October 2, 2002 - “Jonathan Fredman, who was chief counsel to the CIA’s CounterTerrorist Center, attended a meeting of GTMO staff. […] [His] advice to GTMO on applicable legal obligations was similar to the analysis of those obligations in OLC’s first Bybee memo. […] ‘“It is basically subject to perception. If the detainee dies you’re doing it wrong.”’” (DD) [16] Minutes of this meeting quote Lieutenant Colonel Diane Beaver (JAG) as saying: “We may need to curb the harsher operations while ICRC is around. […] It is better not to expose them to any controversial techniques…. This would draw a lot of negative attention.” [92]

April 2003 - “JAGs made a final effort [to fight the change in DOD policy]. They went to see Scott Horton, a specialist in international human-rights law […] The JAGs told Horton they could only talk obliquely about practices that were classified. But they said the U.S. military's 50-year history of observing the demands of the Geneva Conventions was now being overturned. "There is a calculated effort to create an atmosphere of legal ambiguity" about how the conventions should be interpreted and applied” […] the prime movers in this effort […] were DOD Under Secretary for Policy Douglas Feith and DOD general counsel William Haynes. There was, they warned, "a real risk of a disaster" for U.S. interests. […] Ultimately what was developed at Gitmo was a "72-point matrix for stress and duress" (RR) “Intelligence is in the heads of these people. We need to extract it.”-Feith [92]

Between August 2003 and February 2004 - “The various detention facilities operated by the 800th [and 320th] MP Brigade [in Iraq] have routinely held persons [known as “ghost detainees”] brought to them by Other Government Agencies (OGAs) without accounting for them, knowing their identities, or even the reason for their detention. […] On at least one occasion, [6-8] “ghost detainees” [held] for OGAs [were] moved around within the facility to hide them from a visiting ICRC survey team. This maneuver was deceptive, contrary to Army Doctrine, and in violation of international law.” [19]

May 28, 2004-An “Information Paper: (“Applicability of Geneva Conventions to “Ghost Detainees” in Iraq) shows that the DOD interpreted the “security internee” provisions of the Geneva Conventions to allow for “ghosting” of detainees by prohibiting the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) from visiting. It also shows that the DOD recognized that indefinitely prohibiting the ICRC from visiting or failing to notify the ICRC of the existence of detainees was illegal under the Geneva Conventions. [74] This practice is noted in the Taguba Report [19] Also, see “Between August 2003 and February 2004”.

August 2005- Internal DoD documents written in August 2005 “show that the DOD did not, as a matter of course, register detainees with the ICRC until they had been in custody for up to 14 days and that authorization was sought to hold some individuals for up to 30 days without ISN/registry with ICRC to “maximize intelligence collection,” even though “there is some disagreement as to legal basis to go beyond 14 days.” These policies demonstrate the ease with which the CIA could have used DOD facilities as “sorting facilities” without having to worry about ICRC oversight or revelation of the ghost detainee program.” [74] See May 28, 2004.

February 12, 2009- A Center for Constitutional Rights Press Release states: “Documents [released today] […] confirm Department of Defense involvement in the CIA’s ghost detention program […] secret prisons at Bagram and in Iraq; […] and show one case where the DOD sought to delay the release of Guantánamo prisoners […] in order to avoid bad press.” […]” [74]

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[92] Guantanamo and its Aftermath, Center for Constitutional Rights, November 2008 http://ccrjustice.org/files/Report_GTMO_And_Its_Aftermath.pdf

For Sources, see also [and at sig]:

http://www.webdsi.com/jebbie/tlpage42.html

For more on the most recent [2006] Army Field Manual [which Obama’s Executive Order made applicable to all agencies] and its “Appendix” M”, see:

[89] How we were sold on an Army Field Manual that (still) sanctions torture, 1/24/09 http://www.alternet.org/story/122341/how_the_press,_the_pentagon,_and_even_human_rights_groups_sold_us_an_army_field_manual_that_(still)_sanctions_torture/?page=entire

[90] How the Army Field Manual Codified Torture, 1/7/09

http://www.alternet.org/rights/117807/how_the_u.s._army's_field_manual_codified_torture_--_and_still_does/?page=entire

Do you mean any recent injuries?

Amerigo: "It seems to me MORE LIKELY that this is the case than that the hunger-striking Binyam was given further beatings just for the hell of it at this time."

Mike Sulzer: "Nor is there any reason to think that what has happened is any better than it appears to some of us."