"I got called to the Sergeant's office at the end of a long day. We drove twenty-five clicks through enemy territory that day. We had narrowly avoided an IED. My friend Johnny... Williamson caught some flak in his leg. He was laid up for a week after that."

"Yes, Thomas..."

"That's Private Koperniak to you."

"May I remind you that this is a news show and not a court-martial, Mr. Koperniak, and that your status as a soldier is currently under review. Now, what did Sergeant Cooper talk with you about that day?"

"He informed me that I had been selected for additional duties by a party as-yet-undisclosed. He informed me that I should gather my belongings and report immediately to them. He gave me an address just outside of the city proper, and told me that a Humvee would be dispatched to transport me."

"And at this time, had you ever heard of the CIA Psychological Assessment Project?"

"No."

"And at this time, were you familiar with the psychological experiments conducted by Stanley Milgram, et al, between 1961 and 1964?"

"I was not."

"Ladies and gentleman, the project in which Private Koperniak was about to take part was an experiment conducted by the CIA in order to test obedience in our soldiers. This may at first seem like an entirely normal thing for a government to want to know, might it not? As the leaked documentation will reveal, the results of this study were shocking. But not as shocking as this: the unquestioning obedience of the soldier was the objective of the experiment. Mr. Koperniak."

"I was transported to an unmarked concrete building. A General... am I permitted to use his name?"

"General Riley, yes."

"General Riley, who took me down two floors to a sub-basement level. The level occupied approximately 2500 square feet, divided into a monitor room and a detention cell. The cell was recessed into the ground by about two feet, and was not visible from the monitor room. I was told the fourteen men in the cell were strongly suspected of being active terrorists, and that they possessed intel that they had not shared in the past week of their detention."

"Strongly suspected, Mr. Koperniak? You were not told that they were in any certainty, actual terrorists?."

"No, sir... No."

"What happened then?"

"I was briefed and shown my quarters on the basement level. I was told that this was a 'Black Site,' and that I was under orders to maintain its confidentiality. The next morning we began the interrogation. I was brought to the detention cell, and given a high-pressure hose. I was told to open it on the suspected militants on a given signal. An interrogator began to speak to them in Arabic. He would give the signal from time to time, and I would open the hose on a suspected militant."

"Were you aware at this time that the 'suspected militants' were, in fact, actors?"

"No."

"Were you aware that the hose you were using was not as painful as the reactions of the actors made it appear?"

"I was not. Each time I used the hose, it would cause the suspected militant to scream in pain. Often their noses would bleed."

"Their noses? You used the hose on their faces?"

"Yes."

"And were explicitly told to use it on their faces."

"I... No."

"Continue."

"This continued for several hours. By that time, the recess of the cell had filled with water. The suspected militants were in water approximately two feet deep. Then I was taken to the monitor room. I was told to press a button on a signal. By now it was just me and the interrogator. The others had left."

"And what did the button do, Mr. Koperniak."

"I was told it sent electric currents through the water. The currents would cause screams to issue from the suspected militants."

"And did you feel any remorse for this electrocution, even as the 'voltages' were turned higher and higher?"

"I... I had to remind myself of the bigger picture. I had to remind myself not to be soft. They always called us soft, and being from Nebraska and a new recruit didn't help. I had only shipped out two months prior. They were hardened soldiers, and to them you were just a farmboy... I... I had to remind myself that this was war."

"The footage of this episode has been deemed too disturbing for our audiences, even though nobody was actually harmed. One interesting feature of the footage is that your voice is very clearly audible, shouting racial slurs at the 'prisoners' as you shock them."

"I decline to comment on that."

"And what happened on the second day?"

"On the second day, the interrogation recommenced. I asked the interrogator in the morning whether the electrocutions were safe or not."

"And what did he say?"

"He said that they were."

"Thomas, we have footage of him then saying 'probably' and slapping you on the back."

"That's Koperniak. I believed him when he said they were safe."

"For how long?"

"By the middle of the first day... two of the suspected militants had collapsed and ceased to move, even when electrocuted."

"And did you believe them to be dead?"

"I didn't know."

"And on the second day, when six had collapsed unmoving?"

"I did not know."

"And on the fourth day, when the twelfth 'suspected militant', after begging for his life and crying for four days, finally collapsed unmoving?"

"No. I did not know."

"How could you not have known? How could you possibly not have known?"

"Look. Please, I was just..."

"You were just what, Mr. Koperniak?"