Published on Portside (https://portside.org/)
Gina Haspel, Trump’s Pick for CIA Director, Ran a Black Site for Torture
Glenn Greenwald
March 13, 2018
The Intercept
In May 2013, the Washington Post’s Greg Miller reported that the head of the CIA’s clandestine service was being shifted out of that position as a result of “a management shake-up” by then-Director John Brennan. As Miller documented, this official — whom the paper did not name because she was a covert agent at the time — was centrally involved in the worst abuses of the CIA’s Bush-era torture regime.
As Miller put it, she was “directly involved in its controversial interrogation program” and had an “extensive role” in torturing detainees. Even more troubling, she “had run a secret prison in Thailand” — part of the CIA’s network of “black sites” — “where two detainees were subjected to waterboarding and other harsh techniques.” The Senate Intelligence Committee’s report on torture also detailed the central role she played in the particularly gruesome torture of detainee Abu Zubaydah.
Beyond all that, she played a vital role in the destruction of interrogation videotapes that showed the torture of detainees both at the black site she ran and other secret agency locations. The concealment of those interrogation tapes, which violated multiple court orders as well as the demands of the 9/11 commission and the advice of White House lawyers, was condemned as “obstruction” by commission chairs Lee Hamilton and Thomas Keane. A special prosecutor and grand jury investigated those actions but ultimately chose not to prosecute.
The name of that CIA official whose torture activities the Post described is Gina Haspel. Today, as BuzzFeed’s Jason Leopold noted, CIA Director Mike Pompeo announced that Haspel was selected by Trump to be deputy director of the CIA.
This should not come as much of a surprise given that Pompeo himself has said he is open to resurrecting Bush-era torture techniques (indeed, Obama’s CIA director, John Brennan, was forced to withdraw from the running in late 2008 because of his support for some of those tactics only to be confirmed in 2013). That’s part of why it was so controversial that 14 Democrats — including their Senate leader Chuck Schumer, Dianne Feinstein, Sheldon Whitehouse, and Tim Kaine — voted to confirm Pompeo.
That Haspel was the actual subject of the 2013 Post story was an open secret. As Leopold said after I named her on Twitter as the subject of that story: “All of us who covered CIA knew. She was undercover and agency asked us not to print her name.” Gina Haspel is now slated to become the second-most powerful official at the CIA despite — or because of — the central, aggressive, sustained role she played in many of the most grotesque and shameful abuses of the war on terror.
Source URL: https://portside.org/2018-03-13/gina-haspel-trumps-pick-cia-director-ran-black-site-torture
'Recipe for War': Experts Warn Pick of Pompeo Intensifies Risk of US Attack on Iran
commondreams.org/news/2018/03/13/recipe-war-experts-warn-pick-pompeo-intensifies-risk-us-attack-iran
Tuesday, March 13, 2018
Appointing CIA director to lead State Department "furthers a dangerous trend in which Trump is increasingly surrounding himself with foreign policy hawks who fully support his erratic and belligerent foreign policy"
CIA director Mike Pompeo during his confirmation hearing last year. President Trump now wants the war hawk to serve as Secretary of State. (Photo: Joe Raedle/Getty Images)
For all the reasons to be concerned about President Trump's nomination of current CIA director Mike Pompeo to replace Rex Tillerson as Secretary of State, experts on Tuesday warn that an increased risk of a U.S.-initiated war with Iran should be at the top of the list.
In case you are wondering why Rex Tillerson had to be replaced with Mike Pompeo of all people: Iran.
Tillerson was too sane for a catastrophic and absolutely unnecessary Iran war.
Pompeo, on the other hand, has been waiting for this opportunity for decades.
Tillerson was too sane for a catastrophic and absolutely unnecessary Iran war.
Pompeo, on the other hand, has been waiting for this opportunity for decades.
In a reaction on Tuesday, the National Iranian American Council (NIAC), worried openly that Trump's nomination of Pompeo "could have profound implications for the fate of the Iran nuclear deal and the prospect of a new war in the Middle East."
In November of 2016, as CNBC notes, Pompeo warned that Tehran was "intent of destroying America," characterized the nuclear deal forged by the Obama administration as "disastrous," and said he was looking forward to "rolling back" the agreement.
A useful summary of Pompeo’s calls for war with Iran, even as deal was being negotiated and later when it was proven to be working. He is a disastrous pick. This will not end well. https://www.huffingtonpost.com/ryan-costello/trump-cia-pick-hyped-fact_b_13181260.html …
Given that Pompeo has also suggested military strikes would be more effective than diplomacy when it comes to Iran, NIAC said there are "serious questions about his fitness to serve as America's top diplomat."
According to NIAC president Trita Parsi, Pompeo as head of the State Department is "a recipe for war."
Reminder that only a day before #Pompeo was announced as CIA director, he tweeted that he was looking forward to “rolling back” what he called the “disastrous" nuclear deal with Iran.#Tillerson
"The firing of Tillerson and appointment of Pompeo furthers a dangerous trend in which Trump is increasingly surrounding himself with foreign policy hawks who fully support his erratic and belligerent foreign policy," Parsi later added in a statement to Deutsche Welle.
"Though Tillerson was not very effective, he nevertheless was an obstacle against Trump killing the nuclear deal with Iran. Pompeo, on the other hand, has been an ardent opponent of this multilateral agreement. The Iran nuclear deal is increasingly on life support as a result of this decision."
In fact, Trump explicitly cited Pompeo's thinking on Iran when he was asked by reporters on Tuesday morning about Tillerson's ouster.
"We disagreed on things," Trump said of the outgoing secretary of state. While Trump said he believes the Iran deal is "terrible," he said Tillerson that it "was okay."
"So we were not really thinking the same," Trump added. "With Mike Pompeo, we have a very similar thought process. I think it's going to go very well."
For those concerned about Pompeo's aggressive and hawkish positions, however, it's not at all clear that the results will be anywhere near very well.
"Unfortunately," NIAC warned in its response, "the net effect of Pompeo at State may not just be the further isolation of America and erosion of our credibility on the world stage, it may result in a dramatic escalation of tensions in the Middle East and a war with Iran."
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