Pressure at Iraqi prison detailed (new allegations re Condi aide)

[Spazito]

The officer who oversaw interrogations at Abu Ghraib prison near Baghdad testified that he was under intense "pressure" from the White House, Pentagon (news - web sites) and CIA (news - web sites) last fall to get better information from detainees, pressure that he said included a visit to the prison by an aide to national security adviser Condoleezza Rice (news - web sites).


Army Lt. Col. Steven Jordan, in a sworn statement to Army investigators obtained by USA TODAY, said he was told last September that White House staffers wanted to "pull the intelligence out" of the interrogations being conducted at Abu Ghraib. The pressure stemmed from growing concern about the increasingly violent Iraqi insurgency that was claiming American lives daily. It came before and during a string of abuses of Iraqi prisoners in October, November and December of 2003.


Jordan, the top military intelligence officer at Abu Ghraib, described "instances where I feel that there was additional pressure" to get information from detainees, including a visit to the prison last fall by an aide to Rice that was "purely on detainee operations and reporting." And he said he was reminded of the need to improve the intelligence output of the prison "many, many, many times."


Rice staffer Fran Townsend said Thursday that she spent about two hours at Abu Ghraib last November and recalls that Jordan was her guide. Townsend, then deputy national security adviser for combating terrorism, said she did not discuss interrogation techniques or the need to obtain more information from detainees, and neither witnessed nor heard about abuse of detainees.

more

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=676&ncid=716&e=21&u=/usatoday/20040618/ts_usatoday/pressureatiraqiprisondetailed

This story has been picked up by Canadian News too)

[Ivote]

1. Does Anybody

Know when in Nov. This visit took place? Could it have been around Thanksgiving? Just curious that someone from condi's staff visited and there was no mention of it before

[Spazito]

2. Good question! Condi was with bush on that faux turkey run...

so it could very well have been then. The aides says she was there about 2 hours which matches the time bush was there I think.

[0007]

3. This is must read for all interested in Abu Ghraib and the details.

"Examination of Jordan's statement and other internal Army documents provides new insights into the intensity of the demands on commanders at Abu Ghraib to deliver useful intelligence, and the relative lack of emphasis on treating prisoners in accord with international standards. While the documents obtained by USA TODAY do not answer questions about how high approval of the abuses went, they show there was intense interest in the Abu Ghraib operations at the highest levels of the Pentagon and the White House staff.

Jordan said his immediate superior, Army Col. Thomas Pappas, told him at least twice "that some of the (intelligence) reporting was getting read by (Secretary of Defense Donald) Rumsfeld, folks out at Langley (CIA headquarters in Virginia), some very senior folks." Jordan testified that Pappas said pressure came from superiors "at the very beginning," well before the fall of 2003, when the documented abuses occurred."

much much much more........


http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=676&ncid=716&e=21&u=/u...

[saigon68]

4. Bush's enemy within

Somethings ROTTEN HERE


http://www.townhall.com/columnists/robertnovak/rn20030710.shtml

The line between career and political appointments at Justice has been blurred, but Townsend was viewed by old timers at Justice as part of the Reno inner circle. Her critics partially blame Townsend for changes in operation of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) that they claim inhibited sharing of information between intelligence and prosecution.

That shortcoming was corrected by Attorney General John Ashcroft, but not before the failure to investigate Moussaoui prior to Sept. 11. The White House official told me that Townsend had tried to correct FISA shortcomings, but that is not the version by former Justice colleagues. Ashcroft sent Townsend to the Coast Guard as assistant commandant for Intelligence, where she remained until her appointment as the president's adviser on counterterrorism