The National Security Archive has published and cataloged a remarkable collection of over 83,000 primary source documents relating to US policy and practices of detention, interrogation and torture during the so-called war on terror.

“The goal of the The Torture Archive is to become the online institutional memory for essential evidence on torture. Specifically, the Torture Archive seeks to catalog and publish on the Web all primary source documents related to the detention and interrogation of individuals by the United States, in connection with the conduct of hostilities in Iraq and Afghanistan as well as in the broader context of the “global war on terror.” Thousands of these documents are currently available in multiple locations on the Internet and in numerous private collections, thanks to landmark Freedom of Information Act and habeas litigation, leaks from whistleblowers, public relations releases from government, investigative reporting by journalists including the Torturing Democracy team, and Congressional investigations. But the disparate locations, large number of items, and lack of indexing or standard cataloging present real difficulties for users.”

Also take the opportunity to watch Torturing Democracy, which relies heavily on the documentary record to tell the story of the effort to make torture a legal and normative US policy after 9/11.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *