News that the CIA destroyed 92 interrogation tapes should hardly prove surprising to anyone who’s paid even an iota of attention to what the Bush-Cheney administration did. While we’re left to ponder why the tapes were destroyed if, as the Bush Administration claimed, no torture was engaged in, let us at least now follow the path of justice wherever it leads:
The details of CIA interrogations, and the existence of tapes documenting those sessions, have become the subject of long fights in a number of different court cases. In the trial of Sept. 11 conspirator Zacarias Moussaoui, prosecutors initially claimed no such recordings existed, then acknowledged after the trial was over that two videotapes and one audiotape had been made.
The Dassin letter, dated March 2 to Judge Alvin Hellerstein, says the CIA is now gathering more details for the lawsuit, including a list of the destroyed records, any secondary accounts that describe the destroyed contents, and the identities of those who may have viewed or possessed the recordings before they were destroyed.
But the lawyers also note that some of that information may be classified, such as the names of CIA personnel that viewed the tapes.
In that vein, I say name ALL CIA personnel involved declassifying individuals as necessary and get the truth out there. Then, as appropriate, send people to jail for crimes against humanity. And let’s not get wobbly if this goes all the way up the governmental ladder.