CIA Admits It Destroyed Tapes Of Interrogations

[Gold9472]

Mukasey: Criminal probe begins into CIA tapes
CIA said last month it had destroyed tapes of harsh interrogations

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/22474868/

1/2/2008

WASHINGTON - The Justice Department said Wednesday it will launch a criminal investigation into the CIA's destruction of videotapes depicting the harsh interrogation of terrorism suspects.

The CIA last month disclosed that in 2005 it destroyed hundreds of hours of tapes from the interrogations of two al-Qaida suspects, prompting an outcry from Democrats, human rights activists and some legal experts.

The interrogations, which took place in 2002, were believed to have included a form of simulated drowning known as waterboarding, condemned internationally as torture.

President Bush has said the United States does not torture but has declined to be specific about interrogation methods.

The Justice Department launched an initial inquiry last month. The CIA said it had no immediate comment.

[dMole]

From:

IC21: The Intelligence Community in the 21st Century

Staff Study
Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence
House of Representatives
One Hundred Fourth Congress

IX. Clandestine Service
...
1) Most of the operations of the CS (Clandestine Service) are, by all accounts, the most tricky, politically sensitive, and troublesome of those in the IC (Intelligence Community) and frequently require the DCI's close personal attention. The CS is the only part of the IC, indeed of the government, where hundreds of employees on a daily basis are directed to break extremely serious laws in counties around the world in the face of frequently sophisticated efforts by foreign governments to catch them. A safe estimate is that several hundred times every day
(easily 100,000 times a year) DO (Directorate of Operations) officers engage in highly illegal activities (according to foreign law) that not only risk political embarrassment to the US but also endanger the freedom if not lives of the participating foreign nationals and, more than occasionally, of the clandestine officer himself. In other words, a typical 28 year old, GS-11 case officer has numerous opportunities every week, by poor tradecraft or inattention, to embarrass his country and
President and to get agents imprisoned or executed. Considering
these facts and recent history, which has shown that the DCI,
whether he wants to or not, is held accountable for overseeing the
CS, the DCI must work closely with the Director of the CS and hold
him fully and directly responsible to him.
...
http://www.access.gpo.gov/congress/h...1/ic21009.html

Also interesting:
"A final note on the use of the term "clandestine service."
When referring specifically to an existing clandestine service,
such as the CIA's Directorate of Operations (DO) or the
clandestine element of the DoD's Defense HUMINT Service (DHS), this
is done so by name. In discussing an ideal or future organization
performing those missions, we have used the term "Clandestine
Service" or CS as a proper noun."