Testimonies of Camp Delta Standing Operating Procedures, 2002

On October 25, 2012, Wikileaks released a Camp Delta Standing [sic] Operating Procedures for 2002 (click here). The document released differed sharply, however, from the earlier standard operating procedures it released. Both in form and in content. First, the released document has egregious spelling, grammar, and formatting errors. The former can be found even in titles (cf. "Famaliarazation" instead of "Familiarization"). Second, the document seems to have material simply deleted (as opposed to redacted) from it. To give an example, Page 13 of 48 introduced a section "b" for which no section "a" was previously introduced. Mentioned in this section "b" are a number of steps which start at "4" and go through "9". But no mention can be found of any prior steps 1, 2, 3. Along the same lines, page 13 of 48 concludes with a "Section 18. MILITARY POLICE BLOTTER". But no section prior to 18 can be found in the document—let alone seventeen such sections. Page 14 of 18 then continues with step 10 as if the aforementioned Section 18 was never mentioned.

As to content, the document has only 33 pages—which is an order of magnitude smaller than the previously released standard operating procedures for Camp Delta. And the omissions from the document are puzzling. There is almost no mention, for example, of forced cell extractions and how to carry them out (as we find in other SOPs). There are passing references to IRFs (§3009) and how to shackle prisoners in them (§4005.6.c), but nothing about how to approach the cells. Or why. Interestingly, it mentions at §3009 the existence of an IRF-specific SOP. Along similar lines, there is no mention of the initial period of solitary confinement "to prolong the stress of capture" (as we find in other SOPs). Or of the linguistic policies that other SOPs lay down carefully (the use of "self harm gesture" instead of "suicide", for example. Or of "voluntary total fasting" instead of "hunger strike"). There is also no mention of terrorism or the war on terror as a justification for the base.

In light of these disparities, CSHRA will suspend judgement as to the reliability of this document as a source of testimony.

Further discussion of this document can be found in this piece by Jeffrey Kaye.