TPM's Timeline of the CIA's Torture Tapes
By Spencer Ackerman and Paul Kiel - December 11, 2007, 4:18PM
For years, the CIA denied recording any interrogations of al-Qaeda detainees. For years, the Bush administration denied issuing any legal authorization for torture. And for years, members of Congress claimed ignorance of what the CIA and the Bush administration had in store for detained members of al-Qaeda. All of these denials have proven false.
There's a tremendous amount that remains unknown about CIA interrogations of al-Qaeda, the recording of those interrogations, and the destruction of those recordings. Determining just what is known is confusing, as is sorting out when crucial developments occurred. To provide a measure of clarity, TPMmuckraker has compiled a timeline of relevant events over the past five years. Since the core of the current controversy isn't about the destruction of the tapes but the interrogation methods those tapes captured -- which is of course unknown -- we included milestones on the administration's road to developing interrogation policy.
Invaluable research assistance was provided by Adrianne Jeffries, Peter Sheehy, and Andrew Berger. Mistakes in compiling this information are entirely our own, and we hope you'll alert us in comments to any errors we've made.
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