Ackerman writes: "The man at the center of the US Senate's landmark
investigation of the CIA torture program has gone public for the first time
about an experience that led to the CIA spying on him as part of what he
calls a 'failed coverup.'"
CIA headquarters in Langley, Virginia. (photo: Guardian UK)
Senate Investigator Breaks Silence About CIA's 'Failed Coverup' of Torture
Report
By Spencer Ackerman, Guardian UK
10 September 16
Daniel Jones, the man at the center of landmark Senate report, goes public
for the first time about the investigation that led to the CIA spying on him
The man at the center of the US Senate's landmark investigation of the CIA
torture program has gone public for the first time about an experience that
led to the CIA spying on him as part of what he calls a "failed coverup".
For six years, Daniel Jones was the chief investigator for the Senate
intelligence committee's inquiry into CIA detentions and interrogations
carried out in the post-9/11 Bush era. Jones and his team turned 6.3m pages
of internal CIA documents into a scathing study which concluded that torture
was ineffective and that the CIA had lied about it to two presidents,
Congress and the US public.
But before Jones's investigation was released in December 2014, the CIA
searched through Senate files on a shared, firewalled network that had been
set up by the agency for Jones and his team to securely receive classified
documents.
The CIA accessed Jones's work and even reconstructed his emails, sparking an
unprecedented clash between the agency and its legislative overseers on
Capitol Hill.
Jones has broken his silence in an extensive series of interviews with the
Guardian, expressing dissatisfaction with what he called a lack of
accountability for torture at the CIA. He also says the agency, under the
leadership of John Brennan was abetted in trying to silence criticism by
Barack Obama, the president who banned torture as one of the first acts of
his tenure.
"People who played a significant role in this program, who are in the
report, continue to play significant roles in sensitive programs at the
agency," said Jones, a former FBI counter-terrorism analyst.
"To me, it's a huge lost opportunity. Here's an administration that came in
and did all the right things within a few days, shutting down the program .
We were just never given a fair airing. No one from the White House would be
briefed by us. They were briefed by the CIA."
Guardian US has re-investigated the six-year saga of the torture inquiry,
whose work was eventually published in a 525-page summary. The examination
of events between 2008 and 2014 relies upon interviews with people involved
and declassified documents concerning both the use of torture and the
network breach, which committee member Senator Ron Wyden flatly calls
"spying on our staff".
The Guardian's findings, to be published in three installments starting
today, include:
. How Jones was so afraid the CIA would destroy important evidence, that he
covertly removed from a CIA location a classified document, later described
as a "smoking gun" by a senator on the committee ;
. A decision that left the investigation of extradjudicial transfers of
terror suspects into the hands of foreign intelligence services practically
lost to history;
. One of Obama's most senior aides insisted the Senate obscure a finding
that some CIA interrogators who operated at black sites around the world
after 9/11 had been accused of domestic abuse and even sexual assault;
. Senators were prepared to suppress the report amid national security
concerns, until intelligence chief James Clapper provided the committee with
a "farce" of an analysis predicting that its publication would lead to chaos
and violence around the world.
Asked about the Senate-CIA spying episode, agency spokesman Ryan Trapani
said: "CIA considered this a very serious matter and believed it was
important to get to the bottom of what happened."
"What the president has made abundantly clear is that some of the techniques
described in the committee's report were inconsistent with our values as a
nation, which is why one of his first acts in office was to sign an
executive order that brought an end to the program and prohibited the use of
harsh interrogation techniques," said Ned Price, a spokesman for the
National Security Council.
The new revelations about torture and the Senate inquiry come at a time when
the Republican nominee for president, Donald Trump, has pledged to require
the CIA to perform "a hell of a lot worse than waterboarding" on terrorism
suspects.
As the Obama administration's various cabinet agencies have not even opened
the full 6,700-page classified version of the report, critics fear that a
government unwilling to grapple with the torture program will at some point
return to it.
"The deeper, more endemic problem lies in a CIA, assisted by a White House,
that continues to try to cover up the truth. I worry that an agency that has
yet to acknowledge these mistakes could continue to make them under a new
administration," said Mark Udall, a former Democratic senator on the
committee.
Jones, now a consultant in Washington for the Daschle Group and his own Penn
Quarter Group, said that one of the report's shocking findings was that the
CIA misled not just George W Bush on torture, but also Obama.
"This is John Brennan's CIA, Obama's CIA," he said. "They're providing
inaccurate information to the president of the United States in the present
day."
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CIA headquarters in Langley, Virginia. (photo: Guardian UK)
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/sep/09/dan-jones-cia-torture-cover-
report-senatehttps://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/sep/09/dan-jones-cia-t
orture-cover-report-senate
Senate Investigator Breaks Silence About CIA's 'Failed Coverup' of Torture
Report
By Spencer Ackerman, Guardian UK
10 September 16
Daniel Jones, the man at the center of landmark Senate report, goes public
for the first time about the investigation that led to the CIA spying on him
he man at the center of the US Senate's landmark investigation of the CIA
torture program has gone public for the first time about an experience that
led to the CIA spying on him as part of what he calls a "failed coverup".
For six years, Daniel Jones was the chief investigator for the Senate
intelligence committee's inquiry into CIA detentions and interrogations
carried out in the post-9/11 Bush era. Jones and his team turned 6.3m pages
of internal CIA documents into a scathing study which concluded that torture
was ineffective and that the CIA had lied about it to two presidents,
Congress and the US public.
But before Jones's investigation was released in December 2014, the CIA
searched through Senate files on a shared, firewalled network that had been
set up by the agency for Jones and his team to securely receive classified
documents.
The CIA accessed Jones's work and even reconstructed his emails, sparking an
unprecedented clash between the agency and its legislative overseers on
Capitol Hill.
Jones has broken his silence in an extensive series of interviews with the
Guardian, expressing dissatisfaction with what he called a lack of
accountability for torture at the CIA. He also says the agency, under the
leadership of John Brennan was abetted in trying to silence criticism by
Barack Obama, the president who banned torture as one of the first acts of
his tenure.
"People who played a significant role in this program, who are in the
report, continue to play significant roles in sensitive programs at the
agency," said Jones, a former FBI counter-terrorism analyst.
"To me, it's a huge lost opportunity. Here's an administration that came in
and did all the right things within a few days, shutting down the program .
We were just never given a fair airing. No one from the White House would be
briefed by us. They were briefed by the CIA."
Guardian US has re-investigated the six-year saga of the torture inquiry,
whose work was eventually published in a 525-page summary. The examination
of events between 2008 and 2014 relies upon interviews with people involved
and declassified documents concerning both the use of torture and the
network breach, which committee member Senator Ron Wyden flatly calls
"spying on our staff".
The Guardian's findings, to be published in three installments starting
today, include:
. How Jones was so afraid the CIA would destroy important evidence, that he
covertly removed from a CIA location a classified document, later described
as a "smoking gun" by a senator on the committee ;
. A decision that left the investigation of extradjudicial transfers of
terror suspects into the hands of foreign intelligence services practically
lost to history;
. One of Obama's most senior aides insisted the Senate obscure a finding
that some CIA interrogators who operated at black sites around the world
after 9/11 had been accused of domestic abuse and even sexual assault;
. Senators were prepared to suppress the report amid national security
concerns, until intelligence chief James Clapper provided the committee with
a "farce" of an analysis predicting that its publication would lead to chaos
and violence around the world.
Asked about the Senate-CIA spying episode, agency spokesman Ryan Trapani
said: "CIA considered this a very serious matter and believed it was
important to get to the bottom of what happened."
"What the president has made abundantly clear is that some of the techniques
described in the committee's report were inconsistent with our values as a
nation, which is why one of his first acts in office was to sign an
executive order that brought an end to the program and prohibited the use of
harsh interrogation techniques," said Ned Price, a spokesman for the
National Security Council.
The new revelations about torture and the Senate inquiry come at a time when
the Republican nominee for president, Donald Trump, has pledged to require
the CIA to perform "a hell of a lot worse than waterboarding" on terrorism
suspects.
As the Obama administration's various cabinet agencies have not even opened
the full 6,700-page classified version of the report, critics fear that a
government unwilling to grapple with the torture program will at some point
return to it.
"The deeper, more endemic problem lies in a CIA, assisted by a White House,
that continues to try to cover up the truth. I worry that an agency that has
yet to acknowledge these mistakes could continue to make them under a new
administration," said Mark Udall, a former Democratic senator on the
committee.
Jones, now a consultant in Washington for the Daschle Group and his own Penn
Quarter Group, said that one of the report's shocking findings was that the
CIA misled not just George W Bush on torture, but also Obama.
"This is John Brennan's CIA, Obama's CIA," he said. "They're providing
inaccurate information to the president of the United States in the present
day."
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