Dear Bureau Pat:

In 2005, the CIA clearly felt that their interrogation procedures might be subject to scrutiny. Under what circumstances would the CIA be required to submit tapes of their interrogations of terror suspects? Who would have the authority to request this confidential information and how would they go about mandating it?
 

Dear Watchdog,

Your question(s) have been under investigation by two oversight committees within Congress and, because these questions are of a sensitive nature and addressed in closed hearings where the public and the media are not allowed access, we may never have all the answers. These committees are:

1.    The Select Committee on Intelligence, led by Chairman Jay Rockefeller, who, among other duties, provides vigilant legislative oversight into the intelligence activities of the United States, assuring that such activities conform to the Constitution and laws of the United States.

2.    The Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, led by Chairman Silvestre Reyes. Stemming from the Intelligence Oversight Act of 1980, the Committee's jurisdiction is to keep tabs on the heads of those intelligence agencies who are mandated to keep the Committees "fully and currently informed" of their activities, including "any significant anticipated intelligence activity."

Typically, overt or covert actions within the administration are pursued by administrative policy (in this case classified policy) within the White House, through what the Bush administration refers to as National Security Policy Decisions, or NSPDs. At the operational level, agencies like the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) or the Department of Defense (DoD) develop actionable orders or internal policy by interpreting the President's policy (in the DoD, they're called Execution Orders-EXORDS).  However, on occasion, policy may come in some other form of direct correspondence.

The Department of Justice could also subpoena the tapes, if they were needed as evidence in a trial.  Remember we're dealing with a bureaucracy, and in most cases agencies and their staff do not act without direction or higher authority.  So at the end of the day, the two committees have the mandate to find the answers and the Court may exert its power if a federal case is made.  But the real question lies not in the procedures of interrogation (e.g., water boarding) but rather in any potential obstruction of justice by the administration.

The Only,

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