Paul Rester

Paul Rester is the director of the Joint Intelligence Group at the United States' Guantanamo Bay detention camps, in Cuba—the Chief Interrogator.[1][2][3][4][5][6][7]

Rester described the interrogation techniques the military used at Guantanamo to the Associated Press.[1] He said he was concerned that the CIA's use of "extended interrogation techniques" had given the public the wrong impression of the techniques the military used at Guantanamo.

Everybody in the world believes that they know how we do what we do, and I have to endure it every time I turn around and somebody is making reference to waterboarding.

Rester told Andrew Selsky of the Associated Press that the successes of the American military interrogators had come through "rapport-building" techniques—not coercive or brutal techniques.[1] He said Joint Task Force Guantanamo commander Mark Buzby had authorized him to describe one of the interrogators recent successes.

For security reasons, he would only discuss one of the successes, and that was only because his boss, Rear Adm. Mark Buzby, already had described it in a speech last month. Buzby said several detainees, using poster board paper and crayons, drew detailed maps of the Tora Bora area in eastern Afghanistan that enabled coalition forces to wipe out safe houses, trenches and supplies last summer as Taliban forces were returning to the stronghold they had abandoned more than five years ago.

Rester acknowledged that Mohammed al Qahtani, and one other captive, had been subjected to rougher treatment in 2002.[1] He didn't offer the name of the other captive who had been subjected to rougher treatment.

Time Magazine reported that Mohammed al Qahtani's interrogation log had been leaked to them, and that it documented he had been subjected to almost two months of sleep deprivation, forced nudity, force-feedings, forced enemas, threats against his family, and sexual humiliation.

According to Selsky's article Joshua Colangelo-Bryan, a lawyer who volunteered to help Guantanamo captives "scoffed at Rester's contention that rough treatment at Guantanamo was restricted to just two men."[1]

There are so many accounts by FBI agents ... and others who personally saw non-rapport-building techniques that Rester's statement is just not credible.

Following the United States Supreme Court's ruling in Hamdan v. Rumsfeld Rester stated:[7]

Nobody wants to be the first person to allow the next 9/11 to happen. Emptying this place is not my goal.

References
  1. Andrew O. Selsky (February 16, 2008). "Gitmo Interrogator Describes Tactics". Associated Press. Retrieved 2010-03-16.
  2. Eric Firkel (February 17, 2008). "Chief Guantanamo interrogator says most info not forced from detainees". The Jurist. Archived from the original on July 4, 2008. Retrieved 2008-02-10.
  3. Sergeant Christina Douglas (June 16, 2006). ""The O'Reilly Factor" comes to GTMO" (PDF). The Wire (JTF-GTMO). Retrieved 2008-02-16. After lunch, O'Reilly toured various camps and met with Navy RearAdm. Harry B. Harris, the commander of JTF-GTMO, Army Colonel Michael Bumgarner, the commander of the Joint Detention Group, Paul Rester, the director of the Joint Intelligence Group, and two interrogators.
  4. Andrew O. Selsky (February 7, 2008). "US Admiral Confirms Secret Camp at Gitmo". Associated Press. Retrieved 2008-02-16. Paul Rester, the military's chief interrogator at Guantanamo, told AP he has been interviewing one of the Camp 7 detainees and that others may be interrogated, depending on intelligence needs.
  5. Terry Moran (June 26, 2006). "EXCLUSIVE: Guantanamo's Chief Interrogator Says 'We Don't Employ Torture'". ABC News. Retrieved 2008-02-16. For myself, torture is the deliberate and sadistic of mental or physical pain on another human being. It's as simple as that. For the pure and simple satisfaction of doing it. It serves no redeeming social value in eliciting concrete information. It serves no redeeming social value in -- in obtaining the knowledge we need to combat this particular enemy.
  6. "Ex-Guantanamo prisoner, once among youngest held, back in U.S. custody". International Herald Tribune. January 18, 2007. Retrieved 2008-02-16.
  7. "Ruling won't affect camp: commander". Dawn. June 30, 2006. Retrieved 2008-02-16.


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