larry johnson on rendition

This is a must-read, because Larry cuts through the confusion surrounding rendition.

There is a lot of erroneous information floating around about “renditions.” Former CIA analyst Michael Scheuer is a major source for much of the confusion because he claims that he started the “renditions” program in 1995. Horseshit!

...

Poor Michael (who fortunately was removed from his job in the CIA’s Counter Terrorism Center) never heard of Fawaz Younis. Younis was the first terrorist rendered and it happened in 1987 while Ronald Reagan was President.

...

The orders signed by Obama do not preclude a terrorist suspect being rendered for judicial proceedings. That was never a problem not an objectionable matter. What President Obama is clearly signaling is an end to the practice of taking terrorist suspects and putting them in the hands of foreign governments that will torture for us. And there is nothing in the Executive Orders signed by Obama that contradicts that. But you would not know that if you read Miller’s piece.

Be sure to check it out in full.


Updated with this piece from Andrew Sullivan:

And so we are greeted with whoops and hollers because the Obama administration will return to the rendition policies of the GWH Bush and Clinton administrations. Note, as Hilzoy does, what this isn't. It is not the practice of "extraordinary rendition" that the Bush-Cheney administration pioneered to supplement its own torture program. It is the practice of capturing terror suspects and rendering them to non-torturing foreign governments for detention, interrogation or prosecution.