On Point II: Table of Contents

Chapter 5. Intelligence and High-Value Target Operations

ON POINT II: Transition to the New Campaign

The United States Army in Operation IRAQI FREEDOM May 2003-January 2005

Part II

Transition to a New Campaign

Chapter 5
Intelligence and High-Value Target Operations

Notes

1. “Brigadier General Dempsey Briefs on 1st Armored Division Operations in Iraq,” DefenseLink, 20 November 2003, http://www.defenselink.mil/transcripts/2003/tr20031120-0893.html (accessed 21 July 2006).

2. “Dempsey Briefs on 1st Armored Division.”

3. FM 34-1, Intelligence and Electronic Warfare (Washington, DC, 1994), 4–1.

4. FM 34-1, 4–1.

5. Major General Barbara Fast, interview by Contemporary Operations Study Team, Fort Leavenworth, KS, 27 March 2006, 3.

6. Fast, interview, 27 March 2006, 3.

7. Lieutenant General Ricardo Sanchez, interview by Contemporary Operations Study Team, Fort Leavenworth, KS, 14 August 2006, 7–8.

8. Sanchez, interview, 14 August 2006, 8.

9. Sanchez, interview, 14 August 2006, 8.

10. Colonel D.J. Reyes, e-mail interview by Contemporary Operations Study Team, Fort Leavenworth, KS, 17 January 2007, 4.

11. Sanchez, interview, 14 August 2006, 8.

12. Fast, interview, 27 March 2006, 3.

13. Sanchez, interview, 21 August 2006, 11–12.

14. Fast, interview, 27 March 2006, 18.

15. Fast, interview, 27 March 2006, 10.

16. Fast, interview, 27 March 2006, 10.

17. Fast, interview, 27 March 2006, 19.

18. Fast, interview, 27 March 2006, 13, 16.

19. Eliot Cohen et al., “Principles, Imperatives, and Paradoxes of Counterinsurgency,” Military Review, March–April 2006, 50.

20. 1-24 Infantry (SBCT), Adapting in Combat: Reorganizing to Fight a Counter-insurgency Briefing, slide 3.

21. Colonel Stephen R. Lanza et al., “Red Team Goes Maneuver: 1st Cav Div Arty as a Maneuver BCT,” Field Artillery, May–June 2005, 13.

22. Lanza et al., 13.

23. Colonel D.J. Reyes, 101st Airborne Division, JIATF Mission Statement Slide.

24. Lieutenant Colonel Brian McKiernan, interview by Contemporary Operations Study Team, Fort Leavenworth, KS, 29 April 2006, 11.

25. McKiernan, interview, 29 April 2006, 11.

26. McKiernan, interview, 29 April 2006, 11.

27. 173d Airborne Brigade, After Action Review Briefing, 22 January 2004, slide 8.

28. 173d ABN Bde, AAR, slide 7.

29. 1-24 Inf (SBCT), Adapting in Combat, slide 3.

30. 1-24 Inf (SBCT), Adapting in Combat, slide 6.

31. 1-24 Inf (SBCT), Adapting in Combat, slide 8.

32. 1-24 Inf (SBCT), Adapting in Combat, slide 9.

33. Fast, interview, 27 March 2006, 12.

34. Colonel Ralph Baker, interview by Contemporary Operations Study Team, Fort Leavenworth, KS, 1 November 2005, 7.

35. Baker, interview, 1 November 2005, 7.

36. Fast, interview, 27 March 2006, 9.

37. 1st Armored Division, The 636 Insurgent Cell: The Gift that Keeps on Giving Briefing, slide 9.

38. 1st AD, 636 Insurgent Cell, slide 17.

39. 1st AD, 636 Insurgent Cell, slide 26.

40. 1st AD, 636 Insurgent Cell, slide 50.

41. LTC [name redacted], CONUS Team, Department of the Army Inspector General, Memorandum for Chief, Inspections Division. SUBJECT: 4th Infantry Division Detainee Operations Assessment Trip Report, no date. (Memorandum based on interviews conducted by CONUS Team between 5–8 April 2004.), 395, http://action.aclu.org/torturefoia/released/091505/15937.pdf (accessed 11 January 2006).

42. 519th MI Battalion, 525th MI Brigade, Operation Iraqi Freedom: Lessons Learned, 29 March 2004, 9.

43. 519th MI Bn, 525th MI Bde, OIF: Lessons Learned, 9.

44. McKiernan, interview, 29 April 2006, 13.

45. McKiernan, interview, 29 April 2006, 13.

46. FM 3-19.40, Military Police Internment/Resettlement Operations (Washington, DC, 2001), chapter 1.

47. Colonel Marc Warren, Statement to US Army Preliminary Screening Inquiry, 29 November 2004, 6. (Used with permission of Colonel Warren.)

48. Warren, Statement to US Army Preliminary Screening Inquiry, 29 November 2004, 6.

49. Colonel Marc Warren, e-mail correspondence with author, 5 March 2007. The specific contents of these FRAGOs remain classified as of this writing.

50. Colonel Marc Warren, interview by Contemporary Operations Study Team, Fort Leavenworth, KS, 15 March 2007, 11.

51. Lieutenant General Raymond Odierno, interview by Contemporary Operations Study Team, Fort Leavenworth, KS, 14 December 2005, 13–14.

52. Brigadier General Michael Tucker, interview by Contemporary Operations Study Team, Fort Leavenworth, KS, 20 January 2006, 8.

53. 2d Brigade, 2d Infantry Division, After Action Review: Operation Iraqi Freedom 04–06 Briefing, 5 December 2005, slide 240.

54. Lieutenant General Anthony R. Jones, AR 15-6 Investigation of the Abu Ghraib Prison and the 205th Military Intelligence Brigade, 9.

55. Major General Donald Ryder, Assessment of Corrections and Detention Operations in Iraq, 6 November 2003, 4, 8.

56. Major General John Batiste, interview by Contemporary Operations Study Team, Fort Leavenworth, KS, 20 April 2006, 12.

57. “Stryker Brigade Combat Team 1, 3d Brigade, 2d Infantry: Operations in Mosul, Iraq,” Initial Impressions Report (Fort Leavenworth, KS: Center for Army Lessons Learned, 21 December 2004), 54.

58. Department of the Army, The Inspector General, Detainee Operations Inspection, 21 July 2004, 33.

59. LTC [name redacted], CONUS Team, DA IG, Memorandum. SUBJECT: 4th ID Detainee Operations Assessment Trip Report, 394.

60. LTC [name redacted], CONUS Team, DA IG, Memorandum, SUBJECT: 4th ID Detainee Operations Assessment Trip Report, 394.

61. LTC [name redacted], CONUS Team, DA IG, Memorandum, SUBJECT: 4th ID Detainee Operations Assessment Trip Report, 380–381.

62. This section on interrogation operations at Abu Ghraib is intended as a summary of the key events and decisions that surround the abuses at the prison. Because of the complexity of the issues involved, the authors of this study encourage all readers to look into the key primary sources, which are available to the public, to gain a deeper understanding of the origins and characteristics of operations at the prison. Those sources, most importantly the AR 15-6 investigations into the 800th MP Brigade and the 205th MI Brigade, are identified in the endnotes below.

63. The Taguba Report and the AR 15-6 Investigations led by Lieutenant General Anthony Jones and Major General George Fay, which contain the details, recount the story of the abuses in a complete fashion and are available to the public. See Major General Antonio M. Taguba, Article 15-6 Investigation of the 800th Military Police Brigade (The Taguba Report); IG, Detainee Operations Inspection, 21 July 2004. See also Jones, AR 15-6 Investigation; and Major General George Fay, AR 15-6 Investigation of the Abu Ghraib Prison and 205th Military Intelligence Brigade.

64. Fay, AR 15-6 Investigation, 41. The AR 15-6 asserted that Colonel Pappas had command authority over the JIDC. See page 31 of Fay report.

65. Fay, AR 15-6 Investigation, 42.

66. Fay, AR 15-6 Investigation, 39.

67. The officer directing the use of stress positions and sleep adjustment claimed in a sworn statement that while conducting interrogations in Afghanistan in 2002, these techniques received approval from the Coalition military headquarters on a case-by-case basis. See “Sworn Statement of CPT [redacted], 519th MI BN, Annex to Major General George Fay, AR 15-6 Investigation of the Abu Ghraib Prison and the 205th Military Intelligence Brigade, http://www.aclu.org/torturefoia/released/030905/DOD565_615.pdf (accessed 16 January 2007), DOD 000602 and DOD 000603.

68. Taguba, Annex 46, “Testimony of Colonel Thomas Pappas, Commander, 205th MI Brigade,” to The Taguba Report, 9 February 2004, 1, http://www.aclu.org/torturefoia/released/a46.pdf (accessed 16 January 2007).

69. Fay, AR 15-6 Investigation, 39.

70. IG, Detainee Operations Inspection, 21 July 2004, 45.

71. Fay, AR 15-6 Investigation, 76.

72. For use of guidance from other campaigns, see “Sworn Statement of CPT [redacted], 519th MI BN, Annex to Fay, AR 15-6 Investigation, http://www.aclu.org/torturefoia/released/030905/DOD565_615.pdf (accessed 16 January 2007), DOD 000602 and DOD 000603.

73. Fay, AR 15-6 Investigation, 59.

74. Taguba, Annex 20, “The Miller Report” to The Taguba Report, 2.

75. Taguba, Annex 20, “The Miller Report” to The Taguba Report, 6.

76. Taguba, Annex 20, “The Miller Report” to The Taguba Report, 6.

77. Fay, AR 15-6 Investigation, 18.

78. US Congress, Joint Resolution, 107th Cong., 1st sess. (14 September 2001): SJ23ES. It stated: “That the President is authorized to use all necessary and appropriate force against those nations, organizations, or persons he determines planned, authorized, committed, or aided the terrorist attacks that occurred on September 11, 2001, or harbored such organizations or persons, to prevent any future acts of international terrorism against the United States by such nations, organizations or persons.”

79. Karen J. Greenberg and Joshua L. Dratel, eds., The Torture Papers: The Road to Abu Ghraib (Cambridge, MA: Cambridge University Press, 2005), xxi.

80. President George W. Bush, Memorandum, Subject: Humane Treatment of al-Qaeda and Taliban Detainees, 7 February 2002, http://www.pegc.us/archive/White_House/bush_memo_20020207_ed.pdf (accessed 26 October 2006).

81. Office of the Assistant Attorney General, Memorandum for Alberto R. Gonzales, Counsel to the President, Re: Standards of Conduct for Interrogation under 18 U.S.C. 2340-2340A, 1 August 2002. The memo reads in part: “We [the authors] conclude below that Section 2340A proscribes acts inflicting, and that are specifically intended to inflict, severe pain or suffering, whether mental or physical. Those acts must be of an extreme nature to rise to the level of torture within the meaning of Section 2340A and the Convention. We further conclude that certain acts may be cruel, inhuman, or degrading, but still not produce pain and suffering of the requisite intensity to fall within Section 2340A’s proscription against torture. We conclude by examining possible defenses that would negate any claim that certain interrogation methods violated the statute.”

82. Vice Admiral Albert T. Church, Unclassified Executive Summary, “The Church Report,” DefenseLink, February 2005, http://www.defenselink.mil/news/Mar2005/d20050310exe.pdf (accessed 14 July 2005), 4.

83. Church, “The Church Report,” 4.

84. This legal guidance, issued in March 2003 by the Office of Legal Counsel (OLC) in the US Department of Justice remains classified as of this writing. However, Jack Goldsmith, the head of the OLC in late 2003 and 2004, acknowledged its existence and its authority in relation to the DOD Working Group. Jack Goldsmith, The Terror Presidency: Law and Judgment Inside the Bush Administration (New York, NY: W.W. Norton & Company, 2007), 143.

85. Church, “The Church Report,” 5.

86. Church, “The Church Report,” 5.

87. Secretary of Defense, Memorandum for the Commander, US Southern Command, Subject: Counter-Resistance Techniques in the War on Terrorism, 16 April 2003, http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB127/03.04.16.pdf (accessed 17 July 2006), 1.

88. Secretary of Defense, Memorandum, Subject: Counter-Resistance Techniques, 5.

89. Secretary of Defense, Memorandum, Subject: Counter-Resistance Techniques, 5.

90. Secretary of Defense, Memorandum, Subject: Counter-Resistance Techniques, 1.

91. Fay, AR 15-6 Investigation, 24.

92. Combined Joint Task Force–7, CJTF-7 Interrogation and Counter-Resistance Policy, 14 September 2003, 1, http://www.aclu.org/FilesPDFs/september%20sanchez%20memo.pdf (accessed 2 March 2007).

93. CJTF-7 Interrogation and Counter-Resistance Policy, 14 September 2003, 1.

94. CJTF-7 Interrogation and Counter-Resistance Policy, 14 September 2003, 1.

95. The sources are unclear about the origins of these added techniques. The Fay–Jones Report suggests that A Company, 519th MI BN, recommended the techniques. Fay, AR 15-6 Investigation, 25. However, the individual testimonies of an officer in A Company, 519th MI BN, and the Staff Judge Advocate assigned to the 205th MI Brigade present a more complex staffing process. See “Sworn Statement of CPT [redacted], 519th MI BN, Annex to Fay, AR 15-6 Investigation, http://www.aclu.org/torturefoia/released/030905/DOD565_615.pdf (accessed 16 January 2007), DOD 000603 and DOD 000604. See also Statement of person in 1st Armored Division Office of the Staff Judge Advocate, who was attached to 205th MI Brigade. Annex to Fay, AR 15-6 Investigation, http://www.aclu.org/torturefoia/released/030905/DOD565_615.pdf (accessed 16 January 2007), DOD 000848. Further clarification about additional recommended techniques: the Secretary of Defense’s 16 April 2003 did approve sleep adjustment as a technique, but defined it as the reversal of sleep schedules, not the reduction of a detainee’s sleep.

96. Fay, AR 15-6 Investigation, 25.

97. Sanchez, interview, 25 August 2006, 5.

98. CJTF-7 Interrogation and Counter-Resistance Policy, 14 September 2003, 1.

99. Warren, interview, 15 March 2007, 13.

100. Warren, interview, 15 March 2007, 13.

101. The 12 techniques removed were the presence of military working dogs; sleep management; sleep adjustment; yelling, loud music, and light control; stress positions; deception; isolation; false flag; environmental manipulation; dietary manipulation; change of scenery up; and change of scenery down. The General Safeguards section of the 12 October 2003 ICRP did allude to the possibility that military working dogs might be approved for security purposes during interrogations, but that they were to be muzzled and under handler’s control at all times.

102. Taguba, Annex 94, “Headquarters, Combined Joint Task Force Seven, CJTF-7 Interrogation and Counter-resistance Policy” to The Taguba Report, 1.

103. Sanchez, interview, 25 August 2006, 5.

104. Fay, AR 15-6 Investigation, 28.

105. “Sworn Statement of CPT [redacted], 519th MI BN, Annex to Fay, AR 15-6 Investigation, http://www.aclu.org/torturefoia/released/030905/DOD565_615.pdf (accessed 16 January 2007), DOD 000603 and DOD 000604.

106. “Sworn Statement of CPT [redacted], 519th MI BN, Annex to Fay, AR 15-6 Investigation, http://www.aclu.org/torturefoia/released/030905/DOD565_615.pdf (accessed 16 January 2007), DOD 000603 and DOD 000604.

107. Fay, AR 15-6 Investigation, 28.

108. Sanchez, interview, 25 August 2006, 5.

109. Sanchez, interview, 25 August 2006, 5.

110. Fay, AR 15-6 Investigation, 5.

111. Fay, AR 15-6 Investigation, 22.

112. Fay, AR 15-6 Investigation, 92; Sanchez, interview, 25 August 2006, 6.

113. Major General Barbara Fast, comments in 6 March 2007 e-mail to author, 4.

114. Taguba, Annex 53, “Testimony of LTC Steve Jordan, Director, Joint Interrogation and Debriefing Center,” to The Taguba Report, 21 February 2004, 2–5, http://www.aclu.org/torturefoia/released/a53.pdf (accessed 17 January 2007).

115. Fay, AR 15-6 Investigation, 43.

116. Taguba, Annex 53, “Testimony of LTC Steve Jordan” to The Taguba Report, 21 February 2004, 107.

117. Fay, AR 15-6 Investigation, 46.

118. Fay, AR 15-6 Investigation, 96–109.

119. Fay, AR 15-6 Investigation, 96–99.

120. Fay, AR 15-6 Investigation, 91. This report documented Colonel Pappas’ use of UCMJ (Field Grade Article 15) to discipline three Soldiers who had been suspected of sexually assaulting a female detainee on 7 October 2003. Before deciding to use UCMJ, Pappas had ordered an Army CID investigation which ended inconclusively. The 205th MI commander also removed them from interrogation operations. See page 72 of the Fay Report.

121. Fay, AR 15-6 Investigation, 92; Sanchez, interview, 25 August 2006, 16.

122. Fay, AR 15-6 Investigation, 92; Sanchez, interview, 25 August 2006, 6.

123. Fay, AR 15-6 Investigation, 16.

124. Jones, AR 15-6 Investigation, 16–17.

125. Fay, AR 15-6 Investigation, 119.

126. IG, Detainee Operations Inspection, 21 July 2004, 21.

127. Kathleen T. Rhem, “Commanders in Iraq ordered Humane Treatment of Detainees,” DefenseLink, 20 May 2004, http://defenselink.mil/news/May2004/n05202004_200405206.html (accessed 25 October 2006).

128. Vice Admiral A.T. Church III, Review of Department of Defense Detention Operations and Detainee Interrogation Techniques (The Church Report), 7 March 2005, 8. As of this writing, the details of the May 2004 Interrogation Policy remain classified.

129. Church, Review of Department of Defense Detention Operations, 8.

130. Fast, interview, 27 March 2006, 4.

131. 2d Bde, 2d ID, AAR: OIF 04-06, 5 December 2005, slide 249.

132. “Stryker Brigade Combat Team 1, 3d Brigade, 2d Infantry: Operations in Mosul, Iraq,” 86.

133. Sergeant Major Stephen Kammerdiener, interview by Contemporary Operations Study Team, Fort Leavenworth, KS, 11 April 2006, 13.

134. Fast, interview, 27 March 2006, 4.

135. Major Kenneth Cary, interview by Contemporary Operations Study Team, Fort Leavenworth, KS, 7 December 2005, 9.

136. Sanchez, interview, 25 August 2006, 3.

137. 2d Bde, 2d ID, AAR: OIF 04–06, slide 112.

138. 2d Bde, 2d ID, AAR: OIF 04–06, slide 113.

139. Sanchez, interview, 25 August 2006, 3.

140. Sanchez, interview, 25 August 2006, 3.

141. 2d Bde, 2d ID, AAR: OIF 04–06, slide 301.

142. 2d Bde, 2d ID, AAR: OIF 04–06, slide 301.

143. Sanchez, interview, 25 August 2006, 3.

144. Colonel J. Mike Murray, interview by Contemporary Operations Study Team, Fort Leavenworth, KS, 8 December 2005, 14.

145. 2d Bde, 2d ID, AAR: OIF 04–06, slide 262.

146. Headquarters, 2d Brigade, 2d Infantry Division, Memorandum for Record, SUBJECT: OIF 04–06 After Action Review for 2d BCT, 2d ID, 5 December 2005, slide 262.

147. Colonel D.J. Reyes, e-mail interview, 17 January 2007, 2.

148. Charles H. Briscoe et al., All Roads Lead to Baghdad: Army Special Operations in Iraq (Fort Bragg, NC: US Army Special Operations Command History Office, 2006), 427.

149. Colonel D.J. Reyes, OBJ SNAKE, 12 JUN 03, slide, in Briscoe et al., All Roads Lead to Baghdad, the authors state that US forces killed 70 enemy at the terrorist camp on 12 June 2003. See page 434.

150. Colonel David Teeples, interview by Contemporary Operations Study Team, Fort Leavenworth, KS, 4 November, 8–9.

151. Headquarters, 2d Brigade Combat Team, Memorandum, Subject: 2d Brigade Combat Team’s Service in Operation Iraqi Freedom. 25 August 2004, 6.

152. 1st Infantry Division, Operation Iraqi Freedom–Samarra: An Iraqi Success Briefing, 4 October 2004, slide 23.

153. Captain Michael S. Erwin, interview by Operational Leadership Experiences Project Team, Combat Studies Institute, Fort Leavenworth, KS, 19 April 2006, 5.

154. Captain Natalie Friel, interview by Operational Leadership Experiences Project Team, Combat Studies Institute, Fort Leavenworth, KS, 28 July 2006, 6.

155. Friel, interview, 28 July 2006, 6.

156. Friel, interview, 28 July 2006, 6.

157. Erwin, interview, 19 April 2006, 9.

158. Erwin, interview, 19 April 2006, 9

159. “About Iraqi 55 Most Wanted Regime Leader Cards,” Iraq’s 55 Most Wanted Playing Cards, http://www.streetgangs.com/iraq/ (accessed 20 March 2006); “U.S. Distributes Most-Wanted List,” Fox News, 11 April 2003, http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,83894,00.html (accessed 20 March 2006).

160. Tom Zucco, “Troops Deal an Old Tool,” St. Petersburg Times, 12 April 2003, http://www.sptimes.com/2003/04/12/news_pf/Worldandnation/Troops_dealt_an_old_t.shtml (accessed 20 March 2006).

161. Zucco.

162. “Iraq’s Most Wanted,” BBC News, 11 November 2005, http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/middle_east/2939125.stm (accessed 20 March 2006); “Another Saddam Relative Nabbed,” CBS News, 14 April 2003, http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2003/04/18/iraq/main549930.shtml (accessed 22 March 2006).

163. “Iraq’s Most Wanted”; “Another Saddam Relative Nabbed.”

164. “Iraq’s Most Wanted.”

165. Michael R. Gordon and General Bernard E. Trainor, Cobra II: The Inside Story of the Invasion and Occupation of Iraq (New York: Pantheon Books, 2006), 435.

166. Gordon and Trainor, 435.

167. Reyes, e-mail interview, 17 January 2007, 2–3; Lieutenant General David H. Petraeus, interview by Contemporary Operations Study Team, Fort Leavenworth, KS, 17 February 2006, 14.

168. Petraeus, interview, 18 March 2006, 3.

169. Brigadier General Frank Helmick, interview by Contemporary Operations Study Team, Fort Leavenworth, KS, 15 February 2006, 6.

170. Petraeus, interview, 17 February 2006.

171. Petraeus, interview, 17 February 2006, 15.

172. Petraeus, interview, 18 March 2006, 14.

173. Petraeus, interview, 18 March 2006, 3.

174. Gordon and Trainor, 435.

175. Robert O. Babcock, Operation Iraqi Freedom I: A Year in the Sunni Triangle (Tuscaloosa, AL: St. John’s Press, 2005), 185.

176. Lieutenant Colonel Brian Reed, interview by Operational Leadership Experiences Project Team, Combat Studies Institute, Fort Leavenworth, KS, 26 October 2005, 12–13.

177. Babcock, 185–86.

178. Chief Warrant Officer Bryan Gray, interview by Operational Leadership Experiences Project Team, Combat Studies Institute, Fort Leavenworth, KS, 17 November 2005, 10.

179. Colonel James Hickey, interview by Contemporary Operations Study Team, Fort Leavenworth, KS, 15 February 2006, 6.

180. Babcock, 186, 188.

181. Babcock, 186, 188

182. Reed, interview, 26 October 2005, 14.

183. 1st Brigade Combat Team, 4th Infantry Division, “Operation RED DAWN, Baylor Bears Brief,” slides 6 and 7.

184. 1st BCT, 4th ID, “Operation RED DAWN,” slides 6 and 7.

185. Babcock, 192.

186. Hickey, interview, 15 February 2006, 11.

187. Hickey, interview, 15 February 2006, 10.

Chapter 5. Intelligence and High-Value Target Operations

Intelligence and the Transition to Full Spectrum Operations

The HUMINT Gap