WaPo has uncovered a signed memo that contradicts the testimony General Sanchez gave to the Senate earlier this week.
Sadly
Chinese Radio was the only place I could find a good summary of the crucial testimony.
Another key question at the center of the abuse scandal involved a controversial sheet entitled "Interrogation Rules of Engagement" to govern interrogations of prisoners in Abu Ghraib. Its content was made public by a Washington Post report earlier this month. Among them are torture methods, such as: sleep deprivation, stress positions, use of guard dogs, and sensory deprivation to soften up Iraqi prisoners for interrogation. Many of these were believed to be against the Geneva Convention. However, at the Senate hearing on Wednesday, Sanchez categorically denied authorizing that rule of engagement sheet:
"I had no role in preparing it or approving it."
Col. Mark Warren, a military lawyer, assisting Sanchez at the hearing then said the sheet was posted by a relatively low-ranking officer.
However, all these claims were in contrast to the words of an army senior intelligence officer, who told the same Senate Armed Service Committee last week that the guidelines were official policy within Sanchez's command.
You'll recall that the list of interogation techniques was first presented at the hearings with Rumsfeld last week.
The Army's top intelligence officer, Lt. Gen. Keith Alexander, had presented to senators this week a list of techniques, some of which were approved for use on all prisoners and others that required General Sanchez's approval. The chart also listed safeguards, including a warning that "approaches must always be humane and lawful." Senators said at the hearing on Tuesday that General Alexander had characterized the one-page chart as a product of the American military high command in Baghdad. But the Central Command official disclosed Friday that the document was actually produced sometime in October by the Army's 205th Military Intelligence Brigade, which oversaw interrogations at Abu Ghraib. The Central Command official also said that until last fall, commanders did not have an interrogation policy specific to Iraq.
Now WaPo has documentary proof tha Sanchez was lying
In a memo signed on Aug. 18, 2003, the Pentagon's Joint Staff -- acting on a request from Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld and his top intelligence aide, Stephen A. Cambone -- ordered Army Maj. Gen. Geoffrey D. Miller to conduct an inspection there (
Abu Ghraib). Miller, who oversaw the interrogation efforts at the U.S. military base in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, finished his tour on Sept. 9 and left behind his own list of interrogation techniques.
"I think what Miller was trying to do was say, you need something that's maybe a little bit more rigorous," Pentagon spokesman Lawrence DiRita said Friday.
Members of Congress are now investigating how Miller's list -- based on interrogation practices devised for use in Cuba at a site the Pentagon has said is not covered by the Geneva Conventions -- was treated in Iraq.
The military officials said the Army captain memorialized it in a wall posting that said the use of long-term isolation, "working dogs," sleep disruption, "environmental manipulation" and the use of forced "stress positions" were acceptable, but only if they were approved by Sanchez on a case-by-case basis.
And here's the punchline.
Sanchez signed a September memo codifying this policy and then sent it to his superiors at Central Command for review, the officials said. No one has explained precisely what their reaction was, but after what one official called "28 days of coordination," the memo was revised to drop the detailed list of techniques that required special approval.
On Oct. 12, Sanchez signed the new memo, which included a more general statement that "anything not approved, you have to ask for," said one of the officials who briefed reporters. Sanchez has said that after that date, he approved the use of only one harsh technique, long-term isolation, in 25 or so cases.
Finally, as an aside here's how the story played in today's NYT .
In August 2003, the officer in charge of the unit, Capt. Carolyn A. Wood, an experienced Army interrogator, posted her own list of "interrogation rules of engagement," which were inconsistent with those later issued for Iraq by the top American commander, Lt. Gen. Ricardo S. Sanchez, according to Congressional officials.