Ex-CIA Chiefs Slowed Torture Memos Release

WASHINGTON — The Obama administration's release of classified Bush-era memos on harsh CIA interrogations was delayed for nearly a month in part because of strenuous objections from four former intelligence directors.

Former CIA chiefs Michael Hayden, Porter Goss, George Tenet and John Deutch all told the White House that release of the so-called "torture memos" would compromise intelligence operations, current and former officials say. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity to detail internal government discussions.

The former CIA directors also warned that the release would deter foreign intelligence services from sharing information with the United States, and they worried that the memos would be used to target CIA officers, the officials said.

President Barack Obama ultimately overruled those concerns after repeated internal discussions, the officials said.

Comments

[jsanti7]

Countries that torture its enemies send two messages one to its enemies and one to its citizens ...mess with us and you will suffer....­.look at the record of police brutality in the US
Now we have laws that are even more intrusive to the people. armed with laws in place that with one word labeled on you right or wrong ...Terrori­st gets you tortured and the rite of habeas corpus suspended.­and a court that says we cant present any evidence because of National Security..­.... but trust us. This is why we need to prosecute. grant immunity for true evidence against the highest officials involved the rule of law calls for no less

[lungfish]

I like the way Obama is handling this - give the people the facts and if the facts are outrageous the people will say so and demand Justice...­. Now its up to the elected officials to do their jobs and bend to the will of the people....

[Mauiloa]

By all means, let's not compromise intelligence operations because they've been so successful during the past eight years while.

While the CIA was doing their most abominable - as usual - under "der fuhrer" Cheney's direction, the U.S. Constitution was being chipped away and everything our country was supposed to stand for was being subverted.

It's interesting how the history of the CIA has always been to work against the interests of a better society and a better world. But still they have the clout to convince even a man like Obama not to upset the deadly game "The Company" continues to play.

[lungfish]

The CIA, since its inception, has worked to advance American interests - in other words, Corporate interests. The overthrow of Mousedeq in Iran, 1952, was specifically to help British Anglo Oil maintain its business..­. and that is one example. Iran Contra was discovered because a plane piloted by Eugene Hosenfus was shot down and his logs showed that he had been delivering guns for the CIA and bringing cocaine back, for the CIA. In an impossible coincidence, this coincided with the begining of the Crack wars on American streets...
and the list is long and probably much longer if the truth were known.
However, when the CIA was told to turn over interrogation tapes it chose, instead, to "inadvertantly" destroy them to keep them from disclosing torture and murder that would be counter to the claims that we only waterboarded and tortured three high value suspects - as if extrajudicial imprisonment and torture and execution or death during "interrogation" is acceptable at all...
Yes, the CIA probably provided the assassination teams that Cheney allegedly ran out of his office - according to Sy Hersch. Lets hope he lives long enough to get it all out in the public...

[mimigrammy]

Protested YES. Got their way, NO. Not prosecuting the CIA Agents involved in the torture incidents is brillant. For one they would never be convicted and secondly, this is a way for the truth to get out and those responsible to be exposed without havng to go through the mess of litigation. By the time all the information is released on those involved in this violation of US Constitutional law and International law, they will wish they were protected by the four walls of a prison. Justice is not only found in the courtroom.

[ObamAtomic]

Michael V. Hayden, a former C.I.A. director, and Michael B. Mukasey,
are very preoccupied that torture memos do not be release to the public.
they will part of criminal investigation and probably convicted,
as now they are claiming all sorts of excuses to justified torture.

[StillAmused]

Former CIA chiefs Michael Hayden, Porter Goss, George Tenet and John Deutch all told the White House that release of the so-called "torture memos" would compromise future torture sprees, take all the fun out of the intelligence game and force 'The Company' to investigate legitimate persons of interest, rather than roughing up street rabble sold to them by warlords and disgruntled neighbors.

Citing the absence of any domestic alien landings since 2001, all four winked, elbowed each other and reaffirmed that "torture obviously works."

[TheLearnedEnglishDog]

I'm still waiting for someone to explain 911 in a believable way. Why didn't we intercept the planes, etc.? The official version stinks to high heaven, and there have been no further miraculously lucky attacks where 19 untrained kids turned he tables on the entire US military and civil authorities. hmmm. Did Bush and Cheney have any involvement? They had motive, and access to the system from the indside. Guess we'll never know

If they admitted to attacking New York their approval would skyrocket among the Red Staters & tea-baggers

[PSM42]

> I'm still waiting for someone to explain 911 in a believable way.

No can do. (Or 'As are we all'?). But here's a few useful comments -

Peter Dale Scott - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DDZR72PPUO0

[StillAmused]

In the absence of irrefutable, documented alternatives (as opposed to tantalizing theories), I choose to believe THIS:

A handful of well-financed religious extremists (no more than a dozen) with, by their lights, a legitimate beef against the U.S. for stomping all over their sacred turf enlisted 20 or so younger, educated and equally extreme operatives. They sent those operatives to one of the most open societies on the planet where, while the creaking immigration bureaucracy stared off into the distance and the FBI ignored its own field agents, those operatives indulged themselves in the social scene and the occasional flight training course.

After doing some unexceptional, basic math, those operatives bought airline tickets that would position them for coordinated hijackings, boarded four flights and succeeded in guiding three of them into major targets. Unable to cope with our vulnerability to such a painfully simple plot, the nation was whipped into a jingoistic, anti-Muslim fervor by an administration lousy with neocons who'd been openly broadcasting their designs on Iraq (and the need for a "Pearl Harbor" event to catalyze those designs) for more than a decade.

With a useful idiot in the White House (and the able assistance of a lazy, stenographic press), those neocons turned a shocking, criminal plot by -- maybe -- two or three dozen extremists into a global jihad, two unwinnable invasions and occupations and one of the ugliest stains on American history.

... but, then, I could be wrong.

[praire2paradise]

The U.S. government has been refining these techniques for many years and practicing them using U.S. citizens for years. It started with the best of intentions but, somewhere along the way, it morphed into this mess. That dirty little secret is laying right out here in front of our noses. If only the press weren't so controlled, reactionary, and lazy they could have figured this out by now. Maybe somebody will eventually.

[kimleehan]

We all know how investigation work, you go after the guy on the bottom, he gives you someone higher up in the food chain and you cut him some slack, you keep doing it till you get the one on top. Maybe thats what the President is doing. time will tell, all I know is the republicans are having a fit and thats good.

[Reverekin]

Just looked at the first memo on the ACLU site. Where is the original I wonder as this has been so obviously "doctored" using two or three different fonts and sizes and fitting words in, misspellings, etc. Maybe this was discussed earlier. Very strange to see something that looked put together by a ten year old...well maybe an eight year old.

[TeaBaggersRLosers]

Its not a Republican or Dem thing, you fool.

Its AMERICAN slime who think torture and killing of women and kids is okay.

Karma won't be kind to the USELESS STATES.

Its only beginning now with your economy...­..........­...much worse to come.

[JMorgan]

Obama pushes to turn the page.

As long as there is one person defending torture, citing 9/11 and Al Qaeda requires it, and that it works, the page can't be turned.

With all the torture they did, Osama Bin Laden remains at large.

Bring them all to trial. Make them defend what they did before the entire country.

[Luvial]

It's time for Obama to start prosecuting the torturers. It's time for Obama to end the torture.

[FrozenNorthObserver]

Hopefully this "flood" will be strong enough to push your Pres out of the way and let justice take it's course. What O is doing now is causing the same sort of damage to the US rep around the globe that his predecessors did. If he is too frightened to take the lead the least can do is get out of the way.


"Release Of Torture Memos Could Lead To A Flood Of New Disclosures"

[ImWithStupid]

Obama aint stupid. He had to know that releasing this info would lead to this. And maybe he'll be "forced" to allow prosecution. Hint hint, wink wink. I think this is calculated. Do it this way, and he can lay the reason for it with Congress and the American ppl for pursing this. Not him. So the if the Repiglicans want to get angry, blame the public.

[PSM42]

YODELLING AN AVALANCHE

Agreed, ImWithStupid. Someone has been yodelling in the Swiss alps in avalanche country and the avalanche has already started. -

http://informationclearinghouse.info/article22440.htm

[magic3400]

Here's the problem I have with Bush's policy and why those responsible must be held accountable.

I was watching Rachel Maddow's segment with Congresswoman Wasserman Shultz as they discussed the torture memos. The congresswoman, having given a softball answer to question of prosecutions, followed Ms. Maddow into the discussion about Cuba.

Here's the irony of their exchange, the congresswoman stated that one of the impediments to better relations with Cuba is that Castro is presently TORTURING political dissents.

So let me get this right, on one side of the island is the Cuban little shop of horrors and on the other side of the island is the American little shop of horrors...­no wonder our Cuban policy is insane.

Dear Congresswoman, if we are no better than Castro, haven't we lost the moral high ground in that argument? Isn't time to stop playing this stupid game with the lives of real people.

We have lost all moral authority on this issue by our behavior at Gitmo and there is NO way to get it back. Lets face it, it's time for a change.

[gcallaghan]

We CAN regain the moral authority if we put politics aside and let justice run its course. The world is waiting to see if the :great' democracy is a nation of laws or just another aristocracy in disguise. All the evidence of late ponts to the latter. The longer it takes for us to demonstrate that UU's criminal organization violated our own laws as well as international laws and treaties - and that our system can prosecute them for it -the lower we sink in the eyes of the world. The world knew of the crimes which foreign media has reported on for years. As the proof slowly comes to light, not dealing with it has much more dire consequences than midterm election results. A worldwide boycott of American products and services by the end of the year wouldn't surprise me a bit.

[Luvial]

It's time for prosecutions of government crimes.

[PSM42]

JUST WAKE UP?

> Dear Congresswoman, if we are no better than Castro,

While it is wonderful to see anyone wake up, at any time, one wonders where you were at the time of V1. et. nam - 3 to 4 million sla. ught. ered, Operation C0. nd. 0r in the S0. uth. ern C0ne - South America - tens of thousands d1s. appeared, Ch1le - 30,000 sla. ugh. tered, 110,000 t0. rt. ured, Central America - El Sa. lva. dor, H0n. duras, Gua. tem. ala, hundreds of thousands mu. rd. ered by de. at. h squads.

Here's a newsflash - 'we' haven't been better than Castro, since a long time before 1965. And not since, either.

[brandnewstuff]

just to be more knowledgeable

The ATCA ( 28 USC 1350) was passed by the firts Congress as part of the Judicary ACT of 1789.The ATCA gives federal courts the jurisdiction over "any civil action by an alien for a tort only,committed in violations of the law of nations or treaty of the United States." The Statute largely remained dormat since 1789 but has used increasingly durning thepst 25 years to address human rights violations­,according to ILRF

Those Lawyers knew the CIA asked to to write permission to break this United States Code 28 USC
They Broke International laws, Constitutional Laws, Federal criminal Statutory Laws.

[brandnewstuff]

Corporate CYA for the Damages they Caused a Brand name for Torture as a business practice
Contractors

The Anti-Torture Act, Torture Victim Protection Act, Alien Tort Statute all comes under the Protection of The Judicary Act of 1789 this is the orgin

Case Law November 17, 2005
Lawsuit Charges Coca-Cola with Torture
International Labor Rights Funds filed Fed Lawsuit charging CoCa_Cola and its bottler In Turkey
with Intimidation and Torture of the Union activist and their families
Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act,
Turedi V Coca- Cola

[brandnewstuff]

Well documents not just "Alien" but innocent Americans Tortured as well over false feedback.
AS Director Mueller admitted in a Oversight Hearing-
July 26 2007 Mueller on NSL- so lives were ruined maimed and marred (Yes a War Crime)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M_hAEKDBKn4
checks and balances