NYT: Officer Denies Efforts to Sway Lawmakers

[mod mom]

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“They were never directed to use their specific IO skills while preparing background information for the command in advance of distinguished guest visits,” the colonel wrote.

Rolling Stone based its article on information provided by Lt. Col. Michael Holmes and gave a different version of events, saying that the cell was ordered to use its training to mount “psychological operations” or “information operations” in an improper effort to shift the views of visiting lawmakers.

In a telephone interview on Saturday, Colonel Holmes said he was told by a military lawyer in Kabul that the instructions were improper. Another staff judge advocate in Kabul determined that the task was legal, but only after the assignment was rewritten to strictly limit its scope, he said.

Military officers in Kabul have declined to comment because an investigation has been ordered by Gen. David H. Petraeus, the senior commander in Afghanistan. That inquiry will be likely to turn on the intended use of the material compiled by the information operations team, not on whether officers may gather biographical data on guests, which is standard practice.

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http://www.nytimes.com/2011/02/27/world/asia/27military.html?_r=1

If one military lawyer said improper and another said assignment needed to be re-written, don't you think the investigation should be conducted by an authority outside the military?

[xchrom]

1. The military shouldn't investigate it's self, period. Nt