Early 2002: Guantanamo Interrogations Often Conducted Ineptly

Senior US military officials later concede that many of the interrogators initially sent to Guantanamo prison are poorly prepared. Almost none of them have any background in terrorism, al-Qaeda, or other relevant subjects, and many have never questioned a real prisoner before. One even is a reservist who had been managing a donut store. Interrogators often ask the same simple questions over and over again, such as “Do you know bin Laden?” Many interpreters are hired by private contractors and have no intelligence experience. Superiors responsible for military operations in Latin America with no experience with al-Qaeda often rewrite reports on prisoners. Army intelligence officer Lt. Col. Anthony Christino III will later recall, “At the beginning, the process was broken everywhere. The quality of the screening, the quality of the interrogations and the quality of the analysis were all very poor. Efforts were made to improve things, but after decades of neglect of human intelligence skills, it can’t be fixed in a few years.” [New York Times, 6/21/2004]