Obama’s National Intelligence Director, Admiral Dennis Blair, wrote a little memo recently and it was edited by Obama administration staff for the sake of brevity.
“High value information came from interrogations in which those methods were used and provided a deeper understanding of the al Qa’ida organization that was attacking this country”
Admiral Blair’s assessment that the interrogation methods did produce important information was deleted from a condensed version of his memo released to the media last Thursday. Also deleted was a line in which he empathized with his predecessors who originally approved some of the harsh tactics after the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.
“I like to think I would not have approved those methods in the past,” he wrote, “but I do not fault those who made the decisions at that time, and I will absolutely defend those who carried out the interrogations within the orders they were given.”
A spokeswoman for Admiral Blair said the lines were cut in the normal editing process of shortening an internal memo into a media statement emphasizing his concern that the public understand the context of the decisions made in the past and the fact that they followed legal orders.
It would appear brevity and full disclosure cannot exist in the same room in the Obama administration.
A tactic of the Liberal Fascists is to delete any inconvienient truths. Fact.
The Liberal Fascist bloggers love to censor and delete the inconvienient truths, check out Penisblog for examples.
JR:
“It would appear brevity and full disclosure cannot exist in the same room in the Obama administration”
By definition you can have brevity and full disclosure of the same document. To make it shorter, means it won’t be full.
PS. We know have a first hand account from the guy who interrogated Abu Zubadah. Short version, torture did not work it actually hurt.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/23/opinion/23soufan.html?_r=2&ref=global
“I questioned him from March to June 2002, before the harsh techniques were introduced later in August. Under traditional interrogation methods, he provided us with important actionable intelligence. . . .There was no actionable intelligence gained from using enhanced interrogation techniques on Abu Zubaydah that wasn’t, or couldn’t have been, gained from regular tactics. In addition, I saw that using these alternative methods on other terrorists backfired on more than a few occasions — all of which are still classified.”
s/b By definition you can not have
By definition you can have brevity and full disclosure of the same document. To make it shorter, means it won’t be full.
Really, Rick. Duuuhhhh, well dopey me. Thanks for the lesson!
It doesn’t surprise me that the point was lost on you – that certain weighty passages were deleted in the interest of editing for brevity.
Let me get out of the way so we call all watch you froth at the mouth for a third day.
We know have a first hand account from the guy who interrogated Abu Zubadah. Short version, torture did not work it actually hurt.
Note RickDFL’s deceptive use of the definite article ‘the’ in the phrase ”the guy who interrogated . . . ‘, rather than the indefinite article ‘a’. Soufan was one of many people who interrogated Zubadah.
Ali Soufan is FBI, not CIA. Soufan was not present when Zubadah was waterboarded and he has no expertise in this matter.
Funny that RickDFL will take his words on face value, but not Blair’s.
Shhhhh. Don’t tell RatioRick interrogation worked. It will cave the imaginary world he lives in.
Hey, maybe we can send him to interrogate terrorists. Nah, terrorists don’t deserve the torture he is subjecting SiTD regulars to.
Of course it worked. Zubaydah copped to being Oklahoma City John Doe #2.
And the libruls scoffed at Laurie Mylroie.
/jc
A tactic of the Liberal Fascists is to delete any inconvienient truths. Fact.
A parallel – a year after Stalin’s death, my grandparents received a package from the Soviet Encyclopedia publishing house. It contained instructions on how to replace a page in one of the volumes with a new one, included in the package. The old page was to be destroyed – it contained an entry on Beria, the replacement one didn’t.
At least Obama kept his promise about not having ANY lobbyists in his admini – er, never mind.
Transparency.
“If found not guilty beyond a reasonable doubt” – DickheadDFL
“There was no actionable intelligence gained from using enhanced interrogation techniques on Abu Zubaydah that wasn’t, or couldn’t have been, gained from regular tactics.”
So “actionable intelligence” WAS gained on the ol’ waterboard, but in Soufan’s OPINION, he could have gotten it his way too.
Only he didn’t.
brevity (n) 1. Shortness of time or duration; briefness: the brevity of human life. 2. the quality of expressing much in a few words; terseness: Brevity is the soul of wit.
Sorry Rickster, you can have both brevity and full disclosure. For example: “Rick is a DFL shill.” has brevity and is full disclosure.
Contrast that statement to how a peevish post might have put it: “Rick’s opinions can be cited in any discussion as a first order approximation of the distorted world view of the statist, socialistic, and manipulative DFL central committee. His discussions on SitD can often be viewed as taking the discussions to those with contrary views, but without the additional support of logic and facts, many of the discussions wind up involving talks about feelings and philosophies and, thus, rarely engender worthwhile discussions and actually often degenerate into name calling and ad hominum attacks. In view of all this….”
Ah, heck, let’s go with brevity.
I will be very surprised if there is any significantly useful information that comes to light. However, I support the declassification of all of the material on the topic.
The laws of the US and the conventions to which we subscribe are very clear that torture is not acceptable, and that the methods we employed were torture as we have regarded it in the past, as well as it is regarded internationally.
Particularly I object to the manner in which Rumsfeld and the other high ranking members of the Bush administration left the low level participants hanging out to dry in jail for what now clearly appears to be following of orders, by denying responsibility for those orders. It is worth a revisiting of the Yamashita standard and the Medina standard of command responsibility. I find the accounts of General Karpinski to be very persuasive that abuses were authorized at the highest levels, but that accountability was restricted to the very lowest, not only in Abu Ghraib, but epidemically throughout the jurisdictions of the US government.
There seems to be emerging a very clear effort on the part of the Bush administration to coerce the finding of a significant connection between Al Quaida and Iraq that did not in fact exist.
If Blair substantively did not agree with the statement issued in his name, he could have opted not to approve it. This was far less significant altering of a memo than what routinely happened to scientific documents under the Bush Administration, as evidenced by the most recent court decision regarding the FDA, the latest in a long line of politically subverting solid science. Not unlike the corruption engendered by politicizing the Justice Department.
Dog Gone, what do the memos have to do with Abu Ghraib?
The reason those people were hung out to dry in jail is because they were criminals. All involved were properly punished.
Karpinski is a wack job. She had no experience in managing POW’s or a prison. She went very quickly from saying everything was fine at Abu Ghraib to pointing the finger at everyone above her in the chain of command. Why? She was rarely present at Abu Ghraib. She can’t assert that she was both ignorant of what was happening at Abu Ghraib _and_ that she knows that what happened there was the result of secret orders from Rumsfeld.
Terry:
“what do the memos have to do with Abu Ghraib”
Because the policies authorized at GTMO migrated to Afg and Iraq and directly lead to abuse at AG.
See the Senate torture report p. 12-14
http://levin.senate.gov/newsroom/supporting/2008/Detainees.121108.pdf
“In his report of his investigation into Abu Ghraib, Major General George Fay said that interrogation techniques developed for GTMO became “confused” and were implemented at Abu Ghraib. For example, Major General Fay said that removal of clothing, while not included in CJTF-7’s SOP, was “imported” to Abu Ghraib, could be “traced through Afghanistan and GTMO,” and contributed to an environment at Abu Ghraib that appeared “to condone depravity and degradation rather than humane treatment of detainees.” Major General Fay said that the policy approved by the Secretary of Defense on December 2, 2002 contributed to the use of aggressive interrogation techniques at Abu Ghraib in late 2003.”
“Major General Fay said that removal of clothing, while not included in CJTF-7’s SOP, was “imported” to Abu Ghraib”
Right. It was also “imported” into every county jail and prison in the US.
Damn them!
There is a pattern that is evident in the memos on techniques that were used far more widely than Guantanamo. The techniques appear to be consistently used by CIA operative, Military Intelligence, and contractors where these interrogation techniques were previously NOT used, and that consistency is increasingly tracking back to high level members of the Bush administration.
These same techniques were objected to by the FBI, and by some members of the military. Personally, it seems to me that the largest reason for employing contractors of all kinds was intentionally to obscure accountability and record keeping.
The people who were hung out to dry appear to be carrying out orders from higher up. No doubt they should have refused, and certainly they seemed to have participated with more enjoyment in their activities than I could imagine anyone doing. But there is compelling information that the actions occurred in the context of softening up prisoners for further interrogation, not as actions occurring independently of the command structure.
I can believe that Karpinski was ignorant at the time of the full extent of what took place at Abu Ghraib; it appears the very worst of the activities was carried out by private contractors of CACI International who would not have been under her direct command. Not to excuse her role, but there does seem to be at least some agreement that a cover up took place regarding not only Abu Ghraib but other locations. Given the cover up, it is more difficult to determine fairly if Karpinski is a wack job or not. I find it deeply disturbing how much information was intentionally destroyed by the chain of command once the news hit the fan over Abu G.
Karpinski has now come out with a book, and has apparently interviewed those who were convicted and are serving jail time for Abu G. What you perceive as contradictions reflects information acquired at different times? I find it dubious that our armed forces touted Karpinski as the highest ranking woman serving ever, without them having determined if she were in fact a “wack job” prior to promoting her or sending her to Iraq. It seems the government wants it both ways as well…
There was an interesting blog on KSTP, a local a.m. radio station, kept by one of the independent contractor interrogators from Minnesota, Joe Ryan, of his experiences in Iraq back in 2004 prior to the scandal hitting the media.
There used to be a link to at least some of his blog, after it was removed from the KSTP website through Wikipedia. I don’t know if it is still active. Ryan lost his job with CACI International for blogging about his experiences as an interrogator.
There is alo a pesky memo objecting to the legal justification advanced by the recently declassified memos from the legal counsel at Justice to Condi Rice that the Bush Administration allegedly tried to collect and destroy for apparently plausible deniability that there was objection to their position.
It appears that a few copies eluded their attempted destruction. If all of this was so positive, constructive, and useful — why so many efforts at destroying information? That is not the kind of material that is destroyed in cover ups; quite the opposite.
Open up the memos Cheney is calling for, but also open up the rest of the information (redacting only identifying information that would put serving individuals at risk), including that of ALL the contractors.
And then prosecute where appropriate, all the way up the line to the highest office. And exonerate where appropriate as well. Keeping in mind that we have not in the past accepted the excuse of following orders.
Rule of law; not right or left, but right and wrong.
“allegedly . . . appeared . . . apparently”
Time for a fishing expedition! Or maybe a witch hunt?
Rule of law; not right or left, but right and wrong.
And I’m surprized you’d write something like this. It’s the fraud of all partisans to say this. When Obama was running he made noises like this. Then when he was elected he turned over the budget process to the most partisan lawmakers & assured them that he would sign whatever bill they came up with. The result was so partisan that not a single Republican in the house signed on to it.
So please spare me your ‘I’m not being partisan, I’m just after the truth’ speech.
Terry, you wound me to the quick!
I am independent, not partisan. I am frequently critical of Obama, and the democrats.
In particular, regarding the issue of information coming to light about torture for example, I strongly believe that some of the strongest opposition to a full revelation will come from the democrats. Bush and his White House were not operating in a vaccuum; there were regular briefings of the appropriate committees of the House and Senate.
There are plenty of people who are going to want to deny knowing what is in the documents, and either approving, or at the very least not disapproving, of what took place. That is going to include some of the most highly placed democrats; probably more stting dems than republicans, given the current membership.
Don’t even get me started on the failure of both Bush and Obama’s presidencies to comply with the applicable laws relating to the banks.
So, yes Terry, I do feel I can speak as someone who is not partisan. I heartily believe that the country would benefit from throwing out more than a few people from both sides of the aisle. And that we would all benefit from the rule of law even handedly applied.
“The techniques appear to be consistently used by CIA operative, Military Intelligence, and contractors where these interrogation techniques were previously NOT used…”
Ah geeze.
Look. If you think that the CIA, or the military have never tortured someone, or even that it was uncommon, you’re deluding yourself. And I’m not talking about the kind of torture that involves trailer trash mocking genetalia, or making pyramids out of naked, hairy, stinky dudes.
This never would have seen the light of day but for the large number of terrorists needing special attention in a short period of time. W knew that he couldn’t keep the lid on this thing and still get information quickly enough for it to be of use, so he asked for a legal opinion to cover his, and the CIA’s ass.
I’m not going to suggest that I’d enjoy the opportunity to say “I told you so”, but trust me, Osama & Co. are dancing with glee right now. They are about to get more information about what we know (information), and how we know it (methods) than we could ever have hoped to get from them.
And the best part is; they didn’t have to fill a single bucket of water…they got Democrats on their side.
Swiftee writes:
“Look. If you think that the CIA, or the military have never tortured someone, or even that it was uncommon, you’re deluding yourself. And I’m not talking about the kind of torture that involves trailer trash mocking genetalia, or making pyramids out of naked, hairy, stinky dudes.”
Has the CIA done this sort of thing before? Viet Nam, various locations in South America… certainly, and done far worse. It was ineffective then too. Has it been institutionalized like this, given comparative respectability and acceptability before? No, nor should it; it has been comparatively rare when you look at totalitarian governments.
We have a very interesting Center for Victims of Torture here in MN; they have been commenting on torture by numerous governments worldwide since the mid 1980s. I doubt that Osama and company learned anything new; this is old news.
The military and the FBI were correct to oppose this, as were individuals like the whistle blower at AG, Spec. Joe Darby whose identity was revealed in a way calculated to put his life at risk.
I would dispute that W got anythng of use, ever, or that he was doing anything except covering his own backside over the war in Iraq.
I doubt Reid or Pelosi has anything remotely like plausible deniability in the actions of the CIA and other entities. Their hands are not clean either.
“It was ineffective then too.”
You’re ignoring the fact that those closest to the situation have said, several times and in no nuncertain terms that it was very effective.
“I doubt that Osama and company learned anything new; this is old news.”
Exactly. Osama couldn’t care less what happened in Laos or Cambodia; but the Democrats will be releasing the details of methods and information directly related to his band of merry makers that are spanking new.
That makes Osama smile.
I should think Osama has been in a pretty good mood since last November. Heck, he’s almost King of Pakistan now!
Swiftee says:
“You’re ignoring the fact that those closest to the situation have said, several times and in no nuncertain terms that it was very effective.”
And you seem to be equally intent on ignoring those who have indicated just as fervently that it was NOT effective. But by all means – let their proof be produced!
I have an historic curiosity about torture techniques, what / how it is done, the justification, and the results it produces. It is not effective. Ever. It makes people say anything, not tell the truth. That is why it has historically been so useful in gaining false confessions, like John McCain’s — or do you think that confession was truthfull? And I would LOVE to see how much of the false information cost us enormously in time and other resources invalidating them as part of the revelation of information on torture. Let us be very sure we calculate that cost into the equation of how useful torture was or was not. Let us be very careful to compare those results with the track record of those interrogators who did NOT use torture as well
“Osama couldn’t care less what happened in Laos or Cambodia; but the Democrats will be releasing the details of methods and information directly related to his band of merry makers that are spanking new. ”
How many ways do you think there are to torture Swiftee? There are not all that many new things under the sun; most techniques with the exception of a few new pharacological items are ALL old, including those techniques which use electricity, which is more than a half century old.
Kermit Says:
April 23rd, 2009 at 3:47 pm
I should think Osama has been in a pretty good mood since last November. Heck, he’s almost King of Pakistan now! ”
The biggest advantages Osama has in Pakistan is the Pakistani paranoia about India, which keeps them focussing on the wrong target. And their horrific problems with corruption, much like Afghanistan. We would accomplish more opposing Osama, Al Quaida and the Taliban by reducing significantly the amount of corruption, and by improving their infrastructure than anything we could hope to accomplish by torture.
Well yes. That and the fact that the President of Pakistan was found certifiably insane and unable to stand trial in a British court. I can’t wait for the Obama invasion. Yee haw! Ride ’em, cowboy!
Maybe Great Leader could send in an army of menstruating women. That’d show the Taliban what for!
Kermit says:
That and the fact that the President of Pakistan was found certifiably insane and unable to stand trial in a British court. ”
Zardari? When did that happen?
Or are you referring to someone earlier in that office?
I’d have to look it up. I heard it on Eeeevil right wing radio.
That wasn’t hard.
http://www.pakspectator.com/zardari-is-mental-daily-telegraph-says/
Asif Ali Zardari, the widower of former Pakistan prime minister Benazir Bhutto and himself a leading contender for the country’s presidency, was suffering from severe mental illness as recently as last year, it has been reported. Mr Zardari, co-chair of the Pakistan People’s Party, was diagnosed with a range of psychiatric illnesses, including dementia, major depressive disorder and post-traumatic stress disorder.
It seems he was tortured with actual, you know, torture. Not the Barney Song.
Dog Gone, I have a little time now to respond to you.
There are multiple overlapping issues at play here. Some people (I’m thinking of RickDFL) have an ideological hatred of Republicans in general and anyone who was in the Bush administration in particular. Consequently their arguments are all over the place. “It is unquestionable that ‘enhanced interrogation’ is torture because . . . I think it is” “torture is always and everywhere wrong. Well, maybe not, but definitely in this case.” “Even if it was not illegal it didn’t work”. All of these arguments are made with little knowledge of the issues involved.
First you have the issue of whether or not what was done to the three ‘high value’ prisoners was legally forbidden as torture. The memos detail the thinking of Bush’s legal team. I find the outrage at the memo’s content to be genuine, but off-base. This is a legal opinion, not a philosophical essay. One might as well expect deep moral reasoning from the verdict in a civil case. The relevant statutes require legal, not moral, interpretation. We don’t put people in jail because they are bad, we put people in jail because they violate the written word of the law. A too strict interpretation of the law would make it illegal to, say, promise a suspect better food or accommodations in return for revealing where he hid the bodies of his victims.
Also, the UN Convention Against Torture contains no exceptions. This is ridiculous because it might make taking the action necessary to save a million people — even every living thing on Earth — illegal.
Bush’s legal team knew this, so instead of trying to justify enhanced interrogations a posteriori they focused instead on what the legal definition of ‘severe pain or suffering’ might be.
Anyone who makes the claim that the ‘enhanced interrogations’ did not produce the desired results needs to come to grips with the fact that even if it could be proved that the enhanced interrogations saved a million lives they would be still be illegal. In other words, ‘the law is an ass’.
Terry, as much as I enjoy everything you write for its thoughtfullness, I respectfully have to take issue with you on this one.
There is no justification for Bush’s legal team to redefine severe pain or suffering, or humiliation. We have an extensive establishment of what constitutes torture. I have read the Geneva conventions and a number of the other pertinent rules and regs. For example, there is not anywhere that I have seen a requirement for torture to cause physical or psychological suffering after an abusive act ends to be defined as torture legally – although I think it could fairly be argued that there is such suffering. Nor is this about abuse of only three people. Nor is it evident that a million lives were saved at any time by torture.
The statements of people like Cheney are not credible, but if they do happen to be true – let us see the documents before giving credibility. These are the same folks who brought us claims of Iraqi nukes and other WMD. These are the same people who have committed a variety of illegal acts, such as inappopriate wire tapping. I have NO faith whatsoever in the assurances of this administration. Calling the law an ass – however much it may on occasion be true! – does not excuse torture on the scale that this appears to have been done. It was crude and stupid; and I think it may very well be the stupidity that most offends me.
Dog Gone-
Here are the relevant statutes from the OHCHR:
This one means Karpinski has to be put on trial, especially if what she claims is true:
Looks like Boll Clinton is in hot water — say, wasn’t Holder Deputy Attorney General under Clinton? Sounds like a conflict of interest to me.
Just for clarification Terry, are you asserting that the techniques that were “redefined” under the Bush Administration were not torture because they did NOT cause enough pain or suffering to meet a minimum standard? Or do you agree that the actions were fairly in the category of torture as the US has defined it in practice prior to Bush?
There is an interesting situation if a Special Prosecutor is put in charge of investigating and / or prosecuting the crime(s) of torture. I read somewhere recently that the statutes that were the basis for previous special prosecutors expired in 1999; although that would not actually prevent one from being appointed. In any case, I doubt that Holder would be personally prosecuting or investigating.
I would refer you to the very successful FBI interrogations of the Islamic Terrorists who attacked our embassies in Tanzania and Kenya in 1998. They resulted in multiple arrests and convictions, without any torture, and the interrogation was concluded in a relatively short time – a week or two. I continue to be surprised at the number of individuals who seem to think that the interrogation of islamic terrorists is something that was invented after 9/11. Likewise I continue to be surprised at how few people are conversant with the 9/11 like attack by Algerian islamic terrorists, the GIA (Group Islamique Armee) back in 1994. Terrorists attempted to hijack an Air France jet on Christmas Eve, intending to fly it into the Paris equivalent of our Twin Towers. That attempt was dealt with rather well by the French special forces – not unlike their efforts against piracy – for all of our trash talking about the French.
Yet over and over we hear that no one could have possibly predicted such an unlikely event…. Really? Because there were terrorist claims at the time that it was going to be attempted again.
The US can and should be a lot smarter about how we deal with terrorism and extremists. Brute force and torture is not the smart way to go. A bit of learning from history, both what works and what doesn’t would be a good idea.
Another observation – had we not discharged a large number of translaters and interrogators just because they happened to be gay, the US would not have found itself perilously short of qualified individuals who could deal with gathering information. Substituting a little quick and dirty torture was a pitifully inadequate alternative.
I cannot think of a single country in the entire span of history that has used torture, caused people to disappear into black sites a la extreme rendition, or that have engaged in any degree of extensive surveillance on their own citizenry that is positively regarded afterwards, no matter what the excuse used at the time to justify it.
Just for clarification Terry, are you asserting that the techniques that were “redefined” under the Bush Administration were not torture because they did NOT cause enough pain or suffering to meet a minimum standard?
I don’t know the answer to this. The statute is poorly written. It doesn’t forbid inflicting physical or mental suffering on prisoners in order to extract information from them, just ‘severe’ physical or mental suffering. How in the heck do you define that? An ‘after the fact’ definition would turn this into a witch hunt, or perhaps a burlesque.
I believe your last paragraph is hyperbole. The French operated in the way you describe in Indochina and Algeria.
The word “severe” is in the statute for a reason. Because it’s there, then, an interrogation technique that uses pain (but not severe pain), is not torture under the statute.
Does the statute define the term “severe” in such away as to prohibit the use of caterpillars?
I noticed in an earlier comment on one of these “torture” posts, that Dick_tic suggested that solitary confinement be used as an interrogation technique. Solitary confinement has been known to cause severe emotional distress, and even permanent mental disorders.
Who cares what the definition of “is” is? When you need to make an omelet – you brake eggs!
Master of None, an illustration of the silliness of this debate: Blogger Andrew Sullivan considers ‘enhanced interrogation’ to be torture. He defines ‘severe’ as meaning ‘severe enough to make the prisoner give up the information’.
Under his definition, then, you could inflict physical and mental suffering as long as the prisoner did not talk.
Talk about torture!
“There is no justification for Bush’s legal team to redefine severe pain or suffering, or humiliation.”
Dogcrap, are you trying to humiliate Bush? Torture!!! 😆
We are in serious trouble when we have to rely on Burbots for our national security.