Will the Release of SpecialOps Detainee Names to ICRC End our Policy of Disappearances?

/20 Comments/in /by

My guess is no–my guess is that we’ve got disappeared detainees floating on some carrier somewhere. But this is important, but small, progress.

In a reversal of Pentagon policy, the military for the first time is notifying the International Committee of the Red Cross of the identities of militants who were being held in secret at a camp in Iraq and another in Afghanistan run by United States Special Operations forces, according to three military officials.

[snip]

The new Pentagon policy on detainees took effect this month with no public announcement from the military or the Red Cross. It represents another shift in detention policy by the Obama administration, which has already vowed to close the American military prison at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, by next year and is conducting major reviews of the government’s procedures for interrogating and detaining militants.

[snip]

Under Pentagon rules, detainees at the Special Operations camps can be held for up to two weeks. Formerly, the military at that point had to release a detainee; transfer him to a long-term prison in Iraq or Afghanistan, to which the Red Cross has broad access; or seek one-week renewable extensions from Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates or his representative.

Under the new policy, the military must notify the Red Cross of the detainees’ names and identification numbers within two weeks of capture, a notification that before happened only after a detainee was transferred to a long-term prison. The option to seek custody extensions has been eliminated, a senior Pentagon official said.

 And credit to General Petraeus, who seems to have brought this approach from Iraq to Afghanistan.

There are still a lot of problems here. It sounds like ICRC gets the names and ID numbers of detainees, but not yet the access to talk to them. If so, then there is still not an outside monitor on detainee conditions. So the Breedlove review of the Special Operations prisons–described in the article–can’t be assumed to truly reflect the conditions in the prisons. And if the ICRC doesn’t get access, it still means we’re flouting the Geneva Conventions. 

But if we could be sure we were getting out of the disappearances business that would be small progress.

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20 replies
  1. Arbusto says:

    What about CIA initiated/sponsored disappearances, on-board ship or in BF Egypt? With this Administration, accounting of and accountability for these disappearances isn’t going to happen.

  2. LabDancer says:

    I do hope TYT’s Cenk Uygur lumbers up onside for a pass to run with this awhile; he’s too prone to playing that “Ladies and gentlemen … we got him” soundbite without dealing with all that’s implied. Adding to that something like: ‘but we’re not telling you where’s he at, how he’s doing, what we’re doing to his brain & body, how long we’re gonna keep doing stuff to him’ — would help to assure me that younguns have figured out that history repeats itself like a Bill Hicks routine.

  3. BoxTurtle says:

    An improvement, at least. You can’t really expect our government to offer full consistutional rights or full Geneva rights to scary, brown-skinned, arabic-speaking moslems.

    Boxturtle (Did I mention that all moslems were terrorists? BOO!!!)

  4. SmileySam says:

    I just read a article about our continued use of Rendition. The story says that in April the Obama admin. approved and used Rendition for a mundane criminal charge against a foreign contractor. That contractor claims to have been treated in the same manner we have come to recognize as used against detainees. He was stripped, searched,blindfold, earmuffs, denied food and water, and he even claims he was shown a pic of his family and was told he would never see them again until he confessed.

    I have never accepted Rendition as something America should be using but I did see some reasoning behind it’s use against War Criminals and such, but to use it has part of a everyday criminal investigation is way too much overkill.

  7. skdadl says:

    The New York Times reported in 2006 that some soldiers at the temporary detention site in Iraq, then located at Baghdad International Airport and called Camp Nama, beat prisoners with rifle butts, yelled and spit in their faces, and used detainees for target practice in a game of jailer paintball.

    Military officials say conditions at the camps have improved significantly since then, but virtually all details of the sites remain shrouded in secrecy.

    There’s a name glaringly missing from that NYT report — General Stanley McChrystal. And the NYT is not the best source on his background — so far, I believe that a series in Esquire is.

    I’m just a naive foreigner, but I’m prepared to believe that Adm Mullen is a good and very competent guy, given a number of statements he’s made, particularly about the folly of provoking Iran. About Petraeus, I’m an agnostic.

    But McChrystal is another matter. He is not only commanding your troops in Afghanistan; he’s commanding the whole NATO ISAF mission, which includes our guys, who are dying at a higher rate than anyone else’s forces, although from Guardian reports this week, it sure looks as though the Brits are catching up.

    And McChrystal is Camp Nama. It really bothers me that no one is covering him right now, even mentioning him. Afghanistan is a misconceived mission from top to bottom, and I can’t see that either Obama or McChrystal has said anything even vaguely enlightening about what looks to me like a reproduction of the mistakes made in Iraq.

  8. ART45 says:

    Marcy,

    You are tough and smart. I admire you.

    If you were a Demi Moore and had been recruited into the Navy Seals, would you be loyal to that organization?

    • bmaz says:

      You are tough and smart as well. If you were a member of the Navy Seals, would you be loyal to the Constitution and the oath you took to defend it, or simply to the Seals?

      There is a difference between the two.

  9. MadDog says:

    The vagueness of that NYT article leaves one unsure whether the new Pentagon Red Cross notification rules apply only to the 2 named camps run by Special Operations in Bagram Afghanistan and Balad Iraq.

    I’ve got to believe that with US Special Operations forces running ops against “terrorists” in a lot of other places like the Horn of Africa, the Philippines, yea even in Europe, they are likely to have more than just those 2 named “temporary screening sites”.

    Do these new Red Cross notification rules apply across the board, or just to Bagram and Balad?

    I wish the NYT would learn to make public the documents they base their reporting on.

    I can guarantee that a far more thorough and analytic review of said documents would occur should the NYT ever do so.

    DFHs can read, doncha know? *g*

  10. MadDog says:

    And in a related updated article from the NYT, there are these curiosities:

    …Besides the inspector general’s report, other documents expected to be released Monday are a 2007 Justice Department memo reauthorizing the C.I.A.’s “enhanced” interrogation techniques, documents that former Vice President Dick Cheney has said provide evidence that the interrogation methods produced valuable information about Al Qaeda; and Justice Department memos from 2006 concerning conditions of confinement in C.I.A. jails…

    (My Bold)

    I wonder if this is one of the reasons for the NYT Red Cross notification change article?

    And then there’s this:

    …In Mr. Nashiri’s case, military prosecutors announced in July 2008 that they would seek the death penalty as they brought war crimes charges against him. He has been held at the prison camp in Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, and is suspected of helping to plan the bombing of the Cole, an attack that killed 17 sailors…

    …In announcing the charges, which will be heard by the Bush administration’s military commission tribunals at Guantánamo, the Pentagon official, Brig. Gen. Thomas W. Hartmann, appeared to back away from years of assertions by American officials when he was asked at a news conference if Mr. Nashiri was suspected of being the primary planner or mastermind of the Cole attack.

    “I’m not going to say either of those,” General Hartmann said. “I’m going to say he helped to plan and organize and direct the attacks.”

    I’m unable to determine whether Hartmann actually retired as he’d requested or whether he’s still the director of operations, planning and development for the military commissions.

    • emptywheel says:

      Aw Jeebus. If all goes well mr. ew will be finishing a long-overdue Masters tomorrow. (if it doesn’t I’ll have to kick his ass for a few days). This timing is not at all ideal.

      • MadDog says:

        Given all of the hyperbole that is being attached to Monday’s release of a more unclassified version of the CIA OIG Special Review of the CIA Terrorist Detention and Interrogation Program by even the dullest and most brain-dead of the TradMed, I know that there will be even more prominence given to the maddest of “rushes” by all to be the “first” with an “analysis”.

        And of course, the real prize will be not on who’s first, but who’s best.

        Take a deep breath EW, and know that you’ve a unique talent for in-depth analysis that will outperform any of the surface-skimming, headline-grabbing, attention-getting hacks journalists who think they compete.

        We know this!

        Take all the time you need for the real important stuff in life like Mr. EW’s Masters.

        There will be plenty of time to plumb the depths and expertly dissect this latest batch of US torture documentation.

        What there won’t be is any real competition in thoughtful analysis focused on the real backstory secrets behind this the most secret of CIA’s tarnished crown jewels.

        You’ve already got them beat and they don’t even know it.

  11. tjbs says:

    Aren’t the meaning and sequence of words funny.

    As in the cia conducted mock executions.

    NO, the cia or their ” GOOD BUDDIES” conducted 108 executions defined as homicides, scaring the bejebs out of most of the prisoners and mock executions, sins of omission you know.

    The prisoners that weren’t scared were tricked into cooperating with fake executions.

  13. klynn says:

    Hey bmaz,

    I was just reading this:

    WASHINGTON (AP) – Lawyers for a Guantanamo Bay detainee will be allowed to question – in writing – accused Sept. 11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, a federal judge has ruled. The decision is a setback for government lawyers who had sought to limit the scope of detainee lawyers’ challenges to the detention and prosecution of terror suspects.

    In a written ruling, Judge Ricardo Urbina says lawyers for detainee Abdul Raheem Ghulam Rabbani can submit written questions about their client to Mohammed. Prosecutors say he worked for Mohammed, but Rabbani’s lawyers contend he was just a menial servant, not a part of any terror network.

    The ruling says prosecutors may review the answers before delivering them to Rabbani’s lawyers to remove any national security information.

    Government lawyers had unsuccessfully sought to convince the judge that any questioning of Mohammed by Rabbani’s lawyers would risk exposing details of sensitive intelligence programs.

    Urbina’s 15-page decision says Mohammed may have information that could help Rabbani’s case, and allows Rabbani’s lawyers to submit “a list of narrowly tailored” questions for Mohammed.

  14. marc says:

    “Under Pentagon rules, detainees at the Special Operations camps can be held for up to two weeks. Formerly, the military at that point had to release a detainee; transfer him to a long-term prison in Iraq or Afghanistan, to which the Red Cross has broad access; or seek one-week renewable extensions from Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates or his representative”.

    Or there might be a super secret 4Th option, Blackwater dumps weighted down bodies out of their gun running flights in the middle of the Atlantic.

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