May 30, 2003: Military Interrogators Encouraged to Use Harsh Interrogation Tactics FBI Personnel Consider Questionable, Possibly Illegal

An FBI memo released to the American Civil Liberties Union in 2006 (ACLU—see February 23, 2006) documents escalating tensions between FBI and Defense Department personnel stationed at Guantanamo. According to the memo, beginning in late 2002, Defense Department interrogators received encouragement from their superiors to “use aggressive interrogation tactics” that FBI agents believed were “of questionable effectiveness and subject to uncertain interpretation based on law and regulation.” The memo names Major General Geoffrey Miller, the commander of Joint Task Force-Guantanamo, as supporting interrogation methods FBI agents believe “could easily result in the elicitation of unreliable and legally inadmissible information.” FBI personnel took their concerns to senior Pentagon officials, but were ignored. [American Civil Liberties Union, 2/23/2006]