The FBI's "War Crimes" File.

According to the IG report I posted on earlier, FBI agents were occasionally told by detainees that they had been abused. There was no clear guidance on how to handle this information, but some agents were apparently told to keep the details for possible inclusion in a "war crimes" file:

FBI agents also reported to us that detainees sometimes told FBI agents they had previously been abused or mistreated. FBI practices in dealing with such allegations varied over time. Some agents were told to record such allegations for inclusion in a "war crimes" file; others were told to include the allegations in their regular FD-302 interview summaries. As noted above, other FBI agents told us they were instructed not to record such allegations at all. No formal FBI procedure for reporting incidents or allegations of mistreatment to the military was established until after the Abu Ghraib prison abuses became public in 2004.

If you're startled by the lack of euphemism in describing detainee treatment, you shouldn't be. According to the 2004 CIA IG report on "enhanced interrogation techniques," even CIA agents participating in harsh interrogations worried that what they were doing would someday result in them being prosecuted for war crimes. Keep in mind that a number of the interrogations where the FBI observed abuse appears to have involved military personnel -- which should remind us all of how narrow Eric Holder's torture probe -- which will focus solely on those CIA interrogators who may have gone beyond the "legally sanctioned" levels of torture authorized -- actually is.

Just reading through the report, I'm reminded of the impact the revelation of the Abu Ghraib scandal had on public opinion--and how that forced changes in policy. This becomes all the more significant when you consider that the president recently signed a bill that gives the secretary of defense the authority to exempt from the Freedom of Information Act photographs showing detainee abuse between 2001 and 2009.

-- A. Serwer