wots a lil beating(to death) amongst old friends eh?

August 4, 2005

Documents Tell of Brutal Improvisation by GIs

Interrogated General's Sleeping-Bag Death, CIA's Use of

Secret Iraqi Squad Are Among Details

By Josh White

Washington Post Staff Writer

Wednesday, August 3, 2005; A01

Iraqi Maj. Gen. Abed Hamed Mowhoush was being stubborn with

his American captors, and a series of intense beatings and

creative interrogation tactics were not enough to break his

will. On the morning of Nov. 26, 2003, a U.S. Army

interrogator and a military guard grabbed a green sleeping

bag, stuffed Mowhoush inside, wrapped him in an electrical

cord, laid him on the floor and began to go to work. Again.

It was inside the sleeping bag that the 56-year-old detainee

took his last breath through broken ribs, lying on the floor

beneath a U.S. soldier in Interrogation Room 6 in the

western Iraqi desert. Two days before, a secret

CIA-sponsored group of Iraqi paramilitaries, working with

Army interrogators, had beaten Mowhoush nearly senseless,

using fists, a club and a rubber hose, according to

classified documents.

The sleeping bag was the idea of a soldier who remembered

how his older brother used to force him into one, and how

scared and vulnerable it made him feel. Senior officers in

charge of the facility near the Syrian border believed that

such " claustrophobic techniques " were approved ways to gain

information from detainees, part of what military

regulations refer to as a " fear up " tactic, according to

military court documents.

The circumstances that led up to Mowhoush's death paint a

vivid example of how the pressure to produce intelligence

for anti-terrorism efforts and the war in Iraq led U.S.

military interrogators to improvise and develop abusive

measures, not just at Abu Ghraib but in detention centers

elsewhere in Iraq, in Afghanistan and at Guantanamo Bay,

Cuba. Mowhoush's ordeal in Qaim, over 16 days in November

2003, also reflects U.S. government secrecy surrounding some

abuse cases and gives a glimpse into a covert CIA unit that

was set up to foment rebellion before the war and took part

in some interrogations during the insurgency.

The sleeping-bag interrogation and beatings were taking

place in Qaim about the same time that soldiers at Abu

Ghraib, outside Baghdad, were using dogs to intimidate

detainees, putting women's underwear on their heads, forcing

them to strip in front of female soldiers and attaching at

least one to a leash. It was a time when U.S. interrogators

were coming up with their own tactics to get detainees to

talk, many of which they considered logical interpretations

of broad-brush categories in the Army Field Manual, with

labels such as " fear up " or " pride and ego down " or " futility. "

Other tactics, such as some of those seen at Abu Ghraib, had

been approved for one detainee at Guantanamo Bay and found

their way to Iraq. Still others have been linked to official

Pentagon guidance on specific techniques, such as the use of

dogs.

Two Army soldiers with the 3rd Armored Cavalry Regiment in

Fort Carson, Colo., are charged with killing Mowhoush with

the sleeping-bag technique, and his death has been the

subject of partially open court proceedings at the base in

Colorado Springs. Two other soldiers alleged to have

participated face potential nonjudicial punishment. Some

details of the incident have been released and were

previously reported. But an examination of numerous

classified documents gathered during the criminal

investigation into Mowhoush's death, and interviews with

Defense Department officials and current and former

intelligence officials, present a fuller picture of what

happened and outline the role played in his interrogation by

the CIA, its Iraqi paramilitaries and Special Forces soldiers.

Determining the details of the general's demise has been

difficult because the circumstances are listed as

" classified " on his official autopsy, court records have

been censored to hide the CIA's involvement in his

questioning, and reporters have been removed from a Fort

Carson courtroom when testimony relating to the CIA has

surfaced.

Despite Army investigators' concerns that the CIA and

Special Forces soldiers also were involved in serious abuse

leading up to Mowhoush's death, the investigators reported

they did not have the authority to fully look into their

actions. The CIA inspector general's office has launched an

investigation of at least one CIA operative who identified

himself to soldiers only as " Brian. " The CIA declined to

comment on the matter, as did an Army spokesman, citing the

ongoing criminal cases.

Although Mowhoush's death certificate lists his cause of

death as " asphyxia due to smothering and chest compression, "

the Dec. 2, 2003, autopsy, quoted in classified documents

and released with redactions, showed that Mowhoush had

" contusions and abrasions with pattern impressions " over

much of his body, and six fractured ribs. Investigators

believed a " long straight-edge instrument " was used on

Mowhoush, as well as an " object like the end of an M-16 " rifle.

" Although the investigation indicates the death was directly

related to the non-standard interrogation methods employed

on 26 NOV, the circumstances surrounding the death are

further complicated due to Mowhoush being interrogated and

reportedly beaten by members of a Special Forces team and

other government agency (OGA) employees two days earlier, "

said a secret Army memo dated May 10, 2004.

The Walk-In

Hours after Mowhoush's death in U.S. custody on Nov. 26,

2003, military officials issued a news release stating that

the prisoner had died of natural causes after complaining of

feeling sick. Army psychological-operations officers quickly

distributed leaflets designed to convince locals that the

general had cooperated and outed key insurgents.

The U.S. military initially told reporters that Mowhoush had

been captured during a raid. In reality, he had walked into

the Forward Operating Base " Tiger " in Qaim on Nov. 10, 2003,

hoping to speak with U.S. commanders to secure the release

of his sons, who had been arrested in raids 11 days earlier.

Officials were excited about Mowhoush's appearance.

The general, they believed, had been a high-ranking official

in Saddam Hussein's Republican Guard and a key supporter of

the insurgency in northwestern Iraq. Mowhoush was one of a

few generals whom Hussein had given " execution authority, "

U.S. commanders believed, meaning that he could execute

someone on sight, and he had been notorious among Shiites in

southern Iraq for brutality.

Mowhoush had been visited by Hussein at his home in Sadah in

October 2003 " to discuss, among other undisclosed issues, a

bounty of US$10,000 to anyone who video-taped themselves

attacking coalition forces, " according to a Defense

Intelligence Agency report.

Military intelligence also believed that Mowhoush was behind

several attacks in the Qaim area.

After being taken into custody, Mowhoush was housed in an

isolated area of the Qaim base within miles of the Syrian

border, according to a situation summary prepared by

interrogators.

The heavyset and imposing man was moderately cooperative in

his first days of detention. He told interrogators that he

was the commander of the al Quds Golden Division, an

organization of trusted loyalists fueling the insurgency

with mortars, rocket-propelled grenades, sniper rifles,

machine guns and other small arms.

In the months before Mowhoush's detention, military

intelligence officials across Iraq had been discussing

interrogation tactics, expressing a desire to ramp things up

and expand their allowed techniques to include more severe

methods, such as beatings that did not leave permanent

damage, and exploiting detainees' fear of dogs and snakes,

according to documents released by the Army.

Officials in Baghdad wrote an e-mail to interrogators in the

field on Aug. 14, 2003, stating that the " gloves are coming

off " and asking them to develop " wish lists " of tactics they

would like to use.

An interrogator with the 66th Military Intelligence Company,

who was assigned to work on Mowhoush, wrote back with

suggestions in August, including the use of " close

confinement quarters, " sleep deprivation and using the fear

of dogs, adding: " I firmly agree that the gloves need to

come off. "

Another e-mail exchange from interrogators with the 4th

Infantry Division based in Tikrit also suggested " close

quarter confinement " in extremely claustrophobic situations,

because " discomfort induces compliance and cooperation. "

Taking the Gloves Off

A week into Mowhoush's detainment, according to classified

investigative documents, interrogators were getting fed up

with the prisoner. In a " current situation summary "

PowerPoint presentation dated Nov. 18, Army officials wrote

about his intransigence, using his first name (spelled

" Abid " in Army documents):

" Previous interrogations were non-threatening; Abid was

being treated very well. Not anymore, " the document reads.

" The interrogation session lasted several hours and I took

the gloves off because Abid refused to play ball. "

But the harsher tactics backfired.

In an interrogation that could be witnessed by the entire

detainee population, Mowhoush was put into an undescribed

" stress position " that caused the other detainees to stand

" with heads bowed and solemn looks on their faces, " said the

document.

" I asked Abid if he was strong enough a leader to put an end

to the attacks that I believed he was behind, " the document

said, quoting an unidentified interrogator. " He did not deny

he was behind the attacks as he had denied previously, he

simply said because I had humiliated him, he would not be

able to stop the attacks. I take this as an admission of guilt. "

Three days later, on Nov. 21, 2003, Mowhoush was moved from

the border base at Qaim to a makeshift detention facility

about six miles away in the Iraqi desert, a prison fashioned

out of an old train depot, according to court testimony and

investigative documents. Soldiers with the 3rd Armored

Cavalry Regiment and the 101st Airborne Division were

running a series of massive raids called Operation Rifles

Blitz, and the temporary holding facility, nicknamed

Blacksmith Hotel, was designed to hold the quarry.

U.S. troops searched more than 8,000 homes in three cities,

netting 350 detainees, according to court testimony. Even

though Mowhoush was not arrested during the raids, he was

moved to Blacksmith Hotel, where teams of Army Special

Forces soldiers and the CIA were conducting interrogations.

At Blacksmith, according to military sources, there was a

tiered system of interrogations. Army interrogators were the

first level.

When Army efforts produced nothing useful, detainees would

be handed over to members of Operational Detachment Alpha

531, soldiers with the 5th Special Forces Group, the CIA or

a combination of the three. " The personnel were dressed in

civilian clothes and wore balaclavas to hide their

identity, " according to a Jan. 18, 2004, report for the

commander of the 82nd Airborne Division.

If they did not get what they wanted, the interrogators

would deliver the detainees to a small team of the

CIA-sponsored Iraqi paramilitary squads, code-named

Scorpions, according to a military source familiar with the

operation. The Jan. 18 memo indicates that it was " likely

that indigenous personnel in the employ of the CIA

interrogated MG Mowhoush. "

Sometimes, soldiers and intelligence officers used the mere

existence of the paramilitary unit as a threat to induce

detainees to talk, one Army soldier said in an interview.

" Detainees knew that if they went to those people, bad

things would happen, " the soldier said. " It was used as a

motivator to get them to talk. They didn't want to go with

the masked men. "

The Scorpions went by nicknames such as Alligator and Cobra.

They were set up by the CIA before the war to conduct light

sabotage. After the fall of Baghdad, they worked with their

CIA handlers to infiltrate the insurgency and as

interpreters, according to military investigative documents,

defense officials, and former and current intelligence

officials.

Soon after Mowhoush's detention began, soldiers in charge of

him " reached a collective decision that they would try using

the [redacted] who would, you know, obviously spoke the

local, native Iraqi Arabic as a means of trying to shake

Mowhoush up, and that the other thing that they were going

to try to do was put a bunch of people in the room, a tactic

that Mr. [redacted] called 'fear up,' " Army Special Agent

Curtis Ryan, who investigated the case, testified, according

to a transcript.

Classified e-mail messages and reports show that " Brian, " a

Special Forces retiree, worked as a CIA operative with the

Scorpions.

On Nov. 24, the CIA and one of its four-man Scorpion units

interrogated Mowhoush, according to investigative records.

" OGA Brian and the four indig were interrogating an unknown

detainee, " according to a classified memo, using the slang

" other government agency " for the CIA and " indig " for

indigenous Iraqis.

" When he didn't answer or provided an answer that they

didn't like, at first [redacted] would slap Mowhoush, and

then after a few slaps, it turned into punches, " Ryan

testified. " And then from punches, it turned into [redacted]

using a piece of hose. "

" The indig were hitting the detainee with fists, a club and

a length of rubber hose, " according to classified

investigative records.

Soldiers heard Mowhoush " being beaten with a hard object "

and heard him " screaming " from down the hall, according to

the Jan. 18, 2004, provost marshal's report. The report said

four Army guards had to carry Mowhoush back to his cell.

Two days later, at 8 a.m., Nov. 26, Mowhoush -- prisoner No.

76 -- was brought, moaning and breathing hard, to

Interrogation Room 6, according to court testimony.

Chief Warrant Officer Lewis E. Welshofer Jr. did a first

round of interrogations for 30 minutes, taking a 15-minute

break and resuming at 8:45. According to court testimony,

Welshofer and Spec. Jerry L. Loper, a mechanic assuming the

role of guard, put Mowhoush into the sleeping bag and

wrapped the bag in electrical wire.

Welshofer allegedly crouched over Mowhoush's chest to talk

to him.

Sgt. 1st Class William Sommer, a linguist, stood nearby.

Chief Warrant Officer Jeff Williams, an intelligence

analyst, came to observe progress.

Investigative records show that Mowhoush " becomes

unresponsive " at 9:06 a.m. Medics tried to resuscitate him

for 30 minutes before pronouncing him dead.

In a preliminary court hearing in March for Williams, Loper

and Sommer, retired Chief Warrant Officer Richard Manwaring,

an interrogator who worked with Welshofer in Iraq, testified

that using the sleeping bag and putting detainees in a wall

locker and banging on it were " appropriate " techniques that

he himself used to frighten detainees and make them tense.

Col. David A. Teeples, who then commanded the 3rd Armored

Cavalry Regiment, told the court he believed the

" claustrophobic technique " was both approved and effective.

It was used before, and for some time after, Mowhoush's

death, according to sources familiar with the interrogation

operation.

" My thought was that the death of Mowhoush was brought about

by [redacted] and then it was unfortunate and accidental,

what had happened under an interrogation by our people, "

Teeples said in court, according to a transcript.

The CIA has tried hard to conceal the existence of the

Scorpions. CIA classification officials have monitored

pretrial hearings in the case and have urged the court to

close much of the hearing on national security grounds.

Redacted transcripts were released only after lawyers for

the Denver Post challenged the rulings.

Autopsy Shields CIA

The Armed Forces Institute of Pathology's standard " Autopsy

Examination Report " of Mowhoush's death was manipulated to

avoid references to the CIA. In contrast to the other

autopsy reports of suspicious detainee deaths released by

the Army, Mowhoush's name is redacted and under

" Circumstances of Death, " the form says: " This Iraqi

[redacted] died while in U.S. custody. The details

surrounding the circumstances at the time of death are

classified. "

Williams was arraigned yesterday on a murder charge and is

scheduled for court-martial in November, a Fort Carson

spokeswoman said. Welshofer's court-martial is set for

October. Loper and Sommer have not been referred for trial.

Commanders are still considering what, if any, punishment to

impose.

Frank Spinner, an attorney for Welshofer, said his client is

going to fight the murder charge. Reading from a statement

prepared by Welshofer during his Article 32 hearing this

spring, Spinner quoted his client as saying that he is proud

of the job he did and that his efforts saved U.S. soldiers'

lives. " I did not torture anyone, " Spinner quoted him as saying.

William Cassara, who represents Williams, cited Mowhoush's

brutal encounters in the days before he died as possibly

leading to his death. He said Williams, who was not trained

in interrogation tactics, had little to do with the case.

" The interrogation techniques were known and were approved

of by the upper echelons of command of the 3rd ACR, " Cassara

said in a news conference. " They believed, and still do,

that they were appropriate and proper. "

Staff writer Dana Priest contributed to this report.

Teenager in a box

yeah, they'll put you underground and no one will care

cover you up with rocks

you were 18, now you're a statistic

August 5, 2005

Could someone tell me the source of this report?

MTIA

Michael

August 5, 2005

that particular one came from the washington post