General Rejects Call to Penalize Ex-Guantanamo Prison Chief

Military investigators recommended that the former commander of the U.S. military prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, be reprimanded for his role in detainee mistreatment at the facility, but a top Army general rejected the conclusion, defense and congressional sources said Tuesday.

Investigators had recommended a reprimand for Army Maj. Gen. Geoffrey Miller, who ran the Guantanamo Bay prison until March 2004 and was sent to Iraq the next month to overhaul a dysfunctional U.S. military prison system there, shortly before the Abu Ghraib prison scandal became public.

If his reprimand in a new report being issued today had been upheld, Miller would have been the highest-ranking military official to be disciplined in connection with abuses of detainees at U.S. military prisons worldwide.

But the recommendation to reprimand Miller was rejected by Army Gen. Bantz J. Craddock, the chief of the U.S. Southern Command in Miami, which oversees the island prison at Guantanamo.

The military investigators concluded that Miller had failed to monitor the interrogation of Mohammed Al-Qahtani, a so-called high-value prisoner known as the “20th hijacker” for his alleged intention to participate in the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.

The investigators, Air Force Lt. Gen. Randall M. Schmidt and Army Brig. Gen. John T. Furlow, determined that the interrogation techniques used on Al-Qahtani were degrading and abusive, but did not “rise to the level of inhumane treatment,” according to one source briefed on the investigation’s findings.

Whereas Schmidt and Furlow recommended that Miller be disciplined for his failure to monitor the interrogation, Craddock rejected that conclusion on the grounds that Miller did not violate U.S. “law or policy,” according to the source, who spoke on condition of anonymity because portions of the investigation were classified.

Last month, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld said that information obtained during the interrogation of Al-Qahtani helped lead to the arrest of Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, who is considered the mastermind of the Sept. 11 attacks.

The investigation by Schmidt and Furlow is the last in a series of Pentagon inquiries into detainee abuse launched after the Abu Ghraib prison scandal unfolded in May 2004.

The case will now be forwarded to the Army inspector general, though it is unlikely Craddock’s decision will be overturned.

The conclusion of the investigation in effect closes the book on the Pentagon’s examination of detainee abuse worldwide. During the examination, the only senior officer to be reprimanded was former Brig. Gen. Janis Karpinski, the Army Reserve officer who commanded the military police brigade at Abu Ghraib.

Human rights groups on Tuesday condemned Craddock’s move, citing it as another example of senior officials escaping punishment for their role in the prison abuse scandal while low-ranking soldiers took the blame.

“Until there is accountability from top to bottom at Guantanamo Bay, the American people will have no reason to believe that our government is holding itself to the rule of law,” said Christopher Anders, legislative counsel at the American Civil Liberties Union.

Craddock had ordered the investigation into interrogations at Guantanamo Bay after FBI agents complained that military personnel physically and mentally abused prisoners during interrogations, in some cases using methods that many rights advocates said could be considered torture.

In revelations last year, the FBI agents alleged that military officials had placed lighted cigarettes in prisoners’ ears, chained detainees to the floor in a fetal position and humiliated inmates by having female interrogators smear them with fake menstrual blood.

The Schmidt-Furlow investigation concluded that interrogators in several cases had used unauthorized techniques that violated Army regulations and the Geneva Convention. But the investigation concluded that none of the techniques rose to the definition of torture or inhumane treatment.

The improper techniques cited by the military investigators included binding a prisoner’s head and mouth with duct tape; using cold, heat and sleep deprivation to break down prisoners’ will; “short shackling” detainees to the floor and denying them food and water; and having military personnel impersonate FBI agents and State Department officials.

According to sources familiar with the report, the investigators found several cases of “gender coercion” during interrogations. One female interrogator sprayed a detainee with perfume, and another massaged a prisoner’s back. Investigators also confirmed the fake menstrual blood incident.

Schmidt and Furlow will present their findings to Congress today.

The U.S. prison at Guantanamo Bay has been the source of intense anger throughout the Arab world since its creation in the months after the Sept. 11 attacks. Anger surged in recent weeks after military officials found evidence of Koran desecration by U.S. military personnel on base. Critics have called for closing the prison, but the Bush administration argues that it houses prisoners who pose a direct threat to the U.S.

Miller was widely praised for overhauling the Guantanamo Bay prison, of which he took command in fall 2002, especially for devising methods for having military police play a more active role in intelligence gathering. He earned a reputation within the Pentagon as the military’s foremost expert in detainee operations.

Miller was dispatched to Iraq last year to overhaul detainee operations that had become tarnished by early reports of the abuses at Abu Ghraib.

But soon after taking charge, Miller found himself on the defensive after questions arose over his previous assessment of Abu Ghraib, during the summer of 2003, just months before the abuses at the prison occurred.

Critics, including Karpinski, accused Miller of creating an atmosphere that led to the abuses at Abu Ghraib, charges that Miller has long denied and subsequent Pentagon investigations have not supported.

Miller is currently posted at the Pentagon, serving in a position on the Army staff.