Tear Down a Wall, and Build a New One: McCain’s Torture Amendment
One of the things that allowed Al Qaida to get away with the attacks on September 11, 2001 according to Attorney General John Ashcroft was the self-imposed wall between foreign and domestic intelligence.
”In 1995, the Justice Department embraced flawed legal reasoning, imposing a series of restrictions on the FBI that went beyond what the law required,” he said. ”The 1995 Guidelines and the procedures developed around them imposed draconian barriers to communications between the law enforcement and intelligence communities. The wall left intelligence agents afraid to talk with criminal prosecutors or agents. In 1995, the Justice Department designed a system destined to fail.” (Source: GOP USA by Linda Chavez)
Now Senator John McCain wants to build a new one. While it is hard to imagine what Senator McCain went through while held captive in the Hanoi Hilton, it is not hard understand that the experience drives his desire to pass this bill. But hind sight is 20-20.
The U.S. House delivered a setback to the Bush administration by voting to keep an amendment barring cruel and inhumane treatment of suspected terrorists in U.S. custody as part of a defense spending measure.
By a 308-122 vote the House last night instructed negotiators to keep the amendment in the final version of a $440 billion fiscal 2006 spending measure when they resolve differences between the House and Senate versions of the legislation. (Source: Dec. 15 (Bloomberg)
The idea that we need a bill to prevent torture is to infer we are systematically engaging in it. Where we have done so the perpetrators have been dealt with legally. What this well intentioned legislation does is erase the gray areas where our operatives have latitude to use coercive techniques to gain information, information that may well prevent the next 911 attack.
This is a typically American idea that sounds good on the surface but like the wall built before it likely has unintended consequences. Before this is passed it should be viewed through the same glasses the intelligence wall is viewed through now. Rarely do we have an opportunity for 20-20 foresight such as this one.
Cross-posted at SactoDan BLOG.