“On March 18, 2003, on the eve of the invasion of Iraq, Elizabeth Wilmshurst resigned as Deputy Legal Adviser to the UK Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO), the British equivalent of the U.S. State Department.

“‘I regarded the invasion of Iraq as illegal, and I therefore did not feel able to continue in my post,’ she said later. Ms. Wilmshurst discussed her resignation while appearing before the current British inquiry into the Iraq War — the Chilcot Inquiry.

“In an office of 35 or so lawyers, she may have been the only one to resign. However, she testified that her perspective was shared unanimously among all the FCO Legal Advisers, including the head of the office, Sir Michael Wood.

“Sir Michael himself told the Chilcot Inquiry: ‘I considered that the use of force against Iraq in March 2003 was contrary to international law. In my opinion, that use of force had not been authorized by the Security Council, and had no other legal basis in international law.’

“In sum: every lawyer charged with advising the British government on the legality of the Iraq invasion believed it was illegal.”

And, of course, we already knew this. And, of course, we did not need to know it. We just need to read the U.N. Charter to know that aggressive wars are illegal. Dyer spends most of the rest of his article pointing out that even a hobbled toothless inquiry treating public documents as untouchable because “classified” and leading to no law enforcement actions is a giant leap forward from anything happening in the United States, the nation chiefly responsible for the crime under “investigation.”

The Chilcot inquiry may ask to meet with former U.S. officials, as noted by UPI, which also reports on the latest smoking gun tossed high onto the pile of thousands of smoking guns:

“Former British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw says he will check records of his pre-Iraq invasion phone calls with then-U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell.

“Straw made the promise Monday to Britain’s Iraq Inquiry panel after allegations emerged that Powell told him in the weeks prior to the 2001 Iraq invasion that President George W. Bush would invade the country even if Saddam Hussein complied with nuclear arms inspectors, The Times of London reported.

“The newspaper said the calls became an issue after Straw defended his decision to dismiss the advice of his chief legal adviser that the war would be unlawful.

“Inquiry panel member Lawrence Freedman, hinting that the panel may have documents showing Bush planned to attack Iraq even if U.N. weapons inspector Hans Blix found that Saddam was complying with U.N. resolution 1441, asked Straw, ‘Was there any point where Powell said to you that even if Iraq complied, President Bush had already made a decision to go to war?’

“The Times said Straw, now Britain’s justice secretary, replied, ‘Certainly not to the best of my recollection. I would have to check the record of my many conversations I had with Secretary Powell.’”

But that is not how Straw replied. And there was more than a hint here that the questioner already knew the answer. This “inquiry” is being conducted by panelists in possession of numerous documents, both public and still private, that they are forbidden to discuss. The Downing Street Minutes and every other piece of documentation long since confirming for the public the truth into which this show is “inquiring” are deemed “classified” and unmentionable by the Chilcoteers. So, what would it look like to question Straw about a document proving Powell had told him (as the entire world outside of U.S. television viewers knows by now the United States told the United Kingdom) that Bush was going to war regardless of Iraq’s behavior?

Here’s Chris Floyd’s account:

“And so, to close out its first phase, the Chilcot Inquiry recalled Straw — who had already given one sweaty, white-knuckle performance on the witness stand a few weeks ago. With the implacable politesse of the true British mandarin, panelist Sir Lawrence Freedman seized the opportunity to suggest to the right honorable minister that the right honorable minister might, perhaps, be lying through his right honorable teeth in denying that Colin Powell had informed him quite clearly that the Americans were going to war, come hell or high water, in March 2003. As the Guardian notes, Freedman’s questions make it clear that [he] has obviously seen some very interesting paperwork. Here is the exchange, from the Guardian:

“Freedman asked: Can you start by confirming that you knew that military action was planned by the US for the middle of March come what may? You were copied in, presumably, to reports of conversations between the prime minister and the president?

“Straw replied: Yes, I don’t think there was any key document that I should have seen that I didn’t.

“Freedman: Was there any point where [Colin] Powell said to you that even if Iraq complied, president Bush had already made a decision that he intended to go to war?

“Straw replied: Certainly not to the best of my recollection.

“Freedman went on: I was going to suggest you might want to look through your conversations and check.

“Mr Straw at last got the hint: I will go through the records because I think you are trying to tell me something.

“Yes, Mr Straw. He is trying to tell you, and the world, that he has the paper in his hand documenting your conversation with Colin Powell: a clear admission of the war crime of military aggression, as it reveals that there was not even a pretense of a legally justifiable casus belli among the American and British leaders — just the cold, pre-determined intention to attack.”

And yet, what the best of our commentators across the Atlantic seem to miss is that the illegality of the war is taken as a point in its favor in the United States. “Proving” its illegality yet again is not really interesting in Washington. The Washington Post deemed it old news prior to ever mentioning it. President Obama openly declared his power to launch illegal wars in a Nobel Peace Prize acceptance speech some weeks back. For us, an inquiry into war lies is a quaint tourist destination, like a European town with pedestrian streets and neighbors who speak to each other. We love visiting such things, but we wouldn’t want to live there.

David Swanson is co-founder of AfterDowningStreet.org and author of the new book Daybreak: Undoing the Imperial Presidency and Forming a More Perfect Union by Seven Stories Press. You can order it and find out when tour will be in your town by visiting davidswanson.org/book.

Tony Blair at the World Economic Forum Annual Meeting Davos 2009. Photo by Andy Mettler/flickr

Most Americans are blissfully in the dark about it, but across the Atlantic in the UK, a commission reluctantly established by Prime Minister Gordon Brown under pressure from anti-war activists in Britain is beginning hearings into the actions and statements of British leaders that led to the country’s joining the US invasion of Iraq in 2003.

Even before testimony began in hearings that started yesterday, news began to leak out from documents obtained by the commission that the government of former PM Tony Blair had lied to Parliament and the public about the country’s involvement in war planning.

Britain’s Telegraph newspaper over the weekend published documents from British military leaders, including a memo from British special forces head Maj. Gen. Graeme Lamb, saying that he had been instructed to begin “working the war up since early 2002.”

This means that Blair, who in July 2002, had assured members of a House of Commons committee that there were “no preparations to invade Iraq,” was lying.

Things are likely to heat up when the commission begins hearing testimony. It has the power, and intends to compel testimony from top government officials, including Blair himself.

While some American newspapers, including the Philadelphia Inquirer, have run an Associated Press report on the new disclosures and on the commission, key news organizations, including the New York Times, have not. The Times ignored the Telegraph report, but a day later ran an article about the British commission that focused entirely on evidence that British military leaders in Iraq felt “slighted” by “arrogant” American military leaders who, the article reported, pushed for aggressive military action against insurgent groups, while British leaders preferred negotiating with them.

While that may be of some historical interest, it hardly compares with the evidence that Blair and the Bush/Cheney administration were secretly conspiring to invade Iraq as early as February and March 2002.

Recall that the Bush/Cheney argument to Congress and the American people for initiating a war against Iraq in the fall of 2002 was that Iraq was allegedly behind the 9-11 attacks and that it posed an “imminent” danger of attack against the US and Britain with its alleged weapons of mass destruction.

Of course, such arguments, which have subsequently been shown to have been bogus, would have had no merit if the planning began a year earlier, and if no such urgency was expressed by the two leaders at that time. Imminent, after all, means imminent, and if Blair, Bush and Cheney had genuinely thought an attack with WMDs was imminent back in the early days of the Bush administration, they would have been acting immediately, not secretly conjuring up a war scheduled for a year later. (The actual invasion began on March 19, 2003).

As I documented in my book, The Case for Impeachment, there is plenty of evidence that Bush and Cheney had a scheme to put the US at war with Iraq even before Bush took office on Jan. 20, 2001. Then Treasury Secretary Paul O’Neill in his own tell-all book, The Price of Loyalty, written after he was dumped from the Bush Administration, recounts that at the first meeting of Bush’s new National Security Council, the question of going to war and ousting Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein was on the agenda.

Immediately after the 9-11 attacks, NSC anti-terrorism program czar Richard Clarke also recalled Bush ordering him to “find a link” to Iraq. Meanwhile, within days, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld was ordering top generals to prepare for an Iraq invasion. Gen. Tommy Franks, who was heading up the military effort in Afghanistan that was reportedly closing in on Osama Bin Laden, found the rug being pulled out from under him as Rumsfeld began shifting troops out of Afghanistan and to Kuwait in preparation for the new war.

It is nothing less than astonishing that so little news of the British investigation into the origins of the illegal Iraq War is being conveyed to Americans by this country’s corporate media—yet another example demonstrating that American journalism is dead or dying.

It is even more astonishing that neither the Congress nor the president here in America is making any similar effort to put America’s leaders in the dock to tell the truth about their machinations in engineering a war that has cost the US over $1 trillion (perhaps $3 trillion eventually when debt payments and the cost of veterans care is added in), and over 4000 lives, not to mention as many as one million innocent Iraqi lives.

Dave Lindorff is a Philadelphia-based journalist. He is author of Killing Time: An Investigation into the Death Penalty Case of Mumia Abu-Jamal (Common Courage Press, 2003) and The Case for Impeachment (St. Martin’s Press, 2006). His work is available at thiscantbehappening.net

The new ruling brushes off the charges by 212 Iraqis who said they or their late husbands were abused by U.S. personnel at Abu Ghraib. The suit charged private security firm CACI International Inc., of Arlington, Va., of crimes inside the Baghdad hellhole.

But in a 2-1 ruling, the D.C. Court of Appeals said CACI “is protected by laws barring suits filed as the result of military activities during a time of war,” the Associated Press reported. This opinion was written by Judge Laurence Silberman, a Reagan appointee, and supported by Judge Brett Kavanaugh, a Bush appointee.

“During wartime, where a private service contractor is integrated into combatant activities over which the military retains command authority, a tort claim arising out of the contractor’s engagement in such activities shall be pre-empted,” Silberman wrote.

If so, with about as many U.S.-led contract mercenaries as regular army involved in the Iraq conflict, this decision preposterously exempts some 150,000 fighters from legal action for any crimes they commit. It gives a shoot-to-kill pass to privateers such as Blackwater, whose operatives on one occasion are said to have gunned down 17 unarmed Iraqi civilians.

“This abuse and torture of these prisoners detained during war time constituted war crimes and torture in violation of the Geneva Conventions of 1949, the U.S. War Crimes Act, the Convention against Torture, and the U.S. Federal Anti-torture Statute—felonies, punishable by death if death results as a violation thereof,” said Francis Boyle, an international law authority at the University of Illinois, Champaign-Urbana.

“Judges Silberman and Kavanaugh have now become Accessories After the Fact to torture, war crimes and felonies in violation of United States federal law and international criminal law,” Boyle asserted. (See if they are ever prosecuted!)

Dissenter Judge Merrick Garland, appointed by President Bill Clinton, argued the law does not protect independent contractors, particularly when they are accused of acting outside the rules or instructions of their military overseers. But where Silberman said most of the claims were limited to “abuse” or “harm,” not war crimes or torture, according to Courthouse News Service, Garland “found the claims much more alarming.”

“The plaintiffs in these cases allege they were beaten, electrocuted, raped, subjected to attacks by dogs, and otherwise abused by private contractors working as interpreters and interrogators at Abu Ghraib prison,” Garland said.

“No act of Congress and no judicial precedent bars the plaintiffs from suing the private contractors—who were neither soldiers nor civilian government employees,” he wrote.

“Neither President Obama nor President Bush nor any other Executive Branch official has suggested that subjecting the contractors to tort liability for the conduct at issue here would interfere with the nation’s foreign policy or the Executive’s ability to wage war,” Garland pointed out.

“To the contrary, the Department of Defense has repeatedly stated that employees of private contractors accompanying the Armed Forces in the field are not within the military’s chain of command, and that such contractors are subject to civil liability,” he wrote.

Judge Silberman was named to the Federal bench in 1985 by President Ronald Reagan and in 2008 received the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the nation’s highest civilian award, from (surprise!) President George W. Bush, the man who launched the Afghan and Iraq aggressions.

Silverman was supported in his opinion by Kavanaugh, a former legal aide to President Bush who was later appointed by Bush to the Federal bench. In July, 2007, Senators Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., and Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) accused Kavanaugh of “misleading” the Senate during his nomination.

In a statement issued at the time opposing the appointment, Sen. Durbin prophesied, “By every indication, Brett Kavanaugh will make this judgeship a gift that keeps on giving to his political patrons who have rewarded him richly with a nomination coveted by lawyers all over America.” And that, of course, is exactly what happened. Here’s what aroused Durbin’s concern:

“For example, he (Kavanaugh) would not tell us his views on some of the most controversial policy decisions of the Bush administration–like the issues of torture and warrantless wiretapping. He would not comment. He would not tell us whether he regretted the role he played in supporting the nomination of some judicial nominees who wanted to permit torture as part of American foreign policy… It would have been so refreshing and reassuring if Brett Kavanaugh could have distanced himself from their extreme views. But a loyal White House counsel is not going to do that. And that is how he came to this nomination.” And that is how he came to dismiss the torture charges against contractor CACI. Surely, Kavanaugh’s decision in the CACI case is proof he misled the Senate and merits impeachment.

In Jan., 2005, The New York Times reported testimony suggesting that guards and/or interrogators at Abu Ghraib were urinating on detainees, pouring phosphoric acid on them, sodomizing them with a baton, tying ropes to their penises and dragging them across the floor, and jumping on their wounds. Some prisoners were hung with their hands tied behind their back until they died. It should be remembered that the Abu Ghraib inmates were suspects, imprisoned without due process or trials. Abu Ghraib’s commanding officer Brig. General Janis Karpinski estimated that 90 percent of them were innocent.

According to an article by Jeffrey Toobin in the September 21 issue of The New Yorker, President Obama already has the chance to nominate judges for 21 seats on the federal appellate bench—more than 10 percent of the 179 judges on those courts, and at least half a dozen more seats should open in the next few months.

In an interview with the editorial board of the Detroit Free Press last year, Obama said the role of our courts “is to protect people who don’t have a voice…the vulnerable, the minority, the outcast, the person with the unpopular idea, the journalist who is shaking things up…And if somebody doesn’t appreciate that role, then I don’t think they are going to make a very good justice.”

Surely, hundreds of foreign prisoners tortured in an illegal war made by the U.S., or their survivors, are supplicants entitled to a fair hearing, not non-persons to be brushed aside as judges Silberman and Kavanaugh have done this past week. Their ruling that, essentially, injured parties cannot sue the Warfare State and its contractors, drives a tank through the Constitution. Americans had better pray Obama’s judicial choices will aspire to a higher standard.

Sherwood Ross formerly worked for The Chicago Daily News and other major dailies and as a columnist for wire services. He currently runs a public relations firm for “worthy causes”. Reach him at sherwoodr1@yahoo.com

The Washington Post's David Broder.

David Broder, the senior op-ed writer at the Washington Post, has joined his colleagues (Fred Hiatt, David Ignatius, and Richard Cohen) in condemning Attorney General Eric Holder’s decision to name a special counsel to examine possible law-breaking by CIA interrogators. And like his colleagues, Broder has put forth a list of irrelevant reasons for turning away from the abuses and violations of law during the eight years of the Bush administration.

Although Holder’s inquiry will only target those who acted beyond so-called legal guidelines, Broder is concerned that we will ultimately see Vice President Dick Cheney “standing in the dock.” Broder should be concerned with the need to explicitly repudiate the policies and actions of President George Bush and Cheney that violated domestic and international law. These actions require a public hearing and an open record of some kind.  Holder’s inquiry is the first step in what Mark Danner of the New York Review of Books called a “complicated political process.”

Broder’s lamest and most disingenuous reasons deal with CIA director Leon Panetta and the methodology of the Post’s news staff.  Broder calls Panetta a “conscientious director” of the CIA, but Panetta has surrounded himself with the ideological drivers of the policies of detention and interrogation, Steve Kappes and Michael Sulick, and has fought every effort of the Obama administration to bring transparency and accountability to the Bush-Cheney policies.

Broder adds that Panetta’s “judgment” is supported by the reporting of Ignatius and others with “excellent sources inside the CIA.” Their sources, of course, are Kappes and Sulick, the very officers who seek to cover-up their own activities and have the freedom to talk to reporters. Good reporting and journalism require an honest effort to seek all sources and not merely those who reify one’s own positions.

Broder echoes Panetta when he argues that any investigation will have a “harmful effect on the morale and operations of his agency.” No, morale was compromised by high-level CIA officials such as George (“slam dunk”) Tenet, who tailored intelligence to go to war against Iraq, and Porter Goss and Michael Hayden, who used outside contractors to build secret prisons, conduct extraordinary renditions, and engage in torture and abuse.

The CIA Inspector General (IG) responsible for the 2004 report on interrogations and torture told Der Spiegel this week that he decided on preparing a report because “some agency employees involved with the program…were uneasy about it; he told the Washington Post last week that he “could not walk through the cafeteria without people walking up to me, not to complain but to say ‘More power to you.’”

CIA torture and abuse as well as extraordinary renditions also compromised valuable liaison relations with European intelligence services that are needed to combat international terrorism and the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction. As a result of CIA’s illegal activities, intelligence services in Germany, Italy, and Spain were refusing to cooperate with their CIA counterparts.  Nevertheless, the CIA is still resisting the release of hundreds of pages of internal documents on detentions and interrogations, arguing that national security is at stake. No, national embarrassment is involved and not national security.

At some point, Broder and his colleagues should be forced to read the 2004 IG Report on detentions and interrogations; the 2004 CIA report on interrogation techniques; the 2004 Taguba report on military abuse of detainees; the 2005 collection of “secret” documents by Karen Greenberg and Joshua Dratel in their The Torture Papers: The Road to Abu Ghraib; the 2007 International Committee of the Red Cross Report on CIA’s treatment of detainees; the 2008 Senate Armed Services report on U.S. treatment of detainees; and Jane Mayer’s book The Dark Side.

Then, they need to compare the treatment of the detainees, some of whom were totally innocent or erroneously detained, with what the Justice Department memoranda on interrogations permitted.  Of course, Broder believes that the Justice Department torture memoranda demonstrate that the Bush administration engaged in a “deliberate, and internally well-debated policy decision, made in the proper places…by the proper officials.” Meanwhile, the Post has presented no evidence of policy debates on torture and abuse, extraordinary renditions, and secret prisons.

Broder and his colleagues could also try to interview those individuals who watched some or all of the 92 torture tapes before they were destroyed by high-ranking officials from the CIA’s National Clandestine Service. This destruction of evidence has been investigated for the past two years by John Durham, who will conduct the current inquiry for Attorney General Holder.

Broder, Ignatius, Hiatt, and Cohen have relied entirely on those CIA operatives who are trying to put the best possible face on CIA transgressions; the ethics of good journalism requires that they seek sources to learn about the details of the sordid and sadistic activities that put the nation at risk. President Barack Obama should be credited with closing the secret prisons and ending the practice of torture and abuse, but the nation still needs to confront and understand the evidence and the events of the past six years.

Finally, the news and editorial reporters of the Washington Post need to compare their findings of the evidence with the laws that govern the illegalities that have taken place. They could start with the 8^th amendment of the Constitution against “cruel and unusual punishments” (it has the virtue of being short); the War Crimes Act of 1996; the Convention against Torture of 1984 (yes, the United States is a signatory); and of course Common Article Three of the Geneva Conventions.

Broder and his colleagues do not understand that the stature of international and domestic law is diminished when a nation violates it with impunity. The stature of a nation is diminished when it commits crimes against humanity.  And the national leadership and the nation itself are diminished when it ignores the need for accountability and explicit repudiation. Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., had it right when he called for a “truth commission” to gather information on the CIA programs that the Bush administration endorsed and protected.

This would represent a good start in restoring our moral compass on the crimes of the post-9/11 era. The judgment of history will be harsh if we choose not to do so.

Melvin A. Goodman, a senior fellow at the Center for International Policy and adjunct professor of government at Johns Hopkins University, is The Public Record’s National Security and Intelligence columnist. He spent 42 years with the CIA, the National War College, and the U.S. Army. His latest book is Failure of Intelligence: The Decline and Fall of the CIA.

The inspector general’s probe stated that the use of torture against detainees, which Bush administration officials claim was necessary to thwart imminent terrorist attacks “did not uncover any evidence that these plots were imminent.”

“The Agency faces potentially serious long-term political and legal challenges as a result of the [Counterterrorist Center] Detention and Interrogation Program, particularly its use of EITs [enhanced interrogation techniques] and the inability of the U.S. Government to decide what it will ultimately do with terrorists detained by the agency,” the report concluded.

According to the report, CIA officials at agency headquarters ordered interrogators to continue waterboarding Abu Zubaydah, the first high-level detainee captured after 9/11, even though interrogators believed he was cooperating.

“[redacted] is evidenced in the final waterboard session of Abu Zubaydah. According to a senior CTC officer, the interrogation team considered Abu Zubaydah to be compliant and wanted to terminate EITs. [redacted] believed Abu Zubaydah continued to withhold information, [three lines redacted] at the time it generated substantial pressure from Headquarters to continue use of the EITs.

“According to this senior officer, the decision to resume use of the waterboard on Abu Zubaydah was made by senior officers of the DO [Directorate of Operations].  [redacted] to assess Abu Zubaydah’s compliance and witnessed the final waterboard session, after which, they reported back to Headquarters that the EITs were no longer needed on Abu Zubaydah.”

The report also said CIA interrogators and contractors used “unauthorized, improvised, inhumane and undocumented detention and interrogation techniques” that exceeded the legal guidelines for interrogation cited in Justice Department memoranda.

In one instance, a CIA interrogator, who lacked experience conducting interrogations, repeatedly pressed the carotid artery of a detainee until he passed out.

“The extent of these actions is illustrative of the consequences of the lack of clear guidance at the time and the Agency’s insufficient attention to interrogations in [redacted],” according to the report.

Helgerson’s report also said that then-Attorney General John Ashcroft was told numerous times about interrogation-related violations and instead of taking action approved of the repeated use of waterboarding against one detainee, despite the fact that it went above and beyond what the Justice Department had authorized in the legal opinions.

“According to the [CIA's] General Counsel, the Attorney General acknowledged he is fully aware of the repetitive use of the waterboard and that the CIA is well within the scope of the DoJ opinion and the authority given to CIA by that opinion. The Attorney General was informed the waterboard had been used 119 times on a single individual,” the report said, referring to a July 2003 Principals Committee briefing about the CIA’s detention and torture program.

After that meeting, the CIA’s General Counsel, John Rizzo, prepared a Memorandum for the Record dated Aug. 5, 2003 that said Ashcroft “confirmed that DoJ approved of the expanded use of various EITs [enhanced interrogation techniques] including multiple applications of the waterboard” that was inconsistent with the DOJ’s legal opinion.

A review of the detention and torture program was launched in January 2003 after the agency’s Office of the Inspector General received word from agency officials that “unauthorized interrogation techniques” were used against Abd Al-Rahim Al Nashiri, the alleged mastermind of the U.S.S. Cole bombing.

Al Nashiri was captured in late October 2002, was waterboarded 12 days after his capture, and a month later was singled out in a speech George W. Bush gave at the fairgrounds in Shreveport, Louisiana.

“The other day we hauled a guy in named al-Nashiri. It’s not a household name here in America. I can understand why some go blank when they hear his name. But he was the al-Qaeda commander in the Gulf States,” Bush said on Dec. 3, 2002.

“Let me just put it to you this way: He no longer has the capacity to do what he did in the past, which was to mastermind the USS Cole that killed – the plot on the Cole that killed American soldiers. He’s out of action for the good of the world.

“Sometimes you’ll see it and sometimes you won’t. But you’ve got to know that in this war against terror, the doctrine stands that says, ‘Either you’re with us or you’re with the terrorists.’”

About three weeks after Bush’s speech, according to the report, one interrogator, who pretended to be an operative from a Middle East intelligence agency, threatened to rape Al Nashiri’s mother in front of him. Interrogators also threatened Al Nashiri with a gun and revved power drill while he stood naked and hooded during the interrogation.

“The debriefer used an unloaded semi-automatic handgun as a prop to frighten Al-Nashiri into disclosing information….Nashiri sat shackled and [he] racked the handgun once or twice close to Al-Nashiri’s head. On what was probably the same day, the debriefer used the power drill to frighten Al-Nashiri. With [redacted] consent, the debriefer entered the detainee’s cell and revved the drill while the detainee stood naked and hooded. The debriefer did not touch Al-Nashiri with the power drill,” the report says.

The IG report said that the debriefer who threatened Al Nashiri with a handgun did not receive the required two weeks training in interrogations. Debriefers traditionally question suspects after the suspect has already disclosed information to the interrogator.

The report notes that an interrogator “is a person who completes a two-week interrogations training program, which is designed to train, qualify, and certify a person to administer EITs [enhanced interrogation techniques]. An interrogator can administer EITs during the interrogation of a detainee only after the field, in coordination with Headquarters, assesses the detainee as withholding information.

“An interrogator transitions the detainee from a non-cooperative to a cooperative phase in order that a debriefer can elicit actionable intelligence through non-aggressive techniques during debriefing sessions.”

Nashiri was one of three detainees whose waterboarding was personally authorized by Dick Cheney. Additionally, his interrogation was captured on videotape, which the CIA destroyed.

Interrogators also threatened to kill self-professed 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheik Mohammed’s children “if anything else happens in the United States.”

A mock execution was also conducted against a detainee. Outside of the cell where one detainee had been held, CIA officers staged a confrontation. When the detainee was lead outside he  “passed a guard who was dressed as a hooded detainee, lying motionless on the ground, and made to appear as if he had been shot to death.”

It is a violation of anti-torture laws to threaten a prisoner in U.S. custody with imminent death. At least one interrogator feared CIA officers would be prosecuted.

“One officer expressed concern that, one day, agency officers will wind up on some ‘wanted list’ to appear before the World Court for war crimes,” the report said. Another interrogators added, “Ten years from now we’re going to be sorry we’re doing this … (but) it has to be done.”

The report further states that the CIA’s understanding of the way al-Qaeda operated was limited.

“According to a number of those interviewed for this Review, the Agency’s intelligence on Al-Qa’ida was limited prior to the initiation of the [Counter Terrorist Center] Interrogation Program,” the report says. “The Agency lacked adequate linguists or subject matter experts and had very little hard knowledge of what particular Al-Qa’ida leaders—who later became detainees—knew. This lack of knowledge led analysts to speculate about what a detainee ’should know,’ vice information the analyst could objectively demonstrate the detainee did know. [redacted]

“When a detainee did not respond to a question posed to him, the assumption at Headquarters was that the detainee was holding back and knew more; consequently, Headquarters recommended resumption of EITs.”

The report does state that the capture and interrogation of suspected terrorists helped thwart terrorist plots and provided valuable intelligence.

“In this regard, there is no doubt that the program has been effective.” But the use of methods such as waterboarding and whether those tactics were effective “is a more subjective process and not without some concern.”

Helgerson’s report contained 10 recommendations on what steps the agency should take to deal with the violations. But those recommendations were completely redacted in the declassified version of the report.

Helgerson issued a statement Monday after the report was released stating that the Obama administration should have released the contents of the recommendations he had made.

“The most important findings of the review related to basic systemic issues: had management controls been established; were necessary laws, regulations and guidelines in place and understood; had staff officers and contractors been adequately trained; and had they discharged their responsibilities properly?

“The essence of the report is expressed in the Conclusions and Recommendations,” Helgerson said. “I am disappointed that the Government did not release even a redacted version of the Recommendations, which described a number of corrective actions that needed to be taken.”

Helgerson said it appeared that many of the torture techniques “were designed solely because they were degrading.”

He added that he took agency manager at their word that torture produced “a large amount of valuable intelligence.” But he suggested government officials should undertake a comprehensive review conducted by an “independent panel of experts” with interrogation-related backgrounds should evaluate the “quality of intelligence” gained through torture.

Helgerson said the CIA needed to “answer more definitively the question of whether the particular interrogation techniques used were effective and necessary, or whether such information could be acquired using more traditional methods.”

Moreover, he said his investigation, launched in January 2003, was undertaken “in part because of expressions of concern by Agency employees that the actions in which they were involved, or of which they were aware, would be determined by judicial authorities in the U.S. or abroad to be illegal.”

“Many expressed to me personally their feelings that what the Agency was doing was fundamentally inconsistent with long established U.S. Government policy and with American values, and was based on strained legal reasoning,” Helgerson said. “We reported these concerns.

He also said CIA officers were left “scrambling” in the aftermath of 9/11 and were forced to “improvise” when interrogating suspected terrorist “as management oversight, staffing, training, written guidance, and many processes and procedures were still being established.”

He said the common thread among all of the problems he discovered with the torture and detention program was “that management controls and operational procedures were not in place…”

On specific methods, such as waterboarding, Helgerson said:

We found that waterboarding had been utilized in a manner that was inconsistent with the understanding between CIA and the Department of Justice. The Department had provided the Agency a written legal opinion based on an Agency assurance that although some techniques would be used more than once, repetition would “not be substantial.” My view was that, whatever methodology was used to count applications of the waterboard, the very large number of applications to which some detainees were subjected led to the inescapable conclusion that the Agency was abusing this technique.

Helgerson said the Justice Department did not provide the CIA with a “critical legal opinion…, which I believed was needed to protect Agency employees and detainees.”

“The Department of Justice had earlier determined that the Agency’s interrogation techniques did not constitute torture, but it had never opined on whether the same actions were consistent with the obligation undertaken by the US Government under Article 16 of the Torture Convention to prohibit cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment,” Helgerson said. “In fact, it appeared that certain of the techniques were designed solely because they were degrading. As a result of our report and appeals from other key officials, the Department of Justice did later issue an opinion on this matter, approving the Agency’s actions.”

Although Helgerson said he accepted the conclusions of CIA managers that the brutal torture of detainees resulted in “valuable” intelligence, he believed the CIA has yet to provide definitive answers as to whether specific torture techniques were “effective” and “necessary” in obtaining intelligence or whether the same information could have been obtained through “traditional methods.”

“Even at this late date, an independent panel of experts with backgrounds in interrogation should systematically evaluate the quality of the intelligence gained as related to the specific techniques used, or not used, in particular cases,” he said. “This would clarify the value of the information and the utility of various approaches.”

Yet despite the fact that the report clearly shows that the Bush administration officials had been intimately involved in the process, a criminal investigation authorized by Attorney General Eric Holder Monday will be limited in scope and will focus on whether CIA contractors and agency interrogators violated anti-torture laws.

Panetta issued a statement in advance of the release later Monday of a critical 2004 inspector general’s report on the agency’s torture program. Panetta says the horrific details of torture and abuse contained in the report “is in many ways an old story” and that the interrogation methods used against detainees were approved in Justice Department legal memoranda.

The outlines of prior interrogation practices, and many of the details, are public already,” Panetta said. “The use of enhanced interrogation techniques, begun when our country was responding to the horrors of September 11th, ended in January. For the CIA now, the challenge is not the battles of yesterday, but those of today and tomorrow. It is there that we must work to enhance the safety of our country. That is the job the American people want us to do, and that is my responsibility as the current Director of the CIA.

I make no judgments on the accuracy of the 2004 IG report or the various views expressed about it. Nor am I eager to enter the debate, already politicized, over the ultimate utility of the Agency’s past detention and interrogation effort. But this much is clear: The CIA obtained intelligence from high-value detainees when inside information on al-Qa’ida was in short supply. Whether this was the only way to obtain that information will remain a legitimate area of dispute, with Americans holding a range of views on the methods used. The CIA requested and received legal guidance and referred allegations of abuse to the Department of Justice. President Obama has established new policies for interrogation.

His statement was disseminated to reporters hours after ABCNews.com reported that Panetta got into a “profanity-laced screaming match” with a senior White House staff member over reports that Attorney General Eric Holder was considering the appointment of a special counsel to probe the CIA’s use of torture against “war on terror detainees.”

According to intelligence officials, Panetta erupted in a tirade last month during a meeting with a senior White House staff member. Panetta was reportedly upset over plans by Attorney General Eric Holder to open a criminal investigation of allegations that CIA officers broke the law in carrying out certain interrogation techniques that President Obama has termed “torture.”

ABCNews.com added that Panetta had threatened to resign over the possibility of a criminal investigation involving agency interrogators.

Panetta’s about-face stands in stark contrast to statements he made in a series of op-eds in the Monterey County Herald and other publications last year. In a March 8, 2008, column titled, “Americans Reject Fear Tactics,” Panetta wrote that “all forms of torture have long been prohibited by American law and international treaties respected by Republican and Democratic presidents alike.”

“Our forefathers prohibited ‘cruel and unusual punishment’ because that was how tyrants and despots ruled in the 1700’s. They wanted an America that was better than that. Torture is illegal, immoral, dangerous and counterproductive. And yet, the president is using fear to trump the law.”

Here is Panetta’s statment in full hours before the Justice Department released the CIA IG torture report and other documents.

Message from the Director: Release of Material on Past Detention Practices

Today, as part of a number of Freedom of Information Act cases, the government is responding to court orders to release more documents related to the Agency’s past detention and interrogation of foreign terrorists. The CIA materials include the 2004 report from our Office of Inspector General and two papers-one from 2004 and the other from 2005-that discuss the value of intelligence acquired from high-level detainees. The complete package is hundreds of pages long. The declassification process, a mandatory part of the proceedings, was conducted in accord with established FOIA guidelines.

This is in many ways an old story. The outlines of prior interrogation practices, and many of the details, are public already. The use of enhanced interrogation techniques, begun when our country was responding to the horrors of September 11th, ended in January. For the CIA now, the challenge is not the battles of yesterday, but those of today and tomorrow. It is there that we must work to enhance the safety of our country. That is the job the American people want us to do, and that is my responsibility as the current Director of the CIA.

My emphasis on the future comes with a clear recognition that our Agency takes seriously proper accountability for the past. As the intelligence service of a democracy, that’s an important part of who we are. When it comes to past detention and interrogation practices, here are some facts to bear in mind on that point:

· The CIA itself commissioned the Inspector General’s review. The report, prepared five years ago, noted both the effectiveness of the interrogation program and concerns about how it had been run early on. Several Agency components, including the Office of General Counsel and the Directorate of Operations, disagreed with some of the findings and conclusions.

· The CIA referred allegations of abuse to the Department of Justice for potential prosecution. This Agency made no excuses for behavior, however rare, that went beyond the formal guidelines on counterterrorism. The Department of Justice has had the complete IG report since 2004. Its career prosecutors have examined that document-and other incidents from Iraq and Afghanistan-for legal accountability. They worked carefully and thoroughly, sometimes taking years to decide if prosecution was warranted or not. In one case, the Department obtained a criminal conviction of a CIA contractor. In other instances, after Justice chose not to pursue action in court, the Agency took disciplinary steps of its own.

· The CIA provided the complete, unredacted IG report to the Congress. It was made available to the leadership of the Congressional intelligence committees in 2004 and to the full committees in 2006. All of the material in the document has been subject to Congressional oversight and reviewed for legal accountability.

As Director in 2009, my primary interest-when it comes to a program that no longer exists-is to stand up for those officers who did what their country asked and who followed the legal guidance they were given. That is the President’s position, too. The CIA was aggressive over the years in seeking new opinions from the Department of Justice as the legal landscape changed. The Agency sought and received multiple written assurances that its methods were lawful. The CIA has a strong record in terms of following legal guidance and informing the Department of Justice of potentially illegal conduct.

I make no judgments on the accuracy of the 2004 IG report or the various views expressed about it. Nor am I eager to enter the debate, already politicized, over the ultimate utility of the Agency’s past detention and interrogation effort. But this much is clear: The CIA obtained intelligence from high-value detainees when inside information on al-Qa’ida was in short supply. Whether this was the only way to obtain that information will remain a legitimate area of dispute, with Americans holding a range of views on the methods used. The CIA requested and received legal guidance and referred allegations of abuse to the Department of Justice. President Obama has established new policies for interrogation.

The CIA must also keep its focus on the primary responsibility of protecting the country. America is a nation at war. This Agency plays a decisive role in helping the United States meet the full range of security threats and opportunities overseas. That starts with the continuing fight against al-Qa’ida and its sympathizers. There, alongside all its other contributions, the CIA is helping our government chart a new way forward on interrogation, one in keeping with the President’s Executive Order of January 22nd. You, the men and women of this great institution, do the hard work and take the tough risks that intelligence and espionage demand.

I am very proud of what you do, here and abroad, to protect the United States. Your skill, courage, commitment, and focus on mission make the CIA indispensable to the nation. It is a privilege to serve with you.

Leon E. Panetta

The former Bush administration officials rank at the top of the list of the 50 most nortious war criminals living in the U.S.

Compiled below, in hopes that it may be of some assistance to Eric Holder, John Conyers, Patrick Leahy, active citizens, foreign courts, the International Criminal Court, law firms preparing civil suits, and local or state prosecutors with decency and nerve is a list of 50 top living U.S. war criminals. These are men and women who helped to launch wars of aggression or who have been complicit in lesser war crimes. These are not the lowest-ranking employees or troops who managed to stray from official criminal policies. These are the makers of those policies.

The occupations of Iraq and Afghanistan have seen the United States target civilians, journalists, hospitals, and ambulances, use antipersonnel weapons including cluster bombs in densely settled urban areas, use white phosphorous as a weapon, use depleted uranium weapons, employ a new version of napalm found in Mark 77 firebombs, engage in collective punishment of Iraqi civilian populations — including by blocking roads, cutting electricity and water, destroying fuel stations, planting bombs in farm fields, demolishing houses, and plowing down orchards — detain people without charge or legal process without the rights of prisoners of war, imprison children, torture, and murder.

The list below does not include those responsible for war crimes prior to 2001. Nor does it include those currently in power who are making themselves complicit by failing to prosecute or cease commission of these crimes. The list could be greatly expanded. It could also be narrowed. I would argue, however, that it presents a more reasonable starting place than Holder’s reported proposal to investigate only CIA employees who failed to comply with criminal torture policies, of whom there are no doubt more than 50.

Because each of the people on this list should be nonviolently protested everywhere they go (more on that below), I have organized them by location. Please post updates on where they are as comments at http://afterdowningstreet.org/warcriminals

CALIFORNIA

1. John Yoo: Professor of Law at Boalt Hall School of Law in Berkeley, California, with house at 1241 Grizzly Peak Blvd., Berkeley, (but a lawyer with the Pennsylvania bar from which he should be disbarred and would be if enough people demanded it) counseled the White House on how to get away with war crimes, wrote this memo promoting presidential power to launch aggressive war, and claimed the power to decree that the federal statutes against torture, assault, maiming, and stalking do not apply to the military in the conduct of the war, and to announce a new definition of torture limiting it to acts causing 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. Yoo claimed in 2005 that a president has the right to enhance an interrogation by crushing the testicles of someone’s child. Yoo has been confronted in his classroom: video, and defended by the Washington Post, and again confronted in the classroom.

Additional collaborators:
2. Robert J. Delahunty, Yoo colleague, should be disbarred in NY
3. Patrick F. Philbin, Yoo colleague, Deputy, should be disbarred in D.C. and MA

4. Jay Bybee: federal judge on the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, headquartered in San Francisco, California (but Bybee based in Las Vegas), counseled the White House on how to get away with war crimes, including by helping Yoo draft the memo linked above. He signed not only torture memos but also a memo purporting to legalize illegal and unconstitutional wars. BYBEE SHOULD BE IMPEACHED. He works, among other places, at the James R. Browning Courthouse, 95 7th Street, San Francisco, CA 94103, — This is a giant marble building in the center of the city represented in Congress by the Speaker of the House.

5. William J. “Jim” Haynes, II: was General Counsel to the Department of War (“Defense”). He is now Chief Corporate Counsel at the Chevron Corporate Office in San Ramon, California. He counseled the White House on how to get away with war crimes, including by drafting memos for Yoo. Works at Chevron Headquarters, 6001 Bollinger Canyon Road, San Ramon, CA 94583. Member of bar in GA, NC, DC.

More collaborators:
6. Major General (Ret.) Michael E. Dunlavey, (now Judge, Erie County Court, Common Pleas, Erie, PA
7. Diane Beaver, top military lawyer at Gitmo
8. Jack Landman Goldsmith, III, [the illegal transfer memo in March 2004], DoD General Counsel’s Office at Pentagon
9. Ms. Eliana Davidson, International Law Division, Office of the General Counsel, Office of the Secretary of “Defense”

10. Colin Powell: strategic limited partner with Kleiner, Perkins, Caufield & Byers, a Silicon Valley venture capital firm, appears as a speaker in a series of motivational events called Get Motivated, board member of Revolution Health and of the Council on Foreign Relations, took part in White House meetings personally overseeing and approving torture by authorizing the use of specific torture techniques including waterboarding on specific people, lied to the United Nations about the grounds for war in a failed attempt to legalize a war of aggression, and was in fact a leading liar in making the false case for an illegal war of aggression.

Remember: Not every man in a dark suit is a war criminal. Check for blood under their fingernails to confirm identification.

NEW YORK

11. Henry Kissinger: lives in Kent, Connecticut, and works at Kissinger Associates, 350 Park Avenue, New York, N.Y., had a resume envied by other war criminals long before he advised George W. Bush to commit war crimes. Here’s a partial list of his crimes.

12. Nicholas E. Calio: Citigroup’s Executive Vice-President for Global Government Affairs served as a member of the White House Iraq Group (WHIG) which planned the marketing of an illegal war of aggression on the basis of lies.

13. Michael Mukasey: works in New York, N.Y. Some of his crimes are detailed at DisbarTortureLawyers.com.

TEXAS

14. George W. Bush: lives at 10141 Daria Place, Dallas, Texas. His crimes are described at http://afterdowningstreet.org/bush and at War Criminals Watch and at The 13 people who made torture possible.

15. Karen Hughes: lives in Austin, Texas, served as a member of the White House Iraq Group (WHIG) which planned the marketing of an illegal war of aggression on the basis of lies.

16. Paul Bremer lives in Chester, Vermont, and also works in Austin, Texas. His crimes are listed at War Criminals Watch.

Yes, a woman can be a war criminal. What? Did you think any of the men above ever risked personally breaking a fingernail?

WASHINGTON, D.C.

17. Dick Cheney: The former vice president lives nextdoor to CIA headquarters at 1126 Chain Bridge Road, McLean, Va. His crimes are documented at http://impeachcheney.org and at The 13 people who made torture possible and at War Criminals Watch.

18. John Rizzo: The General Counsel for the CIA (then and now) works nextdoor to Dick Cheney’s house at the headquarters of the CIA in McLean, Va. His crimes are described in The 13 people who made torture possible.

More collaborators:
19. Robert Eatinger, CIA lawyer
20. Steven Hermes, CIA’s National Clandestine Service (NCS)
21. Paul Kelbaugh, Deputy Legal Counsel, CTC, CIA

22. Steven Bradbury: also of McLean, Va., is described along with his crimes at SourceWatch, DisbarTortureLawyers.com, and The 13 people who made torture possible.

23. David Addington: was chief of staff to Dick Cheney in Washington, D.C., counseled the White House on how to get away with war crimes, including by helping Yoo draft the memo linked above, and drafted signing statements for Bush declaring the right to violate laws redundantly banning war crimes including torture and the construction of permanent bases in Iraq and efforts to control Iraq’s oil. Lives at 103 W Maple Street, Alexandria, VA 22301-2605 — This is a few blocks from the King Street Metro Stop.

24. Condoleezza Rice: served as Secretary of State in Washington, D.C., and can be found frequenting shoe stores, served as a member of the White House Iraq Group (WHIG) which planned the marketing of an illegal war of aggression on the basis of lies, took part in White House meetings personally overseeing and approving torture by authorizing the use of specific torture techniques including waterboarding on specific people, lied about mushroom clouds, and was in fact a leading liar in making the false case for an illegal war of aggression.

25. Donald Rumsfeld: lives in Washington, D.C., and at former slave-beating plantation “Mount Misery” on Maryland’s Eastern Shore near St. Michael’s and a home belonging to Dick Cheney, as well as at an estate outside Taos, New Mexico. He took part in White House meetings personally overseeing and approving torture by authorizing the use of specific torture techniques including waterboarding on specific people, and was in fact a leading liar in making the false case for an illegal war of aggression, and pushed for wars of aggression for years as a participant in the Project for the New American Century.

26. George Tenet: Distinguished Professor in the Practice of Diplomacy at Georgetown University in Washington, D.C., took part in White House meetings personally overseeing and approving torture by authorizing the use of specific torture techniques including waterboarding on specific people, oversaw the Central Intelligence Agency as it engaged in illegal renditions, detentions, torture, murder, and coverups of crimes, as well as helping to build a false case for an illegal war of aggression.

27. John Ashcroft: has his own lobbying company through which to profit from his government connections: The Ashcroft Group, LLC, 1399 New York Avenue, N.W., Suite 950, Washington, DC 20005, Phone: 202.942.0202, Fax: 202.942.0216, info@ashcroftgroupllc.com took part in White House meetings personally overseeing and approving torture by authorizing the use of specific torture techniques including waterboarding on specific people.

28. Alberto Gonzales: has hired a criminal-defense lawyer George Terwilliger, partner at White & Case, to defend him, while others have created a trust fund to help pay for his legal expenses, meanwhile Gonzales has been unable to find work as a lawyer himself, so his income comes from speaking engagements, then White House counsel, wrote a memo on January 25, 2002. It explained that under the 1996 War Crimes Act, U.S. officials might be prosecuted for violating the Geneva Conventions for actions in Afghanistan (and future parts of the “war on terror”), with penalties up to and including death. He suggested that Bush declare that the Taliban and Al Qaeda weren’t covered by Geneva, to be on the safe side. Bush did so. Gonzo now has a job at Texas Tech, but not teaching law. Help this effort to boot him! Remember that we drove him out of office by almost impeaching him.

29. Paul Wolfowitz: lives in Chevey Chase, Maryland, and is a visiting scholar at the American Enterprise Institute in Washington, D.C., advocated illegal war of aggression, and pushed for wars of aggression for years as a participant in the Project for a New American Century.

30. Doug Feith: serves on the faculty of the Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service at Georgetown University in Washington, D.C., as a Professor and Distinguished Practitioner in National Security Policy, manufactured, cherry picked, and distorted information, and pressured others to do the same, to help build a false case for an illegal war of aggression, and advocated early and openly for an illegal war of aggression against a “non-al qaeda target.” Also works at Hudson Institute, 1015 15th Street, N.W., 6th Floor, Washington, DC 20005, three blocks from the White House.

31. Elliot Abrams: served as Deputy National Security Advisor for Global Democracy Strategy in Washington, D.C., and wherever he can do the most damage around the world, was a well-established war criminal even before he pushed for wars of aggression for years as a participant in the Project for a New American Century, helped to build a false case for attacking Iraq, and supported a failed coup attempt in Venezuela.

32. Karl Rove: owns million dollar houses in Washington, D.C., and Florida, and works for Fox News, Newsweek, and the Wall Street Journal when not testifying to congressional committees or federal prosecutors about his numerous unindicted non-war crimes. He served as a member of the White House Iraq Group (WHIG) which planned the marketing of an illegal war of aggression on the basis of lies, and took part in exposing an undercover agent as retribution for exposing one of WHIG’s lies.

(According to Star80 at DemocraticUnderground, Rove “can be found stuffing his fat pasty little face with crab meat at Cafe 30A in Santa Rosa Beach FL: http://www.cafethirtya.com – 3899 East County Highway 30A Santa Rosa Beach FL 32459.”)

(Citizens arrest of Rove attempted in Iowa, and in California, and in New York.)

33. I. Lewis Libby: lives in McLean, Virginia, and has been disbarred in Washington, D.C., and Pennsylvania, served as a member of the White House Iraq Group (WHIG) which planned the marketing of an illegal war of aggression on the basis of lies, took part in exposing an undercover agent as retribution for exposing one of WHIG’s lies, has already been convicted of obstruction of justice for interfering with investigation, and pushed for wars of aggression for years as a participant in the Project for a New American Century.

34. Mary Matalin: married to James Carville, both of them addicted to Washington, D.C., served as a member of the White House Iraq Group (WHIG) which planned the marketing of an illegal war of aggression on the basis of lies.

35. Stephen Hadley: served as National Security Advisor to the President in Washington, D.C., served as a member of the White House Iraq Group (WHIG) which planned the marketing of an illegal war of aggression on the basis of lies, and took part in exposing an undercover agent as retribution for exposing one of WHIG’s lies.

36. James R. Wilkinson: worked for Bush as Deputy National Security Advisor for Communications in Washington, D.C., served as a member of the White House Iraq Group (WHIG) which planned the marketing of an illegal war of aggression on the basis of lies.

37. John Bolton: lives in Bethesda, Maryland, is a member of a Lutheran Church, works for the law firm Kirkland and Ellis LLP, 655 Fifteenth Street, N.W., Washington, D.C. 20005-5793, T: +1 202-879-5000, F: +1 202-879-5200, is associated with the American Enterprise Institute, Jewish Institute for National Security Affairs, Institute of East-West Dynamics, National Rifle Association, US Commission on International Religious Freedom, and the Council for National Policy, helped to launch an illegal war of aggression by disseminating false claims through the State Department while he was under-secretary of state for arms control, and pushed for wars of aggression for years as a participant in the Project for a New American Century.

38. Michael Chertoff: works in Washington, D.C. Some of his crimes are detailed at DisbarTortureLawyers.com.

39. Timothy Flanigan: works in Washington, D.C. Some of his crimes are detailed at DisbarTortureLawyers.com.

40. Alice Fisher: works in Washington, D.C. Some of her crimes are detailed at DisbarTortureLawyers.com.

41. John Bellinger works in Washington, D.C. His crimes are listed at War Criminals Watch.

42. John Negroponte works in Washington, D.C. His crimes are listed at War Criminals Watch.

43. Jonathan Fredman was a top torture lawyer under John Rizzo at the CIA: details.

44. Scott Muller was general counsel at the CIA: details.

45. Kyle D. “Dusty” Foggo was instrumental in setting up illegal secret prisons.

NEBRASKA:

46. Andrew Card works in Omaha, NE. His crimes are listed at War Criminals Watch.

AFGHANISTAN:

47. Stanley McChrystal has been promoted as reward for his war crimes.

UNKNOWN LOCATION:

48. James Mitchell:
From The 13 people who made torture possible:

Even while Addington, Gonzales and the lawyers were beginning to build the legal framework for torture, a couple of military psychologists were laying out the techniques the military would use. James Mitchell, a retired military psychologist, had been a leading expert in the military’s SERE program. In December 2001, with his partner, Bruce Jessen, Mitchell reverse-engineered SERE techniques to be used to interrogate detainees. Then, in the spring of 2002, before OLC gave official legal approval to torture, Mitchell oversaw Abu Zubaydah’s interrogation. An FBI agent on the scene describes Mitchell overseeing the use of “borderline torture.” And after OLC approved waterboarding, Mitchell oversaw its use in ways that exceeded the guidelines in the OLC memo. Under Mitchell’s guidance, interrogators used the waterboard with “far greater frequency than initially indicated” — a total of 183 times in a month for Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and 83 times in a month for Abu Zubaydah.

More on Mitchell and Jessen.

49. Tommy Franks: His crimes are listed at War Criminals Watch.

50. Michael Hayden: His crimes are listed at War Criminals Watch.

Heck, let’s make it a full deck of 52, by including Bruce Jessen mentioned above and Erik Prince of Blackwater.

No Justice, No Peace

Judge’s comment on Rove’s citizen arrest in Iowa: “It’s about time.”

We encourage you to nonviolently protest these people and insist that they be given what so many of them have denied others: a fair trial. We encourage you to attempt to make citizen’s arrests, after consulting lawyers and learning how to avoid any unnecessary criminal risk to yourselves. It is possible to confront a war criminal at a public event and announce a “citizen’s arrest!” without actually touching (or handcuffing) the criminal.

You may want to avoid announcing that you’re coming, because the war criminal may choose to escape.

Your team should include one or more people who can produce an excellent video and be extremely fast in editing and posting it online. Your team should ideally include a lawyer. And, of course, people who can read the charges and question the suspect. Everyone on your team should be able to keep a secret while you’re planning your arrest or protest.

Read the war criminal their rights, rights they have denied others:
“You have the right to remain silent. Anything you say can and will be used against you in a court of law. You have the right to have an attorney present during questioning. If you cannot afford an attorney, one will be appointed for you.”

Read the war criminal the charges against them.

Ask the war criminal if they would like to say anything.

Once you have good video footage, your top priority becomes immediately getting it edited (if necessary) and online.

If possible, turn the war criminal over to the police.

Pass out flyers to passersby.

Send statement to the media and/or have the media present.

Consult a lawyer to avoid unnecessary risks of violating laws while enforcing the law. According to Wikipedia, “A citizen’s arrest is an arrest made by a person who is not a sworn law enforcement official. In common law jurisdictions, the practice dates back to medieval England and the English common law, when sheriffs encouraged ordinary citizens to help apprehend law breakers. Despite the title, the arresting person does not usually have to be a citizen of the country where he is acting, as they are usually designated as any person with arrest powers…

Each state with the exception of North Carolina permits citizen arrests if the commission of felony is witnessed by the arresting citizen… The application of state laws varies widely with respect to … felonies not witnessed by the arresting party. American citizens do not carry the authority or enjoy the legal protections of police, and are held to the principle of strict liability before the courts of civil- and criminal law including but not limited to any infringement of another’s rights.

Though North Carolina General Statutes have no provision for citizen’s arrests, detention by private persons is permitted and apply to both civilians and police officers outside their jurisdiction. Detention, being different from an arrest in the fact that a detainee may not be transported without consent, is permitted where probable cause exists that one has committed a felony, breach of peace, physical injury to another person, or theft or destruction of property … A person who makes a citizen’s arrest could risk exposing himself to possible lawsuits or criminal charges (such as charges of impersonating police, false imprisonment, kidnapping, or wrongful arrest) if the wrong person is apprehended or a suspect’s civil rights are violated.”

In the case of the war criminals we propose detaining, they are most if not all public figures and we have all witnessed their felonies, as detailed above.

Be prepared to post your video online in multiple places: Youtube, Google, and After Downing Street.

Known upcoming public appearances of war criminals who should be protested and citizen arrested: List. Map. See also: War Criminals Watch.

For more on holding the biggest criminals accountable, see http://prosecutebushcheney.org

See also: “Crimes and Misdemeanors: Slate’s interactive guide: Who in the Bush administration broke the law, and who could be prosecuted?” by Emily Bazelon, Kara Hadge, Dahlia Lithwick, and Chris Wilson. This guide includes some of those complicit in crimes other than war crimes, such as DOJ hirings and firings, destruction of CIA tapes, and illegal spying. (Of course, Karl Rove shows up in every part of every list.)

David Swanson is the founder of AfterDowningStreet.org and the author of the upcoming book “Daybreak: Undoing the Imperial Presidency and Forming a More Perfect Union” by Seven Stories Press.  You can pre-order it for a discount price here.

“There simply is no legal, moral or principled reason to insulate those who authorized the torture of detainees, either through legal reasoning or other policy directive, from investigation,” Rep. Jerrold Nadler, a New York Democrat and chairman of the House Judiciary subcommittee on the Constitution, Civil Rights and Civil Liberties, said in a letter to Holder.

Nadler’s letter of Aug. 4 was followed on Sunday by a report in the Los Angeles Times that Holder was likely to sign off on a criminal probe, but would limit its scope to CIA interrogators who exceeded interrogation limits set in 2002 by Justice Department attorneys John Yoo and Jay Bybee in memos that authorized waterboarding and other brutal acts against suspected terrorists.

“A senior Justice Department official said that Holder envisioned an inquiry that would be narrow in scope, focusing on ‘whether people went beyond the techniques that were authorized’ in Bush administration memos that liberally interpreted anti-torture laws,” the Los Angeles Times reported.

Nadler’s letter reiterated his previous calls for a special prosecutor with broad authority to investigate violations of federal laws that prohibit torture. He also objected to any investigation limited to “activities by interrogators, working in bad faith, that fell outside the ‘four corners’ of the legal memos” provided by lawyers of the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel, where Yoo and Bybee worked.

“First, such an investigation would fail to consider the possible violation of laws by high-ranking officials and lawyers who, through legal advice or otherwise, may have authorized torture,” Nadler wrote.

“This country has been instrumental in establishing the principle that high-ranking officials and lawyers who use legal reasoning to justify or otherwise authorize war crimes can, and should, be held legally accountable. The ban on torture is absolute and we have a legal obligation to investigate torture and all of those who may have been party to its use.”

Nadler’s letter was prompted by several news reports published over the past month indicating that Holder was leaning toward a limited criminal probe after reviewing a classified CIA inspector general’s report that reportedly called into question the legality of the Bush administration’s torture program.

The secret findings of CIA Inspector General John Helgerson led to eight criminal referrals to the Justice Department for homicide and other misconduct, but those cases languished as Vice President Dick Cheney is said to have intervened to constrain Helgerson’s inquiries.

Holder may reopen those cases, but if an investigation is narrowly focused on the CIA interrogators and outside contractors and does not include the Bush administration officials who authorized the policies then the probe would likely amount to a whitewash, much like the Abu Ghraib case.

Of the 12 investigations launched in the aftermath of the Abu Ghraib prison scandal, not one scrutinized the roles of Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld or any other senior Bush administration official. The inquiries concentrated instead on the military police identified in the photographs, like Private Lynndie England and Corporal Charles Graner Jr.

Such a limited approach would also ignore evidence that senior Bush administration officials and high-level officials at CIA headquarters in Langley micromanaged the torture of at least one high-level detainee.

As first reported by The Public Record, documents released earlier this year in a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit between the American Civil Liberties Union and the CIA showed that CIA interrogators provided top agency officials at Langley with daily “torture” updates of Abu Zubaydah, an alleged “high-level” terrorist detainee who was held at a secret “black site” prison and waterboarded 83 times in August 2002.

Additionally, alleged 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed was waterboarded 183 times in the span of a single month. CIA Inspector General Helgerson also “had serious questions about the agency’s mistreatment of dozens more,” according to Jane Mayer, a reporter for The New Yorker and author of the book The Dark Side.

Senior Bush administration officials were known to be closely following these developments and pressed the CIA for more and more results.

Last year, in several interviews prior to exiting the White House, Cheney admitted that he personally authorized the waterboarding of three so-called “high-value” prisoners.

“I signed off on it; others did, as well, too,” Cheney said.

In waterboarding, interrogators strap a person down to a board with a cloth covering his face and then pour water over the cloth, causing the victim to feel as if he is drowning. It is a torture technique dating back at least to the Spanish Inquisition.

“I thought that it was absolutely the right thing to do,” Cheney said of what he called the “enhanced interrogation” of the detainees. “I thought the [administration’s] legal opinions that were rendered [endorsing the harsh treatment] were sound. I think the techniques were reasonable in terms of what they [the CIA interrogators] were asking to be able to do. And I think it produced the desired result.

“Was it torture? I don’t believe it was torture,” Cheney said. “The CIA handled itself, I think, very appropriately. They came to us in the administration, talked to me, talked to others in the administration, about what they felt they needed to do in order to obtain the intelligence that we believe these people were in possession of.”

In his letter to Holder, Nadler suggested statements, like those uttered publicly by Cheney, needed a closer look to determine whether war crimes were committed.

“The Geneva Conventions obligate High Contracting Parties such as the United States to investigate and bring before our courts those individuals ‘alleged to have committed, or to have ordered to be committed grave breaches of those Conventions.

“The War Crimes Act… specifically identifies torture and cruel or inhuman treatment, as well as the conspiracy to commit those acts, as punishable war crimes. The federal Torture Statute …  criminalizes torture and the conspiracy to commit torture.”

Nadler said if Holder decides to sign off on a criminal investigation a prosecutor must probe whether “federal criminal laws were violated by individuals who authorized or participated in the interrogation of detainees, including high-ranking officials and lawyers from the Department of Justice itself who allegedly approved or ordered the use of enhanced interrogation techniques that amounted to torture.”

Nadler added, “The ban on torture is absolute: ‘no exceptional circumstances whatsoever . . . may be invoked as a justification of torture,’ and ‘an order from a superior officer . . . may not be invoked as a justification of torture.’

“It may prove true that some interrogators faced difficult choices – pressure from superiors to obtain intelligence information from detainees coupled with directives or advice indicating that harsh interrogation methods were lawful – but limiting the scope of investigation to exclude individuals up front ignores the absolute bar on torture and our legal obligation to investigate torture, and is not necessary.

“If, indeed, laws were violated, the Detainee Treatment Act of 2005 provides a limited defense for those interrogators who show that they relied in good faith on legal advice in using interrogation methods that they did not know, and that a reasonable person would not know, were unlawful.
“These determinations are necessarily fact-based, and making ultimate decisions as to what the facts might prove or disprove, before any independent investigation has occurred, is unwarranted and would undermine the credibility of any investigation.”

In April, Holder declared that it “would be unfair to prosecute dedicated men and women working to protect America for conduct that was sanctioned in advance by the Justice Department.” That meant any possible criminal investigation would be limited to examining actions that went beyond what was sanctioned, such as repetitious use of waterboarding.

Last year, in the heat of the presidential campaign, Holder, who was a featured speaker at the American Constitution Society’s annual convention, told a packed crowd that the “American people are owe[d] a reckoning” as a result of the “abusive” and “unlawful” policies of the Bush administration.

“Our government authorized the use of torture, approved of secret electronic surveillance of American citizens, secretly detained American citizens without due process of law, denied the Writ of Habeus Corpus to hundreds of accused enemy combatants, and authorized the use of procedures that both violate international law and the United States Constitution,” Holder said in June 2008. “We owe the American people a reckoning.”

Obama, however, has been resistant to any investigation that would “look backward” and divert attention away from his domestic agenda.

Yet, Nadler said that can’t happen without a wide-ranging investigation.

“I appreciate and share the desire to put this unfortunate chapter in our nation’s history behind us, but we cannot do so without fulfilling our legal and moral obligation to investigate whether laws were broken by those who conducted and those who authorized the enhanced interrogation practices.”

It’s the second letter Nadler sent to Holder this year calling for a criminal investigation into the Bush administration’s torture policies. He also sent Holder a letter  on April 28 that was signed by other Democratic lawmakers who are members of the House Judiciary Committee. Nadler is chairman of the panel’s subcommittee on the Constitution, Civil Rights, and Civil Liberties Committee on the Judiciary.

That letter was sent a couple of weeks after the Obama administration released Justice Department memoranda which authorized CIA interrogators to torture “high-value” detainees and legalized domestic surveillance activities.

Tuesday’s letter comes on the heels of several news reports published last month stating that Holder is considering  the possibility of appointing a federal prosecutor.

But, as The Public Record reported last week, those same news reports, quoting unnamed sources, say that if Holder decides in the coming weeks to authorize a criminal investigation it would be limited to the “few bad apples” at the CIA who exceeded interrogation limits set by Justice Department attorneys in memos that authorized brutal acts of torture against suspected terrorists.

Nadler said he is “fundamentally concerned that the scope of the special counsel investigation will be too narrow.”

“There simply is no legal, moral or principled reason to insulate those who authorized the torture of detainees, either through legal reasoning or other policy directive, from investigation,” Nadler wrote. “This country has been instrumental in establishing the principle that high-ranking officials and lawyers who use legal reasoning to justify or otherwise authorize war crimes can, and should, be held legally accountable.

“The ban on torture is absolute and we have a legal obligation to investigate torture and all of those who may have been party to its use.”

Holder will likely make a decision if and when a CIA inspector general’s report is released that reportedly calls into question the legality of the agency’s torture of “high-value” detainees. The report is expected to be released at the end of August.

The secret findings of CIA Inspector General John Helgerson led to eight criminal referrals to the Justice Department for homicide and other misconduct, but those cases languished as Vice President Dick Cheney is said to have intervened to constrain Helgerson’s inquiries.

Holder may reopen those cases, but if an investigation is narrowly focused on the CIA interrogators and outside contractors and does not include the Bush administration officials who implemented the policies then the probe would likely amount to a whitewash, much like the Abu Ghraib case.

Of the 12 investigations launched in the aftermath of the Abu Ghraib prison scandal, not one scrutinized the roles of Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld or any other senior Bush administration official. The inquiries concentrated instead on the military police identified in the photographs, like Private Lynndie England and Corporal Charles Graner Jr.

Such a limited approach would also ignore evidence that senior Bush administration officials and high-level officials at CIA headquarters in Langley micromanaged the torture of at least one high-level detainee.

Documents released earlier this year in a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit between the American Civil Liberties Union and the CIA showed that CIA interrogators provided top agency officials at Langley with daily “torture” updates of Abu Zubaydah, the alleged “high-level” terrorist detainee, who was held at a secret “black site” prison and waterboarded 83 times in August 2002.

Additionally, alleged 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed was waterboarded 183 times in the span of a single month. CIA Inspector General Helgerson also “had serious questions about the agency’s mistreatment of dozens more, including Khalid Sheikh Mohammed,” according to Jane Mayer, a reporter for The New Yorker and author of the book The Dark Side.

Senior Bush administration officials were known to be closely following these developments and pressed the CIA for more and more results.

Last year, in several interviews prior to exiting the White House, Cheney admitted that he personally authorized the waterboarding of three so-called “high-value” prisoners.

“I signed off on it; others did, as well, too,” Cheney said.

Waterboarding, in which a person is strapped down to a board with a cloth covering his face and then water is poured over it, is a torture technique dating back at least to the Spanish Inquisition. The victim feels as if he is drowning.

“I thought that it was absolutely the right thing to do,” Cheney said of what he called the “enhanced interrogation” of the detainees. “I thought the [administration’s] legal opinions that were rendered [endorsing the harsh treatment] were sound. I think the techniques were reasonable in terms of what they [the CIA interrogators] were asking to be able to do. And I think it produced the desired result.

“Was it torture? I don’t believe it was torture,” Cheney said. “The CIA handled itself, I think, very appropriately. They came to us in the administration, talked to me, talked to others in the administration, about what they felt they needed to do in order to obtain the intelligence that we believe these people were in possession of.”

In his letter to Holder, Nadler said he has two “fundamental concerns” with any investigation that is limited to “activities by interrogators, working in bad faith, that fell outside the ‘four corners’ of the legal memos” provided by lawyers from the Office of Legal Counsel of the Department of Justice.”

“First, such an investigation would fail to consider the possible violation of laws by high-ranking officials and lawyers who, through legal advice or otherwise, may have authorized torture,” he wrote.

Additionally, as he wrote in an April 28 letter to Holder, any criminal investigation into the Bush administration’s torture policies must also determine whether war crimes were committed.

“The Geneva Conventions obligate High Contracting Parties such as the United States to investigate and bring before our courts those individuals ‘alleged to have committed, or to have ordered to be committed grave breaches of those Conventions.

“The War Crimes Act… specifically identifies torture and cruel or inhuman treatment, as well as the conspiracy to commit those acts, as punishable war crimes. The federal Torture Statute.. criminalizes torture and the conspiracy to commit torture.”

Nadler said if Holder decides to sign off on a criminal investigation a prosecutor must probe whether “federal criminal laws were violated by individuals who authorized or participated in the interrogation of detainees, including high-ranking officials and lawyers from the Department of Justice itself who allegedly approved or ordered the use of enhanced interrogation techniques that amounted to torture.”

“The ban on torture is absolute: ‘no exceptional circumstances whatsoever . . . may be invoked as a justification of torture,’ and ‘an order from a superior officer . . . may not be invoked as a justification of torture.’

“It may prove true that some interrogators faced difficult choices – pressure from superiors to obtain intelligence information from detainees coupled with directives or advice indicating that harsh interrogation methods were lawful – but limiting the scope of investigation to exclude individuals up front ignores the absolute bar on torture and our legal obligation to investigate torture, and is not necessary.

“If, indeed, laws were violated, the Detainee Treatment Act of 2005 provides a limited defense for those interrogators who show that they relied in good faith on legal advice in using interrogation methods that they did not know, and that a reasonable person would not know, were unlawful. These determinations are necessarily fact-based, and making ultimate decisions as to what the facts might prove or disprove, before any independent investigation has occurred, is unwarranted and would undermine the credibility of any investigation.”

In April, Holder declared that it “would be unfair to prosecute dedicated men and women working to protect America for conduct that was sanctioned in advance by the Justice Department.” What that meant was that a possible criminal investigation would be limited to examining actions that went beyond what was sanctioned, such as repetitious use of waterboarding.

Last year, in the heat of the presidential campaign, Holder, who was a featured speaker at the American Constitution Society’s annual convention, told a packed crowd that the “American people are owe[d] a reckoning” as a result of the “abusive” and “unlawful” policies of the Bush administration.

“Our government authorized the use of torture, approved of secret electronic surveillance of American citizens, secretly detained American citizens without due process of law, denied the Writ of Habeus Corpus to hundreds of accused enemy combatants, and authorized the use of procedures that both violate international law and the United States Constitution,” Holder said in June 2008. “We owe the American people a reckoning.”

Obama, however, has been resistant to any investigation that would “look backward” and divert attention away from his domestic agenda.

Yet, Nadler said that can’t happen without a wide-ranging investigation.

“I appreciate and share the desire to put this unfortunate chapter in our nation’s history behind us, but we cannot do so without fulfilling our legal and moral obligation to investigate whether laws were broken by those who conducted and those who authorized the enhanced interrogation practices.”

Physicians for Human Rights (PHR) discovered the mass gravesite in 2002 and has issued the call for the criminal probe. The organization says U.S. government documents it has obtained show that the bodies were reportedly buried in mass graves in the Dasht-e-Leili desert near Sheberghan, Afghanistan. It charges that Afghan warlord General Abdul Rashid Dostum, who it says was on the payroll of the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), was responsible for the massacre.

“Physicians for Human Rights went to investigate inhumane conditions at a prison in northern Afghanistan, but what we found was much worse,” stated Susannah Sirkin, PHR’s Deputy Director. “Our researchers documented an apparent mass grave site with reportedly thousands of bodies of captured prisoners who were suffocated to death in trucks. That was 2002; seven years later, we still seek answers about what exactly happened and who was involved.”

PHR says senior Bush Administration officials impeded investigations by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), and the State and Defense departments, and apparently never conducted a full inquiry. The New York Times made the disclosure earlier this month in a story by Pulitzer Prize winning reporter James Risen.

Subsequently, President Barack Obama told CNN’s Anderson Cooper that he has directed his national security team to look into the alleged massacre. Obama said the government needs to find out whether actions by the U.S. contributed to possible war crimes.

“The Bush Administration’s disregard for the rule of law and the Geneva Conventions led to torture of prisoners in Guantánamo and many other secret places,” noted Nathaniel Raymond, PHR’s lead researcher on Dasht-e-Leili.

“Contrary to the legal opinions of the previous Department of Justice, the principles of the Geneva Conventions are non-negotiable, as is their enforcement. President Obama must open a full and transparent criminal probe and prosecute any U.S. officials found to have broken the law,” he said.

“The State Department’s statement to the New York Times that suspected war crimes should be thoroughly investigated indicates a move towards full accountability,” added Raymond. “We stand ready to aid the US government in investigating this massacre. It is time for the cover-up to end.”

PHR reiterated its call on the Government of Afghanistan, which has jurisdiction over the alleged mass grave site, to secure the area with the assistance of ISAF (International Security Assistance Force-Afghanistan), protect witnesses to the initial incident and the ensuing tampering and ensure a full investigation of remaining evidence at the site, including the tracing of the substantial amount of soil that appears to have been removed in 2006.

“Gravesites have been tampered with, evidence has been destroyed, and witnesses have been tortured and killed,” PHR said. “The Dasht-e-Leili mass grave site must finally be secured, all surviving witnesses must be protected, and the Government of Afghanistan, in coordination with the UN and NATO (North Atlantic Treaty Organization), must at last allow a full investigation to go forward.”

PHR charged that American officials have been reluctant to pursue an investigation — sought by officials from the FBI, the State Department, the Red Cross and human rights groups — because the warlord, Gen. Abdul Rashid Dostum, was on the payroll of the CIA and his militia worked closely with United States Special Forces in 2001.

The group said the United States also worried about undermining the American-supported government of President Hamid Karzai, in which General Dostum had served as a defense official.

“At the White House, nobody said no to an investigation, but nobody ever said yes, either,” said Pierre Prosper, the former American ambassador for war crimes issues. “The first reaction of everybody there was, ‘Oh, this is a sensitive issue; this is a touchy issue politically’.”

PHR’s Raymond, who is head of the organization’s Campaign Against Torture, told us that President Obama’s statement was welcomed. But, he added, “The President’s rhetoric must be matched by urgent action. He needs to pressure President Karzai to secure the mass graves site, protect witnesses and make sure that U.S.-led military forces and the United Nations in Afghanistan protect all evidence of the crimes.”

PHR said that, in recent weeks, State Department officials have quietly tried to thwart General Dostum’s reappointment as military chief of staff to the Afghan president, according to several senior officials, and suggested that the administration might not be hostile to an inquiry.

The question of culpability for the prisoner deaths — which may have been the most significant mass killing in Afghanistan after the 2001 American-led invasion — has taken on new urgency since the general, an important Karzai ally, was reinstated to his government post last month. He had been suspended last year and living in exile in Turkey after he was accused of threatening a
political rival at gunpoint.

The killings reportedly occurred in late November 2001, just days after the American-led invasion forced the ouster of the Taliban government in Kabul. Thousands of Taliban fighters surrendered to General Dostum’s forces, which were part of the American-backed Northern Alliance, in the city of Kunduz. They were then transported to a prison run by the general’s forces near the town of Shibarghan.

Survivors and witnesses told The New York Times and Newsweek in 2002 that over a three-day period, Taliban prisoners were stuffed into closed metal shipping containers and given no food or water; many suffocated while being trucked to the prison. Other prisoners were killed when guards shot into the containers.

General Dostum, however, has said previously that any such deaths of the Taliban prisoners were unintentional. He has said that only 200 prisoners died and blamed combat wounds and disease for most of the fatalities.

The first calls for an investigation came from his group and the International Committee of the Red Cross. A military commander in the United States-led coalition rejected a request by a Red Cross official for an inquiry in late 2001, according to the official, who, in keeping with his organization’s policy, would speak only on condition of anonymity and declined to identify the commander.

Subsequently, PHR asked the Defense Department to investigate the alleged massacre, but no action was taken. PHR says the prisoner deaths came up in a conversation with Paul D. Wolfowitz, the deputy secretary of defense at the time, in early 2003.

“Somebody mentioned Dostum and the story about the containers and the possibility that this was a war crime. And Wolfowitz said we are not going to be going after him for that.