WASHINGTON, 15 October 2003 — Military personnel in Washington are quietly admitting a grave error was made by not having more Arabic speakers available to translate and assist in the interrogations of detained Al-Qaeda suspects, say sources familiar with the military’s recruitment of translators.
Questions are also being raised about whether the Pentagon was so squeezed for translators that they relaxed security standards, which lead to the recent espionage charges at the Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, detention center.
The interpreter shortage within the American intelligence agencies is not new. In December 2002, a joint report was filed by the Senate Select and House committees on intelligence and stated that before Sept. 11, 2001, the intelligence community had “a readiness level of only 30 percent in the most critical terrorism-related languages.”
The Pentagon is tight-lipped about its shortage of Arabic translators. Lt. Cmdr. Barbara Burfeind, Pentagon spokeswomen, told journalists “due to ongoing investigations regarding detainee operations at Guantanamo, it is not appropriate to comment at this time.”
But Capt. Tom Crosson, a spokesman for the Defense Department’s Southern Command that oversees Guantanamo, insists that all translators there were properly screened: “Translators and military interrogators are required to possess and maintain secret clearance.”
Three men have currently been arrested at Guantanamo. Army Capt. James Yee, 35, Guantanamo’s sole Muslim cleric, was arrested and charged with disobeying a general order for improperly handling classified information, but not espionage.
Air Force Senior Airman Ahmad Al-Halabi, 24, who worked as an interpreter at Guantanamo, has been accused of collecting more than 180 messages from detainees with plans to pass them on to an unidentified person in Syria.
The latest arrest in the Guantanamo investigation was made late in September, when authorities apprehended Ahmed Fathy Mehalba, 31, in Boston.
The spy probe has led several congressmen to call for a more thorough investigation of the Pentagon’s clearance method for translators, and a review of security measures at the Guantanamo base.
The stigma of being an Arabist in the pro-Israeli town of Washington is not new, and has taken a curious twist of American Jews becoming the experts on Arab affairs.
“Being an Arabist here was viewed as a career killer,” a State Department official told Arab News on condition of anonymity. “Which meant that the emphasis has not been on Arabic specialists. As a result, Jewish State Department officials have become the Arabist specialists.”
