Senate Judiciary Committee Hearing on Ethics Report Disappoints

By Daphne Eviatar, Senior Associate, Law and Security

Cross-posted from Huffington Post.


For anyone hoping the Justice Department would commit to further investigation of the latest evidence that White House officials instructed their lawyers to find legal justifications for torture in the aftermath of Sept. 11, today was a disappointment.

Testifying to the Senate Judiciary Committee, Acting Deputy Attorney General Gary Grindler told Senators that the department's legal ethics report issued last Friday, and its decision not to recommend disciplinary sanctions for Office of Legal Counsel lawyers John Yoo and Jay Bybee, constitute "this department's final action."

Under strong questioning from Senator Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.), Grindler did promise to look into the mysterious disappearance of John Yoo's and Patrick Philbin's e-mails, which Office of Professional Responsibility investigators noted "hampered" their investigation. After all, government officials are legally required by law to maintain their official e-mails, as Leahy reminded Grindler, picking up a copy of the U.S. Code.

But what about all the other evidence that wasn't available to the OPR investigators? There was no discussion of the fact that almost all of the White House witnesses refused to speak to the Justice Department investigators, as did former Attorney General John Ashcroft.

Leahy opened the hearing with a reminder that a year ago he'd recommended creation of a nonpartisan "Commission of Inquiry", along the lines of the 9-11 commission, that would thoroughly investigate how torture became part of official U.S. policy. But that proposal never really won much support, and we heard no indication today that Senators plan to insist it happen.

Senator Richard Durbin (D-Ill.) made an eloquent statement acknowledging that the Yoo and Bybee memos defining torture as so extreme that it must be equivalent to the pain accompanying organ failure or death "provided legal cover for the Bush administration to authorize waterboarding," which he called "a torture technique that our country has historically repudiated as torture and even prosecuted as a war crime."

“We have learned that even when America is fearful and concerned about terrorism we should never forget our basic values," concluded Durbin, who's been pressing for release of the OPR report for over a year. "The time will come when those who do will have to answer for it."

Really, they will? How?

That's the big question left open after this hearing. Will anyone be held accountable for the unlawful torture and abuse of detainees in the never-ending "war on terror"? And if they're not, what's to stop such "enhanced" measures from being taken again?

Indeed, some Senators are already urging just that, and using the decision of career Associate Deputy Attorney General David Margolis not to recommend that the lawyers be disciplined by their state bar associations as evidence that Yoo and Bybee were right all along.

"The Department's decision confirms that John Yoo and Jay Bybee deserve nothing but thanks from a grateful American public" for saving us from the next terrorist attack, declared Sen. John Cornyn (R-Tx), adding that the department's preliminary inquiry into whether any CIA interrogators went beyond the memos' authorizations should be dropped as well.

Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.) similarly criticized the current administration for repealing "tough and effective interrogation techniques that are lawful," at the same time as he said the investigation was an embarrassment that "has created the impression worldwide that there's been consistent torture, that the president had a policy to violate the law." He then called on the Justice Department to investigate who had embarrassed Yoo and Bybee by leaking earlier versions of the report, before hammering away at the Obama administration for giving Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, the would-be Christmas Day bomber, the right to a lawyer.

In other words, a hearing on the outcome of a 5-year investigation into how the United States came to authorize torture and cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment of detainees in its custody, in violation of longstanding U.S. laws, values and policies, devolved into partisan politics. Maybe it's what we should have expected. But it was still a disappointment.

Thiessen Watch: Marc fights for the “tummy slap”

By Renée Schomp, Law and Security

It’s too terrifying to be true: we now have one of America’s most recent (self-appointed) torture apologist darlings, former Bush administration speechwriter Marc Thiessen, using his new weekly column in the Washington Post to argue that his position represents the “middle ground” on U.S. national security policy.

Then he rebukes Obama for eliminating “effective interrogation techniques” such as the “tummy slap” and a “diet of liquid Ensure,” among others.

The crux of Thiessen’s argument this week is that use of the Army Field Manual, which Obama instituted to serve as a guideline for U.S. interrogation practice, is an extreme policy that dangerously sidelines a “middle ground” on interrogation techniques. This is an absurd framing of a debate that really should have been over when the American public learned with horror years ago of Abu Ghraib and the torture of detainees at countless CIA “black sites.”

The fact of the matter, as Human Rights First’s Daphne Eviatar explained at the beginning of the month, is that the Army Field Manual itself still allows for the use of abusive interrogation techniques on detainees in U.S. custody—it certainly is not a radical bookend to this mythical “middle ground” written by Thiessen.

To keep things in perspective, let’s keep in mind that the man talking about a “middle ground” is none other than the one who said during an interview with Christiane Amanpour on CNN that torture techniques (such as controlled drowning) are okay because they do not cause “extreme pain,” and who said in the National Review that anyone who opposes such abusive techniques argues from a position of “radical pacifism.”

Sorry, Thiessen, we care about the moral integrity of our country too much to let you characterize your position on national security policy as anything approaching a middle ground. Even if you are saying it in the Washington Post.

Thiessen Watch: Security Clearance = Expertise on Torture?

By Renée Schomp, Law and Security

This morning on MSNBC’s Morning Joe, when former Bush administration speechwriter Marc Thiessen and author of a recently published pro-torture manifesto was asked what credentials he can claim as an expert on interrogation tactics, he replied, “I had a security clearance!”

Does Thiessen know that college students get security clearances before they are allowed to intern in many parts of the federal government? Security clearance aside, Thiessen has his facts wrong. He repeatedly claims that the Obama administration has eliminated its ability to capture, detain, and interrogate suspected terrorists even though alleged Christmas Day bomber Abdulmutallab is, according to news sources, providing intelligence to FBI officials.

His role as a speechwriter advocating on behalf of Bush administration counterterrorism policy gave Thiessen access to information sources within the CIA but this cannot reasonably be held up as expertise regarding intelligence gathering. As mentioned in a previous blog, people with real experience with interrogations, such as FBI interrogator Ali Soufan – who have repeatedly spoken out against using harsh tactics – are those who we should turn to when we consider how to best gather intelligence from suspected terrorists.

An Intelligent Way to Enhance National Security?

By Daphne Eviatar, Senior Associate, Law and Security
Crossposted from Huffington Post

Ever since the failed attempt to blow up a Northwest airline carrier on Christmas Day, critics have been pressing to militarize the treatment of all terrorism suspects and deny them the basic due process rights provided by the law.

On Tuesday, bills were introduced in both the House and the Senate to require the Attorney General to consult with the Director of National Intelligence, the Director of the National Counterterrorism Center, the Secretary of Homeland Security, and the Secretary of Defense before filing any civilian charges against a foreigner suspected of engaging in or materially supporting terrorists, regardless of where he’s arrested. Senators Joseph Lieberman of Connecticut and Susan Collins of Maine have also written to Attorney General Eric Holder urging him to transfer the failed Christmas bomber, Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, to military custody. And on Wednesday, six Senators wrote to Holder “in light of recent events” urging him not to try the four 9/11 suspects in a federal civilian court.

Political posturing to look tough on terrorism is not a new strategy for federal lawmakers. But the level of disingenuousness involved in this particular instance is genuinely striking.
After the State of the Union speech last night, Virginia Governor Bob McDonnell complained that “this foreign terror suspect was given the same legal rights as a U.S. citizen” – as if foreigners have not always been entitled to Constitutional due process when brought to trial in the United States.

At hearings last week, Sen. John McCain (R-Arizona) called the decision to place Abdulmutallab in the federal judicial system "a terrible, terrible mistake when it's pretty clear that this individual did not act alone."

Sen. Lieberman called it "a kind of 'Alice in Wonderland' turning of the world of common sense on its head." And former New Jersey Republican Governor Thomas Kean, who led the investigation into the 9/11 terrorist attacks, said he was "shocked and upset" that Abdulmutallab was read his rights before being fully questioned.

Meanwhile at the National Review, Bill Burck, former Deputy Counsel to President George W. Bush and a former federal prosecutor, was “startled” by Dennis Blair’s and Michael Leiter’s admissions last week that “they were never even consulted about the decision” (his emphasis, not mine) to let the FBI handle the interrogation.

But is the FBI’s handling of Abdulmutallab, arrested at a Detroit, Michigan airport, really so shocking?

In fact, as these critics surely know, every single terrorism suspect arrested in the United States during the eight years of the Bush administration after September 11 was initially interrogated by the FBI, as was Abdulmutallab. Ultimately, every one that was tried had their trial in a civilian federal court. Only two individuals arrested in the United States were ever transferred to military custody – Jose Padilla and Ali Saleh Kahlah al-Marri. And in both cases, after years in military detention, the men were charged as ordinary criminals and accorded a civilian trial.

More than 200 terror suspects have been interrogated and tried this way since Sept. 11, including Richard Reid, the “shoe bomber,” in the case most comparable to Abdulmutallab’s.

So as Senator Claire McCaskill pointed out a hearing last week, to start turning all terror investigations in the United States over to the CIA or the military would be a drastic departure from longstanding precedent.

The critics’ mantra since Christmas that offering terror suspects Miranda rights after an initial intelligence interrogation by the FBI dooms the chances of obtaining useful intelligence is also wholly unsubstantiated. Last week Senator Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.) chastised FBI Director Robert Mueller for allowing FBI agents to read Abdulmutallab his Miranda rights. But as Senator Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI), a former U.S. Attorney, pointed out, an actual review of real-life terrorism prosecutions reveals that “very successful interrogations have been conducted and very significant intelligence information has been obtained from suspects who have been Mirandized.” In fact, sometimes giving Miranda warnings “is actually a part of an interrogation plan for that particular subject,” he said.

Cooperation of suspects arrested in the U.S. criminal justice system has led to invaluable intelligence about the existence of al-Qaida sleeper cells within the United States, training camps in Afghanistan, how to safely dismantle the device used by Richard Reid (the shoe bomber) and details regarding some of the most high-level terrorism suspects, such as Khalid Sheik Mohammed and Hambali, the mastermind of Jemaah Islamiah, a terrorism network in Southeast Asia.

Previous Senate Judiciary Committee hearings have also revealed that FBI-led interrogations have actually been more effective than the far more aggressive ones conducted by the CIA and Defense Department.

In any event, a detainee arrested in the United States and held in military custody is still entitled to a legal representation.

Meanwhile, civilian trials have been far more successful than military commissions, which have won only three convictions in eight years, as compared to 195 in civilian criminal court.

None of this is to suggest that the Bush administration was ‘soft on terror.’ But it wasn’t very smart on terror, either. Not only haven’t most military detainees been convicted, but the detention of hundreds of suspects for years without charge or trial created a national security nightmare for the United States. Hundreds of Muslims were subjected to unlawful and ineffective “enhanced” interrogation techniques devised by inexperienced and unprofessional psychologists with no background in intelligence gathering. The use of those techniques fomented so much anger in the Muslim world against the United States that even President Bush and former presidential candidate John McCain eventually acknowledged that the Guantanamo Bay detention facility had become a liability for the United States and should be closed.

FBI Director Mueller made clear last week that the FBI brought in high-level interrogators who first questioned Abdulmutallab for intelligence purposes, and obtained valuable information, before reading him his Miranda rights. That’s part of FBI protocol for handling terror suspects. But to forbid the United States from trying terrorists as criminals is to force the US government to continue down the same reckless course that’s landed us in our current national security quagmire.

If there was one thing Senators agreed on at their hearings last week, it was that the government needs a rational way of deciding where and how to interrogate and try terror suspects, based on input from top terrorism specialists and interrogators. Administration officials have promised to create just that. But if the administration bows to political pressure and starts subjecting every terror suspect to CIA interrogation and indefinite military detention, it’s only going to exacerbate the current conundrum.

The U.S. Supreme Court has said the government can detain “enemy combatants” – now called “unprivileged enemy belligerents” -- captured on a battlefield for the duration of a military conflict. But the court in the Hamdi case was talking about the battlefield in Afghanistan; it did not suggest that the airport in Detroit could be a battlefield. To expand the definition that broadly would allow the government to get around the Constitution in almost any criminal investigation by simply declaring the target a potential terrorist. And what would prevent the government from throwing a U.S. teenager surfing Jihadi web sites at home in New Jersey into coercive interrogation and years of indefinite detention? Could that possibly comport with the U.S. Constitution, let alone international law?

Members of Congress pressing for legislation that would require the government to respond to all potential terror cases militarily are stepping onto a slippery slope they’ll likely regret if they can convince their colleagues to join them.

In his State of the Union speech, President Obama called on Congress to “put aside the schoolyard taunts about who is tough” and “reject the false choice between protecting our people and upholding our values.”

He could have gone further and said that rejecting our values actually increases the danger to Americans. Guantanamo Bay was bad enough; hundreds of jihadi suspects subjected to secret interrogations and indefinite detention on U.S. soil is hardly an intelligent way to enhance national security.

Bush Speechwriter Makes Jack Bauer Look Reasonable

By David Danzig
Crossposted from Huffington Post

A new book from a former political speech writer for President George Bush makes a number of wild claims in an effort to "correct the record" about the CIA enhanced interrogation program that featured the use of such "techniques" as waterboarding and slamming detainees heads into walls. The book, Courting Disaster: How the CIA Kept America Safe and How Barack Obama Is Inviting the Next Attack, by Mark Thiessen, hit book stores today. An excerpt which ran on The National Review web site calls the CIA interrogators who used these abusive techniques the "real Jack Bauers" but explains that their work was nowhere near as violent as the interrogation scenes depicted on the hit FOX TV program.

Here are some of Thiessen's more extraordinary claims:

1) The real difference between 24 and the CIA's "enhanced interrogation" program is that the CIA techniques are not violent. Indeed, he explains CIA interrogators seek to use "the least coercive method necessary" when questioning detainees.

Analysis: So CIA interrogators do not abuse detainees who talk. And they are progressively more violent until detainees talk, which suggests that they were (often) violent.

2) Abu Zubaydah, an Al Qaeda operative who was waterboarded dozens of times, thanked his interrogators for torturing him because it relieved him of "the moral burden" of resisting.

Analysis: This is so absurd that it really could have happened on 24. The U.S. has to torture detainees because they want to talk, but are required not to until they are tortured? If terrorists really are instructed not to talk until they are tortured then shouldn't we ask ourselves why Al Qaeda has put this rule in place? Might they see some strategic advantage in encouraging the U.S. to continue these abuses, knowing that the world will always eventually learn of these sorts of injustices?

The most likely explanation though for Zubaydah's comments (if they are true) is that he did not want to be tortured again. He probably was being obsequious and simply kissing-up to his captors/torturers in an effort to show them that he was fully compliant and there was no need to nearly drown him again! Ironically, according to Ali Soufan, an FBI interrogator who questioned Zubaydah, the Al Qaeda operative was being helpful before they nearly drowned him so it's not entirely clear why interrogators sought to use more coercive methods. God knows how Thiessen squares this with his absurd claim #1.

3) Enhanced interrogation techniques are not used to gain info, they are used to generate a "state of cooperation." Indeed, Thiessen says that interrogators don't even ask detainees questions that they do not know the answers to during torture. The point is, Thiessen writes, to ask questions you already know the answer to and thereby judge compliance by the accuracy of the answers.

Analysis: Not even 24 is that simplistic. Thiessen has never interrogated anyone or spent (it seems) more than a couple of hours talking to interrogators, but the fact of the matter is that interrogation is complicated. A detainee doesn't go from being willing to die for his cause one minute to being willing to tell the U.S. everything the next simply because a guy shoves his head in a bucket of water. He may dribble out half-truths after being tortured. In some cases, he may give up key details of on-going plots. But the notion that he simply "breaks" instantly and from that point forward he has "switched sides" is so facile that if you were a writer on 24 and tried to present it at a writers meeting for a plot twist in a season, you might very well lose your job.

More likely, Thiessen is confused. Perhaps the interrogators were asking questions they knew the answers to simply because they were attempting to establish "a baseline" by which they could read their subject similar to the way polygraph technicians attempt to get a "read" on their subjects by asking questions where they already know the answers. If the CIA went to all the trouble to abuse these detainees and then did NOT ask them any questions that might reveal anything that we did not already know then the use of these techniques - and all of the harm they have done this country - was even more unnecessary than any of us thought before!

David Danzig is the Deputy Program Director at Human Rights First. He has worked with the writing staff at 24 to encourage them to portray torture on their program in a manner that does not suggest that it is a perfect counter-terror tool that will always cause suspects to reveal critical secrets.

Former Bush speechwriter wants more torture

By Renée Schomp, Law and Security program

Cross-posted from Huffington Post.

On CNN yesterday, Christiane Amanpour asked former Bush administration speechwriter Marc Thiessen, author of Courting Disaster: How the CIA Kept America Safe and How Barack Obama Is Inviting the Next Attack, “Do you support torture? I know you don’t call it that, but the extreme pain [inflicted on detainees]?” Thiessen’s rebuttal: “There’s no extreme pain!”

Apologists for post-9/11 Bush administration policies seem determined to convince us that torture is effective, justified, and necessary. Thiessen’s commentary regarding detainees Abu Zubaydah, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed (KSM), and Jose Padilla misconstrues the facts on prolonged detention and the use of “enhanced interrogation techniques.” In so doing, he promotes a counterterrorism agenda that leads to the gathering of inaccurate intelligence, inadmissible evidence, and the destruction of our country’s moral standing in the eyes of the world.

In December in USA Today, Thiessen used Umar Farouk Abdullmutallab’s attempt to detonate a bomb on Northwest Airlines flight 253 as a means of promoting Bush administration counterterrorism strategy. “In an earlier time, when we tracked down...big fish, we would take them in alive, hand them over to the CIA and find out their plans to kill Americans,” he stated.

“Enhanced interrogation techniques” did not reveal KSM

Citing evidence revealed in newly declassified sections of a Justice Department Inspector General’s report (IG report), in October 2009 Thiessen lambasted former FBI interrogator Ali Soufan in the National Review for speaking out against the use of “enhanced interrogation techniques,” such as simulated drowning. He then misconstrued evidence from the IG report to support his argument that such techniques are necessary to protect national security.

Now again in Courting Disaster, Thiessen discounts the role of the FBI in the interrogation of Abu Zubaydah that led to KSM, arguing that “since the CIA took over interrogations from Soufan, dozens of senior al Qaeda leaders have been captured, including KSM.” In fact, a review of the IG report shows that FBI interrogators Soufan and his colleague “Agent Gibson” played vital roles in the interrogation of detainee Abu Zubaydah. And according to the report, their use of “rapport-” and “relationship-building” techniques –not “enhanced interrogation techniques”—is what led Zubaydah to reveal to them the identity of KSM, the self-proclaimed mastermind of the 9/11 attacks:

“Gibson said that he and Thomas [aka Soufan] initially took the lead in interviewing Zubaydah at the CIA facility because the CIA interrogators were not at the scene when Zubaydah arrived…Gibson said he used relationship-building techniques with Zubaydah and succeeded in getting Zubaydah to admit his identity. When Zubaydah’s medical condition became grave, he was taken to a hospital and Gibson assisted in giving him care, even to the point of cleaning him up after bowel movements. Gibson told us he continued interviewing Zubaydah in the hospital, and Zubaydah identified a photograph of Khalid Sheik Muhammad as ‘Muktar,’ the mastermind of the September 11 attacks.” (68).

Thiessen later acknowledges that KSM was identified without the use of “enhanced interrogation techniques”—but explains that interrogation without the use of torture only worked because Zubaydah was in recovery in the hospital at the time, a situation he calls “by its very nature coercive.” Please. The facts are simple: according to the IG Report, authorities first learned of KSM, the alleged ringleader in the attacks of September 11th, because FBI interrogators chose to use time-tested relationship-building techniques to gather intelligence from detainee Abu Zubaydah—rather than spend years experimenting with “enhanced interrogation techniques.”

The interrogation that led to Jose Padilla

Soon after Abu Zubaydah provided information regarding KSM to FBI interrogators Soufan and “Agent Gibson,” he was transferred to the custody of the CIA and subjected to abusive interrogation techniques. In the National Review, Thiessen cited the IG report to argue that Soufan lied about his role in gathering intelligence from Zubaydah about Jose Padilla, in another attempt to support the use of “enhanced interrogation techniques.”

The IG report, however, explains that the CIA “asked Gibson and Thomas [aka Soufan] to observe and assist” with Zubaydah’s interrogation, after they took over [emphasis added]. Shortly thereafter, the report quotes Gibson as stating that Zubaydah “’gave up’ Jose Padilla and identified several targets for future al Qaeda attacks, including the Brooklyn Bridge and the Statue of Liberty” (68).

In an April 2009 New York Times op-ed, FBI interrogator Ali Soufan wrote: “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.”

Harsher techniques, such as forced nudity and sleep deprivation imposed by the CIA on Zubaydah, may have ultimately contributed to the identification of Jose Padilla. Of course, we can’t prove that Zubaydah would or would not have provided that information if subjected to humane interrogation alone. But we do know that the picture Thiessen tries to paint as fact is simply wishful thinking built on unknowable assumption and conjecture.

The dangerous implications of Thiessen’s assertions on long-term American counterterrorism strategy are perhaps best described by the FBI itself. As FBI Assistant Director Pasquale D’Amuro stated in reference to “enhanced interrogation techniques”: “We don’t do that” (71).

Expert on American counterterrorism strategy?

An important section of the IG report that Thiessen doesn’t address explains why FBI interrogators Soufan and “Agent Gibson” were eventually pulled out of Zubaydah’s interrogation entirely. As D’Amuro told the Office of the Inspector General:

“… these techniques were not as effective for developing accurate information as the FBI’s rapport-based approach…if ‘aggressive’ techniques are used long enough, detainees will start saying things they think the interrogator wants to hear just to get them to stop…Second…the use of the aggressive techniques failed to take into account an ‘end game.’ D’Amuro stated that even a military tribunal would require some standard for admissibility of evidence…Third, in addition to being ineffective and short-sighted, using these techniques was wrong and helped al-Qaeda in spreading negative views of the United States” (71-72). [Emphasis added].

Thiessen’s spin betrays his pedigree as a professional political speechwriter. But Thiessen is not a dispassionate or accurate reporter of facts and the conclusions they suggest. His new book proves mostly his dedication to his former employer and the inhumane and unlawful practices the Bush administration promoted. In the interests of both security and respect for human rights, we would do well to place our faith in the wisdom and knowledge of real experts on these issues—including when it comes to what constitutes “extreme pain.”

Former Bush speechwriter wants more torture

By Renée Schomp

Apologists for post-9/11 Bush administration policies seem determined to convince us that torture is effective, justified, and necessary. Former Bush administration speechwriter Marc Thiessen’s commentary regarding detainees Abu Zubaydah, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, and Jose Padilla misconstrues the facts on prolonged detention and the use of “enhanced interrogation techniques.” In so doing, he promotes a counterterrorism agenda that leads to the gathering of inaccurate intelligence, inadmissible evidence, and the destruction of our country’s moral standing in the eyes of the world.

On Monday, Thiessen publishes a book on CIA interrogation techniques entitled Courting Disaster: How the CIA Kept America Safe and How Barack Obama Is Inviting the Next Attack. This book will likely follow the trend of his commentary on the subject to date. In December in USA Today, Thiessen used Umar Farouk Abdullmutallab’s attempt to detonate a bomb on Northwest Airlines flight 253 as a means of promoting Bush administration counterterrorism strategy. “In an earlier time, when we tracked down...big fish, we would take them in alive, hand them over to the CIA and find out their plans to kill Americans,” he states.

Making Abu Zubaydah talk

Citing evidence revealed in newly declassified sections of a Justice Department Inspector General’s report (IG report), Thiessen lambasted former FBI interrogator Ali Soufan in the National Review for speaking out against the use of “enhanced interrogation techniques,” such as simulated drowning. He cited evidence from the IG report to support his argument that such techniques are necessary for national security.

Contrary to Thiessen’s assertions otherwise, a review of the IG report shows that FBI interrogators Soufan and his colleague “Agent Gibson” played vital roles in the interrogation of detainee Abu Zubaydah. And according to the report, their use of “rapport-” and “relationship-building” techniques –not “enhanced interrogation techniques”—is what led Zubaydah to reveal to them the identity of KSM, the self-proclaimed mastermind of the 9/11 attacks.

“Gibson said that he and Thomas [aka Soufan] initially took the lead in interviewing Zubaydah at the CIA facility because the CIA interrogators were not at the scene when Zubaydah arrived…Gibson said he used relationship-building techniques with Zubaydah and succeeded in getting Zubaydah to admit his identity. When Zubaydah’s medical condition became grave, he was taken to a hospital and Gibson assisted in giving him care, even to the point of cleaning him up after bowel movements. Gibson told us he continued interviewing Zubaydah in the hospital, and Zubaydah identified a photograph of Khalid Sheik Muhammad as ‘Muktar,’ the mastermind of the September 11 attacks.” (68).

Based on the IG Report, it appears that authorities first learned of KSM, the alleged ringleader in the attacks of September 11th, because FBI interrogators chose to use time-tested relationship-building techniques to gather intelligence from detainee Abu Zubaydah—rather than spend years experimenting with “enhanced interrogation techniques.”

The interrogation that led to Jose Padilla

Soon after Abu Zubaydah provided information regarding KSM to FBI interrogators Soufan and “Agent Gibson,” he was transferred to the custody of the CIA and subjected to abusive interrogation techniques. In the National Review, Thiessen cited the IG report to demonstrate that Soufan lied about his role in gathering intelligence from Zubaydah regarding Jose Padilla.

The IG report, however, explains that the CIA “asked Gibson and Thomas [aka Soufan] to observe and assist” with Zubaydah’s interrogation after they took over. Shortly thereafter, the report quotes Gibson as stating that Zubaydah “’gave up’ Jose Padilla and identified several targets for future al Qaeda attacks, including the Brooklyn Bridge and the Statue of Liberty” (68).

In an April 2009 New York Times op-ed, FBI interrogator Ali Soufan stated, “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.”

Harsher techniques, such as forced nudity and sleep deprivation imposed by the CIA on Zubaydah, may have contributed to the gathering of information that would lead to identification of Jose Padilla. We can’t prove that he would or would not have provided that information subject to humane interrogation, alone.

But we do know that the picture Thiessen tries to paint as fact is simply wishful thinking built on unknowable assumption and conjecture. The dangerous implications that Thiessen’s assertions have on long-term American counterterrorism strategy are perhaps best described by the FBI itself.

Expert on American counterterrorism strategy?

An important section of the IG report that Thiessen doesn’t address in his writings provides FBI Assistant Director Pasquale D’Amuro’s explanation for why FBI interrogators Soufan and “Agent Gibson” were eventually pulled out of Zubaydah’s interrogation.

“First…he felt that these techniques were not as effective for developing accurate information as the FBI’s rapport-based approach…if ‘aggressive’ techniques are used long enough, detainees will start saying things they think the interrogator wants to hear just to get them to stop…Second…the use of the aggressive techniques failed to take into account an ‘end game.’ D’Amuro stated that even a military tribunal would require some standard for admissibility of evidence…Third, in addition to being ineffective and short-sighted, using these techniques was wrong and helped al-Qaeda in spreading negative views of the United States” (71-72). [Emphasis added].

Thiessen’s spin betrays his pedigree as a professional political speechwriter, rather than a dispassionate reporter of facts and the conclusions they suggest. His upcoming book will likely only prove his dedication to the inhumane practices that prevailed in the Bush administration. In the interests of both security and respect for human rights, we would do well to place far more faith in the wisdom and knowledge of real experts on these issues such as Ali Soufan and FBI Assistant Director D’Amuro, who have actual working knowledge of interrogation techniques.

Italian Court Decision: an interview with Gabor Rona

Human Rights First's International Legal Director Gabor Rona discusses the implication of the Italian court ruling on extraordinary rendition. Check it out!

Senate Republicans try to dissuade Holder on investigating CIA interrogations

Several Republican Senators sent a letter urging Attorney General Eric Holder to not investigate interrogators who may have exceeded legal advice. Read the stories in the Congressional Quarterly and the L.A. Times.

Human Rights First supports a full accounting for past abuses.

Looking Forward: Ending Torture Under President Obama

With the celebratory cheers brought on by the decisive election of Barack Obama on Tuesday night fading, we are turning our sights on the transition to his inauguration, and the steps necessary to implement some of the promises made on the campaign trail. Although President-elect Obama faces a variety of challenges starting January 20, overhauling the Bush Administration’s most aggressive detention and interrogation policies, including the secret prison network run by the CIA, is among the most urgent.

HRF has called on the President-elect to address these issues right away:

"The erosion of human rights protections in the United States in the aftermath of September 11th has had a profound impact on human rights standards around the world," said Elisa Massimino, Executive Director and Chief Executive Officer of Human Rights First. "We urge President-elect Obama promptly to turn the page on the policies of torture and other abuse that have deprived the United States of its ability to lead on human rights for the past seven years."

Although some advisers acknowledge that the economic crisis may siphon his attention away from foreign policy efforts, these are issues on which Obama placed heavy emphasis during his campaign, and the President-elect's team told the LA Times that they expect his early moves to be "appreciated overseas, and create a more favorable environment for the new administration right at the start."

Addressing detainee treatment and interrogation policies and closing Guantanamo would provide a needed break from the past. The world has so soured on the Bush Administration that foreign leaders are suspicious of American proposals, "even when they're good ones," an advisor added.

Obama has declared that the Guantanamo Bay prison in Cuba should be closed and that detainees should be handled through the U.S. military justice system, and also supported increased oversight of the secret CIA detention program and efforts to promote a single standard of humane interrogation techniques that would restrict the CIA to interrogation techniques used by the military. But there’s a lot of difficult work ahead – and this is where organizations like HRF come in, to keep the pressure on, and to help sort out the details. In the new environment of an Obama Administration, we expect our views to be taken seriously.

Facing the Music: CIA and British Agents May Face Prosecution for Allegations of Torture

Remember Binyam Mohamed? Senior CIA officers could be put on trial in Britain, after it emerged this week that the British Attorney General is investigating allegations of his torture.

To refresh you, Mohamed’s case was documented in HRF’s report Tortured Justice (pp.23-24). An Ethiopian-born former British resident, he was reportedly arrested in Pakistan in April 2002 and transferred to Guantánamo in September 2004, where he remains.

Mohamed maintains that after his arrest in 2002 he was rendered to Morocco, and then transferred to CIA custody in Afghanistan. His attorneys argue that the government's allegations linking him to a “dirty bomb” plot in the United States are based on confessions their client made after his detention and torture in Morocco, where, they say, he was slashed with a razor and beaten. In response to the torture, Mohamed says he attempted to tell his interrogators what he thought they wanted to hear, falsely confessing to some of their accusations.

But now, U.S. District Judge Emmet G. Sullivan has ordered the Justice Department to turn over documents to Mohamed’s attorneys detailing their client’s treatment while in detention overseas. These documents may help prove or disprove Mohamed’s claims that he falsely confessed only after being tortured at the direction of U.S. officials.

On October 21, 2008, shortly before the Justice Department was required to turn over exculpatory evidence to the defense, the Pentagon withdrew charges linking Mr. Mohamed to the “dirty bomb” plot. "That raises serious questions in this court's mind about whether those allegations were ever true," said Judge Sullivan. The government said it stood by the allegations but chose to withdraw them in order to expedite the proceedings. "That doesn't ring true; it rings hollow," Sullivan responded. "The government has never been concerned with acting expeditiously here." Read the Washington Post article here.

Earlier this week, the United States turned over potentially exculpatory intelligence documents related to Mohamed that have been the subject of judgments by the British High Court. The U.S. government initially resisted handing them over, releasing only seven documents, but on Wednesday it turned over the 35 remaining ones. British officials also told the High Court this week that the "question of possible criminal wrongdoing" in Mohamed's case has been referred to the country's attorney general for investigation into the actions of British agents, and potentially, senior CIA officers.

Last night, Mr. Mohamed’s lawyer, Clive Stafford Smith, said: "This is a welcome recognition that the CIA cannot just go rendering British residents to secret torture chambers without consequences, and British agents cannot take part in U.S. crimes without facing the music. Reprieve will be making submissions to the Attorney General to ensure those involved, from the U.S., Pakistan, Morocco, Britain, are held responsible." Reprieve is an organization, founded by Smith, that represents prisoners facing execution at the hands of the state in the conventional criminal justice system, or those subject to imprisonment outside the reach of the law in the ‘war on terror.’

Mike Posner on the Question of 'Enhanced Interrogation'

On Monday, April 30, former CIA Director George Tenet published his memoir, At the Center of the Storm. Much of the coverage of the book has focused on Mr. Tenet’s assessment of the CIA’s role leading up to the war in Iraq. But both in the book and in several media appearances, Mr. Tenet has tried to justify the CIA’s use of secret prisons and so-called “enhanced interrogation techniques.”

What Mr. Tenet says about the monitoring of prisoners in CIA custody:

“CIA officers came up with a series of interrogation techniques that would be carefully monitored at all times to ensure the safety of the prisoner.”
[At the Center of the Storm, p. 242]

Human Rights First’s response:

Monitored by whom? The CIA program Mr. Tenet refers to included holding prisoners in secret incommunicado detention with no access to the International Committee of the Red Cross or any outside monitoring agency. This practice is illegal under U.S. and international law. According to a number of reports, including an in-depth report by Human Rights First, the CIA has operated these secret detention facilities in a number of places including Afghanistan, Pakistan, Jordan, Morocco, Poland, Romania, Bulgaria, the Ukraine, Kosovo, Macedonia and on Diego Garcia.

What Mr. Tenet says about torture and “aggressive interrogation techniques”:

“The most aggressive interrogation techniques conducted by CIA personnel were applied to only a handful of the worst terrorists on the planet, including people who had planned the 9/11 attacks and who, among other things, were responsible for journalist Daniel Pearl’s death. The interrogation of these few individuals was conducted in a precisely monitored, measured way intended to try to prevent what we believed to be an imminent follow-up attack. ”
[At the Center of the Storm, pp. 241-42].

“I don’t talk about techniques and we don’t torture people . . . Whatever we did was authorized. Whatever the program is, the Attorney General of the United States said is legal, you can go ahead.”
[Interview with Scott Pelley – CBS “60 Minutes,” April 29, 2007]

“[W]hat we did was authorized, legal, prudent, briefed. And we don’t torture and I don’t talk about techniques.”
[Interview with Larry King, CNN “Larry King Live,” April 30,2007]

Human Rights First’s Response:

What Mr. Tenet terms “aggressive interrogation techniques” reportedly include torture and other cruel, inhuman or degrading practices like these:

Water Boarding: The detainee is bound to a board while water is poured over his face, which is wrapped in plastic. This causes near asphyxiation and a fear of drowning

Exposure to Severe Cold Temperatures: The detainee is soaked in cold water and left to stand naked in a cold cell.

Stress Positions: the detainee is cuffed and shackled in uncomfortable positions for upwards of 40 hours, depriving him of sleep and causing him pain.

The Belly Slap: The detainee is hit in the stomach, with the intent to cause pain but not internal injury. Government doctors reportedly warned that it could cause permanent internal damage.

In addition the CIA has reportedly denied pain medication, and used extreme sleep deprivation, sensory deprivation and isolation.

All of these techniques violate U.S. and international laws to which US officials, including CIA personnel, are bound. Each of these techniques also explicitly violates the U.S. Army’s Field Manual on Intelligence Interrogation. Last September, on the day the revised Army Field Manual was made public, Lt. General John Kimmons, the Army’s Deputy Chief of Staff for Interrogations announced the Army’s rejection of official cruelty: “[N]o good intelligence is going to come from abusive practices.”

Mr. Tenet’s use of the term “Torture”:

“Larry, we don’t torture people. It’s very important for people to understand that we live in a nation of laws.”
[Interview with Larry King, CNN “Larry King Live,” April 30, 2007]

Human Rights First’s Response:

Mr. Tenet and other administration officials have consistently drawn a distinction between what they deem to be torture, which they say the US does not allow, and other forms of official cruelty, which they argue may be practiced. In August 2002, lawyers in the Office of Legal Counsel of the Justice Department defined torture to mean that “[w]hen the pain is physical, it must be of an intensity akin to that which accompanies serious physical injury such as death or organ failure. Severe mental pain requires suffering not just at the moment of infliction but it also requires lasting psychological harm.” The memo was written at the request of the CIA, which was looking for legal authority to use the techniques described above. Under public pressure, the administration withdrew this definition, which flies in the face of the common sense meaning of the term. But Mr. Tenet and others have continued to assert that the CIA’s “alternative interrogation procedures” are not torture and therefore legal.

These “enhanced” or “alternative” interrogation techniques violate U.S. and international law, including the Detainee Treatment Act, passed overwhelmingly by Congress in the fall of 2005. This law explicitly bans all forms of cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment of any prisoners in US custody. It also applies the Army’s field manual to all U.S. agencies including the CIA when they operate in a US military facility.

Mr. Tenet’s comments on the effectiveness of the CIA’s enhanced interrogation program:

“Information from these interrogations helped disrupt plots aimed at locations in the United States, the United Kingdom, the Middle East, South Asia and Central Asia." [In the Center of the Storm, p. 242]

“I know that this program has saved lives. I know we’ve disrupted plots.”
[Interview with Scott Pelley, CBS “60 Minutes,” April 29,2007]

Human Rights First’s response:

While these coercive interrogations may have yielded some useful intelligence, they also have stained America’s image in the world and seriously undermined support for U.S. efforts in Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere among people around the world whose cooperation and expertise the U.S. needs.

In some important cases, these techniques also have led to official reliance on unreliable information extracted by coercive means. One striking example is the case of Ibn al-Shaykh al-Libbi. He was interrogated by the CIA in Pakistan and then turned over by them to the Egyptian intelligence services for coercive interrogation. Under duress he gave detailed information describing ties between al Qaeda and Saddam Hussein. The Bush administration relied heavily on this testimony in making the case for the war in Iraq , at the UN and elsewhere. Al-Libbi later recanted his testimony after he was returned to U.S. custody, and the U.S. intelligence community recommended that information obtained from al-Libbi be regarded as highly suspect.

Mr. Tenet’s response to Senator John McCain and others who are calling for an end to all forms of official cruelty:

“Listen, Larry, I respect Senator McCain and I know what his experience was . . . And Senator McCain raised something at the end that’s quite important. He raised this values question. He raised where we want to be as a society. All I’m saying , wherever we decide to be , whatever the country decides , whatever we decide on a bi-partisan basis, listen: I accept the issues he raises.”
[Interview with Larry King, CNN “Larry King Live,” April 30,2007]

Human Rights First’s response:

We agree with Mr. Tenet that these issues are about values and who Americans want to be as a people.

Responding specifically to Mr. Tenet’s book Senator John McCain said:

“A man I admire more than anyone else, General Jack Vessey, former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff … told me once – he said ‘John, any intelligence information we might gain through the use of torture could never, ever balance the damage that it does to our image in the world.' I agree with him. Look at the war in Algeria. Look, the fact that you torture someone, they are going to tell you everything they think you want to know. It’s an affront to everything we stand for and believe in.”

“It’s interesting to me that every retired military officer whether it be Colin Powell or whether it be former chairmen of the Joint Chiefs of Staff – everybody whose been in war doesn’t want to torture people and think that it’s the wrong thing to do. And history shows that.”
[Interview of John McCain by Chris Wallace on “Fox News Sunday,” April 29, 2007]

What Military Leaders Say

And finally these are comments by three senior military leaders on the same subject.

“I continue to read and hear that we are facing a ‘different enemy’ in the war on terror; no matter how true that may be, inhumanity and cruelty are not new to warfare nor to enemies we have faced in the past. In my short 46 years in the armed forces Americans confronted the horrors of prison camps of the Japanese in World War II, the North Koreans in 1950-53, and the North Vietnamese in the long years of the Vietnam War, as well as knowledge of the Nazi’s holocaust depredations during World War II. Through those years, we held our own values. We should continue to do so.”
[Letter from General John Vessey , former head of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, to Senator McCain opposing a proposed redefinition of Common Article 3 (the humane treatment standard) of the Geneva Conventions, September 12, 2006]

“The world is beginning to doubt the moral basis of our fight against terrorism. To redefine Common Article 3 would add to those doubts. Furthermore it would put our own troops at risk.”
[Letter from General Colin Powell to Senator McCain on the same subject, September 13, 2006.]

“This issue is all about how we, as Americans, act. Do we walk our talk? Do we change the rules of the game because our enemy acts in a horrific manner? Do we give up our honor because our enemy is without honor? If we do, we begin to mimic the very behavior we abhor.”
[Letter from General Charles Krulak, former Commandant of the Marine Corps, to Senator McCain, September 2006.]