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You can find the current article at its original source at https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/jul/01/the-guardian-view-on-outsourcing-torture-a-shaming-story
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| The Guardian view on outsourcing torture: a shaming story | The Guardian view on outsourcing torture: a shaming story |
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| The British establishment has a technique for dealing with awkward truths about the US: first, a top-level memorandum sets out the inadmissible truth – and then everyone knows which truth they must never subsequently admit, even to themselves. This method was perfected at the time of the American-led invasion of Iraq: having received a memo which explained that “intelligence is being fixed around policy”, Downing Street carried on as if it had never existed. Now the admirably clear and tough report of the parliamentary intelligence and security committee, published last week, displays in some detail how this technique was used to manage British knowledge of the American torture programme that was set up after the invasion of Afghanistan. In September 2001, the committee’s report tells us, “a senior SIS [Secret Intelligence Service] figure” reported back to London from Washington that “SIS should throw away everything that they thought they knew about the [US agencies]. The change was quick and profound. They were … to conduct … operations including renditing [and, SIS believed, killing] terrorists, their supporters, as well as to overthrow regimes that supported terrorists. The gloves were off.” | The British establishment has a technique for dealing with awkward truths about the US: first, a top-level memorandum sets out the inadmissible truth – and then everyone knows which truth they must never subsequently admit, even to themselves. This method was perfected at the time of the American-led invasion of Iraq: having received a memo which explained that “intelligence is being fixed around policy”, Downing Street carried on as if it had never existed. Now the admirably clear and tough report of the parliamentary intelligence and security committee, published last week, displays in some detail how this technique was used to manage British knowledge of the American torture programme that was set up after the invasion of Afghanistan. In September 2001, the committee’s report tells us, “a senior SIS [Secret Intelligence Service] figure” reported back to London from Washington that “SIS should throw away everything that they thought they knew about the [US agencies]. The change was quick and profound. They were … to conduct … operations including renditing [and, SIS believed, killing] terrorists, their supporters, as well as to overthrow regimes that supported terrorists. The gloves were off.” |
| Over the next three years, the parliamentary committee found, there were at least 117 reports back to London from the field describing the use of torture tactics against prisoners detained in the “war on terror”. It frankly beggars belief that intelligence agencies, whose core competence is drawing correct conclusions from partial and inadequate evidence, and who knew that “the gloves were off”, should have failed to understand what these 117 separate reports were pointing to. They would never have made such mistakes had the government in question been an enemy rather than our most powerful ally – and, of course, the doings of a powerful ally are of nearly as much interest as those of an enemy. | Over the next three years, the parliamentary committee found, there were at least 117 reports back to London from the field describing the use of torture tactics against prisoners detained in the “war on terror”. It frankly beggars belief that intelligence agencies, whose core competence is drawing correct conclusions from partial and inadequate evidence, and who knew that “the gloves were off”, should have failed to understand what these 117 separate reports were pointing to. They would never have made such mistakes had the government in question been an enemy rather than our most powerful ally – and, of course, the doings of a powerful ally are of nearly as much interest as those of an enemy. |
| Down on the ground, the committee found, individual officers who witnessed mistreatment did sometimes report it, but “we have seen no evidence that they intervened themselves or complained to the detaining authority on a regular basis”. This reached a pitch of immoral absurdity later on, when the Americans would remove prisoners from the plywood hutches where they were held so that they might be interrogated by British intelligence officers in the relative comfort of a Portakabin before being taken back to their normal quarters after the British had left. | Down on the ground, the committee found, individual officers who witnessed mistreatment did sometimes report it, but “we have seen no evidence that they intervened themselves or complained to the detaining authority on a regular basis”. This reached a pitch of immoral absurdity later on, when the Americans would remove prisoners from the plywood hutches where they were held so that they might be interrogated by British intelligence officers in the relative comfort of a Portakabin before being taken back to their normal quarters after the British had left. |
| Where were the ministers in all this? They were not briefed by the security services until 2004, after reports had started to appear in the media of what had been going on. Neither David Blunkett nor Jack Straw, who were then home secretary and foreign secretary, and so responsible for MI5 and SIS, appeared before the committee – so we do not know how they would have accounted for their ignorance. | Where were the ministers in all this? They were not briefed by the security services until 2004, after reports had started to appear in the media of what had been going on. Neither David Blunkett nor Jack Straw, who were then home secretary and foreign secretary, and so responsible for MI5 and SIS, appeared before the committee – so we do not know how they would have accounted for their ignorance. |
| Mr Straw, in particular, has questions to answer. In all, the report lists 31 rendition operations that were either planned, financed or agreed by the UK. In one particular case, when he was foreign secretary in 2004, he was asked to pay “a large share” of the costs of a rendition flight of two suspects captured in one country as the result of an SIS operation and then flown to their native country to be tortured. Mr Straw signed off on this request. The exact amount is redacted in the committee’s report. But it is hard to believe he had no curiosity about the expenditure he had authorised. The outsourcing of torture in this way may have been a crime under international law. It was also curiously pointless. Who exactly was fooled by the pretence that the government did not know and approve of what was being done in those windowless rooms? | Mr Straw, in particular, has questions to answer. In all, the report lists 31 rendition operations that were either planned, financed or agreed by the UK. In one particular case, when he was foreign secretary in 2004, he was asked to pay “a large share” of the costs of a rendition flight of two suspects captured in one country as the result of an SIS operation and then flown to their native country to be tortured. Mr Straw signed off on this request. The exact amount is redacted in the committee’s report. But it is hard to believe he had no curiosity about the expenditure he had authorised. The outsourcing of torture in this way may have been a crime under international law. It was also curiously pointless. Who exactly was fooled by the pretence that the government did not know and approve of what was being done in those windowless rooms? |
| This report has appeared nearly 16 years after the worst of the crimes it investigates. The committee was prevented from questioning important witnesses. This will not do. What is at stake here is the principle of honesty and accountability in government, the rule of the law – and the human rights of anyone in the hands of the UK security services. | This report has appeared nearly 16 years after the worst of the crimes it investigates. The committee was prevented from questioning important witnesses. This will not do. What is at stake here is the principle of honesty and accountability in government, the rule of the law – and the human rights of anyone in the hands of the UK security services. |
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