Taft, William Howard, IV - Interview master file
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Interviewer | Okay, good afternoon. | 0:05 |
We are very grateful to you | 0:07 | |
for participating in the witness to Guantanamo project. | 0:09 | |
We invite you to speak of your experiences and involvement. | 0:13 | |
(indistinct) resolving issues around Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. | 0:17 | |
We are hoping to provide you | 0:21 | |
with an opportunity to tell your story in your own words. | 0:22 | |
We are creating an archive of stories | 0:27 | |
that people in America and around the world | 0:29 | |
will have a better understanding of what you | 0:32 | |
and others have observed and experienced. | 0:35 | |
If at any time during the interview | 0:39 | |
you'd like to take a break, please let us know. | 0:41 | |
And it was anything you say | 0:44 | |
that you would like as deduct, we can remove that as well. | 0:45 | |
And we'd like to begin by asking you your name | 0:49 | |
and your hometown and your education and birthday and age. | 0:52 | |
- | Yep, my name is William Taft | 1:01 |
and I was born in September of 1945 | 1:03 | |
and I live in Northern Virginia. | 1:11 | |
Let's see how many, what other ones who were there? | 1:14 | |
Interviewer | What's your age (indistinct) | 1:17 |
- | I'm 67. | 1:19 |
Interviewer | And your education? | 1:21 |
- | I was educated at Yale as an undergrad | 1:23 |
and then Harvard Law School. | 1:28 | |
Interviewer | And a little bit about, | 1:31 |
are you married with children? | 1:34 | |
- | I'm married now. | 1:36 |
I was married before and my wife died five years ago, | 1:38 | |
four and a half years ago | 1:44 | |
and I'm married again and I have children | 1:46 | |
and a stepson also. | 1:49 | |
Interviewer | Could you tell us a little bit about | 1:53 |
your background after you left law school? | 1:55 | |
Just briefly? | 2:00 | |
- | Well, I started, pretty much was working in government, | 2:02 |
in the federal government from, | 2:07 | |
I got out of law school in 1969. | 2:10 | |
And from then until 1977, | 2:13 | |
I was working in the federal government | 2:22 | |
at the office of management and budget | 2:24 | |
at the Department of Health Education and Welfare | 2:28 | |
as it then was. | 2:31 | |
Then I was in private practice for four years | 2:33 | |
and then in 1981, I went back into the administration | 2:37 | |
and worked in the Pentagon as the general counsel | 2:43 | |
and then later as the deputy secretary. | 2:47 | |
And from 1989 to '92, I was the US ambassador to NATO. | 2:50 | |
And then went back into private practice | 3:02 | |
for eight, nine years in Washington. | 3:06 | |
And then I was in the state department | 3:11 | |
as the legal advisor from 2001 to 2005. | 3:16 | |
After that I did a little bit of law practice | 3:22 | |
but then also spent two years | 3:27 | |
as a visiting professor at Stanford at the law school. | 3:30 | |
And after that, I retired counsel at my law firm | 3:34 | |
but I don't do a great deal there. | 3:42 | |
Interviewer | We need (indistinct) to, you said 2001, | 3:48 |
you were legal advisor to Colin Powell, | 3:51 | |
was that prior to 911, you started? | 3:55 | |
- | I started in April of 2001, and so yes. | 3:58 |
Interviewer | Could you describe | 4:03 |
just a little bit about the work that you were doing | 4:04 | |
before 911 was working on international law issues | 4:07 | |
prior to 911? | 4:11 | |
- | Yes, we had a number of normal things | 4:14 |
that we do in the legal advisor's office. | 4:19 | |
We had some international litigation | 4:25 | |
involving the International Court of Justice | 4:29 | |
where we represented the government | 4:35 | |
and we had just routine types of questions | 4:39 | |
about diplomatic immunity, the normal disputes | 4:46 | |
that we have with other countries | 5:00 | |
as to the nature of their legal obligations, | 5:02 | |
they had a number of treaties that we were negotiating, | 5:08 | |
things of that sort. | 5:13 | |
Interviewer | And so where were you in 911? | 5:16 |
- | I was in my office. | 5:18 |
Interviewer | And can you tell us what that was like? | 5:20 |
- | Well, I could least in so far as I recall | 5:24 |
it was some years ago, | 5:29 | |
but I believe I was in my office actually | 5:31 | |
having a meeting with some people also from my office, | 5:34 | |
my staff and the news one of them staff came in | 5:38 | |
to the meeting, broke into the meeting | 5:53 | |
and said that an airplane had crashed | 5:54 | |
into World Trade Center. | 5:56 | |
And then another, a little bit later, | 5:59 | |
not much later than another one had. | 6:05 | |
And that was at that point, I guess again | 6:08 | |
it was a little bit after that | 6:17 | |
that another plane crashed into the Pentagon | 6:21 | |
and the order was given to evacuate the building | 6:27 | |
which we did, and eventually assisted some people | 6:34 | |
in getting home and to where they needed to go. | 6:44 | |
It was a lovely day, beautiful, clear 75 degrees. | 6:51 | |
And I eventually went back to my house | 7:01 | |
and was there with my wife and one of my kids was in town | 7:05 | |
and came over and we spent the rest of the day there. | 7:16 | |
Interviewer | Did you think your life | 7:21 |
working for Colin Powell was gonna change the next morning? | 7:25 | |
Did you know, | 7:28 | |
or what do you expect (indistinct) the incidents? | 7:29 | |
- | Well, it was, this was going to be an event | 7:35 |
that would change the lives of of many people | 7:39 | |
working in the government. | 7:45 | |
I would remain doing legal work | 7:48 | |
but I did couldn't exactly foresee at that stage | 7:52 | |
what specifically it would be. | 7:58 | |
We, I know very promptly worked on some resolutions | 8:05 | |
that were passed by the UN security council | 8:15 | |
probably the next day, condemning the attack. | 8:19 | |
And then we worked also on some legislation | 8:22 | |
that would authorize the president to take steps | 8:31 | |
to deal with the people responsible. | 8:36 | |
Interviewer | You worked at UN? | 8:41 |
- | Yeah, we would, have been part of that my office | 8:44 |
and I would have supervised their work | 8:48 | |
but then obviously we were not alone. | 8:51 | |
The White House was taking the lead | 8:53 | |
in the justice department | 8:55 | |
and the defense department we're all involved. | 8:57 | |
Interviewer | And at that time | 9:00 |
it was quite well coordinated to I mean. | 9:01 | |
- | Yeah, I think so, yeah. | 9:05 |
Interviewer | And then could you take us along | 9:07 |
and how that evolved over the next few months? | 9:08 | |
Did any thing change before you heard about Guantanamo? | 9:14 | |
I'm just curious as to what work you were working on | 9:18 | |
through the fall. | 9:22 | |
- | I can't really recall. | 9:24 |
I mean, we had many other things to work on | 9:26 | |
but obviously this was added to the usual diet. | 9:32 | |
Interviewer | So when did you first hear about Guantanamo? | 9:37 |
Would you know that? | 9:39 | |
- | Well, I had known about Guantanamo | 9:41 |
for some years as a place that had been used | 9:43 | |
among other things to house Haitian refugees. | 9:51 | |
So I was aware of it as a place | 9:58 | |
during the course of the fall, | 10:03 | |
particularly after we invaded Afghanistan | 10:07 | |
which took place I think in late October, | 10:10 | |
then the question arose as to what we would be doing | 10:18 | |
with people that we captured there. | 10:25 | |
And that was a question that was one that we discussed | 10:29 | |
with people in the justice department | 10:36 | |
and the White House and the defense department | 10:38 | |
and Guantanamo figured as a one option to be used. | 10:42 | |
Interviewer | Do you know who came up with that idea? | 10:50 |
- | No, I don't. | 10:55 |
Interviewer | Did people respond to it? | 10:59 |
I think that was initially a good idea over the other. | 11:00 | |
- | I think it seemed like a good idea. | 11:04 |
There were not too many options that seemed attractive | 11:07 | |
as the numbers of people | 11:14 | |
who were being detained in Afghanistan grew. | 11:17 | |
The question became more pressing | 11:25 | |
as to whether they should stay there | 11:29 | |
or be moved to the United States | 11:31 | |
or to a third country or possibly to | 11:34 | |
I think Wake Island was mentioned as a possibility | 11:47 | |
or Guantanamo, and Guantanamo certainly had many features | 11:52 | |
that made it a candidate. | 12:03 | |
Interviewer | Were you on board for Guantanamo, | 12:06 |
do you think that was the most suitable? | 12:09 | |
- | Yeah, I think of the places that were looked at | 12:10 |
logistically, it made very good sense. | 12:18 | |
There were facilities, it was secure | 12:22 | |
and it could be expanded to accommodate more people. | 12:27 | |
Those were all called points in its favor. | 12:36 | |
They had experienced down there of receiving | 12:39 | |
with the Haitian refugees, | 12:45 | |
receiving people who they wanted to keep an eye on | 12:46 | |
and keep there. | 12:52 | |
Interviewer | I know John Yoo was quoted as saying | 12:55 |
that he was advocating Guantanamo and other people agreed | 12:57 | |
because it might be a place where the law didn't apply. | 13:01 | |
Had you heard those kinds of statements at the time? | 13:06 | |
- | It's not clear what law didn't apply, | 13:10 |
but there was a memo done not as to whether any law applied | 13:12 | |
but the question of judicial jurisdiction | 13:21 | |
to hear complaints about, or that might be raised | 13:31 | |
by people who were detained there | 13:35 | |
certainly came up in a memo, was written in December, | 13:38 | |
as I recall, which went into the question | 13:41 | |
of whether they would have the ability | 13:46 | |
to seek habeas corpus in US courts. | 13:48 | |
The answer that the memo gave as I recall | 13:55 | |
was that they would not. | 14:02 | |
And that seemed actually to me to be correct | 14:05 | |
but it wasn't to my mind a significant reason | 14:09 | |
to put them there or not put them there. | 14:17 | |
Interviewer | Is that because you believed in the laws | 14:22 |
of one (indistinct) and you didn't see that as a problem, | 14:26 | |
or what were you thinking | 14:31 | |
that you didn't consider that an issue? | 14:32 | |
- | Well, I was actually, I had quite a lot of experience | 14:36 |
in the defense department and my experience told me | 14:40 | |
that the military would treat these people properly | 14:47 | |
and that they need to have access to courts | 14:53 | |
to dispute their treatment | 15:03 | |
whether they were being detained at all | 15:06 | |
or how they were being treated when they were detained. | 15:08 | |
This was, customarily we detained a lot of people | 15:12 | |
in conflicts. | 15:19 | |
Most of them overseas, | 15:21 | |
and most of them never saw the United States | 15:24 | |
or United States judge | 15:26 | |
whether it was in Germany or Japan or Iraq. | 15:31 | |
And there was good, I thought good law supporting that. | 15:38 | |
I signed on the brief to the Supreme Court | 15:44 | |
that argued that there was no judicial review | 15:47 | |
or no habeas corpus right there. | 15:50 | |
But it didn't seem to me to be an important factor | 15:52 | |
in the discussion. | 15:58 | |
Interviewer | Well, as things evolved, | 16:00 |
you wrote a memo that seemed to think otherwise. | 16:03 | |
So can you give us a little background | 16:07 | |
as to how that happened? | 16:09 | |
- | I don't think I did write a memo that was otherwise | 16:13 |
on that narrow point. | 16:21 | |
Interviewer | No, it wasn't on that point, right. | 16:23 |
It was on the point of giving them. | 16:25 | |
- | I wrote a memo on how they should be treated. | 16:28 |
Interviewer | And how did that (indistinct) | 16:32 |
- | And as to whether the Geneva laws | 16:35 |
convention applied to them | 16:39 | |
or should be applied to them, whether it did or not. | 16:41 | |
And they argued that it should be | 16:47 | |
which was actually our practice in Vietnam | 16:51 | |
was where everybody agreed | 16:55 | |
that the Vietcong detainees were not entitled | 16:58 | |
to the protections of the Geneva convention | 17:03 | |
but we gave it to them anyway. | 17:07 | |
And I think that was basically the argument that we made | 17:08 | |
was we thought it did apply | 17:12 | |
in certain circumstances in the conflict. | 17:15 | |
And I'm sure you have the memo. | 17:24 | |
So no point in my trying to remember it wrong | 17:27 | |
but I don't remember it fully, | 17:31 | |
but we argued that vis-a-vis the Taliban in Afghanistan | 17:36 | |
that the Geneva convention applied. | 17:52 | |
I not sure what we argued on Al-Qaeda | 17:56 | |
but so there was, but we have the memo, so. | 18:02 | |
Interviewer | What prompted you to write that memo? | 18:07 |
Could you show a background and how that happened? | 18:10 | |
- | Well, we got a memorandum from the draft memorandum | 18:12 |
from the justice department, which came in, | 18:15 | |
this is a memo that I think was in January | 18:18 | |
or mid January of 2002, is the memo we're talking about. | 18:22 | |
And the memo, a draft memo came over | 18:31 | |
from the department of justice, | 18:39 | |
which said that basically argued | 18:43 | |
that the Geneva convention did not apply | 18:55 | |
or that in any case, the president wasn't bound to follow it | 18:59 | |
because he could suspend it and that so he should not feel | 19:05 | |
that he was in any way constrained by the convention. | 19:13 | |
We wrote a memo disagreeing with this, | 19:19 | |
with the conclusion first of all | 19:22 | |
on whether the Geneva convention applied | 19:24 | |
at least as regards to the Taliban. | 19:26 | |
And I think originally we argued that it was, | 19:28 | |
it applied also to Al-Qaeda, but, and then that in any case | 19:30 | |
he couldn't suspend it as a matter of international law. | 19:40 | |
And there was a question as to whether they argued | 19:45 | |
that Afghanistan was a failed state | 19:48 | |
and we argued that it was not. | 19:51 | |
And that in fact, it was rather important | 19:55 | |
that there was no real such concept | 19:58 | |
in international law that operated in any way | 20:02 | |
that the justice department was saying it did. | 20:11 | |
So we argued that too. | 20:16 | |
And that was why we wrote the memo. | 20:17 | |
Interviewer | You might not wanna answer this | 20:20 |
but were you taking direction from Colin Powell | 20:21 | |
or did he come to you and ask you for advice | 20:27 | |
because you were the expert on this area. | 20:29 | |
How did that happen to you? | 20:31 | |
You had a pop and wrote the memo. | 20:33 | |
- | We wrote it | 20:36 |
because we got the memo from the justice department. | 20:37 | |
They send it over to us for comment, | 20:41 | |
and it would be normal for us to comment on it. | 20:44 | |
I don't think I even needed to, not sure. | 20:48 | |
I talked with Colin about it at all. | 20:51 | |
It was just seemed to me to be a lawyer stuff. | 20:54 | |
And as a matter of fact, I think he wasn't in the country. | 21:00 | |
Not that I mean, I could have reached him if I wanted to | 21:05 | |
but I knew what I needed to do. | 21:07 | |
Interviewer | So I guess on your own direction | 21:10 |
you decided what was right as you saw it | 21:13 | |
and didn't really need counsel with other people. | 21:17 | |
- | Well, I had a lot of staff who I was talking with | 21:20 |
and I think the memo speaks for itself | 21:24 | |
that no one person could have written it. | 21:27 | |
We had a lot of people working on it. | 21:31 | |
Interviewer | And what kind of reaction did you get | 21:33 |
after you wrote the draft for the DOD | 21:35 | |
and DOJ to see, how did they respond to you? | 21:39 | |
- | As I recall, they didn't agree with it | 21:42 |
and they went ahead or the justice department, | 21:46 | |
went ahead and forwarded a memo that was very close | 21:52 | |
to what their original memo had been | 21:57 | |
to the president for his decision. | 22:04 | |
Interviewer | And did you have any thoughts | 22:09 |
about watching that occur? | 22:12 | |
Did you think of? | 22:14 | |
- | I wasn't aware that it was happening actually, they. | 22:15 |
Interviewer | So how did you become aware of that? | 22:21 |
- | We were told that the president had decided | 22:24 |
that the justice department approach was correct | 22:28 | |
and that he would adopt that approach, | 22:33 | |
namely that the Geneva convention did not apply | 22:36 | |
to the conflict either with the Al Qaeda | 22:40 | |
or with the Taliban. | 22:48 | |
Interviewer | Did you follow up (indistinct) | 22:51 |
- | Yeah, we objected, we said, wait a minute, | 22:52 |
we didn't agree with that. | 22:57 | |
And I went to the secretary who was back from his trip | 22:59 | |
and he said that he didn't agree with it either | 23:04 | |
and that he wanted an opportunity to discuss the subject | 23:08 | |
with the president. | 23:11 | |
And so they got a national security council process going | 23:13 | |
which would lead ultimately to a meeting | 23:20 | |
where the president would decide or decide later | 23:28 | |
whether he would continue to adopt the approach | 23:33 | |
that the justice department had given or not. | 23:36 | |
And that took place at the end of January. | 23:41 | |
Interviewer | Were you present at that meeting? | 23:44 |
- | I was present at one meeting | 23:46 |
but there were probably many meetings. | 23:47 | |
Interviewer | Do you remember that one meeting? | 23:50 |
Is there something (indistinct) | 23:51 | |
- | Just that, I guess not, I don't remember much detail | 23:55 |
but all of the arguments were presented. | 24:01 | |
We presented, or we being me and the secretary, | 24:15 | |
the secretary would have spoken for us. | 24:18 | |
So I was not us, didn't have a speaking part | 24:21 | |
but the justice department explained their legal rationale | 24:26 | |
pretty much as it was in their memo. | 24:35 | |
We didn't argue so much the law | 24:38 | |
at that point at that meeting. | 24:44 | |
In fact, don't think we argued at all | 24:46 | |
because there didn't seem to be any point | 24:49 | |
in arguing that the attorney general who was in the meeting | 24:51 | |
didn't know what the law was | 24:59 | |
or I'd gotten that wrong. | 25:03 | |
But we did argue that as a matter of policy, | 25:05 | |
the president ought to direct that the Geneva Conventions | 25:08 | |
be complied with | 25:15 | |
whether they were required to be complied with or not. | 25:17 | |
And the positioning I have taken as in Vietnam | 25:23 | |
and as in every other conflict that we had | 25:28 | |
and the secretary made that point | 25:30 | |
and he was actually supported in that | 25:32 | |
by the chairman of the joint chiefs | 25:35 | |
and by secretary Rumsfeld. | 25:37 | |
But it was a policy argument, not a legal argument. | 25:41 | |
Interviewer | Well then why didn't it prevail, | 25:45 |
do you think? | 25:46 | |
- | That I couldn't tell you, and in a way it did prevail | 25:48 |
or we thought it had prevailed | 25:54 | |
because later the decision was announced | 25:56 | |
that we would follow the conventions | 25:59 | |
or the spirit of the conventions | 26:03 | |
or something along those lines as appropriate. | 26:05 | |
And I think there was another qualifier necessary | 26:11 | |
or something, I don't know what it was. | 26:18 | |
There was some qualifications, | 26:21 | |
but basically the announcement | 26:22 | |
which came out in early February | 26:25 | |
which the press, there was a press release and so forth | 26:26 | |
said that we would be following him. | 26:31 | |
Interviewer | Who was the strong advocate | 26:39 |
for the administration's policy? | 26:41 | |
- | For the what? | 26:44 |
Interviewer | For the administration's policy. | 26:45 |
Who was seemingly the strongest | 26:46 | |
and one of the strong advocates and got the presidency here. | 26:50 | |
- | Well, this would have been the department of justice | 26:56 |
and the White House counsel's office, | 26:58 | |
I think agreed with them. | 27:00 | |
And no, I don't know where the lawyers | 27:03 | |
from the defense department were on that subject | 27:06 | |
because their secretary was arguing in any event | 27:11 | |
that as a matter of policy, | 27:16 | |
he thought we ought to follow them. | 27:18 | |
Interviewer | Did the vice-president have a voice | 27:20 |
at this meeting? | 27:22 | |
- | I don't recall his speaking | 27:23 |
but I'm sure he had some opportunity, whatever opportunity | 27:25 | |
for presenting his views either then, or some other time. | 27:30 | |
I wouldn't doubt it. | 27:35 | |
Interviewer | Did the president present his views? | 27:36 |
- | No, not at that meeting, then none of the meeting of that. | 27:40 |
Interviewer | How did you feel about watching this unfold | 27:44 |
and then the result as an expert in international law? | 27:48 | |
What were your thoughts about what just happened? | 27:53 | |
- | Well, I actually, as I mentioned | 27:56 |
I thought we did rather well, | 27:58 | |
since we did get the policy | 28:01 | |
of adhering to the Geneva Conventions | 28:08 | |
announced in the press statement that was put out. | 28:12 | |
Interviewer | And then when you saw that, | 28:17 |
it wasn't really followed | 28:18 | |
the way it presumably was presented, | 28:21 | |
what were you thinking then? | 28:25 | |
- | Well, I didn't know that it wasn't being | 28:28 |
for many months, many years. | 28:30 | |
Interviewer | Really, you had no one on the ground | 28:32 |
to inform you as to what was going on. | 28:37 | |
I mean, people didn't know that on your level. | 28:40 | |
- | No, I don't, not for a long time. | 28:45 |
Interviewer | There were no rumors going around | 28:52 |
other from what you recall. | 28:55 | |
I mean, I know you at a high level | 28:56 | |
so it could be, you never heard any movements | 28:58 | |
but there were no rumors going on from what you recall | 29:00 | |
as to what was really happening on the ground? | 29:03 | |
- | No, well, that's not quite the case. | 29:06 |
There were things that we heard about | 29:08 | |
that were happening that were not consistent | 29:13 | |
with the conventions. | 29:17 | |
There were people being beaten up in Afghanistan in bogroom. | 29:21 | |
Some of them died. | 29:27 | |
There were reports | 29:30 | |
from the international committee of the Red Cross | 29:33 | |
which said that the people were being abused in Guantanamo. | 29:37 | |
And whenever we heard these, we would report them. | 29:42 | |
We would raise them with the defense department | 29:47 | |
and bring them to their attention | 29:52 | |
and they would go and look into them. | 29:57 | |
Interviewer | Would they report back to you? | 30:00 |
- | Rarely, yeah. | 30:04 |
Not as a common practice, no. | 30:05 | |
Interviewer | Would you expect them to report back to you? | 30:09 |
- | Not really, no. | 30:13 |
Interviewer | Would you trust | 30:16 |
that they would have taken care of the issue of | 30:17 | |
in fact there was a problem? | 30:20 | |
- | Yeah, that would be, it would have been normal. | 30:21 |
And I think they didn't initiate | 30:24 | |
in the case of the bogroom deaths. | 30:27 | |
They did initiate an investigation | 30:31 | |
which took a long time, | 30:33 | |
but I think that was their answer was, | 30:35 | |
we are investigating it which would be normal, | 30:39 | |
I mean, just because there are instances | 30:42 | |
of non-compliance with the Geneva Conventions | 30:50 | |
in all of our conflicts. | 30:55 | |
It doesn't mean | 30:58 | |
that we don't think that they ought to be applied. | 30:59 | |
It means that somebody is out of line | 31:03 | |
and later different subject | 31:05 | |
but same issue at Abu Ghraib where everybody agreed | 31:09 | |
that Geneva Conventions applied. | 31:17 | |
It was, it emerged that they were not being complied with. | 31:19 | |
Well, that didn't mean that they didn't apply, | 31:26 | |
it meant that some people were not applying them | 31:29 | |
and that happens. | 31:33 | |
Interviewer | Were you still working | 31:35 |
with the administration in time to have a great? | 31:36 | |
- | Yes. | 31:39 |
Interviewer | Did you went on with your work | 31:44 |
and I assume that you didn't do much work in Guantanamo then | 31:46 | |
during this period to writing the memo | 31:50 | |
I assume pretty much she then moved on | 31:54 | |
to other kind of work, right, | 31:56 | |
there wasn't much you do in Guantanamo | 31:58 | |
where you're describing Guantanamo was running itself. | 32:00 | |
And if you heard (indistinct) then you checked into it. | 32:04 | |
- | Yeah ICRC would go down there | 32:05 |
for a week at a time or more, or they would, | 32:10 | |
they spent time looking into how it was operating | 32:13 | |
and they would come back and always report to us. | 32:18 | |
And I would, and in fact, they would, | 32:20 | |
the head of the ICRC, Dr. Kellenberger | 32:23 | |
would meet with the secretary | 32:26 | |
and tell him what had been found. | 32:29 | |
And then he would also go over | 32:32 | |
and meet with the secretary of defense and tell him. | 32:33 | |
Interviewer | But then you're probably | 32:38 |
beginning to see patterns, right. | 32:40 | |
That it's not one or two incidents. | 32:41 | |
If every time you'd been in the IRS, ICRC | 32:43 | |
they're reporting violations of the Geneva Convention to you | 32:46 | |
are going to see patterns | 32:51 | |
and are you wondering if anything's actually | 32:52 | |
really being resolved | 32:54 | |
in terms of adhering to the (indistinct) | 32:57 | |
- | No, it didn't, it wouldn't have emerged | 32:59 |
quite so obviously. | 33:03 | |
I mean, you're dealing with a lot of people | 33:05 | |
and we're not alert to the fact | 33:11 | |
that they were not complying with or attempting to comply | 33:23 | |
with the conventions or with the army field manual, | 33:30 | |
as it would operate there | 33:40 | |
which was consistent with the conventions. | 33:42 | |
Interviewer | Did you think also I assume | 33:47 |
his stories about bogroom in condor hall | 33:48 | |
from the same ICRC officials? | 33:52 | |
- | I don't know what our sources were for those. | 33:56 |
I'm not sure that ICRC got into bogroom. | 34:03 | |
I don't know. | 34:07 | |
They may have been, if they did, | 34:09 | |
they would have told us what they found. | 34:11 | |
I just I'm not sure what the source | 34:15 | |
for our information on what later were ruled to be homicides | 34:19 | |
in bogroom was, I don't recall. | 34:29 | |
Interviewer | Did the secretary ever think | 34:34 |
that he was being misled by the administration | 34:36 | |
as to what was going on? | 34:39 | |
- | I never heard him say that. | 34:42 |
Interviewer | Did you visit Guantanamo? | 34:48 |
- | Just one time? | 34:51 |
Interviewer | Could you tell us please? | 34:52 |
- | That was very early. | 34:53 |
That was actually even, probably the first week in January. | 34:55 | |
Right at the same time as the first prisoners were arriving. | 34:59 | |
Interviewer | What was the purpose of your visit? | 35:03 |
- | We wanted to see what was, well we were invited | 35:07 |
by the general counsel at the department of defense | 35:11 | |
and went down and saw the facilities that were being used | 35:17 | |
to house the detainees at that time. | 35:25 | |
And they were just getting started. | 35:31 | |
I think maybe the people that we saw | 35:34 | |
had only been there a couple of days. | 35:39 | |
And there weren't very many of them. | 35:43 | |
Interviewer | Who was with you on the flight? | 35:46 |
- | Well, the general counsel of the department | 35:49 |
of defense was there. | 35:54 | |
I think John Yoo was there, probably Judge Gonzalez. | 35:57 | |
And let's see who else? | 36:09 | |
The counsel to the vice-president, | 36:15 | |
Dave Addington was there. | 36:17 | |
A couple of people from the military, | 36:20 | |
and there may have been some other people | 36:25 | |
from the justice department, I'm not sure. | 36:33 | |
Interviewer | What were your impressions? | 36:35 |
- | Well, when we got there, | 36:39 |
we went over to look at where the people were being housed. | 36:43 | |
You might call it housed. | 36:54 | |
They were in these cages, essentially under roof | 36:57 | |
but very austere and I think they were maybe eight by 15 | 37:05 | |
and they were all there. | 37:15 | |
They could talk to each other if they wanted to I guess. | 37:17 | |
Maybe they weren't allowed to talk to each other | 37:20 | |
but they could see each other and through the wire. | 37:22 | |
And that was, seemed to be a temporary arrangement | 37:31 | |
that was set up. | 37:43 | |
And in the circumstances, it seemed the best | 37:45 | |
that that could be done for these arrivals. | 37:49 | |
And we looked at it and I think felt that it was okay | 37:57 | |
as a temporary thing, but that it shouldn't last very long. | 38:04 | |
And they were getting on to build other facilities | 38:07 | |
to put them in. | 38:11 | |
We heard about other things that aspects of their treatment, | 38:13 | |
which were actually rather reassuring. | 38:25 | |
They were getting a good diet. | 38:28 | |
They were getting medical treatment | 38:32 | |
which many of them needed and things of that sort. | 38:35 | |
Interviewer | Were you under the impression, | 38:41 |
these were the worst of the worst of that early time? | 38:43 | |
Do you recall if that's how they were presented to. | 38:46 | |
- | They were identified as being people | 38:50 |
who had been selected out in Afghanistan | 38:54 | |
for detention out of the country as being more dangerous | 39:00 | |
than people who were just taken in and released, yes. | 39:11 | |
Interviewer | Did you speak to any of them? | 39:15 |
- | No. | 39:17 |
Interviewer | Did you have any impressions | 39:18 |
on your own as to whether these men were that dangerous? | 39:19 | |
- | You couldn't tell. | 39:23 |
Interviewer | I couldn't tell. | 39:24 |
Were they wearing the orange jumpsuits? | 39:26 | |
Do you recall that? | 39:27 | |
- | I think they were, yes. | 39:28 |
Interviewer | Did you go to bogroom | 39:33 |
or kinda had to (indistinct) | 39:35 | |
- | No, I have never been to Afghanistan. | 39:36 |
Interviewer | And did. | 39:43 |
- | My wife went there, but that was in 1999. | 39:44 |
Interviewer | Before. | 39:51 |
Did you get the impression that David Addington | 39:53 | |
might have been a strong advocate | 39:57 | |
of not adhering to Geneva Conventions | 40:06 | |
given his knowledge of the Geneva Conventions? | 40:10 | |
Apparently I understood that he knew them better, | 40:12 | |
he knew international better than many people. | 40:16 | |
And he might've been involved | 40:19 | |
in some of the writing of the memos. | 40:20 | |
- | I don't know whether he was involved | 40:23 |
in the writing of the justice department memo, | 40:25 | |
but I think he agreed with it | 40:28 | |
as did people in the White House counsel's office. | 40:29 | |
Interviewer | And when you went back to Washington, | 40:34 |
you see after that visit to Guantanamo, | 40:38 | |
did you have any interest in going back | 40:41 | |
or there was no reason to return again to? | 40:43 | |
- | I didn't see any benefit going back now. | 40:46 |
Interviewer | Did you hear from other countries at all | 40:50 |
that their citizens were being harm by being in Guantanamo? | 40:51 | |
Had you, were you involved | 41:00 | |
with that in the state department? | 41:01 | |
- | Yeah, we did have some contacts from other countries | 41:02 |
whose nationals were there | 41:14 | |
and they would be through the state department. | 41:18 | |
Now that would have been handled | 41:22 | |
by the ambassador for war crimes who was Pierre Prosper | 41:24 | |
and he was in charge of the contacts | 41:32 | |
with these other countries at a diplomatic level. | 41:34 | |
When they found out that some of the people that we had | 41:40 | |
were nationals of their countries, | 41:44 | |
they would naturally take an interest in them. | 41:47 | |
There was not, as far as I can recall much complaint | 41:54 | |
about the way they were being treated. | 42:01 | |
Mostly, it was a question of them | 42:05 | |
because for many months, | 42:07 | |
they didn't have any access to them. | 42:09 | |
Then there was some arrangement reached where, | 42:15 | |
I've forgotten the exact. | 42:24 | |
There was some problem | 42:26 | |
as to whether there would be consular access to the national | 42:28 | |
or whether it would be the perhaps intelligence officers | 42:39 | |
of these different countries and the countries were | 42:47 | |
and I forget which way it played out | 42:53 | |
but the countries were willing to do it either way. | 42:55 | |
(coughs) | 43:00 | |
And they would make a console | 43:03 | |
into an intelligence officer or an intelligence officer | 43:04 | |
into a consular officer I think, | 43:07 | |
whichever way it was that it was agreed, | 43:10 | |
they could have access. | 43:12 | |
And I think fairly early on, | 43:13 | |
it emerged that there was an Australian there. | 43:21 | |
Interviewer | (indistinct) | 43:29 |
- | Was that, yeah, I think that was his name, | 43:30 |
but there may have been two of them. | 43:33 | |
And I'm not sure which was which, | 43:37 | |
but there were a couple of Australians | 43:41 | |
there were after a while, | 43:42 | |
but I'm not sure that they were there immediately, | 43:49 | |
some breads. | 43:50 | |
And then there were a number of people whose nationalities | 43:53 | |
didn't emerge maybe for a while. | 44:02 | |
And certainly the Saudis and the Yemenis | 44:05 | |
were not as concerned or the Libyans | 44:13 | |
were not as concerned about their people | 44:17 | |
as the Brits and others were. | 44:20 | |
Interviewer | Well and the Brits and the Australians | 44:23 |
Were considered, does that mean visits, or does that mean. | 44:24 | |
- | They wanted to visit them | 44:26 |
and see how they were being treated | 44:27 | |
and to see if they were entitled to anything | 44:29 | |
that they were getting it. | 44:33 | |
Interviewer | And were you involved in negotiating? | 44:35 |
- | No, this this would have been a Pierre doing. | 44:39 |
Interviewer | And my understanding | 44:43 |
from detainees we interviewed | 44:45 | |
is that sometimes when the counselor went out | 44:46 | |
and the official showed up, they would interrogate them | 44:48 | |
as opposed to really look out for their interests. | 44:51 | |
Had you heard anything about what happened | 44:54 | |
when they did show up? | 44:57 | |
- | No. | 44:58 |
Interviewer | And when the ministers of various countries | 45:02 |
wanted their men released back to their countries, | 45:05 | |
were you involved in that part? | 45:09 | |
- | No, that would have also been Pierre's work. | 45:11 |
It was clearly possible to release them. | 45:14 | |
There was nothing unlawful about that if we want it to. | 45:16 | |
We didn't but we also felt that it was pretty clear | 45:22 | |
that we didn't have to release them and that's either. | 45:28 | |
Interviewer | Well, how did you feel | 45:34 |
when you began to see the US government | 45:35 | |
releasing these people to countries | 45:37 | |
that supported us in the war, | 45:39 | |
it was some of the first people released. | 45:41 | |
Do you have any thoughts about (indistinct) | 45:44 | |
- | No, I didn't, it seemed a natural. | 45:45 |
And then they also released a lot of people | 45:49 | |
back to Afghanistan over time. | 45:53 | |
Interviewer | Right. | 45:57 |
And did you think the people | 45:58 | |
that they released were innocent, | 45:59 | |
do you think they released because (indistinct) | 46:02 | |
- | I have no idea. | 46:02 |
They had their reasons whatever they were for each one. | 46:07 | |
I mean, they had their reasons | 46:13 | |
for putting them there in the first place | 46:15 | |
and then they had their reasons for releasing them. | 46:17 | |
And I think it's fair to say they made some mistakes | 46:20 | |
at both ends. | 46:23 | |
Interviewer | And so I guess you weren't that involved | 46:27 |
in Guantanamo issues once you completed that memo, right? | 46:33 | |
Is that kind of what (indistinct)? | 46:37 | |
- | Yeah, I think that's pretty much the case. | 46:40 |
I say I never went down there again. | 46:51 | |
I don't think anybody from the state department went down. | 46:55 | |
I don't at all. | 47:01 | |
It may appear, he may have gone down, yeah. | 47:02 | |
He may have done | 47:04 | |
because I don't think he was on the first trip. | 47:06 | |
And so he probably wanted to take a look at it | 47:09 | |
but that would have been different | 47:12 | |
and we were in often, what I was involved in | 47:16 | |
related to Guantanamo was then the legal issues | 47:21 | |
that were raised when the detainees | 47:25 | |
began to seek habeas corpus | 47:33 | |
and we were involved in all of those cases. | 47:37 | |
Interviewer | And so when you involved | 47:40 |
in writing the brief on behalf of the US government? | 47:43 | |
- | Well, they would be written | 47:46 |
usually by the solicitor General's office | 47:49 | |
or the justice department | 47:52 | |
but we would comment on them and I signed onto them, | 47:53 | |
some of them. | 47:57 | |
Interviewer | What was your reason | 47:58 |
why habeas didn't apply in Guantanamo? | 47:59 | |
- | It was basically the Eisentrager case. | 48:02 |
I mean, there were four dissents in the Supreme Court. | 48:04 | |
It was a closed case. | 48:07 | |
It was not obvious that, | 48:10 | |
and Eisentrager case was a very solid preston. | 48:13 | |
Interviewer | And did you see it, | 48:17 |
how did the Eisentrager case could be distinguished, | 48:19 | |
or it didn't seem? | 48:21 | |
- | Yeah, I could see that it might be distinguished | 48:24 |
but it would seem to me to be | 48:26 | |
that it was good authority for not having, | 48:32 | |
I mean that narrow question of whether there was the right | 48:35 | |
if you were not in the US to have a court, | 48:44 | |
US court take jurisdiction of your case and supervise it. | 48:55 | |
Interviewer | Did you, so did the state department | 49:01 |
believe that Guantanamo was clearly not | 49:04 | |
under American territory? | 49:07 | |
I mean, that was understood by the state department too | 49:11 | |
but it was not American territory. | 49:16 | |
- | We went along with the argument that was made. | 49:19 |
Yes, which was, I'm not sure whether it was territory | 49:23 | |
or whether we had jurisdiction or authority or whatever | 49:29 | |
but those were the issues and you have the briefs. | 49:37 | |
Interviewer | Right. | 49:40 |
So (indistinct) were you surprised or not necessarily? | 49:41 | |
- | I was surprised. | 49:45 |
Interviewer | You were. | 49:46 |
- | Yeah, as I thought, as I say, I mean, it wasn't, | 49:47 |
for me, it was not a big issue | 49:51 | |
because I thought the military would treat them correctly | 49:53 | |
just as they treated people correctly in everywhere before, | 49:56 | |
without any habeas corpus, | 50:03 | |
German POW's never got habeas corpus. | 50:06 | |
And so that was what I thought would be happening. | 50:12 | |
So on that narrow question, I was quite comfortable. | 50:18 | |
Interviewer | How much longer did you work | 50:23 |
in the state department? | 50:25 | |
- | Until February of 2005. | 50:27 |
Interviewer | Okay, so word began to come out even more | 50:30 |
as lawyers began to go to Guantanamo in the fall of four. | 50:34 | |
So probably you've been. | 50:38 | |
- | Yeah, no, it appeared in some time in 2004, I think | 50:41 |
that the memo on torture | 50:51 | |
that had been written two years before | 51:04 | |
I think became public. | 51:10 | |
Somehow we had never seen it. | 51:18 | |
Interviewer | Really. | 51:19 |
- | And it cost quite a stir. | 51:21 |
And it also appeared that the defense department | 51:30 | |
and the justice department had been considering | 51:41 | |
whether and how to apply the army field manual, | 51:47 | |
but that all came out in the summer of, | 51:52 | |
I think it was the summer of 2004. | 51:55 | |
Interviewer | Do you recall your reaction | 51:58 |
when you saw that there was a torture memo written | 51:59 | |
without your knowledge two years? | 52:02 | |
- | I was not happy about it. | 52:04 |
Interviewer | Why? | 52:08 |
- | Because I should have been advised and asked for my views. | 52:09 |
It had to do with the interpretation of a treaty. | 52:16 | |
And we would expect that the department of state | 52:21 | |
which negotiated the treaty | 52:27 | |
and had a lot of information about it | 52:29 | |
would have been a consultant. | 52:33 | |
Interviewer | Did you raise those concerns? | 52:39 |
- | Yeah, of course. | 52:40 |
Interviewer | And what kind of reaction did you get? | 52:41 |
- | We're starting with just, | 52:44 |
well we didn't get around to talking to you. | 52:45 | |
I mean, (indistinct) | 52:48 | |
Interviewer | Did you change your impression | 52:51 |
about what had really been going on | 52:53 | |
over these years once you saw that torture memo? | 52:55 | |
- | Yes, of course. | 52:58 |
Interviewer | How? | 52:59 |
- | Yeah, and then also, I believe there was also | 53:00 |
by that time, at some point, some indication | 53:06 | |
that there were other people being detained, | 53:10 | |
not in Guantanamo, but elsewhere, | 53:14 | |
which we hadn't been aware of. | 53:18 | |
Interviewer | We weren't aware of the rendition. | 53:19 |
- | No, and that, so that then | 53:21 |
and these people being detained | 53:25 | |
in what were called later black sites, | 53:27 | |
we were not part of that. | 53:35 | |
Interviewer | How did this secretary respond to these? | 53:38 |
- | I didn't really discuss it with him. | 53:42 |
Interviewer | Do you feel you should have been informed | 53:47 |
on the black sites as well in the (indistinct) | 53:48 | |
- | Of course. | 53:51 |
Interviewer | Because it was also an international issue | 53:55 |
that you should be giving as well. | 53:57 | |
- | Yeah. | 53:59 |
Interviewer | Well, these, | 54:02 |
we might know the answer to this | 54:05 | |
but I think it's important for history | 54:06 | |
because I think people will be watching this even | 54:07 | |
perhaps more than today. | 54:11 | |
And did you begin to think maybe the rule of law | 54:12 | |
wasn't really being adhered to in America? | 54:18 | |
I mean, is what kind of, what feelings did you get | 54:21 | |
when you all sense, discover these things from the inside? | 54:24 | |
- | Well, I was very unhappy about it. | 54:29 |
It felt a little bit the same way as I felt | 54:32 | |
when I found out about Abu Ghraib. | 54:35 | |
Interviewer | Which is? | 54:39 |
- | Great disappointment and unhappiness | 54:41 |
with the fact that there were people who were not complying | 54:50 | |
with what I had thought they were complying with. | 54:55 | |
Interviewer | How did you hear about Abu Ghraib? | 55:02 |
- | In the newspaper. | 55:04 |
Interviewer | And what kind of reaction | 55:08 |
did other people have? | 55:10 | |
- | The same? | 55:12 |
Interviewer | Well, did it seem to you | 55:15 |
like things are beginning to fall apart. | 55:16 | |
You're just given three very distinct events | 55:18 | |
that occurred within a six month period | 55:22 | |
that American had generally never participated in before | 55:26 | |
and is not the way we see ourselves. | 55:31 | |
How do people in the state department view all this? | 55:34 | |
- | Well, we didn't like it at all. | 55:40 |
I mean, that's clear, | 55:43 | |
but I wouldn't wanna speak for other people | 55:45 | |
but Abu Ghraib was a shame | 55:52 | |
and a blot on the military | 55:56 | |
and the people who were responsible for it. | 55:59 | |
And similarly the homicides in bogroom | 56:03 | |
and the mistreatment of people in Guantanamo | 56:08 | |
when that emerged, | 56:14 | |
it's hard to know what you can do | 56:24 | |
beyond being disgusted and objecting | 56:27 | |
and investigating and punishing those responsible. | 56:32 | |
Interviewer | I mean, Alberto Mora | 56:36 |
told us that he felt he was misled | 56:37 | |
by people higher up as to what was going on. | 56:40 | |
Did you have that same kind of feeling? | 56:43 | |
- | Yeah, of course. | 56:47 |
Interviewer | Well, looking back at it, | 56:50 |
it's something that the state department | 56:53 | |
or somebody that could have done | 56:56 | |
to avoid something like this from happening | 56:57 | |
and how do we stop it from happening the next time? | 56:59 | |
- | Well, I think you make sure that the people | 57:04 |
in the justice department and the defense department | 57:06 | |
and the White House consult with a little more broadly | 57:09 | |
and actually that began to happen, I believe, | 57:14 | |
although I wasn't there and this is going on now. | 57:19 | |
Interviewer | How do you make sure? | 57:23 |
- | By appointing people who will do that kind of thing. | 57:26 |
Interviewer | Did you leave | 57:30 |
because of your sense of betrayal | 57:31 | |
or a sense of sadness, why did you leave? | 57:37 | |
What caused you to leave at that early | 57:40 | |
right after what you just talked about. | 57:42 | |
- | Well, a couple of reasons. | 57:44 |
So the secretary who had asked me to come | 57:49 | |
and do that job had left. | 57:54 | |
And the new secretary, secretary Rice | 57:58 | |
had her own counsel from the NSC, | 58:02 | |
John Bellinger, whom she wanted to have in my slot. | 58:05 | |
And she didn't have anything else for me to do. | 58:10 | |
So that was time for me to go | 58:12 | |
and it was time for me to go anyway (laughs) | 58:13 | |
Interviewer | Did you think the new secretary | 58:17 |
would be more, would do a better job | 58:19 | |
in making sure that the DOJ and the DOD | 58:22 | |
would inform her of actions they're taking? | 58:26 | |
- | I think so. | 58:30 |
And actually for the simple reason | 58:32 | |
that what their, the practice that they had had | 58:37 | |
of not telling people had kind of backfired on them | 58:42 | |
particularly with the torture memo | 58:48 | |
which had to be withdrawn | 58:50 | |
and their own people, Jack Goldsmith for instance | 58:52 | |
had withdrawn quite a few memoranda | 58:57 | |
that had been previously issued. | 59:03 | |
And he had the approach | 59:06 | |
that you needed to consult very broadly. | 59:08 | |
That's the way you change it. | 59:13 | |
Interviewer | Did you have interactions | 59:15 |
with the CIA to the state department of (indistinct)? | 59:16 | |
Like did they, the CIA have any obligation | 59:20 | |
to inform the state department | 59:23 | |
of it's (indistinct) actions too? | 59:26 | |
Or is that where, who would influence? | 59:29 | |
- | I would have thought they should, but they didn't. | 59:30 |
Interviewer | Did you know Rizzo? | 59:35 |
- | Yes. | 59:38 |
Interviewer | And during all this time you knew him? | 59:40 |
- | I don't know. | 59:42 |
Interviewer | Looking back, how do you feel about the fact | 59:45 |
that you were interacting with all these people | 59:48 | |
and they weren't telling you the truth? | 59:49 | |
- | Oh, they weren't telling me everything they were doing. | 59:53 |
Well, I don't like it. | 59:57 | |
It's not the way I was brought up | 59:59 | |
to operate in the government. | 1:00:01 | |
I wouldn't actually put John Rizzo | 1:00:06 | |
in that same category | 1:00:09 | |
as the people in the justice department | 1:00:11 | |
and the defense department. | 1:00:13 | |
Interviewer | Why is that? | 1:00:15 |
- | I don't think that he felt he had actually | 1:00:16 |
an obligation to share whatever he wasn't sharing with me. | 1:00:19 | |
And he was also very, he was very concerned | 1:00:27 | |
at various points about what advice he was getting | 1:00:35 | |
or not getting from the justice department. | 1:00:39 | |
Interviewer | Did you know what power John Yoo was playing | 1:00:43 |
during those years before the memos came out? | 1:00:46 | |
- | Well, it didn't seem to be very close | 1:00:48 |
to the White House counsel's office. | 1:00:50 | |
Interviewer | Did you think that it was (indistinct) | 1:00:52 |
- | No, that would be normal. | 1:00:55 |
The office of legal counsel should be very close | 1:00:59 | |
to the White House Counsel's office. | 1:01:03 | |
Interviewer | Well since | 1:01:08 |
I'm seeing government for so many years looking back, | 1:01:14 | |
would you have some advice and perhaps some sobering advice | 1:01:17 | |
as to what we can do | 1:01:25 | |
in the future to make sure I know you said some things | 1:01:28 | |
but I think it's really important | 1:01:31 | |
'cause how do you know you have the right people in there | 1:01:32 | |
and how do you guarantee | 1:01:35 | |
that we do have a situation that won't occur | 1:01:36 | |
like you've described? | 1:01:41 | |
- | (laugh) you do need to get the right people | 1:01:45 |
and have it be that they are open | 1:01:50 | |
and prepared to work with others, | 1:01:54 | |
and that they have sound views, that's all. | 1:01:59 | |
What else can you do? | 1:02:08 | |
I mean, I can't think of people are going to be | 1:02:09 | |
in those positions who don't want to work with other people | 1:02:16 | |
or let them know what they're doing. | 1:02:19 | |
It won't work, it's true. | 1:02:23 | |
Interviewer | I mean, I guess I'm seeking. | 1:02:31 |
What kind of emotion did you or others feel? | 1:02:32 | |
I mean, it does seem like tell better more as a betrayal. | 1:02:37 | |
I mean, it seems to me people who really work in government | 1:02:41 | |
for so many years and really believe | 1:02:44 | |
in doing the right thing | 1:02:46 | |
and are confronted with this, it must be so hot on people. | 1:02:47 | |
And I just think it's important | 1:02:54 | |
for the viewer to see how you felt from. | 1:02:55 | |
- | Well, it's been awhile. | 1:03:01 |
I have to say what, it's eight years | 1:03:03 | |
since I was in government or discovered about these things. | 1:03:06 | |
And I guess I've gotten used to knowing it. | 1:03:10 | |
I don't wanna get all worked up all over again. | 1:03:17 | |
Interviewer | Did people come to you | 1:03:23 |
and have comments to you as to what we can do now, | 1:03:24 | |
did you worry that maybe there's still more hidden agendas | 1:03:29 | |
that you're not aware of? | 1:03:33 | |
- | I don't think there are at the moment. | 1:03:38 |
Oh, well, there are now. | 1:03:40 | |
I'm not meant to be aware of them. | 1:03:41 | |
Interviewer | Could that mean, that tend, | 1:03:44 |
do you think there more that I think there were more hidden | 1:03:45 | |
that you weren't aware of. | 1:03:49 | |
- | I think it's all pretty much out in the open now. | 1:03:51 |
Maybe there's more, I don't know. | 1:03:55 | |
There would be Jack Goldsmith's written a book. | 1:03:58 | |
He would be the man who would know. | 1:04:03 | |
- | Right. | 1:04:05 |
When Obama was elected, | 1:04:06 | |
do you think he would close Guantanamo? | 1:04:08 | |
- | He said he would. | 1:04:13 |
Interviewer | Do you think he would, | 1:04:14 |
did you think it was possible? | 1:04:15 | |
- | I thought so. | 1:04:16 |
Interviewer | Were you surprised when he couldn't do it? | 1:04:18 |
- | Yes. | 1:04:20 |
That's, I would have thought | 1:04:23 | |
he would have been able to do it. | 1:04:24 | |
Interviewer | And why do you think he was able to? | 1:04:27 |
- | I think the Congress made it very difficult for him. | 1:04:29 |
They use their appropriating power, I believe | 1:04:32 | |
to prevent any expenditures | 1:04:38 | |
to move the detainees to the US or something, I don't know. | 1:04:43 | |
I wasn't close to it. | 1:04:48 | |
That would have been quite a long time after I was out. | 1:04:51 | |
- | Do you miss working in government? | 1:04:55 |
- | No. | 1:04:57 |
- | Were you involved in the Iraq? | 1:05:03 |
I know that Colonel Wilkerson told us he was involved | 1:05:05 | |
in writing some of the speeches that Colin Powell gave her | 1:05:09 | |
in getting involved with some of the work of Iraq. | 1:05:13 | |
Were you involved in that too? | 1:05:16 | |
- | We were involved in the discussion | 1:05:18 |
of the UN resolutions related to Iraq. | 1:05:21 | |
We drafted them. | 1:05:24 | |
We looked at other drafts that other people had made | 1:05:26 | |
and that was our job to make sure that the invasion | 1:05:33 | |
or the use of force against Iraq was authorized. | 1:05:39 | |
Interviewer | Did you see Iraq coming? | 1:05:44 |
Some people believe that the administration was, | 1:05:47 | |
they had to go into Iraq very early on. | 1:05:49 | |
Did you see that early on? | 1:05:53 | |
- | I began to think in the summer of 2002, | 1:05:57 |
that we were very likely, | 1:06:04 | |
the president would very likely decide | 1:06:08 | |
that he had to use force in Iraq. | 1:06:10 | |
Interviewer | Why do you think that? | 1:06:13 |
- | Because we were getting reports | 1:06:15 |
that the Iraqi's Saddam Hussein was using, | 1:06:17 | |
was trying to develop weapons of mass destruction. | 1:06:31 | |
And I thought that the president | 1:06:36 | |
would use force to stop him. | 1:06:40 | |
Interviewer | Were there any dissenters | 1:06:43 |
who felt that force? | 1:06:45 | |
Wasn't a good idea, especially | 1:06:47 | |
since we were already in Afghanistan? | 1:06:48 | |
- | They're not in the administration as I recall. | 1:06:53 |
Brent Scowcroft wrote a memo, wrote op-ed | 1:06:55 | |
and maybe Zbig Brzezinski too. | 1:07:00 | |
There would but within the administration | 1:07:02 | |
I don't think, and I was not a policy official | 1:07:08 | |
in this sense, but I think most people felt | 1:07:12 | |
that the threat of Saddam Hussein using, | 1:07:20 | |
developing weapons of mass destruction | 1:07:27 | |
was something that had to be stopped. | 1:07:30 | |
And by use of force if that was necessary | 1:07:32 | |
Interviewer | Were you surprised | 1:07:36 |
when you discovered that in fact | 1:07:37 | |
that the US was misled | 1:07:38 | |
as to his not having weapons mass destruction? | 1:07:40 | |
- | I think he misled us. | 1:07:46 |
Interviewer | And the UN was misled too. | 1:07:50 |
- | Yes and no. | 1:07:54 |
Some in the UN I think felt that he was developing WMD | 1:07:57 | |
and some didn't. | 1:08:05 | |
I don't know that the Mr., was it Blix. | 1:08:06 | |
Interviewer | Yeah. | 1:08:11 |
- | I'm not sure what he thought. | 1:08:12 |
He Knew that he hadn't found evidence that he was, | 1:08:16 | |
but I don't know that he decided that he wasn't. | 1:08:19 | |
Interviewer | Were you involved | 1:08:25 |
with some of the legal issues? | 1:08:26 | |
- | Yes, yeah. | 1:08:27 |
Interviewer | I'm not sure. | 1:08:32 |
I have many other questions if. | 1:08:33 | |
- | How are we doing on time? | 1:08:34 |
- | We are at about. | 1:08:35 |
- | If I can ask you one. | 1:08:37 |
- | It's what? | 1:08:40 |
Interviewer | (indistinct) 6:15. | 1:08:41 |
- | Oh, we're doing fine. | 1:08:42 |
Interviewer | Yeah, so is there some questions | 1:08:42 |
I didn't ask you that you wanted to share with the audience | 1:08:44 | |
as to what you saw these last 10 years, and. | 1:08:49 | |
- | I don't think so. | 1:08:56 |
I've written a couple of articles here and there | 1:08:59 | |
and I think that I'm not writing anymore. | 1:09:03 | |
Interviewer | So should Guantanamo be closed. | 1:09:12 |
Do you think it should be closed? | 1:09:21 | |
- | As a base for are meeting, | 1:09:24 |
as a base for detaining people from the war with Al-Qaeda | 1:09:28 | |
and yes, I think it would be, | 1:09:38 | |
there aren't very many people there anymore. | 1:09:45 | |
And as I understand it, maybe 100, something like that. | 1:09:49 | |
I think they should be tried in the United States | 1:09:56 | |
and dealt with. | 1:10:02 | |
Interviewer | You think it will ever be closed? | 1:10:09 |
- | I have no idea. | 1:10:12 |
I mean, the base will stay as a Naval base calling station | 1:10:16 | |
whatever purpose it originally had. | 1:10:26 | |
Interviewer | Right. | 1:10:28 |
- | Yeah. | 1:10:29 |
Interviewer | Has your attitude or thoughts | 1:10:30 |
about the US change over the last 10 years? | 1:10:33 | |
Just what you observed in terms of how. | 1:10:38 | |
- | Not fundamentally, no, no, not about the US, no. | 1:10:43 |
Interviewer | Are you disappointed other people | 1:10:49 |
around the world have a different impression of the US? | 1:10:52 | |
- | I think we've lost some credibility | 1:10:59 |
and some attraction for some people, | 1:11:08 | |
but I'm quite sure that we can win them back | 1:11:12 | |
by behaving better. | 1:11:16 | |
Interviewer | And you believe we will behave better. | 1:11:19 |
- | I am sure we will. | 1:11:22 |
Interviewer | Do you think that was an anomaly then | 1:11:24 |
with that what happened during those years? | 1:11:25 | |
Was it an anomaly and is probably | 1:11:29 | |
it's not as likely to happen again. | 1:11:31 | |
- | As far as the interaction between the justice department | 1:11:33 |
and the state department and the defense department. | 1:11:39 | |
Yes, I think it was. | 1:11:42 | |
Interviewer | And the kinds of the torture? | 1:11:43 |
- | Well, that too, yes, yeah. | 1:11:46 |
That's been repudiated. | 1:11:48 | |
Interviewer | Right. | 1:11:50 |
And if there was another 911, | 1:11:51 | |
do you think it still would be repudiated? | 1:11:53 | |
- | I would hope so. | 1:11:56 |
Interviewer | If you have nothing else to add, | 1:11:59 |
I think I'm done. | 1:12:01 | |
If there's any kind of thoughts. | 1:12:04 | |
- | Okay, yeah, no. | 1:12:06 |
Interviewer | You need 20 seconds. | 1:12:06 |
Johnny needs 20 seconds of room tone where. | 1:12:08 | |
- | Right, I have heard about that concept. | 1:12:10 |
Interviewer | Okay, yeah, okay (indistinct) | 1:12:13 |
Johnny | Okay, begin room tone. | 1:12:16 |
End room tone. | 1:12:34 |
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