WASHINGTON, DC - Sept. 8 - In a letter to President Bush, eight retired generals and admirals called for a comprehensive, independent commission to investigate U.S. detention and interrogation practices at Abu Ghraib and other U.S.-operated detention facilities.

"Given the range of individuals and locations involved in these reports, it is simply no longer possible to view these allegations as a few instances of an isolated problem," said the letter to the President, which was signed by retired military leaders, listed above, from the Army, Navy and Marine Corps. The letter was faxed and sent by overnight mail to the President on September 7. Biographical information on each of the signatories is below.

The letter was released to the media at a press conference on September 8, 2004 in Washington, D.C. Rear Admiral John D. Hutson (Ret.), and Brigadier General James Cullen (Ret.), represented the group.

"The investigations to date have failed to address senior military and civilian command responsibility and in doing so separate culpability from responsibility. This is antithetical to the way the military operates," said Rear Admiral Hutson, who served as the Navy's Judge Advocate General from 1997 to 2000 and now is the President and Dean of the Franklin Pierce Law Center in Concord, New Hampshire. "If we are to get to the truth, of what happened - and to make sure this treatment is never repeated - we need a comprehensive investigation commissioned and conducted by those whose actions are not at issue."

"Each of the investigators has been limited by his own place in the chain of command and by his institutional inability to inquire beyond the four walls of the military itself. We now have more pieces of the puzzle, but no clear picture. And yet this is essential if we are to restore America's name and protect our own troops in the future," said Brigadier General Cullen, who served in the U.S. Army Reserve Judge Advocate General Corps and last served as the Chief Judge (IMA) of the U.S. Army Court of Criminal Appeals. He currently practices law in New York City.

In the letter, the eight military leaders wrote: "Understanding what has gone wrong and what can be done to avoid systemic failure in the future is essential not only to ensure that those who may be responsible are held accountable for any wrongdoing, but also to ensure that the effectiveness of the U.S. military and intelligence operations is not compromised by an atmosphere of permissiveness, ambiguity, or confusion. This is fundamentally a command responsibility."

The retired generals and admirals write, in their letter, that they welcomed the range of investigations recently completed and currently underway into instances of abuse in U.S. detention and interrogation practices. The letter maintains, however, that none of the investigations is "sufficiently comprehensive or independent to effectively identify and recommend how to address any underlying causes of such widespread abuse."

The military leaders cite in particular the investigative report by Major General Antonio Taguba, which looked only at the role of U.S. military police at Abu Ghraib, and the report by Gens. Fay and Jones, which looked only into the role of military intelligence forces at that facility.

"Early accounts have suggested that a critical part of what went wrong at Abu Ghraib was the relationship - and failures in the command structure - between intelligence and police operations," the letter says. "Only a more overarching inquiry can fully understand that interaction, and recommend appropriate corrective measures."

A key reason an independent investigation is needed, the letter says, is that the investigations to date have all been commissioned or conducted by the military itself. "Investigations that are purely internal to the military, however competent, cannot examine the whole picture ... Internal investigations by their nature also suffer from a critical lack of independence. Americans have never thought it wise or fair for one branch of government to police itself. But that has been exactly the case in many of the abuse inquiries to date."

The letter was released in a joint press conference with Human Rights First, which released a report called Getting to Ground Truth. The report outlined the key gaps in investigations to date. For more information on the report, please visit: www.humanrightsfirst.org.

Both the military leaders and Human Rights First agree that to overcome the deficiencies of existing investigations, an independent and comprehensive commission of U.S. detention and interrogation practices in the war on terror should be modeled on successful efforts such as the just-concluded 9/11 Commission and should satisfy the following criteria:

• It must be bipartisan and led by recognized experts of unimpeachable
  credibility in military and intelligence operations, human rights and international law.
  
• It must be fundamentally independent of the Executive Branch, with commission
  members selected jointly by appropriate congressional and executive officials.
  
• It must have access to classified information and a mandate to inquire into
  information from all relevant agencies and all levels of authority.
  
• It must have the power to take testimony under oath, and to
  subpoena witnesses.
  
• It must be empowered to offer whistleblower protection to all those with relevant
  knowledge, including those who may fear retribution for testifying truthfully.
  
• It must review and build on the findings of investigations already underway.
  
• It should, to the extent consistent with U.S. national security classification needs,
  be open to the public - a feature unique to democracy and essential to the
  commission's credibility in the United States and around the world.

For more information, contact:

Sean Crowley: 202-478-6128 / SeanCrowley@mrss.com
David Danzig: 212-845-5252 / DanzigD@humanrightsfirst.org

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The following eight retired generals and admirals co-signed a letter to President Bush calling for an independent, comprehensive investigation into U.S. detention and interrogation practices at Abu Ghraib and elsewhere.

General David M. Brahms (Ret. USMC)

Brigadier General David M. Brahms served in the Marine Corps from 1963-1988. He served as the Marine Corps' senior legal adviser from 1983 until his retirement in 1988. General Brahms currently practices law in Carlsbad, California and sits on the board of directors of the Judge Advocates Association.

General James Cullen (Ret. USA)

James Cullen is a retired Brigadier General in the United States Army Reserve Judge Advocate General's Corps and last served as the Chief Judge (IMA) of the U.S. Army Court of Criminal Appeals. He currently practices law in New York City.

General John L. Fugh (Ret. USA)

General Fugh was The Judge Advocate General of the U.S. Army, retiring from that post in July 1993 as a Major General. General Fugh was 15 years old when he migrated to the United States with his family from China. He was the first Chinese-American to attain General officer status in the U.S. Army. General Fugh currently lives in the Washington, D.C. metropolitan area.

General Robert Gard (Ret. USA)

Robert Gard is a retired Lieutenant General who served in the United States Army; his military assignments included combat service in Korea and Vietnam. He is currently a consultant on international security and president emeritus of the Monterey Institute for International Studies.

Admiral Lee F. Gunn (Ret. USN)

Vice Admiral Gunn served as the Inspector General of the Department of the Navy until his retirement in August 2000. Admiral Gunn commanded the USS BARBEY and the Destroyer Squadron "Thirty-one," a component of the U.S. Navy's Anti-Submarine Warfare Destroyer Squadrons. Gunn is from Bakersfield, California and is a graduate of the University of California, Los Angeles. He received his commission from the Naval ROTC program at UCLA in June 1965.

General Joseph Hoar (Ret. USMC)

General Hoar served as Commander-in-Chief, U.S. Central Command. After the first Gulf War, General Hoar led the effort to enforce the naval embargo in the Red Sea and the Persian Gulf, and to enforce the no-fly zone in the south of Iraq. He oversaw the humanitarian and peacekeeping operations in Kenya and Somalia and also led the U.S. Marine Corps support for operations in Rwanda, and the evacuation of U.S. civilians from Yemen during the 1994 civil war. He was the Deputy for Operations for the Marine Corps during the Gulf War and served as General Norman Schwartzkopf's Chief of Staff at Central Command. General Hoar presently runs a consulting business in California.

Admiral John D. Hutson (Ret. USN)

Rear Admiral John D. Hutson served as the Navy's Judge Advocate General from 1997 to 2000. Admiral Hutson now serves as President and Dean of the Franklin Pierce Law Center in Concord, New Hampshire.

General Richard Omeara (Ret. USA)

Brigadier General Richard Omeara is a combat decorated veteran who fought in Vietnam before earning his law degree and joining the Army's Judge Advocate General Corps. He retired from the Army Reserves in 2002 and now teaches courses on Human Rights and History at Kean University and at Monmouth University.