The only reason we had any kind of control - I will tell you this flat out, up front - the only reason we had any kind of control in any of our prison facilities, Abu Ghraib aside, was because the MPs were taking the initiative and finding ways to accommodate the prisoners. It wasn't because of the fine security of the prison facility. It was because the prisoners knew that the MPs were doing everything they could, everything in their power, to make life more acceptable for them while they were spending their days and nights incarcerated.

    We had civilian so-called experts - contractors - under the Coalition Provisional Authority, who worked under the Ministry of Justice. Now these prison experts all had experience as wardens or as directors for prisons in the United States.

    MC: Were some of them former US Special Forces?

    JK: No, they were not. They were all civilians. There was only one of them who was retired from the military, and he was actually retired as a Military Police officer. But it's just incredible that these three contractors that they brought over were hired by the Justice Department in Washington, and it was the same Justice Department - there aren't two separate entities - it was the same Justice Department that, between 30 and 60 days before hiring these people to come to Baghdad, the same Justice Department had fired them from their positions in the Utah Corrections Facility for prisoner abuse.

    And I didn't know that when we were there. Nobody bothered to tell us that. But we were told that we were going to go up to Baghdad, we were going to relocate the headquarters up to Baghdad to assist the Prisons Department, under the Ministry of Justice, with this restoration of jails and prisons. Well, we got up there and there were three of them and one director. And they were looking at 121 different jails for us to run and operate. And I told them I don't have that many MPs! I couldn't put 3 MPs in each one of those facilities and run them. We have to find the biggest facilities, and that's what they did. They eventually identified, I think they identified, 15 or 18 and we settled on 15 or 16.

    MC: Why did they bring these civilian contractors? Why do you think they brought them over?

    JK: Well, at that time, everybody was under the impression that the Coalition Provisional Authority was being run under the auspices of the State Department, and that the Iraqi Detention Operation was a function that would eventually be turned over to the Iraqis.

    Well, that may have been true in some back room plan, that people had an idea that was going to be in place. But there was no plan. Because normally, prison operations and jail operations come with the restoration of peace and security. And that comes with a sustainment operation that follows combat operations. So on a backward timeline, when the war was declared over on the aircraft carrier, then sustainment operations - engineers, civilian contractors, military police, military police organizations - all those organizations kind of kick into high gear to get things moving down the same road. Well there was no sustainment plan. And I can tell you, Marjorie, my opinion is that there was no sustainment plan because, by that time, there were a lot of contractors - US contractors exclusively - who realized they could make a lot of money in Iraq.

    MC: How did the enlisted soldiers feel about the contractors getting these fat paychecks?

    JK: My soldiers were saying, I heard this often: "Ma'am, I want to get out of the Army and come back over here. I could be making five times the money that I'm making as a soldier. And these guys never go out and do anything. We're doing all the work, and they're drawing all the pay!" I heard it a dozen times a week from every level of soldier, every rank, in every one of my units. They could see it. They knew what was going on. Here's these three contractors who are supposed to restore the prison system with the help of the military, and they never - I don't want to say never - they hardly leave the confines of the Coalition Provisional Authority.

    MC: Now did they play a role in the interrogations?

    JK: No, they did not. The interrogations were separate and apart from Iraqi detention operations. The only role they played was, they were restoring Abu Ghraib. They were using funds from the Coalition Provisional Authority to restore the cells out at Abu Ghraib.

    MC: So who was in charge of the interrogations at Abu Ghraib?

    JK: The Military Intelligence.

    MC: And you were reprimanded and demoted for failing to supervise the staff at Abu Ghraib, and you've said you were a scapegoat?

    JK: Right.

    MC: What do you mean by that?

    JK: Well, I have to refer to a timeline. Miller comes, we have Abu Ghraib, and Abu Ghraib was a pile of rubble the first time I saw it. The only advantage of Abu Ghraib, the only advantage, was this 20-foot high retaining wall around the ground, acres and acres of the grounds of Abu Ghraib. So we had that as a security, first line of defense. But everything inside the prison at that time had been looted. Electrical systems, water systems, infrastructure, doors were gone. Blocks of concrete were removed from the interior section, the interior cells.

    But I had a Company Commander who was commanding an MP unit out there, and he told me in July, "Ma'am, if you get us the resources we can at least hold prisoners here until the other facilities are restored." So there was great opposition to that, because of the history of Abu Ghraib. But we proceeded with the encouragement and the support, to a limited extent, from Ambassador Bremer. Because we needed some place to put these Iraqi criminals that the divisions were policing in the course of their operations and attempted to get sustainment operations underway, throughout Iraq. So in August, the divisions were directed to undertake these - let me back up. At Abu Ghraib during July and the beginning of August 2003, we were holding several hundred prisoners.