Horn of Africa historical (pre-2011): catch all thread

[Tom Odom]

Agreed on the abuse thing and thanks for the legal definitions


But I will repeat what I first said to Wilf, if Mr Salopek got it right on the local perspectives--that is that the US was involved in transferring South African, Tunisian, and Rwandan Muslims to Ethiopia for interrogation--then the legal perspectives as we discuss them here are largely irrelevant to the effcts from such a program.

In this case, the US received bad PR simply because FBI and CIA officers allegedly interviewed some of the detainees. We don't read that US involvement, in the Kenyan-Ethiopian "sweep rendition", is "unclear" until the last sentence of the article - and that, only after we are reminded of an individual 2002 rendition from Kenya to Gitmo.

Nope. The unclear is near the bottom if the first page. Here is the last paragraph

In October, Ethiopia freed eight Kenyans held in custody for more than a year. Meanwhile, all those released without explanation are trying to get on with their lives.

"I still have some anxiety leaving my apartment," said Moosa, the South African. "I'm a bit paranoid. I will never leave South Africa again."

In between the "unclear" and that last paragraph, there is more discussion including the bit about the CIA and FBI types at the Sheraton in Addis. That part was sourced to HRW and the diplomatic crowd. Addis is not that big--having lived in several African gold fish bowls --new folks at the local ritz that is usually a watering hole get noticed quickly.

But in any case, my point is simply that if the US and AFRICOM are to invest so heavily in buidling rapport on the continent, then it has to be a fuly coordinated effort. That much of this happened before AFRICOM's watch matters not a whit; JTFHOA was in full swing as were ops in Somalia. In any case, to the Africans we--AFRICOM, JTFHOA, FBI, CIA or Sgt Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band--all look the same or are at least looked at from a common suspicious perspective.

Tom

[jmm99]

being temporarily stupid is not an issue - being permanetly stupid, is.

So, there is a bit of meat to the story. But, even if there weren't, I expect it would still find a receptive audience. E.g., Soapy Williams' 1964 Congo letter, forged by the Czechs. I expect we could find more than one GWOT operation that, even though arguably legal, resulted in a PR blowback.

[Bill Moore]

Among those captured was Daniel Joseph Maldonado, an American who is now serving a 10-year sentence in federal prison in Houston for undergoing military training at a camp in Somalia. Canadians, Swedes, Eritreans and Syrians also were detained.

While the operation netted a handful of hard-core Islamist militants who were training at jihadist camps in Somalia—an American among them—the vast majority of the detainees have been released without charges.

Tom,

Truth in lending, the only information I have on these allegations is the article you posted, so we're all making assumptions and forming opinions with little to no facts; however, you still bring up some good points:

Risk versus gain? The two paras I "selectively" cut and paste above indicate that the actual risk may have been very high to our national interests and even the Europeans. The author admits, yet simply glances over it, that some were hard core Islamist militants. Only speculaton, but if they were planning another major attack on western embassies somewhere in Africa, or to possibly hijack a plane, or execute a Mumbai type attack, then the renditions in theory could have prevented hundreds of innocent deaths.

You wrote,

But in any case, my point is simply that if the US and AFRICOM are to invest so heavily in buidling rapport on the continent, then it has to be a fuly coordinated effort. That much of this happened before AFRICOM's watch matters not a whit; JTFHOA was in full swing as were ops in Somalia. In any case, to the Africans we--AFRICOM, JTFHOA, FBI, CIA or Sgt Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band--all look the same or are at least looked at from a common suspicious perspective.

I agree 100%, and I hope that risk factor was taken into the analysis process, and I further hope that if the decision to execute was in some way influenced by us, there was a "deliberate" decision making process that weighed the costs versus benefits and that the right decision based on the information available at the time was made.

I'm not a big fan of the current administration, but I do agree strongly with the President's statement that this is a different type of war. If this unorthodox operation saved American and other innocent lives then that should also be considered in the calculus.

Final argument, "if" the American people found out we had intelligence of an impending attack and we didn't act to prevent it by all means necessary, what would their judgment be? Would they accept that we thought it was more important to enable AFRICOM strategic communication and gain access to Africa?

I only throw these what-if thoughts out for consideration. I would like to hear jmm99's thoughts from the legal perspective.

[davidbfpo]

I accept the point made by Bill Moore that US and other publics would ask questions if intelligence showed a real threat of attack and nothing was done.

What is missing INHO is that neither policy-makers or those with an IO mandate explain why pre-emption, detention without trial etc are used - when no-one is charged to appear in court.

Here in the UK much has been made of the number of successful prosecutions in terrorism cases, often with guilty pleas and sometimes admissions. Those cases account for around 10% of all those arrested for terrorism.

There is a clear need to explain why, to our own publics and those communities where suspects / terrorists hide. Alongside considering how our enemies and their "soft" supporters will react. In the UK they are too often left un-challenged.

[Bob's World]

Just a couple of observations:

First, in the law this would be described as "the slippery slope..." Once one starts waging CT ops in sovereign nations around the world, and detaining suspects, what starts off as fairly clean can get messy...

Second is that intel guys are great at first order effects: "this is a bad guy, stop him and you will stop or disrupt this bad thing." What they do not look at, and even often do not consider to part of their job, is what are the second and third order effects to our larger scheme of engagement in the area.

I experienced personally where the intel community continually listed one particular individual as one of the top 2-3 "High Value Individuals" and briefed the senior leadership to this effect for months. Finally the host nation rolled the guy up. When we went back to the intel community a few months later to get facts to put into an update brief for that same senior leadership, the assessment from those very same intel officers was that his removal had made the organization stronger.

Somehow, I suspect that with a different approach to our analysis we could have predicted that and taken a different course. So my question is that while it looks like there may be some great first order effects from some of these grabs...what are the deeper effects on the bigger picture???

[Tom Odom]

All good points from all posters.

JMM and the forged Congo Letter Good point and it could be that some of that is going on. In referring to the Congo, you bring to mind the Congo 64 rescue that the US and Belgium with other Western handnolders in the background agonized over for nearly 3 months, When it was finally done and several thousand hostages were rescued, the USIA Library in Cairo was burned to the ground in the backlash.


Bill Moore Understand that some of the round ups were valuable and we will probably not hear the gains. Hopefully there were real calculations involved. This takes me to

[Bob's World Essentially you describe intel target fixation and as leadership gets worse and in some cases the IO effort gets into the same cycle, we get into the mindset "if we only get this guy, we will unhinge them."

Secondary effects are slower to mount but often larger and of longer duration. Most targeteers on the intel side--especially other agencies--that I have met get caught up in the "shoot first" mentality unless someone is there to guide them through a longer target appreciation.

Last David You make the greatest point in response to the strategic needs generated by such programs. When it comes to extraordiary rendition, you had better be prepared to explain why someone was targeted and turned over to another country's apparatus--especially if you or the country holding them are going to release them.

Tom

[jmm99]

Tons of ink on multi-tons of paper have addressed "extraordinary rendition".

The 2005 Report for the All Party Parliamentary Group on Extraordinary Rendition (cite in post # 5 above) sums it:

(p.13)
International law on responsibility of a State with regard to unlawful acts of other States:

*Prohibits the knowing aid or assistance in the practice of Extraordinary Rendition;

*Requires a State to assert jurisdiction over Extraordinary Rendition in defined circumstances; and

*Requires a State to take into custody, investigate and then extradite or prosecute an alleged offender when that offender is on its territory.

and (same page)

To what extent does international law apply in the “War on Terror”?

International law prohibits both torture and complicity to torture in the context of terrorism and national security emergencies. The absolute nature of this prohibition in CAT Article 2(2) was specifically included in CAT to distinguish freedom from torture as one right from which no derogation is permitted under international law, even in times of war or other emergency. Unlike CAT, the ICCPR (Article 4(1)) and the European Convention (Article 15) contains provisions permitting certain derogations from human rights obligations in specific circumstances. Each of these conventions is clear, however, that certain rights are always non-derogable. Paradigmatic among these is the prohibition against torture. Like CAT’s non-derogability provision, the Geneva Conventions’ obligation to investigate and prosecute individuals who are alleged to have committed “grave breaches” of the Geneva Conventions is not derogable. Thus Geneva III’s prohibition against torture and inhumane treatment of POWs and Geneva IV’s prohibition against torture, inhumane treatment and unlawful transfers of civilians to States where they may be subject to Geneva Convention violations apply during war.

International and regional law uniformly provides that regardless of whether the transfer of a person occurs as part of an extradition request and regardless of any exceptional circumstances such as efforts to combat terrorism or another threat against national security, the anti-torture and non-refoulement principles would be violated if, as a result of such transfer, the person is at risk of being subjected to torture or other ill-treatment.

So, what I call Ordinary Rendition, a process which (if allowed by domestic law) permits some dispensation from formal extradition procedures, still seems viable. But, morphing that process into what we call Extraordinary Rendition has always been questionable. As Bob correctly says (both as lawyer and SF COL, I presume), this is a very slippery slope - both in terms of legal and non-legal coinsiderations.

Interrogations, interviews, whatever you want to call them, are not necessarily in violation of anything (assuming they meet legal standards); but, they can be tainted by the rest of the process. Much of this is wisdom applied - not law.

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Since I have to assume that these problems are long-term (for the rest of my life), a comprehensive set of standards have to be developed (intel, military, diplomatic, judicial) to handle not only hardcore types (Jack Bauer & 24 ?, which I have never watched, so I can't judge), but also the lesser goats and sheep who are caught up in the net.

IMO: The present "War Crimes" cases are a bloody mess (with some exceptions) and should be "lessons learned" on how not to do it - as David correctly alluded because he has been following the UK component of one of the messier cases (which may or may not continue here under the Obama DoJ).