Asia Times picks up the Lockheed Martin's torturer story

http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/GK19Ak03.html

The men who ask the questions

Dozens converged this summer on the US high desert town of El Paso, Texas, en route to spending six months in Iraqi prisons.

They were going not as prisoners, but as interrogators, walking a legal tightrope that stretches across the Geneva Conventions. Just for signing up, they got a US$2,000 check from a company that is rapidly becoming one of the key employers in the world of intelligence: Lockheed Martin.

After a week of orientation and medical processing, they flew to Tampa, Florida, and on to their final destinations - Iraq's infamous prisons, including Abu Ghraib, Camp Cropper near Baghdad International Airport and Camp Whitehorse near the southern Iraqi town of Nasariyah.

Known in the intelligence community as "97 Echoes" (97E is the official classification number for the interrogator course taught at military colleges), these civilian contractors work side-by-side with military interrogators using 17 officially sanctioned techniques, ranging from "love of comrades" to "fear up harsh" - violently throwing detainees to the ground. Their subjects will be the tens of thousands of men and women put into United States-run military jails on suspicion of links to terrorism.

Jobs for this new breed of interrogators typically begin with a phone call or email to retired Lieutenant Colonel Marc Michaelis, in the quaint flour-milling town of Ellicott City, Maryland, about an hour's drive from Washington.
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while you are at A.T. you might check out the home page which has four articles on:

The ghosts haunting the White House

Two ghosts raised by the invasion of Iraq are hovering over the White House: Vietnam and Watergate. This week, they have been vying for attention as never before. First, famed Watergate investigative reporter turned stenographer for the Bush administration, Bob Woodward, crashed and burned over the Libby case, which has its roots in cover-up and lies relating to the Iraqi WMD deception. Then, decorated Vietnam War veteran and hawkish congressman John Murtha demanded the immediate pullout of US forces from the Iraqi quagmire. Asia Times Online tells the horror stories:


'Bring them home'
After a long, patriotic silence, Bush's congressional opponents finally find their voices, writes Jim Lobe.

Rise of the 'patriotic journalist'
Robert Parry chronicles the decline of the US news media since the Watergate glory days.

The lesson of Watergate
It may look bad now, but it's going to get worse, writes Tom Engelhardt in his introduction to the Elizabeth de la Vega article below.

Libby's 'some other dude did it' defense
Is Woodward's revelation a bombshell or a smokescreen? Former US federal prosecutor Elizabeth de la Vega examines the evidence.
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