Constitutional Law

On 'Closing' the CIA's Secret Prisons

Late in the week, The New York Times reported on CIA Director Leon Panetta's statement to agency officers about the decommission of secret overseas prisons where Al Qaeda suspects were tortured during interrogations. The Times concluded that the prisons' decommissions would bring a 'symbolic' end to 'the most controversial counterterrorism program of the Bush administration.' In a piece for The Daily Beast, John Sifton takes a closer look at Panetta's statement and wonders whether the CIA director is 'discombobulated.'

Sifton says that Panetta also comes off as defensive in claiming that the secret sites would be decommissioned, have been closed and would save the agency millions.

Sifton writes:

This is a strange set of claims and it is difficult to know how to parse them. Panetta seems to be saying that 'there are no sites,' that 'we've submitted a plan to close the sites,' and that 'we're closing the sites,' all at the same time. But then he also makes it sound as the CIA is 'taking charge' of the sites from contractors, and that 'taking over' the sites will save $4 million, suggesting they're being kept open for the time being. (From where comes the $4 million in savings? If the sites are being closed, isn't the money saved anyway?) Each of his statements seems to contradict that last. At a later point the note, Panetta writes, 'CIA retains the authority to detain individuals on a short-term transitory basis.' But where is the agency going to hold them, if the sites are closed? Panetta does not explain.

Panetta, however, is clear in his opposition to criminal charges being lodged against CIA officials for their involvement in the handling of terrorist suspects. 'Officers who act on guidance from the Department of Justice – or acted on such guidance previously – should not be investigated, let alone punished,' Panetta wrote in his missive to CIA officers.

Sifton says Panetta's argument against investigation of CIA agents is 'misplaced and inaccurate as a matter of criminal law.'

He writes:

And as a general matter, it increasingly appears as though he's more interested in protecting various CIA officials beneath him – holdovers from the Bush era – than in cleaning up the CIA.

Full post as published by ACS Blog on April 12, 2009 (boomark / email).