Much has been said about the release of these torture memos today. Undoubtedly some are happy, some not so happy, and some like me who are a little confused as to the "balance" President Obama is trying to strike.
While I understand that some information has to stay redacted, why would you give a blanket cover to CIA operatives who may have committed torture under the "good faith" of legalisms coming from the executive branch.
First, I want to raise this discussion above party affiliation because the intelligence community spans across several administrations.
First, from my understanding I thought that the CIA, FBI, and our soldiers were covered by "similar" laws that protect them from prosecution when in a time war. And if so, then is a portion of Eric Holder's statement redundant.
Eric Holder's Statement
...Holder also stressed that intelligence community officials who acted reasonably and relied in good faith on authoritative legal advice from the Justice Department that their conduct was lawful, and conformed their conduct to that advice, would not face federal prosecutions for that conduct.
The Attorney General has informed the Central Intelligence Agency that the government would provide legal representation to any employee, at no cost to the employee, in any state or federal judicial or administrative proceeding brought against the employee based on such conduct and would take measures to respond to any proceeding initiated against the employee in any international or foreign tribunal, including appointing counsel to act on the employee’s behalf and asserting any available immunities and other defenses in the proceeding itself....
Here are a few questions I have:
- If the members of the intelligence have overall immunity now, is this a backdoor way to protect whistleblowers?
- If our soldiers can go to jail for torturing, what statues exist that differentiate a soldier, and a intelligence operative, during a time of war?
- Are the CIA considered to be in "permanent" time of war mode?
- Are the doctors that monitored these events protected under this blanket immunity?
- In a historical context, are protections granted to the intelligence community more about protecting the intelligence community, or protecting the DOJ (since the DOJ is where the legal underpinning are solidified)?
There are probably others question to ask (I wouldn't know to ask them anyway). Please add then in the comments below. I'm not a laywer but I love hearing well reasoned arguments even if I disagree with them. Personally I think Obama still left the door open since the immunity was for those that implemented the tactic, not for those that created the policy.