Also posted at Daily Kos, NION, and Invictus
First it was the leak of the 2003 Standard Operating Procedures (SOP) Manual for Guantanamo. The SOP included procedures for psychological torture and abusive conditions of detention, including long-term isolation to foster dependence upon interrogators and “enhance and exploit the disorientation and disorganization felt by a newly arrived detainee in the interrogation process”. Also, prisoners were hidden from the International Red Cross.
The military assured critics that “SOPs by definition, undergo periodic review and change as situations warrant. Detention operations at JTF-GTMO have evolved significantly since 2003…”
Now Wikileaks has released a copy of the 2004 SOP, and guess what? Nothing changed, unless (mostly) for the worse! As the Washington Post notes, since the Supreme Court “prepares to hear arguments this week on the rights of enemy combatants at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, the public is getting another peek at how detainees have been treated there.”