Former intel chair: CIA tape affair part of 'an ongoing pattern' of Bush administration cover-up David Edwards and Jason Rhyne

Published: Thursday December 13, 2007



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Print This Email This The former chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee says he was kept in the dark about severe interrogations of suspected al-Qaeda terrorists taped by the CIA, and calls the episode just another example of the Bush administration's "covering up" of unwanted revelations. Former Sen. Bob Graham (D-FL), who chaired the Senate Intelligence Committee from 2001 to 2003 -- the period during which the CIA has admitted to implementing waterboarding and other severe methods on two high-level detainees -- says he was never told by the agency that such tactics were being employed. Appearing on CNN's American Morning, Graham was asked about a recent story in the Washington Post which cited officials claiming that four members of Congress, including now-Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, had been thoroughly briefed about the techniques being used. But if that briefing did occur, it didn't include him -- and it certainly should have, said the former intelligence chairman. "I was briefed on a number of other activities that were going on after 9/11, but not on this issue of the use of torture to gain information from detainees," said Graham. "Not only should I have been briefed, but the entire committee [should have] been briefed." As described by the Post, most of the briefings heard by the so-called "gang of four," which consists of the chairman and ranking member of the House and Senate intelligence committees. "The only basis for what they called these covert gang of four briefings is where the president has indicated there's an action that's being undertaken for which the United States wants to have deniability," said Graham. "It's not a blanket for every subject that the intelligence community might be involved with. My judgment, this was not a covert operation, and should have been briefed to the entire intelligence committee." Graham went on to describe the confining structure of the classified briefing process. "You can't take any notes. You can't bring anyone with you and after the meeting, you cannot discuss what you've heard," he said. "So that if, for instance, there's an issue about 'is this legal under the Geneva Conventions,' you can't go to someone who is an expert on that subject and get their opinion. It is a very limiting situation." The whole affair involving the CIA's intel gathering tactics -- and subsequent decision to destroy tapes of its interrogations -- were part of an ongoing attempt by the Bush administration to obfuscate the truth, he said. "Let me say, this is not an isolated episode," said the former chairman. "This administration has had a practice of covering up, disclosing, what they were doing in a variety of matters. This is just one example of an ongoing pattern." It's not the first time Graham has accused the Bush administration of a cover-up, having previously alleged that the White House had hidden evidence exposing Saudi Arabia's links to the Sept. 11 hijackers. In his book 'Intelligence Matters,' Mr. Graham writes that the administration prohibited a Congressional inquiry's interview of the landlord of two of the 9/11 hijackers, who he said could help prove the connection. Graham called a letter to that effect "a smoking gun," telling reporters that the "reason for this cover-up goes right to the White House." This video is from CNN's American Morning, broadcast on December 13, 2007.













