As of Sunday, the official line on the destruction of the CIA’s torture tapes was that the agency had been warned to preserve the videos. The White House, in particular, was at least tacitly aware of the videos’ existence, and the White House counsel’s office urged the CIA to keep them intact.
So, who exactly was involved in identifying incriminating evidence and giving the order to destroy it? The NYT reports today that CIA lawyers “gave written approval in advance” of the 2005 video destruction.
The former intelligence official acknowledged that there had been nearly two years of debate among government agencies about what to do with the tapes, and that lawyers within the White House and the Justice Department had in 2003 advised against a plan to destroy them. But the official said that C.I.A. officials had continued to press the White House for a firm decision, and that the C.I.A. was never given a direct order not to destroy the tapes.
“They never told us, ‘Hell, no,'” he said. “If somebody had said, ‘You cannot destroy them,’ we would not have destroyed them.”
The former official spoke on condition of anonymity because there is a continuing Justice Department inquiry into the matter. He said he was sympathetic to Jose A. Rodriguez Jr., the former chief of the clandestine branch, who has been described by intelligence officials as having authorized the destruction of the tapes. The former official said he was concerned that Mr. Rodriguez was being unfairly singled out for blame in the destruction of the tapes.
That seems like a safe bet. Kevin Drum summarized just how weak the latest version of events from the Bush administration really is: “The White House had been in the loop for two years. The CIA had received letters from both the Justice Department and congressional leaders arguing that the tapes shouldn’t be destroyed. The CIA’s top lawyer had been involved for the entire time. And yet we’re supposed to believe that, in 2005, a mid-ranking agency lawyer suddenly decided the tapes could be destroyed and the head of the clandestine branch then gave the order to do so without anyone else being involved? Really? Does anyone actually believe this story?”
No, not if they’re paying attention they won’t. Oliver Willis’ observation was quite apt: “The #1 Rule for the Bush Administration: If they say something, don’t believe them.”
Other headlines from the torture-tape controversy:
* The WaPo reports that top CIA officials are scheduled to appear today “before a closed congressional hearing to account for the decision to destroy recordings of the interrogations of Abu Zubaida and another senior captive, Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri.”
* Also yesterday, as expected, Reps. Silvestre Reyes (D-Tex.) and Pete Hoekstra (R-Mich.), the two top members of the House Intelligence Committee, announced that their panel is “launching its own investigation into the tapes’ destruction.”
* CIA Director Michael Hayden has emphasized in recent days that the House Intelligence Committee has been “properly notified” of the tapes and their destruction. Reyes and Hoekstra said in a statement that Hayden’s claim “does not appear to be true.”
* The NYT report added, “The C.I.A. has said that the two interrogations shown in the videotapes occurred in 2002, and that the taping of interrogations stopped that year. On Monday, however, a lawyer representing a former prisoner who said he was held by the C.I.A. said the prisoner saw cameras in interrogation rooms after 2002.”
* The LAT considers in some detail whether the CIA likely obstructed justice. The paper concludes that “such questions are a close call.”
* And while the White House’s role seems to be getting bigger, we apparently won’t be getting any additional information from press briefings.
Stay tuned.