Psyche, Science, and Society

Levine on General “Coverup” Kiley

March 5th, 2007

Art Levine, who documented the APA interrogations issue in the Washington Monthly reminds people that the newly disgraced General Kiley, the man who did exactly nothing as wounded soldiers in their own filth in rooms infected with black mold, is also the man who has been covering up the abuses committed by the BSCT psychologists at Guantanamo [Lt. General "Coverup" Kiley: From Abused Detainees to Neglected Soldiers]:

The only question on Kiley’s future is this: will he be fired before the week’s out, after he testifies before Congress, or will he keep his job until assorted independent reviews and panels finish their work investigating outpatient care and issue their scathing criqiques?

But the Walter Reed scandal isn’t the first time that Kiley has covered up abuses. He was a point person for the Army’s coverup of the torture and degrading treatment of detainees by health professionals, including psychologists, at Guantanamo and other unaccountable military detention sites. He commissioned whitewashed “studies” of the problem that concluded that there wasn’t any abuse abetted by health professionals — even though his investigators never talked to any detainees or their attorneys. The problems were so widespread that the American Psychiatric Association and the American Psychiatric Association banned its members from being involved in interrogations, but the American Psychological Association allowed its members to continue to aid military interrogators. (The American Prospect and Salon , among others, helped publicize these issues in the last two years. ) Even so, Kiley appeared last year at the psychologists’ conference to plead for their continued involvement, while blithely downplaying the impact of coercive interrogation strategies.

Read it all.

Entry Filed under: APA, Guantanamo, Iraq, Psychology, Rights and Liberties, Torture, Veterans, War Crimes