JAG Objections to Interrogation Tactics

I am not at all surprised to see that senior JAG officers raised serious objections to the Pentagon's interrogation policies when they were in development:

Three top military lawyers said yesterday that they lodged complaints about the Justice Department's definition of torture and how it would be applied to interrogations of enemy prisoners captured by U.S. forces, the first time they have publicly acknowledged that they objected to the policy as it was being developed in early 2003.

At a Senate hearing yesterday, the judge advocate generals (JAGs) for the Army, Air Force and Marines said they expressed their concerns as the policy was being hashed out at the Pentagon in March and April 2003. Though their letters to the Defense Department's general counsel are classified, sources familiar with them said the lawyers worried that broadly defined, tough interrogation tactics would not only contravene long-standing military doctrine — leaving too much room for interpretation by interrogators — but also would cause public outrage if the tactics became known.

The Army JAG Legal Center and School sits adjacent to the University of Virginia School of Law, from which I recently graduated. I distinctly remember a panel event focus on the interrogation policies, and either John Yoo or Jack Goldsmith (maybe both) were on the panel. They have become (in)famous as authors and architects of various terror-related policies. Anyhow, there were a number of JAG officers in attendance, and the discussion became quite heated. It was abundantly clear that the JAG folks felt a lot of disdain for the policies that were being handed down from DOJ and DOD. It was very interesting to see, especially since it occurred at a time when civilians were being labelled unpatriotic or charged with giving aid and comfort to the enemy for raising the same objections.