CIA Admits That Info About Torture Briefings For Dems May Not Be Accurate
As I noted below, newly released documents appear to show that according to the CIA, officials briefed Nancy Pelosi and other Democrats back in 2002 about the use of torture techniques on terror suspects.
But a letter that accompanied these documents, written by the head of the CIA, appears to clearly concede that the information in the docs about who was briefed and when may not be accurate or reliable.
Republicans are pointing to the documents — which were produced by the CIA and the Director of National Intelligence, and sent to select members of Congress — to charge that Pelosi and other Dems have been lying about what they knew about waterboarding and when.
But the docs were accompanied by a letter from CIA chief Leon Panetta that appears to suggest the CIA can’t promise that the info is right. The letter was sent along with the documents to GOP Rep Pete Hoekstra, a leading critic of Dems on torture, and Dem Rep Silvestre Reyes, the chairman of the intelligence committee.
I’ve obtained the letter, and a PDF is right here. This is the key part (click to enlarge):
Emphasis mine. “MFR” apparently refers to “memorandum for the record.”
As you can see, this letter says that the info about briefings is taken from notes based on the “best recollections” of those who were there, adding:
In the end, you and the Committee will have to determine whether this information is an accurate summary of what actually happened.
That would appear to be a concession that the CIA isn’t willing to vouch for the accuracy of the info about the briefings in the docs, and that only further inquiry will produce a reliable recounting of what happened.
To be clear, it’s perfectly possible that the info about what Dems were told is right. But not even the CIA is willing to promise this right now. So it’s unclear how much stock to place in the documents at this point.
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Update: I’ve just learned that this same letter was also sent to GOP Rep Pete Hoekstra, a leading proponent of the claim that Dems knew the full scope of the torture program early on. I’ve edited the above to reflect this.
I’ve obtained the letter to Hoekstra, which you can read right here. What this means is that the Republican who has lodged the highest-profile attacks on Dems over what they knew and when has been directly informed by the CIA that the info on the briefings may not be reliable.
Bonus Update: Marcy Wheeler nails exactly why this is important.
Special Update For Waterboarding Obsessives: Here’s the key question in a nutshell.
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So we are back at the She said, They said stage, or nowhere.. It just depends on who you believe. I would have to say right now I am leaning toward Nancy Pelosi… not because I think she is always reliable, but just because I think there are enough holdovers in the CIA who are in a CYA mode and that is exactly what this is looking like to me.. CYA.. If they had proof why didn’t this come out in February when she appeared on Rachel Maddow’s show and made the statement she did.
Well we DO know that Jane Harman sent a recently declassified letter to the CIA inquiring about the EITs. One more thing, Zubaydah was waterboarded 83 times in August. I don’t know the nature of these briefings but if he gave up vital information during that time would it have been presented at the briefing normally? And if so why wasn’t it this time? Also the first time the intelligence report specifically notes a mention of waterboarding is on Feb of 03. Why isn’t there notation for the previous briefings?
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Check out the July 15 2004 briefing where actionable intelligence from EITs were discussed. Isn’t that around the same time Cheney put his CYA dossier together. Could that same document have been used in that briefing? Is that what Cheney is trying to get declassified? I just looked and the dates add up because the document he wants is from July 13 2004
SG, Agreed, I think it’s clear that the dates don’t match up. trying to dig in on this too.
I think Congressman Rockefeller may know exactly what is in those documents that Cheney wants declassified due to that briefing in 2004. Has he weighed in at all on the efficacy of waterboarding?
Greg: between you and Emptywheel you have raised some key issues. But there are a group of Hoekstras who will never rely on evidence. The sad thing is that lying and cya-ing is now commonplace in our government. People don’t want to be bothered by evidence. But keep up the good work. I saw Peggy Noonan droning on about investigative journalism on Morning Joe where Arianna Huffington was surprisingly quiescent (almost passive). I have seen examples of ABC’s investigative journalism: reminds me of all thunder and no lightning.
Here is the thing about the report. You have to contrast what they say members of Congress were briefed on early on with what they say they were briefed on later. Remember that this report was formulated relatively recently so it doesn’t really make any sense that in some notations they spell out all of the techniques that were described during the meetings but in others they just use the EIT notation. That implies that either the people putting together the report couldn’t ascertain which EITs were explained in those previous meetings, OR they made a conscious decision not to note what WAS mentioned because then they would have to account for what was NOT.
You know what all this back and forth and accusations and counter-accusations are telling me? That the CIA, Cheney and everyone else involved KNEW and still KNOW that what they were doing was illegal.
Otherwise they would have briefed the Speaker of the House. They didn’t because they KNEW.
(ps – I’m getting the “you are posting too quickly” message regularly, Greg, the last couple days. Even when it’s a first comment for me.)
SG hits this one on the head. Perfectly.
Greg
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I think you might have the wrong link up for the Marcy Wheeler post on why the Hoekstra letter is important. Did you mean to link to this one?
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http://emptywheel.firedoglake.com/2009/05/07/cia-lying-to-abc-about-torture-again-abc-reporting-it-uncritically-again/
Thanks for actually reading the documents the CIA gave ABC, because it is obvious they did not.
I don’t think this says quite what you think it says. The section you highlight says that they cannot at this time verify that the MFRs and recollections of individuals regarding the meetings are accurate. It does not say that the information provided to Pelosi et al in the meetings was inaccurate or did not reflect the actual torture policies at the time. Do you see the difference? The paragraph is saying “we’re not entirely sure what happened at the meeting, but this is our best understanding.” You’re taking that to mean, “We, the CIA, may have misrepresented the torture program to Nancy Pelosi.” There is a huge difference here.
Wouldn’t it be great if we could just rely on everyone of our elected and appointed officials to tell us the truth. In the end, with something this serious, we should find out who is lying. Those who are, should be fired immediately. It is much easier for me to believe Pelosi at this point. Afterall, the Bushies have lied to me over and over for 8 years. Still, I want to know the truth.
It’s all about that sacred plausible deniability, isn’t it, Greg? You don’t want to prove that she didn’t know about it, your job is to make sure there’s just the slightest possibility that it might not be true, therefore giving Madam Speaker some thin ice from which to issue a shrill denial.
You are pathetic.
Why all the excitement over a boilerplate disclaimer? Everything you ever have and will read is based on “best recollections.” Heck, the fact that George Bush was once president is only my best recollection. It may not be true at all.
of course it’s a best recollection issue…as is any report executed after the fact…the issue will be whether or not the MFRs were submitted contemporaneously…if a briefer writes a report 2 hours after a briefing, has notes from what the briefing was to cover, and has attendees confirming that the subject matter intended to cover actually was, I’m taking that over the lone dissent, developed 6 years later. If Pelosi has contemporaneous notes from the briefings, let’s see them. Pelosi briefed one month after the EIT began on Zubaydah, and she was briefed only on hypotheticals? To ask is to answer…
They hyped up the accusation.
Now watch them downplay the retraction, if there is any retraction at all.
It doesn’t matter though, because the damage they wanted to inflict on the Democrats has already been done. Millions of people now incorrectly believe the Democrats are just as guilty as the Weepublicans when it comes to torture.
Of course in reality, the Democratic mole hill of occasional indiscretion or stupidity simply does not equate with the Weepublican mountain of habitual criminality and purposeful malfeasance, again.
Of course, WaPooPravda, the owner of this website is also guilty of parroting the Neocon-Fascist propaganda.
No wonder they are going bankrupt like the rest of the MSM.
Long live the internet and credible sources of the news:
Buzzflash.com
Crooksandliars.com
Mediamatters.org
Consortiumnews.com
Smirkingchimp.com
…. the head of the CIA… That’d be Panetta.. right? What a surprise that he’s muddying the waters!!
Actually, I think hearings would be a good thing. First, CIA officials would have to testify under oath, which would be quite interesting. Second, the GOP can hardly call for hearings on Pelosi without acknowledging that hearings on Bush et al are also justified. Finally, legislators have no culpability here. They were not involved in decision making, or even in an “advice and consent” capacity. They were just *briefed* and then forbidden from speaking out publicly or even discussing with their colleagues. Hoekstra is playing a very dangerous card here, and the Dems could simply say, OK, hearings all around. You asked for it.
Are you kidding me? Seriously. Are you joking?
Nancy Pelosi is incapable of telling the truth. The evidence is overwhelming.
These after the fact “investigations” are a waste of time of money. We won’t know anymoe than we do now, and no one ever does jail time except a low level flunky.
Personally, I wouldn’t care if they hooked every member of Congress up to a lie detector and find out what they knew or didn’t know about a host of issues. Indeed, it would’t bother me if we incarcerated every single member of Congress (or for that matter, if we shot them all.)
When will we learn that this whole Democrat/Republican power struggle always ends up being a net loser for this country irrespective of who is in power at the moment?
It’s moronic to think that anyone (besides the morons doing the interrogation), being informed they had water-boarded a suspect “EIGHTY-THREE” times, would consent.
Sad.
Best Regards
Lobato1c
Pelosi is a Liar, and this country would be better off if she quit. She wont. These pandering political hacks all need term limits! Royalty is what 2 of 3 branches of government ooze of. Term Limits Period. Most controversy/ coruption involves senate/congress men/women beyond their second term. Wake up America. The King of england was royalty. we kicked his butt back to Europe. USA dont need career political hacks.
Knothead! Let’s see, several CIA staffers make contemporaneous notes about what was said in a meeting but they are not to be trusted over what a career politician in deep deep trouble says. Hmmmm . . . . Plenty of doubt raising about CIA and repubs: where is the smell test and fair questioning of Pelosi? This is not he said she said – it’s Panetta making a generous small concession to a former colleague in the House – sho probably begged on her knees.
Besides, anyone stupid enough to challenge the CIA and at the same time accuse them of felonies (misleading Congress, lying under oath etc.) should go home to SF where she belongs.
HI looks very interesting! bookmarked your blog. john brightman
# Kevin Schmidt | May 8th, 2009 at 04:32 pm
Of course, WaPooPravda, the owner of this website is also guilty of parroting the Neocon-Fascist propaganda.
No wonder they are going bankrupt like the rest of the MSM.
Long live the internet and credible sources of the news:
Buzzflash.com
Crooksandliars.com
Mediamatters.org
Consortiumnews.com
Smirkingchimp.com
Why leave out that Murdoch had to write down 8.4 billion last quarter and none of MURDOCHS papers or periodicals are profitable.
I love how a paper that allows a divergent point of view is biased,as long as a paper allows hate of democrats and love of republicans,well thats fair and balanced.
Who is programed and has the “talking points”?
Extremist talking points make it through the extremist system in a day,sometimes hours,never does a political opinion go anywhere in mainstream media.
Thats ok though,you guys and your weirdo **** and best bud limbaugh are the best weapons mainstream America has.
iam concurrent this article