6 ms·

A reminder that a CIA officer who oversaw, ordered, and participated in systematic detainee torture, then wrote the order to destroy the evidential tapes of sai

by lehi 6y ago

A reminder that a CIA officer who oversaw, ordered, and participated in systematic detainee torture, then wrote the order to destroy the evidential tapes of said torture, was not only not punished or prosecuted but promoted to the current Director of the agency. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2005_CIA_interrogation_videotapes_destruction https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2005_CIA_interrogation_videota... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gina_Haspel https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gina_Haspel

portpecos 6y ago
Yeah but Gina had unanimous support by Democrats, Republicans, and the entire CIA to become the Director of the CIA. Let’s not forget that Obama re-signed the Patriot Act even after campaigning in 2008 to end it. This kind of behavior is a problem that spans generations of government positions. It’s about time something is done about it.
- est31 6y ago
  > Yeah but Gina had unanimous support by Democrats, Republicans, and the entire CIA to become the Director of the CIA. * 109 generals oppose her nomination in a letter: https://www.humanrightsfirst.org/sites/default/files/RMLSenateLetterOnHaspelNomination.pdf https://www.humanrightsfirst.org/sites/default/files/RMLSena... * yes, there were some democrats who voted in her favour, but there were republicans too who voted against her. Overall though, the overwhelming majority democrats did vote against her. Far from "unanimous support" like you claim. https://www.senate.gov/legislative/LIS/roll_call_lists/roll_call_vote_cfm.cfm?congress=115&session=2&vote=00101 https://www.senate.gov/legislative/LIS/roll_call_lists/roll_...
  - ncmncm 6y ago
    Thank you, I had not seen the letter before. It is chilling that anyone voted for her after seeing it.
    - est31 6y ago
      You are welcome! There was at least some level of accountability for US Army members after the Abu Ghraib scandal [0], while I haven't heard about any CIA employee being held accountable in a similar way. It's one thing to support an authoritarian regime with torture cells because it gives you cheap oil, it's another thing to do it yourself, with your own personel, because with this you lose your moral superiority and tarnish your own reputation. I'm not saying the former is great, it's bad, but that regime is not beholden to the US constitution, laws and judges, unlike the US federal employees. A good point I heard a senator make in her confirmation hearings [1]: Even if she wasn't involved in torture at all, (and she was), alone the fact that Trump nominated her because he believed she was involved, turns the decision about her nomination into a decision about torture, no matter how much she regrets it in her letter to Sen. Warner (and the letter's regret was minimal). [0]: Caution, graphic pictures https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abu_Ghraib_torture_and_prisoner_abuse#Convictions_of_soldiers https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abu_Ghraib_torture_and_prisone... [1]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C9R9ZGubvMs https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C9R9ZGubvMs
    - reportgunner 6y ago
      Perhaps they were afraid that they would be tortured.
  - Cd00d 6y ago
    I have no goal in undermining your point; it has only raised a curiosity for me. Overall your point is strong with your second bullet, it's just the first bullet I want to discuss without detracting from. 109 generals sounds like a large number. It's a compelling metric! But, I don't really know how many generals (and admirals) there really are in the military. I just know that the US military is kinda huge, so there's got to be a lot of them. I mean, the Pentagon alone is a massive building (the largest office in the world!) that I imagine being full of generals. And then, I see in the letter that all of the signees are retired, which expands the total number of generals (and admirals) alive significantly. I guess, I'm trying to ask a question about metrics, because I face this constantly. The absolute metric (>100 generals!) looks very strong, but the relative metric (nn% of all living generals and admirals active and retired) would possibly be underwhelming. It's no small feat to get a person with a real voice to sign a public letter like that so, the absolute number is big, but if the cause were of broad interest the relative number would be significant too.... On a minor bit of research I see there can only be 231 flag officers active at any time. I don't know how many are retired, but that does indicate the absolute number is a significant relative number. I still just struggle with the right way to report and digest metrics like this.
    - ryani 6y ago
      > I see in the letter that all of the signees are retired, which expands the total number of generals (and admirals) alive significantly. Active duty generals generally do not comment on political matters. Once they have left military service it's much easier for them to give a public opinion about politics without creating a conflict of interest.
    - darksaints 6y ago
      The number of generals (and admirals) in active duty is capped at about 650. Active duty generals are prohibited in most instances from opining in political matters, and they almost absolutely refrain from political matters over which they are not prohibited from opining on. Even after retirement, most still refrain from public opinions on political matters, but a small subset become politically active. 109 retired generals is far more than you can regularly expect on ordinarily political matters. For context, nominations for secretary of defense generally elicit opinions from retired generals. James Mattis, who quite possibly is the most popular military general for several decades, only ever received a couple dozen public expressions of support for confirmation as secretary of defense. The fact that 109 generals publicly opposed any confirmation of a Secretary of Anything, let alone a director level position, and did so in a unanimous letter, is absolutely massive.
- staticautomatic 6y ago
  And John Yoo teaches at Berkeley law!
  - alasdair_ 6y ago
    “Any questions class?” “How do you sleep at night?”
- flutterdude420 6y ago
  Must defend Trump! Even if it means lying about easily verifiable house voting records!
- KingOfCoders 6y ago
  Both republicans and democrats will do everything to keep up the American empire. Their foreign policy doesn't differ too much (Korea, Vietnam, Afghanistan, Syria, Bay of Pigs/Cuba, Panama, ...) as does their management of the three letter agencies (CIA torture and drug trading, NSA listening in, ...). Kennedy, Obama and Clinton haven't been that different from Nixon, Reagan or Bush in that area. Sometimes their tools differ.
coretx 6y ago
What happend with Gen. Keith Alexander?
- smegger001 6y ago
  He retired and became an executive at a privet cyber security company last I had heard.
  - toomuchtodo 6y ago
    https://www.hstoday.us/people-on-the-move/telos-corporation-welcomes-gen-keith-alexander-as-inaugural-member-of-advisory-board/ https://www.hstoday.us/people-on-the-move/telos-corporation-...
HashThis 6y ago
Similarly, the NSA betrayed us. They don't get to say that they were just following orders. We must always understand that the NSA betrayed us and we can't trust them any more. Information dominance is the most powerful way for a nation to dominate and control its people. The NSA turned on the US Citizens and betrayed them in this way.
- lawnchair_larry 6y ago
  Do you think they wanted to control US people?
  - mattacular 6y ago
    Do you not?
darksaints 6y ago
These are war crimes. Someone convicted of torture in the way that CIA officials have authorized could be sentenced to life imprisonment. The only problem is that the US is not a party to the ICC (probably because so many power holders are guilty of war crimes), so we do not pursue war crime trials. I would like to see a concerted effort to document these crimes, issue warrants for arrest, and have customs officials in all ICC-party states ready to flag and arrest any suspected war criminal, in order to extradite for ICC trial. Some countries do this already but we need all of the ICC-party states to do it. And yes, I get that they would likely just never travel to countries where they may be arrested. But for the powerful, that in itself is a punishment. They may not serve prison time, but we can take away their European vacations.
- jaywalk 6y ago
  That's a nice fantasy you've got there. I'd love to see some EU nation try to kidnap a prominent US citizen, but it'll never happen because the consequences would be severe.
  - darksaints 6y ago
    They're certainly trying: https://www.ecchr.eu/en/case/germany-criminal-complaint-against-cia-director-gina-haspel/ https://www.ecchr.eu/en/case/germany-criminal-complaint-agai...
  - haidut 6y ago
    The consequences would not be simply severe. There is an actual law passed by US in 2002 authorizing military action against ANY country (including NATO members!) working to bring US citizens to the Hague for a trial at ICC. And yes, that law explicitly allows invading the Netherlands and attacking ICC if needed in order to prevent war crime trials against US citizens. To make matters worse, there are rumored secret extensions (by executive action) of that law allowing LETHAL action against ANY individual(s) (as opposed to countries) who work towards getting a US citizen to trial at the ICC. See my comment in response to the use who you said was living in a fantasy world. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Service-Members%27_Protection_Act https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Service-Members%27_Pr...
jjcon 6y ago
Was anything they did ruled illegal? Pretty sure it wasn’t so I’m not sure how that is relevant.

by lehi 6y ago

portpecos 6y ago

Yeah but Gina had unanimous support by Democrats, Republicans, and the entire CIA to become the Director of the CIA. Let’s not forget that Obama re-signed the Patriot Act even after campaigning in 2008 to end it. This kind of behavior is a problem that spans generations of government positions. It’s about time something is done about it.

est31 6y ago
> Yeah but Gina had unanimous support by Democrats, Republicans, and the entire CIA to become the Director of the CIA. * 109 generals oppose her nomination in a letter: https://www.humanrightsfirst.org/sites/default/files/RMLSenateLetterOnHaspelNomination.pdf https://www.humanrightsfirst.org/sites/default/files/RMLSena... * yes, there were some democrats who voted in her favour, but there were republicans too who voted against her. Overall though, the overwhelming majority democrats did vote against her. Far from "unanimous support" like you claim. https://www.senate.gov/legislative/LIS/roll_call_lists/roll_call_vote_cfm.cfm?congress=115&session=2&vote=00101 https://www.senate.gov/legislative/LIS/roll_call_lists/roll_...
- ncmncm 6y ago
  Thank you, I had not seen the letter before. It is chilling that anyone voted for her after seeing it.
  - est31 6y ago
    You are welcome! There was at least some level of accountability for US Army members after the Abu Ghraib scandal [0], while I haven't heard about any CIA employee being held accountable in a similar way. It's one thing to support an authoritarian regime with torture cells because it gives you cheap oil, it's another thing to do it yourself, with your own personel, because with this you lose your moral superiority and tarnish your own reputation. I'm not saying the former is great, it's bad, but that regime is not beholden to the US constitution, laws and judges, unlike the US federal employees. A good point I heard a senator make in her confirmation hearings [1]: Even if she wasn't involved in torture at all, (and she was), alone the fact that Trump nominated her because he believed she was involved, turns the decision about her nomination into a decision about torture, no matter how much she regrets it in her letter to Sen. Warner (and the letter's regret was minimal). [0]: Caution, graphic pictures https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abu_Ghraib_torture_and_prisoner_abuse#Convictions_of_soldiers https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abu_Ghraib_torture_and_prisone... [1]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C9R9ZGubvMs https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C9R9ZGubvMs
  - reportgunner 6y ago
    Perhaps they were afraid that they would be tortured.
- Cd00d 6y ago
  I have no goal in undermining your point; it has only raised a curiosity for me. Overall your point is strong with your second bullet, it's just the first bullet I want to discuss without detracting from. 109 generals sounds like a large number. It's a compelling metric! But, I don't really know how many generals (and admirals) there really are in the military. I just know that the US military is kinda huge, so there's got to be a lot of them. I mean, the Pentagon alone is a massive building (the largest office in the world!) that I imagine being full of generals. And then, I see in the letter that all of the signees are retired, which expands the total number of generals (and admirals) alive significantly. I guess, I'm trying to ask a question about metrics, because I face this constantly. The absolute metric (>100 generals!) looks very strong, but the relative metric (nn% of all living generals and admirals active and retired) would possibly be underwhelming. It's no small feat to get a person with a real voice to sign a public letter like that so, the absolute number is big, but if the cause were of broad interest the relative number would be significant too.... On a minor bit of research I see there can only be 231 flag officers active at any time. I don't know how many are retired, but that does indicate the absolute number is a significant relative number. I still just struggle with the right way to report and digest metrics like this.
  - ryani 6y ago
    > I see in the letter that all of the signees are retired, which expands the total number of generals (and admirals) alive significantly. Active duty generals generally do not comment on political matters. Once they have left military service it's much easier for them to give a public opinion about politics without creating a conflict of interest.
  - darksaints 6y ago
    The number of generals (and admirals) in active duty is capped at about 650. Active duty generals are prohibited in most instances from opining in political matters, and they almost absolutely refrain from political matters over which they are not prohibited from opining on. Even after retirement, most still refrain from public opinions on political matters, but a small subset become politically active. 109 retired generals is far more than you can regularly expect on ordinarily political matters. For context, nominations for secretary of defense generally elicit opinions from retired generals. James Mattis, who quite possibly is the most popular military general for several decades, only ever received a couple dozen public expressions of support for confirmation as secretary of defense. The fact that 109 generals publicly opposed any confirmation of a Secretary of Anything, let alone a director level position, and did so in a unanimous letter, is absolutely massive.
staticautomatic 6y ago
And John Yoo teaches at Berkeley law!
- alasdair_ 6y ago
  “Any questions class?” “How do you sleep at night?”
flutterdude420 6y ago
Must defend Trump! Even if it means lying about easily verifiable house voting records!
KingOfCoders 6y ago
Both republicans and democrats will do everything to keep up the American empire. Their foreign policy doesn't differ too much (Korea, Vietnam, Afghanistan, Syria, Bay of Pigs/Cuba, Panama, ...) as does their management of the three letter agencies (CIA torture and drug trading, NSA listening in, ...). Kennedy, Obama and Clinton haven't been that different from Nixon, Reagan or Bush in that area. Sometimes their tools differ.

coretx 6y ago

What happend with Gen. Keith Alexander?

smegger001 6y ago
He retired and became an executive at a privet cyber security company last I had heard.
- toomuchtodo 6y ago
  https://www.hstoday.us/people-on-the-move/telos-corporation-welcomes-gen-keith-alexander-as-inaugural-member-of-advisory-board/ https://www.hstoday.us/people-on-the-move/telos-corporation-...

HashThis 6y ago

Similarly, the NSA betrayed us. They don't get to say that they were just following orders. We must always understand that the NSA betrayed us and we can't trust them any more. Information dominance is the most powerful way for a nation to dominate and control its people. The NSA turned on the US Citizens and betrayed them in this way.

lawnchair_larry 6y ago
Do you think they wanted to control US people?
- mattacular 6y ago
  Do you not?

darksaints 6y ago

These are war crimes. Someone convicted of torture in the way that CIA officials have authorized could be sentenced to life imprisonment. The only problem is that the US is not a party to the ICC (probably because so many power holders are guilty of war crimes), so we do not pursue war crime trials. I would like to see a concerted effort to document these crimes, issue warrants for arrest, and have customs officials in all ICC-party states ready to flag and arrest any suspected war criminal, in order to extradite for ICC trial. Some countries do this already but we need all of the ICC-party states to do it. And yes, I get that they would likely just never travel to countries where they may be arrested. But for the powerful, that in itself is a punishment. They may not serve prison time, but we can take away their European vacations.

jaywalk 6y ago
That's a nice fantasy you've got there. I'd love to see some EU nation try to kidnap a prominent US citizen, but it'll never happen because the consequences would be severe.
- darksaints 6y ago
  They're certainly trying: https://www.ecchr.eu/en/case/germany-criminal-complaint-against-cia-director-gina-haspel/ https://www.ecchr.eu/en/case/germany-criminal-complaint-agai...
- haidut 6y ago
  The consequences would not be simply severe. There is an actual law passed by US in 2002 authorizing military action against ANY country (including NATO members!) working to bring US citizens to the Hague for a trial at ICC. And yes, that law explicitly allows invading the Netherlands and attacking ICC if needed in order to prevent war crime trials against US citizens. To make matters worse, there are rumored secret extensions (by executive action) of that law allowing LETHAL action against ANY individual(s) (as opposed to countries) who work towards getting a US citizen to trial at the ICC. See my comment in response to the use who you said was living in a fantasy world. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Service-Members%27_Protection_Act https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Service-Members%27_Pr...

jjcon 6y ago

Was anything they did ruled illegal? Pretty sure it wasn’t so I’m not sure how that is relevant.