A WICKED BETRAYAL OF ALL WE STAND FOR
IT HAS taken the best part of 15 years to produce an official report into British involvement in the torture and kidnap of terror suspects, and the murky aftermath of the 9/11 attack on the Twin Towers.
Much too long. It is disgracefully and shamefully overdue.
However, yesterday’s report from the Intelligence and Security Committee commands respect. It is detailed, forensic, and shocking.
It shows that British involvement in George W Bush’s illegal and barbarous programme of kidnap for torture was far deeper and more extensive than we have previously been told.
The figures are stupefying: 13 incidents where British intelligence officers witnessed the mistreatment of suspects; 25 incidents where our intelligence personnel were told by the detainees they were being mistreated, and a further 128 incidents where intelligence officers were informed by foreign liaison services about instances of mistreatment.
Thanks to the ISC report, we at last learn for certain that there was direct ministerial involvement. The report contains the revelation that Jack Straw authorised, at least once, the payment of ‘a large share’ of the costs for a plane that was used for rendition purposes. That is reprehensible. The report doesn’t disclose the identities of the victims of that particular operation. It does, however, reveal they were taken to a location with a ‘real risk of torture or cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment’.
Mr Straw signed off this payment in September 2004, and yet just over a year later he made a remarkable statement in the House of Commons which bears repeating in full: ‘Unless we all start to believe in conspiracy theories and that officials are lying, that I am lying, that behind this is some kind of secret state which is in league with some dark forces, and let me also say, we believe that US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice is lying, there simply is no truth in the claims that the United Kingdom has been involved in rendition.’
MR Straw’s conspiracy theory, we now know, was true. This report lays that bare. Yet Mr Straw continues to maintain he didn’t know what was going on, insisting yesterday that he learned the truth of what had been happening for the first time from the ISC investigation.
This isn’t remotely good enough. The former Foreign Secretary was responsible for the British overseas intelligence service MI6 at a time when something went dreadfully wrong.
I don’t believe that his emphatic statement in the Commons when answering questions about extraordinary rendition 13 years ago is remotely compatible with his protestations of ignorance today. Mr Straw’s conduct was deplorable.
So, unfortunately, was that of Sir Richard Dearlove, who was head of MI6 at the time when the US embarked, with British collusion, on its programme of extraordinary rendition and torture after the attack on the Twin Towers on September 11.
The ISC report highlights the fact that British intelligence knew very early on that the US had changed its policy on torture to be far more aggressive, and yet they did not react, or even apparently deign to tell ministers.
In fairness, it was a very difficult time. There were fears of a follow-up attack and intelligence officers felt a patriotic duty to protect their fellow citizens. Some argued that the use of torture was justified by the extreme urgency of the international crisis which followed 9/11. I would remind them that in the late summer of 1990, Saddam Hussein invaded Kuwait. Back in those days, Margaret Thatcher was still British Prime Minister, and as war loomed she sent an instruction around Whitehall saying that under no circumstances should British officials make use of intelligence obtained under torture.
Something changed after 9/11, and not for the better.
It is essential to bear in mind that one of the most important pieces of information leading to the decision to go to war with Saddam Hussein in 2003 was obtained through the torture of Libyan terror suspect Ibn al-Shaykh al-Libi.
He told his interrogators that Saddam had close links with al-Qaeda. This information was widely used to justify the invasion of Iraq by President Bush, Vice-President Dick Cheney, Secretary of State Colin Powell, and others.
It was also completely untrue. Shaykh al-Libi disclosed later that he had fabricated these claims in order to mitigate his suffering.
This is one example where the use of torture proved utterly counter-productive. There are many other cases we know where it was simply worthless. Some victims pulled off the street were innocent of any terror involvement. For years, British spooks and politicians lied about all of this.
It is important to remember that the first Intelligence and Security Committee inquiry into extraordinary rendition, which was carried out as long ago as 2007, concluded that nothing had been amiss.
MI6 withheld vital documents from the inquiry, causing the committee to reach a false verdict.
SIR John Scarlett, successor to Sir Richard at MI6, was head of the agency at the time. This is the same John Scarlett who, as the head of the Joint Intelligence Committee at the start of the century, oversaw the deeply misleading dodgy dossier on Saddam Hussein’s weapons of mass destruction. In effect, that was a propaganda weapon to sell the calamitous Iraq invasion to the British people.
Spy novelist John le Carré once remarked that the health of a nation can be measured by the health of its intelligence services. If he is right, then something went very badly wrong with British intelligence, and Britain itself, at the start of the century.
Tony Blair, the Prime Minister at the time, must bear the heaviest responsibility, even though the ISC has produced no smoking gun linking him to torture. But Sir Richard and Sir John bear much of the blame.
Many unanswered questions remain, partly because Theresa May refused permission for key officials to be interviewed by the inquiry.
How much did Mr Straw really know? Why did intelligence chiefs not tell ministers the truth? What we do know for sure is that the intelligence services betrayed the values that Britain stand for.
Yet so far there has been barely a squeak of contrition from anyone involved. That isn’t good enough because torture, and collusion with torture, are not just a betrayal of British values. They are against the law.
Action should follow. Dearlove and Scarlett should be stripped of their knighthoods. They have brought shame and disgrace not just on MI6 but also on Britain.
In less tolerant countries, intelligence chiefs who have made much less serious errors get shot at dawn. As for Straw, he should be stripped of his Privy Councillorship.
And the question of prosecution must be reopened.
For our intelligence services to be effective, they need to have the trust of the British people, something they enjoyed for many years.
The ISC investigation suggests they are worthy only of contempt after their cynical betrayal of all that we stand for as a proud, civilised and humane nation. That is a disaster for British intelligence, and a disaster for Britain.