Rejecting complaints that these techniques violate international law, Rumsfeld said Pentagon lawyers had cleared them for use by U.S. interrogators.
May you never find yourself with nothing but government lawyers standing between you and torture. The New York Times reveals a few other things government lawyers signed off on:
[I]nterrogators used graduated levels of force, including a technique known as “water boarding,” in which a prisoner is strapped down, forcibly pushed under water and made to believe he might drown.
These techniques were authorized by a set of secret rules for the interrogation of high-level Qaeda prisoners, none known to be housed in Iraq, that were endorsed by the Justice Department and the C.I.A.…
The C.I.A. has been operating its Qaeda detention system under a series of secret legal opinions by the agency’s and Justice Department lawyers. Those rules have provided a legal basis for the use of harsh interrogation techniques, including the water-boarding tactic used against Mr. Mohammed.
One set of legal memorandums, the officials said, advises government officials that if they are contemplating procedures that may put them in violation of American statutes that prohibit torture, degrading treatment or the Geneva Conventions, they will not be responsible if it can be argued that the detainees are formally in the custody of another country.
The Geneva Conventions prohibit “violence to life and person, in particular … cruel treatment and torture” and “outrages upon personal dignity, in particular, humiliating and degrading treatment.”
Regarding American anti-torture laws, one administration figure involved in discussions about the memorandums said: “The criminal statutes only apply to American officials. The question is how involved are the American officials.”
The official said the legal opinions say restrictions on procedures would not apply if the detainee could be deemed to be in the custody of a different country, even though American officials were getting the benefit of the interrogation. “It would be the responsibility of the other country,” the official said. “It depends on the level of involvement.”
You want a picture uglier than leering military prison guards turning loose their dogs on a naked cowering prisoner? Uglier than masked jihadists sawing off the neck of a civilian contractor? Try picturing a bunch of lawyers sitting around trying to find the loopholes in the torture prohibitions of the Geneva Conventions.
Lawyers don’t come cheap, and from the looks of the articles I’ve excerpted above, the Pentagon, the Justice Department and the C.I.A. each have their own set of eager loophole-hunters. Keep those taxes coming.
