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Karen J. Greenberg
Director, Center on National Security, Fordham Law School
An interview with Karen J. Greenberg conducted February 10 and February 15, 2012 by Myron A. Farber for the Columbia Center for Oral History, Rule of Law Oral History Project.
Karen Greenberg emerged as a key figure in the Guantánamo debate in the spring of 2004. While fact-checking an article on torture for a law magazine, she uncovered a trove of documents outlining the U.S. government’s torture policies at Abu Ghraib prison. Her findings led to her first book on the subject, co-edited with Joshua Dratel, called The Torture Papers. She has since written four other books on national security and terrorism. Highlights of this interview include discussions of Greenberg’s personal experience on 9/11, the opening of and initial policies at Guantánamo Bay, early changes of command at Guantánamo and the creation of Joint Task Force 170, the Bush administration’s mistrust of the courts and interpretation of the Geneva Conventions, rendition and indefinite detention, the Obama administration’s Guantánamo policies, and the future of the war on terror.
