The Senate Intelligence Committee Report on Torture: Committee Study of the Central Intelligence Agency's Detention and Interrogation Program (11 page)

Ten days later, on July 26, 2002, CIA officers in Country
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, none of whom had been trained in the use of the CIA’s enhanced interrogation techniques, proposed putting al-Najjar in isolation
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and using “sound disorientation techniques,” “sense of time deprivation,” limited light, cold temperatures, and sleep deprivation.
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The CIA officers added that they felt they had a “reasonable chance of breaking Najjar” to get “the intelligence and locator lead information on UBL and Bin Ladin’s family.”
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The plan for al-Najjar was circulated to senior CIA officers as part of the Daily DCI Operations Update.
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On August 5, 2002, the day after Abu Zubaydah’s interrogation using the CIA’s enhanced interrogation techniques at DETENTION SITE GREEN began, CIA Headquarters authorized the proposed interrogation plan for al-Najjar, to include the use of loud music (at less than the level that would cause physical harm such as permanent hearing loss), worse food (as long as it was nutritionally adequate for sustenance), sleep deprivation, and hooding.
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More than a month later, on September 21, 2002, CIA interrogators described al-Najjar as “clearly a broken man” and “on the verge of complete breakdown” as result of the isolation.
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The cable added that al-Najjar was willing to do whatever the CIA officer asked.
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In October 2002, officers from the U.S. military conducted a short debriefing of al-Najjar at DETENTION SITE COBALT and subsequently expressed an interest in a more thorough debriefing.
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On November █, 2002, a U.S. military legal advisor visited DETENTION SITE COBALT and described it as a “CIA detention facility,” noting that “while CIA is the only user of the facility they contend it is a [Country
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] facility.”
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The U.S. military officer also noted that the junior CIA officer designated as warden of the facility “has little to no experience with interrogating or handling prisoners.” With respect to al-Najjar specifically, the legal advisor indicated that the CIA’s interrogation plan included “isolation in total darkness; lowering the quality of his food; keeping him at an uncomfortable temperature (cold); [playing music] 24 hours a day; and keeping him shackled and hooded.” In addition, al-Najjar was described as having been left hanging—which involved handcuffing one or both wrists to an overhead bar which would not allow him to lower his arms—for 22 hours each day for two consecutive days, in order to “‘break’ his resistance.” It was also noted al-Najjar was wearing a diaper and had no access to toilet facilities.
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The U.S. military legal advisor concluded that, because of al-Najjar’s treatment, and the concealment of the facility from the ICRC, military participation in al-Najjar’s interrogation would involve risks for the U.S. military
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. The legal advisor recommended briefing the CIA’s detention and interrogation activities to U.S.
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[combatant command] to alert the command of the risks prior to the U.S. military
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being involved in any aspect of the interrogation of al-Najjar.
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According to the CIA inspector general, the detention and interrogation of Ridha al-Najjar “became the model” for handling other CIA detainees at DETENTION SITE COBALT.
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The CIA disseminated one intelligence report from its detention and interrogation of Ridha al-Najjar.
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4. Death of Gul Rahman Leads CIA Headquarters to Learn of Unreported Coercive Interrogation Techniques at DETENTION SITE COBALT; CIA Inspector General Review Reveals Lack of Oversight of the Detention Site

In November 2002, ALEC Station officers requested that CIA contract interrogator Hammond DUNBAR, one of the two primary interrogators of Abu Zubaydah in August 2002, travel to DETENTION SITE COBALT to assess a detainee for the possible use of the CIA’s enhanced interrogation techniques.
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While DUNBAR was present at DETENTION SITE COBALT, he assisted
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[CIA OFFICER I] in the interrogations of Gul Rahman, a suspected Islamic extremist. As reported to CIA Headquarters, this interrogation included “48 hours of sleep deprivation, auditory overload, total darkness, isolation, a cold shower, and rough treatment.” CIA Headquarters did not approve these interrogation techniques in advance. Upon receipt of these cables, however, officers at CIA Headquarters responded that they were “motivated to extract any and all operational information on al-Qa’ida and Hezbi Islami from Gul Rahman” and suggested that “enhanced measures” might be needed to gain Gul Rahman’s compliance. CIA Headquarters also requested that a psychological assessment of Rahman be completed.
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Prior to DUNBAR’s departure from the detention site on November ██, 2002, [a few days before the death of Gul Rahman] DUNBAR proposed the use of the CIA’s enhanced interrogation techniques on other detainees and offered suggestions to
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[CIA OFFICER 1], the site manager, on the use of such techniques.
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On November
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, 2002,
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[CIA OFFI-CER 1] ordered that Gul Rahman be shackled to the wall of his cell in a position that required the detainee to rest on the bare concrete floor. Rahman was wearing only a sweatshirt, as
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[CIA OFFICER 1] had ordered that Rahman’s clothing be removed when he had been judged to be uncooperative during an earlier interrogation. The next day, the guards found Gul Rahman’s dead body. An internal CIA review and autopsy assessed that Rahman likely died from hypothermia—in part from having been forced to sit on the bare concrete floor without pants.
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[CIA OFFICER 1’s] initial cable to CIA Headquarters on Rahman’s death included a number of misstatements and omissions that were not discovered until internal investigations into Rahman’s death.
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The death of Gul Rahman resulted in increased attention to CIA detention and interrogation activities in Country
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by CIA Headquarters. The CTC formally designated the CTC’s Renditions Group
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as the responsible entity for the management and maintenance of all CIA interrogation facilities, including DETENTION SITE COBALT, in early December 2002.
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Despite this change, many of the same individuals within the CIA—including DUNBAR, officers at DETENTION SITE COBALT, and officers within ALEC Station who had recommended the use of the CIA’s enhanced interrogation techniques against Gul Rahman—remained key figures in the CIA interrogation program and received no reprimand or sanction for Rahman’s death. Instead, in March 2003, just four months after the death of Gul Rahman, the CIA Station in Country ██ recommended that
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[CIA OFFICER 1] receive a “cash award” of $2,500 for his “consistently superior work.”
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██████ [CIA OFFICER 1] remained in his position as manager of the detention site until July 2003 and continued to be involved in the interrogations of other CIA detainees. He was formally certified as a CIA interrogator in April 2003 after the practical portion of his training requirement was waived because of his past experience with interrogations at DETENTION SITE COBALT.
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Later investigations of DETENTION SITE COBALT conducted by the CIA inspector general and the deputy director of operations following the death of Gul Rahman found that the use of the CIA’s enhanced interrogation techniques—and other coercive interrogation techniques—was more widespread than was reported in contemporaneous CIA cables. Specifically, the interrogation techniques that went unreported in CIA cables included standing sleep deprivation in which a detainee’s arms were shackled above his head, nudity, dietary manipulation, exposure to cold temperatures, cold showers, “rough takedowns,” and, in at least two instances, the use of mock executions.
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On November 18, 2002, the CIA’s Office of Inspector General contacted █████████ CTC Legal,
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, to indicate their interest in being briefed by CTC on the detention facility in Country ██. At their meeting with the DDO and the chief of CTC on November ██, 2002, the OIG staff explained that, while in that country on a separate matter, the staff had overheard a conversation that included references to “war crimes” and “torture” at a CIA detention facility and were therefore seeking to follow-up on this information. According to notes from the meeting, the DDO described the “most recent event concerning Gul Rahman”—his death, which occurred on November ██, 2002.
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In January 2003, CIA Inspector General John Helgerson began a formal review of the death of Gul Rahman and began a separate review of the entire CIA Detention and Interrogation Program. The resulting Special Review of Counterterrorism Detention and Interrogation Activities (“Special Review”) found that there were no guidelines for the use of the CIA’s enhanced interrogation techniques at DETENTION SITE COBALT prior to December 2002, and that interrogators, some with little or no training, were “left to their own devices in working with detainees.”
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The Inspector General’s Special Review also revealed the lack of oversight of DETENTION SITE COBALT by CIA leadership. DCI Tenet stated that he was “not very familiar” with DETENTION SITE COBALT and “what the CIA is doing with medium value targets.”
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Associate Deputy Director of Operations
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stated that he was unaware that the CIA’s enhanced interrogation techniques were being used there.
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In August 2003, CIA General Counsel Scott Muller relayed that he was under the impression that DETENTION SITE COBALT was only a holding facility and that he had “no idea who is responsible for [COBALT].”
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Senior Deputy General Counsel John Rizzo informed the OIG that he knew little about DETENTION SITE COBALT and that his focus was on DETENTION SITE GREEN and DETENTION SITE BLUE.
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CTC Chief of Operations ██████████████ stated that he had much less knowledge of operations at DETENTION SITE COBALT, and that the CIA’s GREEN and BLUE detention sites were much more important to him.
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Finally, Chief of CTC Jose Rodriguez stated that he did not focus on DETENTION SITE COBALT because he had “other higher priorities.”
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5. The CIA Begins Training New Interrogators; Interrogation Techniques Not Reviewed by the Department of Justice Included in the Training Syllabus

The CIA’s CTC Renditions Group began preparing for the first CIA interrogator training course in August 2002—during the period in which Abu Zubaydah was being interrogated using the CIA’s enhanced interrogation techniques at DETENTION SITE GREEN.
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, the CIA’s chief of interrogations,
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and
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, the CIA officer with OTS who had spent ██ years as a SERE Instructor with JPRA, led the interrogation training. The first interrogation training, conducted with the assistance of JPRA personnel, occurred from November 12, 2002, to November 18, 2002.
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The class included eight students who were seeking to become CIA interrogators and three students seeking to support the CIA interrogation process.
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The CIA training program involved 65 hours of instruction and training on the CIA’s enhanced interrogation techniques, including at least two interrogation techniques whose legality had not been evaluated by the Department of Justice: the “abdominal slap” and the “finger press.” Although a number of personnel at CIA Headquarters reviewed the training materials, there are no CIA records of any CIA officer raising objections to the techniques being included in the syllabus.
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6. Despite Recommendation from CIA Attorneys, the CIA Fails to Adequately Screen Potential Interrogators in 2002 and 2003

On November █, 2002, after the completion of the first formal training class,
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CTC Legal,
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, asked CTC attorney
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to “[m]ake it known that from now on, CTC/LGL must vet all personnel who are enrolled in, observing or teaching—or otherwise associated with—the class.”
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added:

“Moreover, we will be forced to DISapprove [
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] the participation of specific personnel in the use of enhanced techniques unless we have ourselves vetted them and are satisfied with their qualifications and suitability for what are clearly unusual measures that are lawful only when practiced correctly by personnel whose records clearly demonstrate their suitability for that role. The vetting process will not be that dissimilar from the checks that are provided by the OIG, OS, etc. in certain cases before individuals are promoted or receive awards, and the selection and training of aggressive interrogators certainly warrants a similar vetting process.”
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The chief of CTC, Jose Rodriguez, objected to this approach, stating:

“I do not think that CTC/LGL should or would want to get into the business of vetting participants, observers, instructors or others that are involved in this program. It is simply not your job. Your job is to tell all what are the acceptable legal standards for conducting interrogations per the authorities obtained from Justice and agreed upon by the White House.”
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Contrary to statements later made by CIA Director Michael Hayden and other CIA officials that “[a]ll those involved in the questioning of detainees are carefully chosen and screened for demonstrated professional judgment and maturity,”
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CIA records suggest that the vetting sought by
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did not take place. The Committee reviewed CIA records related to several CIA officers and contractors involved in the CIA’s Detention and Interrogation Program, most of whom conducted interrogations. The Committee identified a number of personnel whose backgrounds include notable derogatory information calling into question their eligibility for employment, their access to classified information, and their participation in CIA interrogation activities. In nearly all cases, the derogatory information was known to the CIA prior to the assignment of the CIA officers to the Detention and Interrogation Program. This group of officers included individuals who, among other issues, had engaged in inappropriate detainee interrogations, had workplace anger management issues, and had reportedly admitted to sexual assault.
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