Psyche, Science, and Society

ACLU: Newly released documents confirm psychologists’ roles in Iraq and Afghanistan interrogations

May 5th, 2008

Catching up on what I missed last week. The ACLU posted newly released FOIA documents, including previously redacted sections of the Church Report on detainee abuse. Interestingly, these previously withheld materials are on medical and psychological complicity with abuse. The documents

include new details exposing the role of psychologists in military interrogations. The documents also uncover new information about the failure of military medical personnel to report abuses at Abu Ghraib, the military’s use of unlawful interrogation methods subsequent to a directive that was ostensibly meant to end such practices, and detainee deaths in Afghanistan and Iraq.

“The documents reveal that psychologists and medical personnel played a key role in sustaining prisoner abuse — a clear violation of their ethical and legal obligations,” said Amrit Singh, a staff attorney with the ACLU. “The documents only underscore the need for an independent investigation into responsibility for the systemic abuse of detainees held in U.S. custody abroad.”

With regard to psychologists:

The report states that “analogous to the BSCT in Guantanamo Bay, the Army has a number of psychologists in operational positions (in both Afghanistan and Iraq), mostly within Special Operations, where they provide direct support to military operations. They do not function as mental health providers, and one of their core missions is to support interrogations.”

Of course, these documents don’t really add much to what we psychologists have already known, but they do provide another source. As for Afghanistan, we have already known that Col. Morgan Banks and Captain Bryce Lefever, both of the APA’s PENS task force, were involved in interrogations there. As for Iraq, we knew that psychologists were present in the BSCT at Abu Ghraib, and that SERE psychologists aided Special Forces in Iraq.

Read the new material and the previously released Church Report here.

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