News Clips - Retired Military Leaders Speak Out Against Torture in South Carolina and Florida

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Group pushes for clarification of U.S. interrogation policies

By Tony Bartelme

Tuesday, January 15, 2008

At first, it seemed like an intelligence jackpot. Months after 9/11, Pakistani forces captured Ibn al-Libi, leader of an al-Qaida training camp in Afghanistan.

Pakistani officials turned al-Libi over to U.S. forces, and FBI and Army operatives went to work.

"They were playing by the book," said David Irvine, a retired Army brigadier general and part of a group of more than 40 retired military leaders concerned about the Bush administration's stance toward interrogations.

But then CIA operatives intervened, and al-Libi soon was at the center of a government tug-of-war over who would handle him. The issue went to the White House, and the CIA won the job. Agents sent al-Libi to Egypt. After being tortured, al-Libi said that Iraq was working with al-Qaida to make weapons of mass destruction.

Al-Libi's torture-induced confession would become one of the prime justifications for the war in Iraq. But al-Libi eventually recanted his story. "He only said what he said to save his life," Irvine said. The widely documented al-Libi case is "a fine example of how torture leads to unreliable information."

Irvine, who among other things, taught interrogation techniques, and three other generals and admirals were in Charleston on Monday as part of a larger push to clarify the nation's approach to terrorism interrogations.

"It's a defining issue," retired Vice Adm. Lee Gunn said.

Their visit comes a month after U.S. Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., blocked a House bill outlawing waterboarding and holding the CIA to interrogation tactics in an Army field manual.

Graham, who has taken strong stands against waterboarding, nevertheless said the new law would hamper the CIA's interrogations. In a statement, he said he had been briefed on the current CIA program. "It is aggressive, effective, lawful and in compliance with our legal obligations."

But another member of the retired officers' group, Army Brig. Gen. James Cullen, said the international community isn't ready to trust Graham's word — not after Abu Ghraib and other stories of prisoner mistreatment.

During a meeting with The Post and Courier's editorial board, he and others in the group said the nation needs a clear policy on torture and that the CIA shouldn't be allowed to operate under different rules than the military.

Human Rights First helped organize the retired military officers. But the officers aren't a bunch of peaceniks. Members include Paul Kern, a retired general who led the military's investigation into Abu Ghraib, and Stansfield Turner, a retired admiral and former CIA director.

The group's main goal is to educate presidential candidates that "torture is wrong, inefficient, unnecessary and damaging to our national security," said Gunn, a former Navy inspector general.

Gunn said that studies have long proven that torture doesn't elicit reliable information.

It also can have serious effects on the interrogators themselves, said retired Brig. Gen. Stephen Xenakis. "During the let-down, the questions come back," he said. If the definitions under which they were operating aren't clear, this second-guessing can lead to emotional trauma.

The officers said they were concerned about how the popular TV show "24" depicts torture. The main character, Jack Bauer, frequently uses torture to get information within seconds. Gunn said the show's values are filtering into the battlefield, creating ambiguity where clarity is needed most.