Finally we have proof that it wasn't just "a few bad apples" - it went right to the top. A controversial torture memo from Bush's Office Of Legal Council has just been released. As has been long suspected, Bush's top legal advisers assured him that he was "free to override [international law] at his discretion".
And US soldiers practicing torture had nothing to worry about either:
"Even if... an interrogation method might violate those prohibitions, necessity or self-defense could provide justifications for any criminal liability."The Justice Department memo was written by John Yoo and dated March 14, 2003. It was sent to the Pentagon's top lawyer, William J. Haynes, and not rescinded for another nine months. By that time there was a rampant culture of abuse prevalent at Gitmo and Abu Ghraib. It wasn't till 2004 that investigations began to reveal the extent of it.
Tell me again: where does the buck stop?????
