http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/31176348


CIA urges judge to keep detainee papers secret
Panetta says releasing documents would damage national security




Bin Laden emerges from the shadows



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updated 5:10 p.m. PT, Mon., June 8, 2009

WASHINGTON - CIA Director Leon Panetta told a federal judge Monday that releasing documents about the agency's terror interrogations would gravely damage national security.

Panetta sent a 24-page missive to New York federal judge Alvin Hellerstein, arguing that release of agency cables describing tough interrogation methods used on al-Qaida suspects would tell the enemy far too much about U.S. counterterrorism work.

The CIA director filed the papers in a lawsuit brought by the American Civil Liberties Union. The suit has already led to the unveiling of Bush administration legal memos authorizing harsh methods — among them waterboarding, a type of simulated drowning, and slamming suspects into walls — and a fight over releasing long-secret photos of abused detainees.
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"I have determined that the disclosure of intelligence about al-Qaida reasonably could be expected to result in exceptionally grave damage to the national security by informing our enemies of what we knew about them, and when, and in some instances, how we obtained the intelligence," Panetta wrote.

Panetta acknowledges in the court papers that the CIA destroyed 92 videotapes of detainee interrogations that took place in 2002. Officials have previously said that a dozen of those tapes showed the so-called "enhanced interrogation techniques," which critics call torture. The destruction of the videotapes has spurred a criminal investigation into why they were destroyed.

The tapes — and the interrogations — are also an issue in the ACLU's lawsuit.

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The CIA is fighting efforts to force release of the documents, including dozens of agency cables. The cables, Panetta said, describe in detail the methods used on terror suspects, the information gleaned from them, and what U.S. officials still did not know at the time the suspects were being questioned.

I don't think the Gitmo papers are for public eyes, never before has there been such a push for confidential papers and memos , what could be accomplished by the release but just what the article stated . Endangering the security of the US. They need to get over this and move on to bigger fish such as the economy and health care.
If Obama thinks he can put 600,000 people back to work by the summer he better get to steppin, 300,000+ people lost jobs in May adding to the 14.1 million already out of work . It seems while he has concerned himself with banks and auto manufactures he is letting down the very ones he promised to help as soon as he got into office. The recession is far from over , we have a long road ahead. If the health care isn't written to protect the middle class we will all pay thru the nose , not just the higher income bracket. And what is the deal with gas, 43 straight days of increases, something isn't right. Is the administration trying to break down the middle class and the lower class haven't got a chance. His $250.00 hand out again doesn't seem to be stimulating anything. There has to be a better way than what is happening now.

My Words>> if i recollect Goss was the CIA Director at he time they were suppose to have told congress about waterboarding..umm and then 90+ tapes destroyed?

With ssc/s post i agree, other things are important, jobs,economy,Health insurance

The old trash still popping up has to be dealt with. My opinion

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http://www.newsweek.com/id/78065


Tracking a Paper Trail

A memo from a top intelligence official warned the CIA not to destroy its interrogation tapes
Tim Sloan / AFP-Getty Images
John Negroponte testifies before Congress in September
By Michael Isikoff and Mark Hosenball | NEWSWEEK
From the magazine issue dated Dec 24, 2007


In the summer of 2005, then CIA director Porter Goss met with then national intelligence director John Negroponte to discuss a highly sensitive matter: what to do about the existence of videotapes documenting the use of controversial interrogation methods, apparently includ­ing waterboarding, on two key Al Qaeda suspects. The tapes were eventually de­stroyed, and congressional investigators are now trying to piece together an extensive paper trail documenting how and why it happened.

One crucial document they'll surely want to examine: a memo written after the meeting between Goss and Negroponte, which records that Negroponte strongly advised against destroying the tapes, according to two people close to the investigation, who asked for anonymity when discussing a sensitive matter. The memo is so far the only known documentation that a senior intel official warned that the tapes should not be destroyed. Spokespeople for the CIA and the intel czar's office declined to comment, citing ongoing investigations.

Current and former U.S. officials familiar with the history of the tapes, who also asked for anonymity, told newsweek that Jose Rodriguez Jr., then chief of the CIA's espionage branch, the National Clandes­tine Service, decided on his own authority in late 2005 to destroy the tapes in order to protect the identity of under­cover CIA officers. The officials said that Rodriguez and his close aides had been asking top agency managers for more than two years about what to do with the tapes, but felt they never got a straight answer.

The tapes were kept—and destroyed—at a secret location overseas. It is unknown whether Rodriguez knew about Negroponte's position. Goss believed he had an "un­derstanding" with Clandestine Services that the tapes were to be preserved and was dis­mayed to learn that they had been destroyed, according to a source familiar with his views.

The fate of the congression­al inquiries remains unclear. On Friday, the Justice Department asked the House intel panel to back off its request for documents and testimony on the grounds that it might in­terfere with its own probe. In addition, prominent criminal defense lawyer Robert Bennett confirmed that he is representing Rodriguez. Bennett told NEWSWEEK that his client had been "a dedicated and loy­al public servant for 31 years" and "has done nothing wrong." But he warned that Rodriguez may refuse to cooperate with investigators if he concludes that the probes are a "witch hunt." "I don't want him to become a scapegoat."

SSC wrote:I don't think the Gitmo papers are for public eyes, never before has there been such a push for confidential papers and memos , what could be accomplished by the release but just what the article stated . Endangering the security of the US. They need to get over this and move on to bigger fish such as the economy and health care.
If Obama thinks he can put 600,000 people back to work by the summer he better get to steppin, 300,000+ people lost jobs in May adding to the 14.1 million already out of work . It seems while he has concerned himself with banks and auto manufactures he is letting down the very ones he promised to help as soon as he got into office. The recession is far from over , we have a long road ahead. If the health care isn't written to protect the middle class we will all pay thru the nose , not just the higher income bracket. And what is the deal with gas, 43 straight days of increases, something isn't right. Is the administration trying to break down the middle class and the lower class haven't got a chance. His $250.00 hand out again doesn't seem to be stimulating anything. There has to be a better way than what is happening now.

i agree, the cia thing is old news, and needs to be moved own from, all this has been hashed to death, obama has said he has other problems he works on, move on, same thing said over and over is getting old, im so tired of the word waterboarding its been posted here to many time already, and we all know about the release of document, and the tapes, its time to move on and see what happens with current things,

rosco 357 wrote: im so tired of the word waterboarding its been posted here to many time already, and we all know about the release of document, and the tapes, its time to move on and see what happens with current things,

Agreed. Waterboarding "happened", period. Right or wrong? That's the debate with most people, I don't, and never will think it was right or do I condone it, torture is an unacceptable alternative. We don't do that as a nation if we consider ourselves right in our issues.. . But that's the debate many people would argue, but it basically for me comes down to morals, what you think is right and what you think is wrong, there is no middle ground when it comes to issues like that for me, what you think should happen under those stressful circumstances is the issue. I personally would not allow it under my administration, but that's just me, I'm not about to run for president or would I ever...lol

I agree, so I will move on, :)