When the Abu Ghraib scandal initially broke in April 2004, attention focused on a small group of players, composed of the soldiers depicted in the abuse photos and the senior officers directly in charge of them. In the myriad investigations, trials, and news reports that have followed, the scope of the abuse allegations has widened to include locations in Afghanistan, Cuba, and secretive detention facilities at unknown locations.
It would be impossible to catalog every private, sergeant, captain, and colonel involved with the abuses, let alone the long list of CIA officials, government lawyers, contractors, and others involved with the scandal. Instead, Slate has compiled this chain of command, from President Bush down to the soldiers who served at Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo:
http://www.slate.com/features/whatistorture/ChainOfCommand.html
JAY BYBEE
Photograph courtesy AP
What he did then: Assistant Attorney General; Chief, Office of Legal Counsel, 2001-2003
What he does now: Judge, U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9 th Circuit
Reported involvement: Bybee served as the assistant attorney general in charge of the Justice Department's Office Legal Counsel from 2001 until his confirmation to the 9 th Circuit in 2003. OLC acts as a sort of in-house counsel for the executive branch, providing legal opinions to cabinet agencies. UC Berkeley law professor John Yoo worked as a deputy in Bybee's office and played a central role in developing many of OLC's most controversial memos on detention and interrogation. Bybee and Yoo's Aug. 1, 2002, "torture memo" created a legal framework for the authorization of abusive interrogation techniques by the president. Critics charge that this memo and its progeny amounted to a cookbook for unlawful conduct by the executive branch.
...and let's not forget the other war criminal in our backyard, William J. Haynes II, who resigned from his position as the Defense Department's general counsel.[13] He started his new job as the Chief Corporate Counsel at the Chevron Corporate Office in San Ramon, CA on April 28, 2008.
