of Deception: Integration of Practice and Theory", held in Arlington, VA, in July 2003. She shared organizational tasks for this affair with Kirk Hubbard, Chief of the Research & Analysis Branch, Operational Assessment Division of the CIA. One agenda item at this workshop was to discuss new ways to utilize drugs and sensory bombardment techniques to break down interrogatees.

Here's one example of the workshop's "thematic scenarios":

# How do we find out if the informant has knowledge of which s/he is not aware?

# How important are differential power and status between witness and officer?

# What pharmacological agents are known to affect apparent truth-telling behavior?....

# What are sensory overloads on the maintenance of deceptive behaviors? How might we overload the system or overwhelm the senses and see how it affects deceptive behaviors?

Some time back, I wrote to some of the key APA officials involved in this workshop, but they never responded to my queries. That includes an email to the APA ethics director, Stephen Behnke, as well.

Now that we've gotten to the truth drugs, the sensory overwhelm and "overload of [the] system", it feels time to stop, to wash off the ordure, if nothing else.

From the current perspective of recent revelations on the torture scandal, from the OLC memos to the release of the full SASC report, it's clear that there's much more to be revealed. For instance, what role did APA play in the operational planning that resulted in the various torture programs? (For it's also clear now, that there was more than one such program, i.e., the "enhanced interrogation program" outlined by the Bybee memo, and the JTF-GTMO interrogation plan forwarded to the Joint Chiefs of Staff by General James T. Hill, Commander at SOUTHCOM, in late October 2002.)

Will we ever hear more about the double game played by the likes of Banks? Or will we know the real behind-the-scenes story about PENS? What exactly did go on at that CIA/RAND/APA July 2003 meeting, and what psychologists, psychiatrists and others were present, discussing ways to implement torture? Will Susan Brandon be called to the stand? Or Scott Shumate? And then there are the charges by Jane Mayer and others that yet another former APA president, Martin Seligman, was involved in teaching theories of "learned helplessness" to SERE psychologists-cum-torturers, James Mitchell and Bruce Jessen.

We won't probably get to know much of this information unless investigations are begun, and soon, before all the dead bodies are buried, and the political opening for this vital social endeavor is closed for another generation.

Extra addition (5/9/09): Earlier this week the PENS e-mail listserv was posted online as part of an article simultaneously posted at Salon.com and ProPublica. Researchers and the curious are encouraged to check it out.

Full ICRC Report on CIA Prisoner Abuse Now Published Online

The New York Review of Books has now posted a full version of the "strictly confidential" February 2007 report by the International Committee of the Red Cross on CIA torture of "high-value detainees." The report was leaked in part by journalist Mark Danner, who wrote a review of the report in April 9 edition of the NYRB.

I subsequently reviewed Danner's article here at Invictus.

Danner makes the connections which I and others have made between these techniques and the study of torture and "brainwashing" undertaken by the CIA and the military over 50 years ago, which culminated in the codification of such procedures in the CIA counterintelligence interrogation KUBARK manual of the early 1960s.

The NY Review article also confirms the ABC news report of approximately a year ago that reported how each variation and application of the torture techniques was vetted by the White House.

The full ICRC report has a remarkable section on the participation of medical providers at the CIA interrogations. Joby Warrick and Julie Tate have an article posted at the Washington Post right now. According to the Post, the ICRC found the "participation [of medical officers] in some of the more harsh episodes to be a severe breach of medical ethics."

Medical officers who oversaw interrogations of terrorism suspects in CIA secret prisons committed gross violations of medical ethics and in some cases essentially participated in torture, the International Committee of the Red Cross concluded in a confidential report that labeled the CIA program "inhuman."

Health personnel offered supervision and even assistance as suspected al-Qaeda operatives were beaten, deprived of food, exposed to temperature extremes and subjected to waterboarding, the relief agency said in the 2007 report, a copy of which was posted on a magazine Web site yesterday. The report quoted one medical official as telling a detainee: "I look after your body only because we need you for information."

The news comes at the same time as highly regarded medical ethicist Steven Miles has released his second edition of his book documenting medical complicity in Bush's torture program, Oath Betrayed: America's Torture Doctors, which I will be reviewing here in the next week or so. This new edition "shows how interrogation psychologists may have moved from information-gathering to coercive experiments, warning all of us about a new direction in U.S. policy and military medicine--a direction that not so long ago was unthinkable."

"Medical Ethics and Torture: Revising the Declaration of Tokyo"

The following is a press release from The Lancet, describing an important new article on the question of medical ethics in relation to the torture of prisoners. It is reproduced here:

A Viewpoint in this week’s edition of The Lancet discusses how the 1975 Declaration of Tokyo, on Medical Ethics and Torture, could be further revised to make it more relevant to the world today — making sure that physicians who are complicit in torture of prisoners are held to account. The Viewpoint is written by Dr Steven Miles, Center for Bioethics, University of Minnesota, MN, USA, and Dr Alfred Freedman, New York Medical College, USA.

Medical complicity with torture and abuse of prisoners is common in the roughly 100 countries that practise torture. Physicians devise ways to keep physical scars to a minimum, certify prisoners as fit for abuse, monitor vital signs during mistreatment, and give approval to intensify abuse. A third to half of torture survivors report physicians overseeing the abuse; this number does not include those who do not see physicians being accomplices of the abuse and those who die of torture that a physician, either willingly or under coercion, certifies as death by natural causes. Many more physicians are complicit with abusing prisoners than work in programmes to treat torture survivors.

The World Medical Association’s (WMA) Declaration of Tokyo has been a landmark event in medical ethics. It was passed in 1975, and has undergone several revisions. The declaration condemns medical participation in torture, and cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment, or any act to diminish the ability of the victim to resist such treatment. It serves as a template for many medical codes. Although the WMA updated the Declaration of Tokyo in 2006, a revised version might further clarify medical roles and duties in countries where prisoners are abused.

The authors propose four manners in which the code should be revised. First, it should incorporate authoritative definitions of torture and cruel, inhuman, and degrading treatment, to harmonise this medical ethics code with international law and, thereby, communicate the accountability of physicians to international law. Second, a revision of the Declaration of Tokyo should incorporate some of the good ideas recently endorsed by various clinical societies — for example, a death certificate should be publicly posted for every death in custody, as is currently mandated for prisoners of war by a Geneva Convention. False or non-issued death certificates conceal torture. Third, a revision of the Declaration of Tokyo must commend ways for holding physicians professionally and criminally accountable for abetting abuse of prisoners — including those who flee the country where the abuse occurred and attempt to obtain a licence to practice elsewhere. Finally, a revision of the Declaration of Tokyo should be readable by a person with 12 years of education — the current version needs advanced collegiate-grade reading skills, with its average sentence containing more than 30 words.

The authors conclude: “The medical community is key to the campaign against torture. Governments that practice torture need complicity of prison medical personnel. Furthermore, a profound link exists between domestic torture and worldwide medical solidarity against torture. A physician community that acquiesces to abuses by its members undermines its credibility in protesting against foreign medical communities or colleagues who abet torture. Accordingly, physicians and their societies must act on their duty to promote prisoners’ wellbeing, access to prisons, skills at identifying abuse, and membership of civil society.”

Of special interest in Miles and Freedman's article is their delineation of what they call unofficial teaching definitions of torture and cruel, inhumane, and degrading treatment or punishment. (The article covers the de jure definitions, as well). These two categories are often buried in legalese and, therefore, confusion. Their "unofficial definition" is meant to cut through the obfuscations:

Torture is any act that intends to cause a prisoner to feel severe physical or mental pain or suffering. Torture occurs when a government official orders, supervises, consents to, allows, or performs acts that cause such pain or suffering.

Torture is unacceptable for any reason, including when it is used to:

-- obtain information or a confession from the tortured person or someone else or
-- punish the tortured person or someone else for an act that he or she has done or is suspected of having done or
-- frighten or coerce the tortured person or someone else or
-- discriminate against a race, religion, political belief
-- or any other reason

This definition does not include pain or suffering that is caused by legal prison conditions and sentences

Cruel, inhumane, or degrading treatment or punishment is any physical or mental abuse. Among other things, it includes depriving a prisoner of sight, hearing, and awareness of place or the passing of time.

Furthermore:

A physician [or any treating professional, such as a psychologist] should not:

-- assist with torture and cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment or punishment
-- be present when a prisoner is subject to, or threatened with, torture and cruel, inhumane, or degrading treatment
-- provide or withhold clinical facilities, equipment, supplies, or knowledge to support torture and cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment
-- assist procedures that aim to decrease a prisoner's ability to resist interrogation or punishment;
-- withhold, or threaten to withhold, medical assessment or treatment from a prisoner who is not cooperating with officials;
-- assist in certifying a prisoner's fitness for interrogation, treatment, or punishment that might harm that person's physical or mental health
-- assist in monitoring an interrogation, treatment, or punishment to advise officials to modify procedures that might harm a prisoner's physical or mental health.

Miles and Freedman note that there is a "pandemic of torture" going on in the world. The attempt to squeeze torture techniques into the U.S. Army Field Manual, and furthermore cover up the attempt, is only one aspect of this frightening spread of the torture cancer. Arm in arm with it, there is an attack on civil liberties in general, and a glorification of militarism and brutality in public life and political action. The invasion and attack on Gaza, the missile attacks by U.S. robot aircraft in Afghanistan and Pakistan, the massive death of civilians in Iraq, the Congo, Somalia, and elsewhere around the world are part and parcel of the torture ethic, which reduces human beings to mere things, despised objects, and victims of national greed and will.

American Psychological Association: An Object Lesson in Ethics Failure

Doctors and ethicists such as Steven Miles and Alfred Freedman, and their colleagues in human rights and medical organizations around the world are to be applauded for their attempts to turn back the tide of dehumanization and violence.

Compare this to the actions of the American Psychological Association, who, weeks now after the head judge at Guantanamo condemned the interrogation of Mohammad al-Qahtani as "torture", refuses to even utter a statement of condemnation or regret for the participation of one of its members, John Leso, in this abomination of an interrogation. Instead, they have dragged out an ethics investigation of this same individual for over a year. Meanwhile, the same institution is trying to pretend that it is suddenly interested in revamping an ethics clause (1.02) that allows its members to follow "authorities" who may command them to undertake actions that go against their ethics code.

If Stephen Behnke, the ethics director of APA, had any self-respect, or if the organization itself had any integrity, he would have resigned or been fired after the Crawford revelations on the al-Qahtani torture interrogation.

It certainly seems like the world is being swept by a pandemic of torture, war, and brutality. The primary sources of information for the populace do little to educate the public, or push fear and misinformation. These are terrible times, indeed. The new U.S. president proclaims this a time of progressive change and hope. But no president can undertake alone the massive social changes that are needed. That is up to each of us, and that is the message I believe Miles and Freedman are giving us. While international law and institutions press to change national deformations, each individual in each profession must take responsibility upon themselves to provide ethical leadership.

Top Bush Official Admits "We Tortured Qahtani"

"We tortured [Mohammed al-]Qahtani".... His treatment met the legal definition of torture. And that's why I did not refer the case [for prosecution]."

In a bombshell admission on the eve of the Senate hearings on Obama Attorney General nominee, Eric Holder, the Washington Post reports (in an article by Bob Woodward) that Susan Crawford, the convening authority of military commissions at Guantanamo since February 2007, investigated and determined that U.S. forces there tortured al-Qahtani during his imprisonment. The techniques included isolation, sleep deprivation, forced nudity, use of "working dogs", and prolonged exposure to cold, among other torture techniques.

Crawford, 61, said the combination of the interrogation techniques, their duration and the impact on Qahtani's health led to her conclusion. "The techniques they used were all authorized, but the manner in which they applied them was overly aggressive and too persistent. . . . You think of torture, you think of some horrendous physical act done to an individual. This was not any one particular act; this was just a combination of things that had a medical impact on him, that hurt his health. It was abusive and uncalled for. And coercive. Clearly coercive. It was that medical impact that pushed me over the edge" to call it torture, she said....

"I think the buck stops in the Oval Office."

Crawford also says not everyone at Guantanamo was tortured, but admits that its difficult for anyone to believe the government at this point. She lays the blame for the abuse at the feet of Rumsfeld and Bush.

Al-Qahtani became practically a household name when it was revealed that he was Detainee #063. Logs of the torture sessions were published in Time Magazine. Steven Miles wrote up al-Qahtani's case in the American Journal of Bioethics. Miles has meticulously documented the participation of doctors and other medical personnel, particularly psychologists, in the U.S. torture program. Al-Qahtani's case was a horrific exemplar of that dangerous collaboration:

In October 2002, before the time covered by the log, Army investigators found that dogs were brought to the interrogation room to growl, bark and bare their teeth at al-Qahtani. The investigators noted that a BSCT psychologist witnessed the use of the dog, Zeus, during at least one such instance, an incident deemed properly authorized to “exploit individual phobias"....

Major L. [John Leso], a psychologist who chaired the BSCT at Guantanamo, was noted to be present at the start of the interrogation log. On November 27, he suggested putting the prisoner in a swivel chair to prevent him from fixing his eyes on one spot and thereby avoiding the guards....

Many psychological “approaches” or “themes” were repetitively used. These included: “Failure/Worthless,” “Al Qaeda Falling Apart,” “Pride Down,” “Ego Down,” “Futility,” “Guilt/Sin Theme... Al-Qahtani was shown videotapes entitled “Taliban Bodies” and “Die Terrorist Die.” Some scripts aimed at his Islamic identity bore names such as “Good Muslim,” “Bad Muslim,” “Judgment Day,” “God’s Mission” and “Muslim in America"....

Although continuously monitored, interrogators repeatedly strip-searched him as a “control measure.” On at least one occasion, he was forced to stand naked with women soldiers present. Female interrogators seductively touched the prisoner under the authorized use of approaches called “Invasion of Personal Space” and “Futility"....

Some psychological routines referred to the 9/11 attacks. He was shown pictures of the attacks, and photographs of victims were affixed to his body. The interrogators held one exorcism (and threatened another) to purge evil Jinns that the disoriented, sleep deprived prisoner claimed were controlling his emotions.

As the inside word is that Obama will order Guantanamo closed, and all abusive interrogation techniques be ended, with interrogations limited only to those techniques specified in the Army Field Manual, officials associated with the Bush torture regime, both innocent and guilty (we cannot know right away who is who) are scampering for legal and moral cover.

Of course, limiting interrogation techniques to the Army's interrogation field manual leaves an open door for more abusive interrogation, as it allows the use of isolation, sleep deprivation, fear, sensory deprivation, and other techniques on those designated "unlawful enemy combatants." The U.S. may close Guantanamo, but what about the thousands of other prisoners held by the U.S. in Iraq, Afghanistan, prison ships, and CIA secret prisons? What will happen to them, if the AFM still allows some abusive techniques?

Much that Bush and Cheney have done has ended in failure. Guantanamo will close. The military commissions are a dead issue (for now). But not all they have done has been disassembled, and there will be much pressure on Obama to let some of the apparatus off the hook.

Right now, the biggest push among progressives, and with much popular support among the citizenry, is for investigations and prosecutions of the war criminals who are now leaving the White House. These should be supported with all our efforts. Bush and Cheney have both recently admitted to ordering torture.

Buhdydharma at Docudharma wrote the following today:

House Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers has just released a 487 page report (NOTE: pdf file) whose table of contents clearly spells out what must be on AG Holders agenda in both reforming the DOJ and to effectively "reclaim America's standing in the world as a nation that cherishes and protects individual freedom and basic human rights.":

Hiring and Firing of U.S. Attorneys and other Department Personnel
Selective Prosecution
Politicization of the Prosecution Function
Politicization of the Civil Rights Division and Voting Rights Enforcement
Detention
Enhanced Interrogation
Ghosting and Black Sites
Extraordinary Rendition
Warrantless Domestic Surveillance
National Security Letters (NSLs) and Exigent Letters
Use of Signing Statements
Midnight Rulemaking
The Leak of Valerie Plame Wilson's Covert CIA Identity
Improper Use of State Secrets and Other Authorities
Manipulation and Misuse of Intelligence

There is far more than probable cause to prosecute major figures of the Bush Administration, the Pentagon, and the CIA (and possibly DIA) for crimes against humanity, such as starting an aggressive war, and implementation of torture and abusive, inhumane treatment of prisoners. There is ample legal precedent to charge these individuals. If we do not do it, it should be undertaken by another willing nation.

A huge political battle will be waged over these issues in the next weeks and months. All progressives and anti-torture advocates should be ready to counter moves from the entrenched opposition centered in sections of the Pentagon and the CIA.

In the meantime, Susan Crawford has just thrown a dangerous projectile into the ranks of these criminals, and it's all the more satisfying as it comes from their own ranks. We should not expect too many more such "betrayals." The greatest danger will be thinking the closure of Guantanamo will really end things. It will only be one battle won. There will be more losses and victories before we see the end.

Update: The following was spurred by a comment by Nightprowlkitty in the comments to the Daily Kos crossposting to this article:

Torture is never legal. It is a jus cogens, a norm from which no derogation is permitted. Really these people are outside the pale, outside the law. Only the law can handle it though. But the sentences, if convicted, can be tough. Scott Horton reminded us the other day that the execution of Charles I of England, over 400 years ago, was for torture:

The charge, repeated the prosecutor, was that the executive had violated the laws of nations in that he authorized or indulged the torture and brutal mistreatment of prisoners taken in wartime. The commissioners deliberated and rendered their verdict: The charge against the defendant was sustained, the defendant was guilty as charged. And then the punishment was fixed. How does one punish an executive for violation of the laws of nations by authorizing the torture of prisoners? The verdict was that he be taken to a place of execution, where his head was to be severed from his body by an axe.

In today's column, Horton said this about Crawford's admission:

This admission is important for several reasons. First, it is an acknowledgement of criminal conduct by the administration by one of its own team. Second, Crawford very properly abandons the absurd legalisms of the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel which essentially boil down to “if the president authorizes it, that means it’s legal.” Third, she has apparently evaluated “torture” on the basis of the totality of the treatment meted out by interrogators and jailers to the prisoner, not by segmenting and evaluating each individual technique applied. That is what the law requires, and what the Justice Department studiously ignores, fully aware of the inevitable conclusion to which it would lead. It adds up to another admission of high crimes. The case for criminal accountability continues to build.

Whence Torture? An Early SERE Critic, Circa 1956

Joost Meerloo was a Dutch psychiatrist and psychoanalyst who, having fled German-occupied Holland in 1942, and survived torture by the Gestapo in Belgium, made a name for himself in British and U.S. medical establishments. By the early 1950s, he had undertaken an examination of the supposedly new phenomena of "brainwashing." The latter had made headlines when U.S. POWs in the Korean War cooperated with their captors, and even made accusations of U.S. use of "germ warfare." Dr. Meerloo was expert witness on "menticide" -- his term for brainwashing -- at the U.S. tribunal of Frank Schwable, one of the men involved in biological weapons accusations.

All this is by way of background, and while interesting in and of itself, I've written some on this before. While today we know that the primary providers of domestic propaganda on brainwashing were sponsored by or agents of the CIA -- Frank Hunter, who coined the term, was only revealed to be in the pay of the CIA years later -- I don't know how closely Dr. Meerloo was involved with U.S. intelligence. His contacts, his works, and his interests seem to argue that he was heavily involved.

With my interests in the literature of the period (see link), when the works of psychologists and physicians heavily concentrated upon how to induce suggestion and control of a person's mind, it was only a matter of time until I found myself reading Meerloo's out-of-print 1956 classic, The Rape of the Mind: The Psychology of Thought Control, Menticide, and Brainwashing. (A portion of the work, though not the quote below, can be read online.)

So imagine my surprise when Dr. Meerloo had some comments to make about an organization that has been heavily implicated in the U.S. military's torture regime abroad. The Survival, Evasion, Resistance, Escape (or SERE) schools in the different branches of the military have their origin in the Pentagon's response to the POW confessions of the Korean War. More recently, it has been documented that psychologists working for SERE, in probably collusion with military and political higher-ups, helped the CIA and military "reverse-engineer" the torture techniques the school was supposed to use to inoculate U.S. military personnel against foreign coercive interrogation and captivity. Subsequently, these techniques were used against detainees in Bush's "war on terror", from Guantanamo, to Iraq, to Afghanistan, and possibly at secret CIA "black prisons" around the world.

On page 262-263 of the 1961 Universal Library edition of Rape of the Mind is the following criticism of the SERE program. How odd that it comes from one of the principal investigators into interrogations of his time, one closely associated with the CIA/military program of the 1950s that was investigating how to psychologically break down prisoners in a "scientific" fashion, and which included such sinister programs as MK-ULTRA and MK-NAOMI. The quote comes from Chapter 15, "Training Against Mental Torture." The words are prescient in the extreme. (Bold emphasis is added.)

An educational concept exists to the effect that conditioning to physical torture will help soldiers to be more immune to brainwashing. In one of the air force bases, airmen had to go through a "school of torture," euphemistically called the School of Survival, in which some of the barbarous and cruel Communist methods of handling prisoners were initiated in order to harden the men against future brutality. [Meerloo here footnotes an article on the school in Time, Sept. 19, 1955, "Training in Torture", which can be read online.] The trainees could stand the ghoulish exercises rather well. However, such a training can condition men to take over, unwittingly, the methods of totalitarianism. It may give a semiofficial green light to enemy tactics by implying that we can do the same. Moreover, such methods may stimulate hidden sadistic tendencies in both trainer and trainee. Under the disguise of an earnest training need, American youth may be educated in the same sadistic view as their enemies

Meerloo could have added that, after decades, an entire bureaucratic apparatus or section of government can become infected with the bacillus of brutality and sadism. This is one way that one can understand how it was that the SERE officials -- although not all of them -- were so excited about contributing their expertise when asked by the Department of Defense in late 2001.

As the drumbeat for investigations and prosecutions of Bush officialdom gains intensity in the last days of Bush's rule, and particularly over the promotion of torture, it will help us to understand the motivation of the men who acted to spread this vile practice, to understand why they were so easily perverted, the better to make sure it will never happen again. Because recent events have proven that we have become, as medical ethicist and researcher Steven Miles titled it, a torture-endangered society, "a society that is abraded by the process of dehumanization."

One place any policy committee could start is with the decommissioning of the SERE schools. There is no evidence they do what they say they do. They are unnecessarily brutal to soldiers, and now we know, they are breeding grounds for savagery and a drive to torture among their practitioners.

Miles at BMJ on Sanctions for Doctors Who Torture

A new editorial by Steven Miles in the British Medical Journal, Doctors’ complicity with torture: It is time for sanctions (BMJ 2008;337:a1088), describes the serious shortcomings inherent in a society where ethical prohibitions against harm are not backed up by the instrumentation of accountability.

As Dr. Miles laid out in his excellent book, Oath Betrayed: Torture, Medical Complicity and the War on Terror, participation by physicians in the torture of detainees by the military and intelligence agencies is both rampant and uncontrolled by outside ethics or governmental watchdog agencies. While the American Medical Association formally forbids its members participate in such activities, a letter published by The Lancet last year, signed by 260 doctors, pummelled the AMA for not taking the issue of doctor complicity in torture seriously, accusing the U.S. medical establishment for turning

...a blind eye to the abuse of military medicine at the Guantanamo Bay prison in Cuba, doctors from around the world said in a letter published Friday in a prestigious British medical journal.

Health care workers in the U.S. military seem to have put their loyalty to the state above their duty to care for patients -- and American regulatory bodies have done nothing to remedy the situation....

In his new editorial at BMJ, Dr. Miles writes:

The medical profession ought to dissociate itself from torture—a practice that destroys institutions of civil society; that is used against colleagues of conscience, and that has far reaching adverse mental, physical, and social consequences. Instead, medical societies and licensing boards offer lofty condemnation, which is most ardently aimed at offenders abroad rather than accomplices at home.

Doctors who abet torture rarely face professional risks. Governments will not punish a doctor for helping them carry out their crimes. Few medical societies or licensing boards have the courage and constancy of vision to investigate or censure colleagues who carry out the law of the land.

Rather than look to the Nuremberg Trials as an instance of how to hold medical professionals responsible for illegal acts -- being the juridical proceedings of a conquering nation over its vanquished opponent -- Miles cites the attempts by governments in Greece, Chile, and Argentina to sanction and imprison doctors or medical personnel in their own countries that have been implicated in torture or other crimes carried out in the process of engaging in their medical role.

Dr. Miles continues:

A more secure foundation for this kind of accountability can and should be laid. The World Medical Association’s Declaration of Hamburg states that licensing boards should deny licences to doctors who are guilty of war crimes, including torture... Unfortunately, that declaration only applies to immigrating doctors who are accused of crimes in another country....

Countries wax and wane in their practice of torture. Foundations for making doctors accountable for this crime must be laid during periods of civil society. At such times, each national medical society and licensing agency should assert that medical complicity with torture and cruel inhuman or degrading treatment is a punishable breach of medical ethics that cannot be excused by law and for which there is no term limit....

A civilian medical community that acquiesces to torture by its military members cannot credibly protest against foreign doctors who carry out torture. Such a community can hardly support doctors who are endangered for their resistance against torture. The prestige and values of medicine make it a crucial part of the campaign to abolish torture....

The medical accomplices of torture must not rest in the confidence that they can violate civil society and the ethics of medicine with impunity.

April 30, 2004... and now where are we?

If behavioral scientists are concerned solely with advancing their science, it seems most probably that they will serve the purposes of whatever individual or group has the power.

The quote above is from U.S. psychology pioneer Carl Rogers. It is worth pondering his statement as we consider both recent developments in the fight against U.S. torture, and more general considerations about the role of psychologists, physicians, and other scientific and medical personnel in interrogations for Bush's "War on Terror."

I was reading the New York Times's article on the decision by the "Convening Authority" at Guantanamo to drop all charges "without prejudice" against purported sixth 9/11 Al Qaeda hijacker Mohammed al-Qahtani, when my attention was drawn to an ad from the CIA trumpeting the announcement that they were seeking applicants for "National Clandestine Service Careers." A few clicks later, curious to see what they were offering for my own profession (not that I wish to apply), I found a number of positions open. Here's one that caught my eye:

Operational Psychologist
Work Schedule: Full Time
Salary: $82,961 – $127,442
Location: Washington, DC metropolitan area

Responsible for providing behavioral science consultancy to the Intelligence Community, the major activities involved in this role include psychological testing and behavioral assessment; customized training/consultation on topics related to cross-cultural personality assessment; and applied research.

"Applied research." "Cross-cultural personality assessment." Perhaps it was the sort of job that Major John Leso, psychologist at Guantanamo in late 2002-early 2003, had applied for, only to find himself present at the 54-day interrogation of Mr. al-Qahtani, otherwise known as Detainee 063. As Philippe Sands explains in his recent must-read article at Vanity Fair, "The Green Light", Mr. al-Qahtani had the unusual luck to have his interrogation log publicly leaked, detailing the torture -- which included 15 of 18 torture techniques, then under special approval of then-Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld -- he underwent, in part under the participation of psychologist Leso.

No one knows for sure, as the "Convening Authority" is under no statutory obligation to explain herself, but it seems likely that al-Qahtani was dropped from Bush's projected show trials of other selected detainees, projected to begin sometime next year, because the evidence on him included large amounts of material produced through torture. There is no way the government can suppress this evidence by citing state secrecy, as the interrogation log is now public record, thanks to an anonymous leaker. Portions have already been published at Time Magazine. The full log is available at Center for Constitutional Rights.

Meanwhile, the Pentagon and the Bush Administration is preparing to try five other "high-profile" Guantanamo inmates at its dubious military commission hearings, as it seeks the death penalty for all five. One of the five is Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the accused "mastermind" of the 9/11 attacks, who was admittedly waterboarded by CIA torturers during his interrogation. The videotape evidence of this was destroyed, leading to a brouhaha in the press and increased Congressional scrutiny.

Legal Experts Take on Bush/Cheney's Legal Team

Some of that Congressional interest was displayed at hearings on May 6 before the Subcommittee on the Constitution, Civil Rights, and Civil Liberties of the House Judiciary Committee, looking at Bush Administration lawyers and the development of Administration interrogation rules over the past six years. Much of this history is already available in Philippe Sands' article cited above. Mr. Sands, a professor at University College London, was one of three prominent legal authorities to testify at the hearings (transcript courtesy of AfterDowningStreet.org):

Mr Chairman, Honourable Members of the Committee, the story I uncovered is an unhappy one. It points to the early and direct involvement of those at the highest levels of government, often through their lawyers, the individuals on whom I largely focused. In June 2004, after the scandal of Abu Ghraib broke, and the August 1, 2002 Bybee Torture Memo became public, Mr Gonzalez and Mr Haynes appeared before the media to claim that the Bush Administration had not authorized such abuse. Contrary to the impression given by the Administration, repeated by Mr Haynes when he appeared before the Senate Judiciary Committee in July 2006, his involvement (and that of Secretary Rumsfeld) began well before that stated in the official version. Mr. Haynes had visited Guantanamo, together with Mr Gonzales and Mr Addington, discussed interrogations, and then recommended that the U.S. military abandon its tradition of restraint. My conclusion, on the basis of interviews and documents, is that this is a story not only of crime but also of cover-up, to protect the most senior members of the Administration from the consequences of the illegality that has stained America’s reputation.

Also speaking at the hearing was Marjorie Cohn, President of the National Lawyers Guild, who has recently called for the firing of University of California law professor John Yoo, who is heavily implicated in giving legal cover for Bush's torture plans. Ms. Cohn spoke very precisely about the legal gyrations of Bush administration lawyers as they sought refuge from legal accountability for the deliberate breaking of torture laws both national and international. What follows is an edited version of her testimony:

What does torture have in common with genocide, slavery, and wars of aggression? They are all jus cogens. Jus cogens is Latin for "higher law" or "compelling law." This means that no country can ever pass a law that allows torture. There can be no immunity from criminal liability for violation of a jus cogens prohibition. [emphasis added]

The United States has always prohibited the use of torture in our Constitution, laws executive statements and judicial decisions....

The Convention Against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment, says, "No exceptional circumstances whatsoever, whether a state of war or a threat of war, internal political instability or any other public emergency, may be invoked as a justification for torture."

Whether someone is a POW or not, he must always be treated humanely; there are no gaps in the Geneva Conventions. He must be protected against torture, mutilation, cruel treatment, and outrages upon personal dignity, particularly humiliating and degrading treatment under, Common Article 3....

The US War Crimes Act, and 18 USC sections 818 and 3231, punish torture, willfully causing great suffering or serious injury to body or health, and inhuman, humiliating or degrading treatment.

The Torture Statute provides for life in prison, or even the death penalty if the victim dies, for anyone who commits, attempts, or conspires to commit torture outside the United States....

In Filartiga v. Peña-Irala, the Second Circuit declared the prohibition against torture is universal, obligatory, specific and definable. Since then, every U.S. circuit court has reaffirmed that torture violates universal and customary international law. In the Paquete Habana, the Supreme Court held that customary international law is part of U.S. law....

Yet on February 7, 2002, President Bush, relying on memos by lawyers including John Yoo, announced that the Geneva Conventions did not apply to alleged Taliban and Al Qaeda members....

Lawyers in the Department of Justice’s Office of Legal Counsel wrote memos at the request of high-ranking government officials in order to insulate them from future prosecution for subjecting detainees to torture....

The [United Nations] Torture Convention defines torture as the intentional infliction of severe physical or mental pain or suffering. The U.S. attached an "understanding" to its ratification of the Torture Convention, which added the requirement that the torturer "specifically" intend to inflict the severe physical or mental pain or suffering. This is a distinction without a difference for three reasons. First, under well-established principles of criminal law, a person specifically intends to cause a result when he either consciously desires that result or when he knows the result is practically certain to follow. Second, unlike a "reservation" to a treaty provision, an "understanding" cannot change an international legal obligation. Third, under the Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties, an "understanding" that violates the object and purpose of a treaty is void. The claim that treatment of prisoners which would amount to torture under the Torture Convention does not constitute torture under the U.S. "understanding" violates the object and purpose of the Convention, which is to ensure that "no one shall be subjected to torture or to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment"....

Nevertheless, Yoo twisted the law and redefined torture much more narrowly than the definitions in the Convention Against Torture and the Torture Statute. Under Yoo's definition, the victim must experience intense pain or suffering equivalent to pain associated with serious physical injury so severe that death, organ failure or permanent damage resulting in loss of significant body functions will likely result.

Attorney David Luban, a Georgetown law professor, and the third expert to speak at the committee hearing, zeroed in on White House legal counsels' terrible twisting of the meaning of pain and suffering under torture:

...as I mentioned earlier, [John Yoo] wrenches language from a Medicare statute to explain the legal definition of torture. The Medicare statute lists severe pain as a possible symptom of a medical emergency, and Mr. Yoo flips the statute and uses the language of medical emergency to define severe pain. This was so bizarre that the OLC itself disowned his definition a few months after it became public. It is highly unusual for one OLC opinion to disown an earlier one, and it shows just how far out of the mainstream Mr. Yoo had wandered. This goes beyond the ethical limits for a legal advisor. In fact, even in the courtroom there are limits to spinning the law: ethics rules forbid advocates from making frivolous legal arguments, or failing to disclose adverse legal authority. But it would be a mistake to focus only on Mr. Yoo. Mr. Levin’s replacement memo also takes liberties with the law. In particular, when the Levin Memo discusses the term “severe physical suffering” (which is part of the statutory definition of torture), it states that the suffering must “prolonged” to be severe – and that requirement simply isn’t in the statute at all. Under that definition, of course, waterboarding would not be torture because people break within seconds or minutes. This is a perfect example of a legalistic definition that looks inconspicuous but in reality narrows the definition of torture dramatically. Notice that the quicker a technique breaks the interrogation subject, the less prolonged his suffering will be – so the harsher the tactic, the less likely it is to qualify as “torture.”

I wonder if any CIA psychologist wannabes were watching the House committee testimony on C-Span. Perhaps they will have to sign a waiver releasing the Agency from liability if they are later found prosecutable for war crimes. One never knows.

Torture and Civil Society

Among those who are fighting to remove psychologists from government interrogations at Guantanamo and other "war on terror" prison sites (including CIA secret torture prisons), there is some recent hope that the tide is turning in the struggle against the ossified bureaucratic apparatus of the American Psychological Association. Steven Reisner got a plurality of votes in the first round of voting for APA president. Even more, a petition to essentially remove psychologists from operational roles at national security interrogations has gained over 800 signatures thus far.

About 950 signatures, or about 1% of the total APA membership, is needed to move the petition along to the next stage in the overly onerous process of delivering a vote on participation in interrogations to the overall APA membership. Along the way, supporters must survive vetting of the measure by both the APA president and the APA Council of Representatives. I believe the petition supporters are hoping that political pressures within and without the organization will help push it through. Meanwhile, APA leadership is planning to once again "discuss" the interrogations "issue" at its annual conference this August, hoping, no doubt, to talk their opponents into oblivion, or at least to a standstill, as they await marching orders from their bosses in Washington, DC and/or Langley.

We are too close and embroiled in the struggle against state-sponsored torture to get a complete perspective on just how compromised major portions of U.S. civil society has become. But things are not exactly looking promising at the moment. The quote from Dr. Rogers that opened this essay was written over forty years ago. A generation has come and gone, and the same problems remain. Note Rogers' emphasis: "If behavioral scientists are concerned solely with advancing their science..." Scientists and attorneys, doctors and soldiers, if one is only concerned with advancing their profession, then professional parochialism is surely the prelude to societal dissolution.

Dr. Steven Miles, whose book Oath Betrayed documents the complicity of medical doctors and personnel in torture and abuse at Guantanamo, Abu Ghraib, among other prison sites, is fond of noting that over four years after the revelations of the sickening, criminal abuse and torture at Abu Ghraib was made public on April 30, 2004, the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) "maintains continuous editorial silence on medical complicity with human rights abuses in US war on terror prisons." Meanwhile, the American Psychological Association maintains the fiction that psychologists are at Guantanamo, for example, in order to make interrogations "safe" for the detainees.

Slowly, achingly, you can feel the decent core of society straining to lift the crimes of torture and aggressive war off its bowed shoulders, like a modern Atlas struggling to raise the world up, while bureaucrats, military and intelligence hawks, crooked politicians, careerist attorneys, war profiteers, and oblivious medical and psychological personnel careen over themselves to pull it down. Will they succeed? And which "they" do you identify with?