Ex-Pentagon Lawyers Face Grilling in Torture Probe

Pentagon lawyers had more input than was initially thought into the harsh interrogation techniques used on Guantanamo Bay prisoners, sources close to a Senate investigation have told the New York Times. Documents from 2002 reveal that officials in the Department of Defense, then run by Donald Rumsfeld, researched techniques like waterboarding months before they were used on detainees.

Harsh techniques were instituted after Pentagon lawyers expressed frustration by the lack of intelligence information coming from prisoners, said a senior lawyer due to testify today before the Senate Armed Services Committee. Chairman Carl Levin said it was "particularly disturbing" that the more aggressive techniques came from a US military training manual on how to survive interrogation if captured by enemies that ignored the Geneva Conventions. (More Pentagon stories.)