Editor’s Note: In reaction to the extraordinary
appeal by seven ex-CIA directors that President
Barack Obama halt a Justice Department inquiry
into the use of torture by CIA interrogators,
a dozen former U.S. intelligence professionals
urge the President to ignore that appeal and
back the investigation. (Their memo to Obama
was dated Sept. 27.)
MEMORANDUM FOR: The President
FROM: Veteran Intelligence Professionals for
Sanity (VIPS)
SUBJECT: Accountability for Torture
We write you, Mr. President, as former intelligence
professionals to voice strong support for Attorney
General Eric Holder’s authorization of
a wider investigation into CIA interrogation.
We respectfully disagree with the direct appeal
to you by seven former CIA directors to quash
that wider investigation.
The signatories of this Memorandum are former
intelligence officers and analysts who have
worked with CIA directors going back as far
as Allen Dulles. Our cumulative experience totals
more than 200 years.
We are encouraged by your own support for Attorney
General Holder’s decision to have federal
prosecutor John Durham investigate possible
criminal activity by individuals engaging in
torture and other violations of international
agreements on the treatment of detainees.
From our own experience in intelligence, both
as field operators and as senior analysts, we
know that personal accountability is vital to
maintaining an effective intelligence service
that reflects our best traditions and the rule
of law.
Among the former CIA directors who, by letter
of September 18, asked you to “reverse”
the attorney general’s decision are some
who were cognizant of and involved in decisions
that led to the abuses in question. We find
that troubling.
Clearly, the role of CIA directors in issuing
orders that led to inappropriate behavior, and
their failure to hold officers accountable,
helped create the environment in which abuses
occurred — the ones detailed in the Special
Review of the CIA Inspector General, for example.
No analytical leap is required to conclude
that those particular CIA directors might have
understandable interest in blocking investigation
of their own complicity. They include, first
and foremost, George Tenet — many of whose
misdeeds are already a matter of public record.
To mention just a few:
—Tenet was the chief enabler of torture.
He also oversaw widespread kidnapping (“extraordinary
rendition”), which in some cases led to
torture.
—Our sources tell us that Tenet knew
about the overstepping of the guidelines approved
by the lawyers and that he knew the people doing
it. Rather than restrain them, he pushed them
still harder, in an attempt to please his masters.
We strongly believe that investigations of
possible wrongdoing cannot, in all fairness,
be limited to the proverbial “bad apples
at the bottom of the barrel.” Rather,
in our view, such investigations must be allowed
to go wherever the evidence leads.
The inquiry last year by the Senate Armed Services
Committee provides a good model for doing precisely
that. The main conclusion of the committee’s
“Inquiry Into the Treatment of Detainees
in U.S. Custody,” approved last fall without
dissent, was captured in its first subhead:
“Presidential Order Opens the Door to
Considering Aggressive Techniques.”
The Hollywood version of the CIA portrays amoral
spies willing to do anything without regard
to ethics or human rights. Our own long experience
persuades us that the intelligence community
has an abundance of men and women of outstanding
character, who are committed to the rule of
law, and whose primary desire is to serve the
nation and protect the American people.
However much former CIA directors and other
people at risk might wish to derail an investigation
into possible war crimes, we believe the moral
standing of our nation requires that we apply
the same standards to offenses by U.S. officials
as we would to accusations of war crimes by
those in other countries.
For all these reasons, we strongly endorse
efforts by the Department of Justice to investigate
allegations of torture and human rights abuses
by any Americans — CIA officers and contractors
included.
Please regard this Memorandum as follow up
to the more extensive comments on torture in
the VIPS review prepared for you in late April.
A copy of that Memorandum was eventually posted
at Consortiumnews.com (see http://tinyurl.com/cvvr2x).
Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity
Steering Group
Ray Close, National Clandestine Service (CIA),
Princeton, NJ
Phil Giraldi, National Clandestine Service (CIA),
Purcellville, VA
Melvin A. Goodman, US Army, CIA, Dept. of State,
Dept. of Defense, Bethesda, MD
Larry Johnson, CIA & Department of State,
Bethesda, MD
Pat Lang, US Army (Special Forces), DIA, Alexandria,
VA
David MacMichael, National Intelligence Council,
Linden, VA
Tom Maertens, Department of State, Mankato,
MN
Ray McGovern, US Army, CIA, Arlington, VA
Sam Provance, US Army (Abu Ghraib), Greenville,
SC
Coleen Rowley, FBI, Apple Valley, MN
Greg Thielmann, Dept. of State, Sen. Intelligence
Committee Staff, Arlington, VA
Ann Wright, US Army, Department of State, Honolulu,
HI
Melvin A. Goodman, a senior fellow at the
Center for International Policy and adjunct
professor of government at Johns Hopkins University,
is The Public Record’s National Security
and Intelligence columnist. He spent 42 years
with the CIA, the National War College, and
the U.S. Army. His latest book is Failure of
Intelligence: The Decline and Fall of the CIA.
Copyright 2009 The Public
Record
