Washington Post: “In his first week in office, Obama had ordered an end to torture. And back in May 2009, before rejecting the idea of setting up a commission, Obama condemned harsh techniques in a soaring speech at the National Archives… Obama wanted to avoid distracting and divisive criminal prosecutions or hearings. He believed any inquiry of his would look like an attack on his predecessor, President George W. Bush, and dispel any hope of bringing a bipartisan spirit to government. And he feared that the intelligence services, whose career rank-and-file members had followed guidelines handed down from above, would feel they had been abandoned by a new administration.”
Save to Favorites