Torture The first jolt was so bad I just wanted to die. " —Gloria Esperanza Reyes, speaking of her torture in Honduras, where electric wires were attached to her breasts and vagina. "They always asked to be killed Torture is worse than death. " —José Barrera, Honduran torturer. Turkey, July 14, 1999, the police break into the home of a Kurdish family and announce they want to take the two daughters—Medine, 14, and her younger sister Devran—in for questioning. "I headed for the bedroom to get dressed, " said Devran later, "but Medine...went straight to the window and jumped. " Medine& mother explained: "My daughter, you see, preferred death to being tortured once again. "Torture might last a short time, but the person will never be the same. " Amnesty International report "No exceptional circumstances whatsoever, whether a state Of war or a threat of war, internal political instability or any other public emergency, may be invoked as a justification for The Convention Against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment, 1987
hysical abuse or other degrading treatment was rejected, not only because it is wrong, but because it has historically proven to be ineffective."—Richard Stolz, Deputy Director of Operations of the Central Intelligence Agency, 1988.5 The CIA likes to say things like this because they think it sounds like good plausible denial. But who can believe that torture does not loosen up tongues, that for such purpose it is not exceedingly effective? Richard Stolz and the CIA would have us believe that Medine, in the above example, if denied the opportunity to kill herself, would not talk under torture. Torture's effectiveness extends yet further, for its purpose is frequently not so much to elicit information as it is to punish, to coerce the victims from any further dissident activity by gouging out the idealism from their very being, and as a warning to their comrades. For these ends, the CIA has co-existed with torture for decades. (Turkey, it must be remembered, is one of Washington's
decades. (Turkey, it must be remembered, is one of Washington's very closest strategic allies; for Honduras, see below.) Sleeping with friendly torturers has been a closely guarded secret at the Agency, and for that reason the actual painful details have been difficult to come by over the years. But here is some of the record that has made its way to the light of day: Greece During the late 1940s, the CIA was instrumental in the creation of a new internal security agency, KYP. Before long, KYP was carrying out all the endearing practices of secret police everywhere, including systematic torture. It was most active during the military junta, 1967-74, a period of routine horrific torture. Amnesty International later reported that "American policy on the torture question as expressed in official statements and official testimony
has been to deny it where possible and minimize it where denial was not possible. This policy flowed naturally from general support for the military regime. "6 James Becket, an American attorney sent to Greece by Amnesty, wrote in 1969 that some torturers told prisoners that some of their equipment had come as US military aid. One item was a special 'thick white double cable" whip that was "scientific, making their work easier"; another was the head screw, known as an "iron wreath", which was progressively tightened around the head or ears.7 American support, reported Becket, was vital to the Hundreds of prisoners have listened to the little speech given by Inspector Basil Lambrou, who sits behind his desk which displays the red, white, and blue clasped-hand symbol of American aid. He tries to show the prisoner the absolute futility of resistance: "You make yourself ridiculous by thinking you can do anything. The world is divided in two. There are the communists on that side and on this side the
displays the white, blue cl American aid. He tries to show the prisoner the absolute futility of resistance: "You make yourself ridiculous by thinking you can do anything. The world is divided in two. There are the communists on that side and on this side the free world. The Russians and the Americans, no one else. What are we? Americans. Behind me there is the government, behind the government is NATO, behind NATO is the U.S. You can't fight us, we are Americans. Iran The notorious Iranian security service, SAVAK, which employed torture routinely, was created under the guidance of the CIA and Israel in the 1950s.9 According to a former CIA analyst on Iran, Jesse J. Leaf, SAVAK was instructed in torture techniques by the Agency. 10 After the 1979 revolution, the Iranians found CIA film made for SAVAK on how to torture women. I
Germany In the 1950s, in Munich, the CIA tortured suspected infiltrators of Soviet émigré organizations in Western Europe, which the Agency was using in anti-Soviet operations. Amongst the techniques employed by the CIA were such esoteric torture methods as applying turpentine to a man's testicles or sealing someone in a room and playing Indonesian music at deafening levels until he cracked. 12 This information probably surfaced because it's weird- sounding to the point of being amusing; there was likely more of regular torture methods not fit for conversation. Vietnam The Green Berets taught its members who were slated for duty in Vietnam in the 1960s how to use torture as part of an interrogation. 13 The notorious Operation Phoenix, set up by the CIA to wipe out the Vietcong infrastructure, subjected suspects to torture such as electric shock to the genitals of both men and
women, and the insertion into the ear of a six-inch dowel, which was tapped through the brain until the victim died; suspects were also thrown out of airborne helicopters to persuade the more important suspects to talk, although this should probably be categorized as murder of the ones thrown out, and a form of torture for those not.14 In violation of the Geneva Convention, the US turned prisoners over to their South Vietnamese allies in full knowledge that they would be tortured, American military personnel often being present during the torture. 15 Bolivia In 1967, anti-Castro Cubans, working with the CIA to find Che Guevara, set up houses of interrogation where Bolivians suspected of aiding Che's guerrilla army were brought for questioning and
sometimes tortured. When the Bolivian interior minister learned of the torture, he was furious and demanded that the CIA put a stop to it. 16 Uruguay In the late 1960s, Dan Mitrione, an employee of the US Offce of Public Safety (part of Agency for International Development), which trained and armed foreign police forces, was stationed in Montevideo, Uruguay. Torturing political prisoners in Uruguay had existed before Mitrione's arrival. However, in a surprising interview given to a leading Brazilian newspaper, Jornal do Brasil in 1970, the former Uruguayan ChiefofPolice Intelligence, Alejandro Otero, declared that US advisers, and Mitrione in particular, had instituted torture as a more routine measure; to the means of inflicting pain, they had added scientific refinement; and to that a psychology to create despair, such as playing a tape in the next room of women and children screaming and telling the
the next room of women and children screaming and telling the prisoner that it was his family being tortured. 17 The newspaper interview greatly upset American offcials in South America and Washington. The director of OPS in Washington tried to explain it all away by asserting: "The three Brazilian reporters in Montevideo all denied filing that story. We found out later that it was slipped into the paper by someone in the composing room at the Jornal do Brasil."18 Mitrione built a soundproofed room in the cellar of his house in Montevideo, in which he assembled Uruguayan police offcers to observe a demonstration of torture techniques. Four beggars were rounded up to be the subjects upon whom Mitrione demonstrated the effects of different voltages on different parts of the body. The four of them died. "The precise pain, in the precise place, in the precise amount, for the desired effect," was Mitrione's motto.
"When you get what you want, and I always get it, "he said, "it may be good to prolong the session a little to apply another softening-up. Not to extract information now, but only as a political measure, to create a healthy fear of meddling in subversive activities."19 And in 1981, a former Uruguayan intelligence omcer declared that US manuals were being used to teach techniques of torture to his country's military. He said that most of the offcers who trained him had attended classes run by the United States in Panama. Among other niceties, the manuals listed 35 nerve points where electrodes could be applied.20 Brazil Before the Offce of Public Safety assigned Dan Mitrione to Uruguay, he had been stationed in Brazil. There, he and other Americans worked with OPS, AID and CIA in supplying Brazilian security forces with the equipment and training to facilitate the torture of prisoners. The Americans also advised on how much
Uruguay, he had been stationed in Brazil. There, he and other Americans worked with OPS, AID and CIA in supplying Brazilian security forces with the equipment and training to facilitate the torture of prisoners. The Americans also advised on how much electric shock could be administered without killing the person, if his or her death might prove awkward.21 Guatemala From the 1960s through the 1980s, Guatemalan security forces, notably the Army unit called G-2, routinely tortured "subversives". One method was electric shock to the genital area, using military field telephones hooked up to small generators, equipment and instructions for use supplied by Uncle Sam. The US and its clients in various countries were becoming rather adept at this technique. The CIA advised, armed, and equipped the G-2, which maintained a web of torture centers, whose methods reportedly included chopping off limbs and singeing flesh, in addition to
electric shocks. The Army unit even had its own crematorium, presumably to dispose of any incriminating evidence. The CIA thoroughly infiltrated the G-2, with at least three G-2 chiefs of the 1980s and early 90s, as well as many lower-level offcers, being on the Agency's payroll.22 Also benefiting from the Agency's generosity was General Hector Gramajo Morales (see chapter 9), who was Defense Minister during the armed forces' 1989 abduction of Sister Dianna Ortiz, an American nun. She was burned with cigarettes, raped repeatedly, and lowered into a pit full of corpses. Typically, torturers exult in demonstrating the power they hold over their victims—one of them put a large knife or machete into Ortiz's hand, put his own hands on top of hers, and forced her to stab another female prisoner. Ortiz thinks she may have killed the woman. A fair- skinned man, whom the others referred to as "Alejandro", and as their 'boss", seemed to be in charge, she said. He spoke Spanish with an American accent and cursed in English. Later, Ortiz adds,
when this man realized she was American, he ordered the torture stopped. Clearly, if his motivation had been humanitarian, and not simply trying to avoid a possible political flap, he would have stopped it regardless of her nationality.23 In 1996, in the United States, Ortiz received a number of documents from the State Department in response to a Freedom Of Information Act request. Only one, dated 1990, contained a significant reference to Alejandro. It read as follows: VERY IMPORTANT: We need to close the loop on the issue of the "North American" named by Ortiz as being involved in the case...The EMBASSY IS VERY SENSITIVE ON THIS ISSUE, but it is an issue we will have to respond to publicly ...24 The next two pages were completely redacted.
El Salvador During the counter-insurgency period of the 1980s, there was widespread torture practiced by the various Salvadoran security forces, all of whom had close working relations with the CIA and/or the US military. In January 1982, the New York Times published an interview with a deserter from the Salvadoran Army who described a class where severe methods of torture were demonstrated on teenage prisoners. He stated that eight US military advisers, apparently Green Berets, were present. Watching "will make you feel more like a man," a Salvadoran offcer apprised the army recruits, adding that they should "not feel pity of anyone" but only "hate for those who are enemies of our country. Another Salvadoran, a former member Of the National Guard, later testified in a 1986 British television documentary: "l belonged to a squad of twelve. We devoted ourselves to torture, and to finding people whom we were told were guerrillas. I was trained in Panama for nine months by the [unintelligible] of the
United States for anti-guerrilla warfare. Pan of the time we were instructed about torture. "26 Honduras During the 1980s, the CIA gave indispensable support to the infamous Battalion 316, which kidnapped, tortured and killed hundreds of citizens, using shock and suffocation devices for interrogation, amongst other techniques. The CIA supplied torture equipment, torture manuals, and in both Honduras and the US, taught battalion members methods of psychological and physical torture. On at least one occasion, a CIA omcer took part in interrogating a torture victim. The Agency also funded Argentine counter-insurgency experts to provide further training for the Hondurans. At the time, Argentina was famous for its
their contract employees, and the CIA against detainees in one or another edifice of the sprawling global prison complex maintained by the United States in occupied Iraq, occupied Afghanistan, and occupied Cuba; the same, and probably worse (because more hidden), has taken place daily in other secret CIA prisons around the world. The details are derived from major news organizations, the International Red Cross, human-rights organizations, and US Army reports which made it to the open after photos of abuses appeared in the American media.29 For the great majority of these acts, multiple similar instances have been reported. It should be noted that the US State Department's annual human-rights reports about the rest of the world routinely denounce some of these acts, such as sleep deprivation. Standing or kneeling or forced into contorted, painful positions for hours...in leg shackles and handcuffs with eyes, ears, and mouths covered and wearing mittens in tropical heat... stripping detainees naked, leading them around with a dog leash...depriving them of sleep, subjecting them to a 24-hour bombardment ofbright lights or blaring noise, hooding them, exposing them to extremes of heat or cold...death in custody with bag over his head, hands tied behind back.. Guards staged races of detainees in short leg shackles, violently punishing them if they fell...withholding painkillers and other medications from the injured...sensory deprivation...male detainees made to wear female underwear..."water boarding", in which a prisoner is strapped to an inclined board, head down, towel over his face, water poured on the towel to simulate drowning... made to lie naked on a sheet of ice... Fake blood smeared on Muslim men before they intended to pray, told that it was menstrual blood...one female soldier sat on his lap, another rubbed her breasts against his back and massaged
pray, told that it was menstrual blood...one female soldier sat on his lap, another rubbed her breasts against his back and massaged his chest and a third squatted near his crotch. He head-butted the Torture 73 woman behind him, knocking her off him. All three ran out and a team of soldiers stormed in and beat him... kicked by female offcers... The Iraqi general "was put headfirst into a sleeping bag, wrapped with electrical cord and knocked down before the soldiers
The Iraqi general "was put headfirst into a sleeping bag, wrapped with electrical cord and knocked down before the soldiers sat and stood on him. The cause of death was determined to be suffocation. " Chained to the ceiling, shackled so tightly that the blood flow stops...shackled to the floor in fetal positions for more than 24 hours at a time, left without food and water, and allowed to defecate on themselves, a detainee found almost unconscious on the floor, with a pile of hair next to him; he had apparently been literally pulling his own hair out throughout the night... Wrapping a prisoner in an Israeli flag...kept naked and hooded and kicked to keep them awake for days on end...use of unmuzzled, growling dogs to frighten, in at least one instance actually biting and severely injuring a detainee..."burn marks on their backs"...detainee left at an Iraqi hospital, comatose, with massive head trauma, bums on the bottoms of his feet caused by electrocution$ruises on his arms...at least 37 detainees have died
during interrogations... The death of two captives in Afghanistan: one from "blunt force injuries to lower extremities complicating coronary artery disease"; an autopsy showed that his legs were so damaged that amputation would have been necessary; the other captive suffered from a blood clot in the lung that was exacerbated by a "blunt force injury". Kicks to the groin and legs, shoving or slamming detainees into walls and tables, forcing water in their mouths until they could not breathe...He had his hands handcuffed behind him and was suspended by his wrists in an effort to coerce his cooperation. "His arms were so badly stretched I was surprised they didn 't pop out of their sockets."...
Female American soldier, cigarette dangling from her mouth, giving a jaunty thumbs-up sign and pointing at the genitals of a young Iraqi, naked except for a sandbag over his head, as he is forced to masturbate while being photographed and videotaped. She stands arm in arm with male soldier, both are grinning and giving the thumbs-up behind a cluster of about seven naked Iraqis, piled on top of each other in a pyramid. Punched a detainee in the chest so hard he almost went into cardiac arrest...a prisoner placed in an isolation cell with little or no clothes, no toilet or running water, no ventilation or window, for as much as three days...forcing naked male detainees to wear women's underwear...standing a naked detainee on an electrified metal drum with a sandbag on his head, wires attached to his fingers, toes, and penis to simulate electric torture.. The report by General Taguba found that between October and December of 2003 there were numerous instances of "sadistic, blatant, and wanton criminal abuses" at Abu Ghraib prison in
The report by General Taguba found that between October and December of 2003 there were numerous instances of "sadistic, blatant, and wanton criminal abuses" at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq. The report listed: breaking chemical lights and pouring the phosphoric liquid on detainees; pouring cold water on naked detainees; beating detainees with a broom handle and a chair; threatening male detainees with rape; allowing a military police guard to stitch the wound of a detainee who was injured after being slammed against the wall in his cell; sodomizing a detainee with a chemical light and perhaps a broom stick... A 14-year-old Iraqi with a broken arm being hurled to the ground and then mocked by US soldiers as the boy wept and wet himself...a male soldier having sex with a female detainee... 18 days naked alone in a cell, often with his hands and feet bound together, frequently beaten..."He locked his arm under mine and holding the back of my head he beat my head against the doors of the cells"...his hands and feet were pushed through the metal bars of the cell door and then tied together. "There was a stereo inside the cell and it Ia ed music with a sound so loud I couldn't sl
I stayed like that for 23 hours." Six weeks after his release, he says he has lost the will to live. He is too ashamed to be seen by his friends and family and has not seen or spoken to his fiancée. The wedding is off. "I was a man before, but my manhood was taken away. Since this happened to me, I consider myself dead. My life feels over." Jamadi died an hour after his arrival at Abu Ghraib in early November, 2003; he had been beaten while in CIA custody and then hung by his wrists, with his arms crossed across his back. US Army guards at the prison then packed his body in ice and posed with the corpse in mocking photographs. Iraqi prisoners were forced to crawl through broken glass and wear women's sanitary products...two drunken interrogators took a female Iraqi prisoner from her cell in the middle ofthe night and stripped her naked to the waist...an Iraqi woman in her 70s was harnessed and ridden like a donkey...detainees were pressed to denounce Islam, or force-fed pork and liquor...
to denounce Islam, or force-fed pork and liquor.. "We believe she was raped and that she was pregnant by a US guard. After her release from Abu Ghraib, I went to her house. The neighbours said her family had moved away. I believe she has been killed." Honor killings are not unusual in Islamic society. "They forced us to walk like dogs on our hands and knees.„ And we had to bark like a dog, and if we didn't do that they started hitting us hard on our face and chest with no mercy."..."Do you believe in anything?" the soldier asked. "I said to him, 'I believe in Allah.' So he said, 'But I believe in torture and I will torture you'." Taken out and tied to a post, rubber bullets were fired at them; made to kneel in the sun until they collapsed..."They tied my hands to my feet behind my back. My left hand to my right foot and my right hand to my left foot. I was lying face down and they were beating me like this"...inmates kept in wire cages with concrete floors and no protection from the elements."They actually said: 'You have no rights here'. After a while, 76 ROGUE STATE we stopped asking for human rights—we wanted animal rights."... crosses shaved into their scalp or body hair...dislocated his arms, beat his leg with a bat, crushed his nose, and put an unloaded gun in his mouth and pulled the trigger...Six Kuwaiti prisoners said they were severely beaten, given electric shocks and sodomized by US forces in Afghanistan.
A CIA offcer ordered guards to sü-ip naked an uncooperative young Afghan detainee, chain him to the concrete floor and leave him there ovemight without blankets. He was dragged around on the concrete floor, bruising and scraping his skin, before putting him in his cell. By morning he had frozen to death. The Afghan detainee had been captured in Pakistan along with a group of other Afghans. His connection to al Qaeda or the value ofhis intelligence was never established before he died. "He was probably associated with people who were associated with al Qaeda," one US govemment offcial said. No release from the stress, increased by uncertainty over whether they will ever be released...Guards telling prisoners repeatedly: "You will never go home."..."ln my cell I was shouting: 'Please come and take me. Please kill me. I am Osama bin Laden, I was in the plane that hit the World Trade Centre.' I wished for death at that time. I wanted to be dead 1,000 times. I asked my God to take my soul."...numerous suicide attempts... No famil contact. No c . Nola ers.Noa Is.
I was in the plane that hit the World Trade Centre.' I wished for death at that time. I wanted to be dead 1,000 times. I asked my God to take my soul."...numerous suicide attempts.. No family contact. No charges. No lawyers. No appeals. The brazenness with which the servicemen and women conducted themselves, snapping photographs and flashing the 'thumbs-up" sign as they abused prisoners, suggests they felt they had nothing to hide from their superiors.30 After the photos became public and a "scandal" broke out, the GIs insisted that they had been encouraged by military intelligence offcers and other higher-ranking offcers to "soften up" prisoners for interrogation purposes, to "take the gloves off', but in the end none of their superiors were indicted
and only a handful ofthe lower-ranking servicemembers were. The military judge in a court-martial of some of the servicemembers refused defense attorneys' requests to consider the role of offcers in the trial.31 Neither have any civilian offcials in the Pentagon or White House, instrumental in formulating and condoning policies on torture, faced any charges. As further indication that the American military was not terribly upset about the use of torture, two US defense contractors being sued over allegations of abuse at Abu Ghraib prison were awarded valuable new contracts by the Pentagon, despite demands from American human rights groups that they should be barred from any new government work. Three employees of the firms, CACI International and Titan, had been separately accused of abusive behavior, including rape and the use of dogs.32 President George W. Bush, 2004: "The world is better off without Saddam Hussein in power. The world is better off because he sits
President George W. Bush, 2004: "The world is better off without Saddam Hussein in power. The world is better off because he sits in a prison cell. Because we acted, torture rooms are closed, rape rooms no longer exist."33 Brian Whitman, spokesman for the US Department of Defense, 2005: "The United States treats all detainees in their custody with dignity and respect. "34 At home At the US Navy's schools in San Diego and Maine during the 1960s and 1970s, students were supposedly learning about methods of "survival, evasion, resistance and escape" which they could use if they were ever a prisoner ofwar. There was in the course something of survival in a desert, where students were forced to eat lizards, but the naval offcers and cadets were also subjected to beatings,
but the naval offcers and cadets were also subjected to beatings, jarringjudo flips, "tiger cages"—hooded and placed in a 16-cubic- 78 ROGUE STATE foot box for 22 hours with a coffee can for their excrement—and a torture device called the "water board": the subject strapped to an inclined board, head downward, a towel placed over his face, and cold water poured over the towel; he would choke, gag, retch and le he ex •en
face, and cold water poured over the towel; he would choke, gag, retch and gurgle as he experienced the sensation of drowning. A former student, Navy pilot Lt. Wendell Richard Young, claimed that his back was broken during the course and that students were tortured into spitting, urinating and defecating on the American flag, masturbating before guards, and, on one occasion, engaging in sex with an instructor.35 In 1992, a civilian oversight board revealed that over a 13-year period (1973-1986), Chicago police offcers and commanders engaged in "systematic" torture and abuse of suspects, including electric shock to penises, testicles and other areas; beatings, suffocation (plastic bags secured over the heads, stopping the flow of oxygen; some subjects passed out, and when they recovered, the bag was placed over their head again); guns stuck in prisoners' mouths and triggers pulled; prisoners hung from hooks by handcuffs attached to their wrists and beaten on the bottoms of
mouths and triggers pulled; prisoners hung from hooks by handcuffs attached to their wrists and beaten on the bottoms of their feet and on their testicles; as well as much psychological torture. Some were released after being tortured and were never charged. More than 40 cases were collected. According to one of their attorneys, "All of the victims were black or Latino, so far as we've seen, and the people who were doing the torturing were white omcers."36 A Human Rights Watch investigation in 1995 of more than 20 US prisons and jails in New York, California, Florida and Tennessee, and a close look at prison litigation for a ten-year period, showed "extensive abuses ofthe U .N. 's minimum standards forthe treatment of prisoners...amounting to torture"...a handcuffed prisoner forced into a tub of 145-degree water...prisoners dying after receiving
repeated jolts of electricity from stun guns or stun belts (50,000 volt shock for 8 seconds)...prisoners held in outdoor cages, rain or shine...prisoners held in total isolation from other human beings for long periods of time with sensory deprivation ...37 Amnesty International has released reports such as "Torture, Ill Treatment and Excessive Force by Police in Los Angeles, California" (1992), and "Police Brutality and Excessive Force in the New York City Police Department" (1996), as well as later reports dealing with Chicago and other cities. Amnesty states that US police forces have been guilty of "violating international human rights standards through a pattern of unchecked excessive force amounting to torture or other cruel, inhuman and degrading treatrnent".38 Amnesty has also published "The Pain Merchants" (2003), which deals with the practice of American companies exporting millions of dollars worth of equipment known to be used for torture, such as electro-shock devices, leg-irons, shackles and
millions of dollars worth of equipment known to be used for torture, such as electro-shock devices, leg-irons, shackles, and restraints. Sales have been made to a dozen countries where the US State Department says the use of torture is Lest any of the above give the impression that the United States government is not disturbed by the practice of torture, it should be pointed out that Congress passed a bill in 1996 allowing, for the first time, an American citizen to sue a foreign government in a US court for having been tortured in that foreign country. There was, however, one small limitation imposed. The only countries that can be sued under this law are Washington's offcially- designated enemies (ODE), those categorized as "state sponsors of terrorism" .39 For other countries, the situation may be like the case in the early 1990s of Scott Nelson, an American who sued Saudi Arabia in a US court for torture. A Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that he
hysical abuse or other degrading treatment was rejected, not only because it is wrong, but because it has historically proven to be ineffective."—Richard Stolz, Deputy Director of Operations of the Central Intelligence Agency, 1988.5 The CIA likes to say things like this because they think it sounds like good plausible denial. But who can believe that torture does not loosen up tongues, that for such purpose it is not exceedingly effective? Richard Stolz and the CIA would have us believe that Medine, in the above example, if denied the opportunity to kill herself, would not talk under torture. Torture's effectiveness extends yet further, for its purpose is frequently not so much to elicit information as it is to punish, to coerce the victims from any further dissident activity by gouging out the idealism from their very being, and as a warning to their comrades. For these ends, the CIA has co-existed with torture for decades. (Turkey, it must be remembered, is one of Washington's
decades. (Turkey, it must be remembered, is one of Washington's very closest strategic allies; for Honduras, see below.) Sleeping with friendly torturers has been a closely guarded secret at the Agency, and for that reason the actual painful details have been difficult to come by over the years. But here is some of the record that has made its way to the light of day: Greece During the late 1940s, the CIA was instrumental in the creation of a new internal security agency, KYP. Before long, KYP was carrying out all the endearing practices of secret police everywhere, including systematic torture. It was most active during the military junta, 1967-74, a period of routine horrific torture. Amnesty International later reported that "American policy on the torture question as expressed in official statements and official testimony
has been to deny it where possible and minimize it where denial was not possible. This policy flowed naturally from general support for the military regime. "6 James Becket, an American attorney sent to Greece by Amnesty, wrote in 1969 that some torturers told prisoners that some of their equipment had come as US military aid. One item was a special 'thick white double cable" whip that was "scientific, making their work easier"; another was the head screw, known as an "iron wreath", which was progressively tightened around the head or ears.7 American support, reported Becket, was vital to the Hundreds of prisoners have listened to the little speech given by Inspector Basil Lambrou, who sits behind his desk which displays the red, white, and blue clasped-hand symbol of American aid. He tries to show the prisoner the absolute futility of resistance: "You make yourself ridiculous by thinking you can do anything. The world is divided in two. There are the communists on that side and on this side the
displays the white, blue cl American aid. He tries to show the prisoner the absolute futility of resistance: "You make yourself ridiculous by thinking you can do anything. The world is divided in two. There are the communists on that side and on this side the free world. The Russians and the Americans, no one else. What are we? Americans. Behind me there is the government, behind the government is NATO, behind NATO is the U.S. You can't fight us, we are Americans. Iran The notorious Iranian security service, SAVAK, which employed torture routinely, was created under the guidance of the CIA and Israel in the 1950s.9 According to a former CIA analyst on Iran, Jesse J. Leaf, SAVAK was instructed in torture techniques by the Agency. 10 After the 1979 revolution, the Iranians found CIA film made for SAVAK on how to torture women. I
Germany In the 1950s, in Munich, the CIA tortured suspected infiltrators of Soviet émigré organizations in Western Europe, which the Agency was using in anti-Soviet operations. Amongst the techniques employed by the CIA were such esoteric torture methods as applying turpentine to a man's testicles or sealing someone in a room and playing Indonesian music at deafening levels until he cracked. 12 This information probably surfaced because it's weird- sounding to the point of being amusing; there was likely more of regular torture methods not fit for conversation. Vietnam The Green Berets taught its members who were slated for duty in Vietnam in the 1960s how to use torture as part of an interrogation. 13 The notorious Operation Phoenix, set up by the CIA to wipe out the Vietcong infrastructure, subjected suspects to torture such as electric shock to the genitals of both men and
women, and the insertion into the ear of a six-inch dowel, which was tapped through the brain until the victim died; suspects were also thrown out of airborne helicopters to persuade the more important suspects to talk, although this should probably be categorized as murder of the ones thrown out, and a form of torture for those not.14 In violation of the Geneva Convention, the US turned prisoners over to their South Vietnamese allies in full knowledge that they would be tortured, American military personnel often being present during the torture. 15 Bolivia In 1967, anti-Castro Cubans, working with the CIA to find Che Guevara, set up houses of interrogation where Bolivians suspected of aiding Che's guerrilla army were brought for questioning and
sometimes tortured. When the Bolivian interior minister learned of the torture, he was furious and demanded that the CIA put a stop to it. 16 Uruguay In the late 1960s, Dan Mitrione, an employee of the US Offce of Public Safety (part of Agency for International Development), which trained and armed foreign police forces, was stationed in Montevideo, Uruguay. Torturing political prisoners in Uruguay had existed before Mitrione's arrival. However, in a surprising interview given to a leading Brazilian newspaper, Jornal do Brasil in 1970, the former Uruguayan ChiefofPolice Intelligence, Alejandro Otero, declared that US advisers, and Mitrione in particular, had instituted torture as a more routine measure; to the means of inflicting pain, they had added scientific refinement; and to that a psychology to create despair, such as playing a tape in the next room of women and children screaming and telling the
the next room of women and children screaming and telling the prisoner that it was his family being tortured. 17 The newspaper interview greatly upset American offcials in South America and Washington. The director of OPS in Washington tried to explain it all away by asserting: "The three Brazilian reporters in Montevideo all denied filing that story. We found out later that it was slipped into the paper by someone in the composing room at the Jornal do Brasil."18 Mitrione built a soundproofed room in the cellar of his house in Montevideo, in which he assembled Uruguayan police offcers to observe a demonstration of torture techniques. Four beggars were rounded up to be the subjects upon whom Mitrione demonstrated the effects of different voltages on different parts of the body. The four of them died. "The precise pain, in the precise place, in the precise amount, for the desired effect," was Mitrione's motto.
"When you get what you want, and I always get it, "he said, "it may be good to prolong the session a little to apply another softening-up. Not to extract information now, but only as a political measure, to create a healthy fear of meddling in subversive activities."19 And in 1981, a former Uruguayan intelligence omcer declared that US manuals were being used to teach techniques of torture to his country's military. He said that most of the offcers who trained him had attended classes run by the United States in Panama. Among other niceties, the manuals listed 35 nerve points where electrodes could be applied.20 Brazil Before the Offce of Public Safety assigned Dan Mitrione to Uruguay, he had been stationed in Brazil. There, he and other Americans worked with OPS, AID and CIA in supplying Brazilian security forces with the equipment and training to facilitate the torture of prisoners. The Americans also advised on how much
Uruguay, he had been stationed in Brazil. There, he and other Americans worked with OPS, AID and CIA in supplying Brazilian security forces with the equipment and training to facilitate the torture of prisoners. The Americans also advised on how much electric shock could be administered without killing the person, if his or her death might prove awkward.21 Guatemala From the 1960s through the 1980s, Guatemalan security forces, notably the Army unit called G-2, routinely tortured "subversives". One method was electric shock to the genital area, using military field telephones hooked up to small generators, equipment and instructions for use supplied by Uncle Sam. The US and its clients in various countries were becoming rather adept at this technique. The CIA advised, armed, and equipped the G-2, which maintained a web of torture centers, whose methods reportedly included chopping off limbs and singeing flesh, in addition to
electric shocks. The Army unit even had its own crematorium, presumably to dispose of any incriminating evidence. The CIA thoroughly infiltrated the G-2, with at least three G-2 chiefs of the 1980s and early 90s, as well as many lower-level offcers, being on the Agency's payroll.22 Also benefiting from the Agency's generosity was General Hector Gramajo Morales (see chapter 9), who was Defense Minister during the armed forces' 1989 abduction of Sister Dianna Ortiz, an American nun. She was burned with cigarettes, raped repeatedly, and lowered into a pit full of corpses. Typically, torturers exult in demonstrating the power they hold over their victims—one of them put a large knife or machete into Ortiz's hand, put his own hands on top of hers, and forced her to stab another female prisoner. Ortiz thinks she may have killed the woman. A fair- skinned man, whom the others referred to as "Alejandro", and as their 'boss", seemed to be in charge, she said. He spoke Spanish with an American accent and cursed in English. Later, Ortiz adds,
when this man realized she was American, he ordered the torture stopped. Clearly, if his motivation had been humanitarian, and not simply trying to avoid a possible political flap, he would have stopped it regardless of her nationality.23 In 1996, in the United States, Ortiz received a number of documents from the State Department in response to a Freedom Of Information Act request. Only one, dated 1990, contained a significant reference to Alejandro. It read as follows: VERY IMPORTANT: We need to close the loop on the issue of the "North American" named by Ortiz as being involved in the case...The EMBASSY IS VERY SENSITIVE ON THIS ISSUE, but it is an issue we will have to respond to publicly ...24 The next two pages were completely redacted.
El Salvador During the counter-insurgency period of the 1980s, there was widespread torture practiced by the various Salvadoran security forces, all of whom had close working relations with the CIA and/or the US military. In January 1982, the New York Times published an interview with a deserter from the Salvadoran Army who described a class where severe methods of torture were demonstrated on teenage prisoners. He stated that eight US military advisers, apparently Green Berets, were present. Watching "will make you feel more like a man," a Salvadoran offcer apprised the army recruits, adding that they should "not feel pity of anyone" but only "hate for those who are enemies of our country. Another Salvadoran, a former member Of the National Guard, later testified in a 1986 British television documentary: "l belonged to a squad of twelve. We devoted ourselves to torture, and to finding people whom we were told were guerrillas. I was trained in Panama for nine months by the [unintelligible] of the
United States for anti-guerrilla warfare. Pan of the time we were instructed about torture. "26 Honduras During the 1980s, the CIA gave indispensable support to the infamous Battalion 316, which kidnapped, tortured and killed hundreds of citizens, using shock and suffocation devices for interrogation, amongst other techniques. The CIA supplied torture equipment, torture manuals, and in both Honduras and the US, taught battalion members methods of psychological and physical torture. On at least one occasion, a CIA omcer took part in interrogating a torture victim. The Agency also funded Argentine counter-insurgency experts to provide further training for the Hondurans. At the time, Argentina was famous for its
their contract employees, and the CIA against detainees in one or another edifice of the sprawling global prison complex maintained by the United States in occupied Iraq, occupied Afghanistan, and occupied Cuba; the same, and probably worse (because more hidden), has taken place daily in other secret CIA prisons around the world. The details are derived from major news organizations, the International Red Cross, human-rights organizations, and US Army reports which made it to the open after photos of abuses appeared in the American media.29 For the great majority of these acts, multiple similar instances have been reported. It should be noted that the US State Department's annual human-rights reports about the rest of the world routinely denounce some of these acts, such as sleep deprivation. Standing or kneeling or forced into contorted, painful positions for hours...in leg shackles and handcuffs with eyes, ears, and mouths covered and wearing mittens in tropical heat... stripping detainees naked, leading them around with a dog leash...depriving them of sleep, subjecting them to a 24-hour bombardment ofbright lights or blaring noise, hooding them, exposing them to extremes of heat or cold...death in custody with bag over his head, hands tied behind back.. Guards staged races of detainees in short leg shackles, violently punishing them if they fell...withholding painkillers and other medications from the injured...sensory deprivation...male detainees made to wear female underwear..."water boarding", in which a prisoner is strapped to an inclined board, head down, towel over his face, water poured on the towel to simulate drowning... made to lie naked on a sheet of ice... Fake blood smeared on Muslim men before they intended to pray, told that it was menstrual blood...one female soldier sat on his lap, another rubbed her breasts against his back and massaged
pray, told that it was menstrual blood...one female soldier sat on his lap, another rubbed her breasts against his back and massaged his chest and a third squatted near his crotch. He head-butted the Torture 73 woman behind him, knocking her off him. All three ran out and a team of soldiers stormed in and beat him... kicked by female offcers... The Iraqi general "was put headfirst into a sleeping bag, wrapped with electrical cord and knocked down before the soldiers
The Iraqi general "was put headfirst into a sleeping bag, wrapped with electrical cord and knocked down before the soldiers sat and stood on him. The cause of death was determined to be suffocation. " Chained to the ceiling, shackled so tightly that the blood flow stops...shackled to the floor in fetal positions for more than 24 hours at a time, left without food and water, and allowed to defecate on themselves, a detainee found almost unconscious on the floor, with a pile of hair next to him; he had apparently been literally pulling his own hair out throughout the night... Wrapping a prisoner in an Israeli flag...kept naked and hooded and kicked to keep them awake for days on end...use of unmuzzled, growling dogs to frighten, in at least one instance actually biting and severely injuring a detainee..."burn marks on their backs"...detainee left at an Iraqi hospital, comatose, with massive head trauma, bums on the bottoms of his feet caused by electrocution$ruises on his arms...at least 37 detainees have died
during interrogations... The death of two captives in Afghanistan: one from "blunt force injuries to lower extremities complicating coronary artery disease"; an autopsy showed that his legs were so damaged that amputation would have been necessary; the other captive suffered from a blood clot in the lung that was exacerbated by a "blunt force injury". Kicks to the groin and legs, shoving or slamming detainees into walls and tables, forcing water in their mouths until they could not breathe...He had his hands handcuffed behind him and was suspended by his wrists in an effort to coerce his cooperation. "His arms were so badly stretched I was surprised they didn 't pop out of their sockets."...
Female American soldier, cigarette dangling from her mouth, giving a jaunty thumbs-up sign and pointing at the genitals of a young Iraqi, naked except for a sandbag over his head, as he is forced to masturbate while being photographed and videotaped. She stands arm in arm with male soldier, both are grinning and giving the thumbs-up behind a cluster of about seven naked Iraqis, piled on top of each other in a pyramid. Punched a detainee in the chest so hard he almost went into cardiac arrest...a prisoner placed in an isolation cell with little or no clothes, no toilet or running water, no ventilation or window, for as much as three days...forcing naked male detainees to wear women's underwear...standing a naked detainee on an electrified metal drum with a sandbag on his head, wires attached to his fingers, toes, and penis to simulate electric torture.. The report by General Taguba found that between October and December of 2003 there were numerous instances of "sadistic, blatant, and wanton criminal abuses" at Abu Ghraib prison in
The report by General Taguba found that between October and December of 2003 there were numerous instances of "sadistic, blatant, and wanton criminal abuses" at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq. The report listed: breaking chemical lights and pouring the phosphoric liquid on detainees; pouring cold water on naked detainees; beating detainees with a broom handle and a chair; threatening male detainees with rape; allowing a military police guard to stitch the wound of a detainee who was injured after being slammed against the wall in his cell; sodomizing a detainee with a chemical light and perhaps a broom stick... A 14-year-old Iraqi with a broken arm being hurled to the ground and then mocked by US soldiers as the boy wept and wet himself...a male soldier having sex with a female detainee... 18 days naked alone in a cell, often with his hands and feet bound together, frequently beaten..."He locked his arm under mine and holding the back of my head he beat my head against the doors of the cells"...his hands and feet were pushed through the metal bars of the cell door and then tied together. "There was a stereo inside the cell and it Ia ed music with a sound so loud I couldn't sl
I stayed like that for 23 hours." Six weeks after his release, he says he has lost the will to live. He is too ashamed to be seen by his friends and family and has not seen or spoken to his fiancée. The wedding is off. "I was a man before, but my manhood was taken away. Since this happened to me, I consider myself dead. My life feels over." Jamadi died an hour after his arrival at Abu Ghraib in early November, 2003; he had been beaten while in CIA custody and then hung by his wrists, with his arms crossed across his back. US Army guards at the prison then packed his body in ice and posed with the corpse in mocking photographs. Iraqi prisoners were forced to crawl through broken glass and wear women's sanitary products...two drunken interrogators took a female Iraqi prisoner from her cell in the middle ofthe night and stripped her naked to the waist...an Iraqi woman in her 70s was harnessed and ridden like a donkey...detainees were pressed to denounce Islam, or force-fed pork and liquor...
to denounce Islam, or force-fed pork and liquor.. "We believe she was raped and that she was pregnant by a US guard. After her release from Abu Ghraib, I went to her house. The neighbours said her family had moved away. I believe she has been killed." Honor killings are not unusual in Islamic society. "They forced us to walk like dogs on our hands and knees.„ And we had to bark like a dog, and if we didn't do that they started hitting us hard on our face and chest with no mercy."..."Do you believe in anything?" the soldier asked. "I said to him, 'I believe in Allah.' So he said, 'But I believe in torture and I will torture you'." Taken out and tied to a post, rubber bullets were fired at them; made to kneel in the sun until they collapsed..."They tied my hands to my feet behind my back. My left hand to my right foot and my right hand to my left foot. I was lying face down and they were beating me like this"...inmates kept in wire cages with concrete floors and no protection from the elements."They actually said: 'You have no rights here'. After a while, 76 ROGUE STATE we stopped asking for human rights—we wanted animal rights."... crosses shaved into their scalp or body hair...dislocated his arms, beat his leg with a bat, crushed his nose, and put an unloaded gun in his mouth and pulled the trigger...Six Kuwaiti prisoners said they were severely beaten, given electric shocks and sodomized by US forces in Afghanistan.
A CIA offcer ordered guards to sü-ip naked an uncooperative young Afghan detainee, chain him to the concrete floor and leave him there ovemight without blankets. He was dragged around on the concrete floor, bruising and scraping his skin, before putting him in his cell. By morning he had frozen to death. The Afghan detainee had been captured in Pakistan along with a group of other Afghans. His connection to al Qaeda or the value ofhis intelligence was never established before he died. "He was probably associated with people who were associated with al Qaeda," one US govemment offcial said. No release from the stress, increased by uncertainty over whether they will ever be released...Guards telling prisoners repeatedly: "You will never go home."..."ln my cell I was shouting: 'Please come and take me. Please kill me. I am Osama bin Laden, I was in the plane that hit the World Trade Centre.' I wished for death at that time. I wanted to be dead 1,000 times. I asked my God to take my soul."...numerous suicide attempts... No famil contact. No c . Nola ers.Noa Is.
I was in the plane that hit the World Trade Centre.' I wished for death at that time. I wanted to be dead 1,000 times. I asked my God to take my soul."...numerous suicide attempts.. No family contact. No charges. No lawyers. No appeals. The brazenness with which the servicemen and women conducted themselves, snapping photographs and flashing the 'thumbs-up" sign as they abused prisoners, suggests they felt they had nothing to hide from their superiors.30 After the photos became public and a "scandal" broke out, the GIs insisted that they had been encouraged by military intelligence offcers and other higher-ranking offcers to "soften up" prisoners for interrogation purposes, to "take the gloves off', but in the end none of their superiors were indicted
and only a handful ofthe lower-ranking servicemembers were. The military judge in a court-martial of some of the servicemembers refused defense attorneys' requests to consider the role of offcers in the trial.31 Neither have any civilian offcials in the Pentagon or White House, instrumental in formulating and condoning policies on torture, faced any charges. As further indication that the American military was not terribly upset about the use of torture, two US defense contractors being sued over allegations of abuse at Abu Ghraib prison were awarded valuable new contracts by the Pentagon, despite demands from American human rights groups that they should be barred from any new government work. Three employees of the firms, CACI International and Titan, had been separately accused of abusive behavior, including rape and the use of dogs.32 President George W. Bush, 2004: "The world is better off without Saddam Hussein in power. The world is better off because he sits
President George W. Bush, 2004: "The world is better off without Saddam Hussein in power. The world is better off because he sits in a prison cell. Because we acted, torture rooms are closed, rape rooms no longer exist."33 Brian Whitman, spokesman for the US Department of Defense, 2005: "The United States treats all detainees in their custody with dignity and respect. "34 At home At the US Navy's schools in San Diego and Maine during the 1960s and 1970s, students were supposedly learning about methods of "survival, evasion, resistance and escape" which they could use if they were ever a prisoner ofwar. There was in the course something of survival in a desert, where students were forced to eat lizards, but the naval offcers and cadets were also subjected to beatings,
but the naval offcers and cadets were also subjected to beatings, jarringjudo flips, "tiger cages"—hooded and placed in a 16-cubic- 78 ROGUE STATE foot box for 22 hours with a coffee can for their excrement—and a torture device called the "water board": the subject strapped to an inclined board, head downward, a towel placed over his face, and cold water poured over the towel; he would choke, gag, retch and le he ex •en
face, and cold water poured over the towel; he would choke, gag, retch and gurgle as he experienced the sensation of drowning. A former student, Navy pilot Lt. Wendell Richard Young, claimed that his back was broken during the course and that students were tortured into spitting, urinating and defecating on the American flag, masturbating before guards, and, on one occasion, engaging in sex with an instructor.35 In 1992, a civilian oversight board revealed that over a 13-year period (1973-1986), Chicago police offcers and commanders engaged in "systematic" torture and abuse of suspects, including electric shock to penises, testicles and other areas; beatings, suffocation (plastic bags secured over the heads, stopping the flow of oxygen; some subjects passed out, and when they recovered, the bag was placed over their head again); guns stuck in prisoners' mouths and triggers pulled; prisoners hung from hooks by handcuffs attached to their wrists and beaten on the bottoms of
mouths and triggers pulled; prisoners hung from hooks by handcuffs attached to their wrists and beaten on the bottoms of their feet and on their testicles; as well as much psychological torture. Some were released after being tortured and were never charged. More than 40 cases were collected. According to one of their attorneys, "All of the victims were black or Latino, so far as we've seen, and the people who were doing the torturing were white omcers."36 A Human Rights Watch investigation in 1995 of more than 20 US prisons and jails in New York, California, Florida and Tennessee, and a close look at prison litigation for a ten-year period, showed "extensive abuses ofthe U .N. 's minimum standards forthe treatment of prisoners...amounting to torture"...a handcuffed prisoner forced into a tub of 145-degree water...prisoners dying after receiving
repeated jolts of electricity from stun guns or stun belts (50,000 volt shock for 8 seconds)...prisoners held in outdoor cages, rain or shine...prisoners held in total isolation from other human beings for long periods of time with sensory deprivation ...37 Amnesty International has released reports such as "Torture, Ill Treatment and Excessive Force by Police in Los Angeles, California" (1992), and "Police Brutality and Excessive Force in the New York City Police Department" (1996), as well as later reports dealing with Chicago and other cities. Amnesty states that US police forces have been guilty of "violating international human rights standards through a pattern of unchecked excessive force amounting to torture or other cruel, inhuman and degrading treatrnent".38 Amnesty has also published "The Pain Merchants" (2003), which deals with the practice of American companies exporting millions of dollars worth of equipment known to be used for torture, such as electro-shock devices, leg-irons, shackles and
millions of dollars worth of equipment known to be used for torture, such as electro-shock devices, leg-irons, shackles, and restraints. Sales have been made to a dozen countries where the US State Department says the use of torture is Lest any of the above give the impression that the United States government is not disturbed by the practice of torture, it should be pointed out that Congress passed a bill in 1996 allowing, for the first time, an American citizen to sue a foreign government in a US court for having been tortured in that foreign country. There was, however, one small limitation imposed. The only countries that can be sued under this law are Washington's offcially- designated enemies (ODE), those categorized as "state sponsors of terrorism" .39 For other countries, the situation may be like the case in the early 1990s of Scott Nelson, an American who sued Saudi Arabia in a US court for torture. A Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that he
