Detainees

Hayden: Probe of IG Is Just a 'Management Review'

Spencer Ackerman | October 23, 2007, 12:26PM

As Josh flagged, CIA Director Michael Hayden recently sat down with Charlie Rose for a two-part interview (the second part of which airs tonight). You'll be relieved to know that CIA has never made any mistakes in detentions, interrogations or renditions, and certainly not during Hayden's year-plus as director. Nor has the director made a mistake in examining the activities of John Helgerson, the CIA's inspector general, who himself was subjecting detentions, interrogations or renditions to review.

According to Hayden, his look into Helgerson's activities are no more than "a management review" -- "inquiry is the big and wrong word here," he said -- to see whether complaints made by the legal counsel's office and the CIA's clandestine operatives about Helgerson's fairness were merited. Hayden didn't say anything about whether such a management review will have a chilling effect on the IG's ability to conduct internal scrutiny of CIA programs, as many veteran intelligence watchers suspect. But not to worry: after all, the CIA doesn't make mistakes. (Except when it does.)

Hayden said that his special adviser, Robert Dietz, conducting the five-month-old Helgerson review, will wrap up work next week. Don't expect Dietz's report to be public.

Way Way Way Late Update: Here's the video from Hayden's chat with Rose:

Detainees

Mukasey's 'Goal' is Closing Guantanamo

Spencer Ackerman | October 17, 2007, 11:22AM

Mukasey wouldn't commit to recommending to President Bush that the Guantanamo Bay detention facility be closed. Shuttering Gitmo, reportedly, was one of Defense Secretary Robert Gates' first major recommendations to the president earlier this year.

Responding to Sen. Herb Kohl (D-WI), Mukasey said he's "not prepared to say, close it... there's no easy solution." His concern is figuring out what happens to the approximately 330 detainees still within the island prison. But he did say that "I'm prepared to say we need to get the best advice and the best ideas we can, with the goal of closing it down." He considered himself in broad alignment with the administration, since Bush said last year that he'd "like to close Guantanamo" but also added a number of caveats.