by Deb Cupples | Today, the New York Times ran this headline: "Banned Techniques Yielded 'High Value Information,' Memo Says."
The headline gives the impression that torture worked. That headline is accurate but doesn't fully reflect the text of the article, in that people who get their news by skimming headlines might get the impression that the debate over whether torture works has definitively ended -- with torture fans emerging the winners.
In fact, the article (as a whole) does not seem to reach that conclusion -- and neither does. The article's second paragraph states:
"'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,' Adm. Dennis C. Blair, the intelligence director, wrote in a memo to his staff last Thursday."
The last line of the article -- a quote from Mr. Blair -- seems to inject doubt into the debate over torture's effectiveness.
A Republican senator reportedly asked Mr. Blair whether the CIA's "interrogation detention program" worked: to which, Mr. Blair replied:
"'I’ll have to look into that more closely before I can give you a good answer on that one.'"
About halfway into the article, readers see another quote from Mr. Blair, which seems to indicate that he doubts the benefits of torture:
"“The information gained from these techniques was valuable in some instances, but there is no way of knowing whether the same information could have been obtained through other means....
I must interject here: the information gained from torture was "valuable"? That is completely beside the point. The money that one gains from robbing a bank (or bilking investors through fraud) would be "valuable" -- but bank robbery is against the law.
Torture is also illegal (see (18 U.S. Code 2340(a) and 2340). Mr. Blair's quote continues:
"The bottom line is these techniques have hurt our image around the world, the damage they have done to our interests far outweighed whatever benefit they gave us and they are not essential to our national security."
Though a new memo (on which today's Times article focuses) claims that torture rendered information that helped the Bush administration stop a terrorist attack, toward the end of the Times article is this bit:
"Several news accounts, including one in the New York Times last week, have quoted former intelligence officials saying the harsh interrogation of Abu Zubaydah, a Qaeda operative who was waterboarded 83 times, did not produce information that foiled terror plots."
Illegality aside, did torture "work" or not? The answer ot that question comes down to whom one believes is telling the truth.
That's a terribly tough call to make, given the half truths and untruths that some government officials fed us taxpayers over the past seven or eight years. No, 'm not referring to the Bush Administration's masterful (and successful) attempts to deceive the American people into supporting the invasion of Iraq -- though that example is worth considering.
In February 2008, The Los Angeles Times informed us taxpayers:
"On Friday evening, Atty. Gen. Michael B. Mukasey and Director of National Intelligence J. Michael McConnell had said in an unusually blunt letter to Congress that the nation 'is now more vulnerable to terrorist attack and other foreign threats' because lawmakers had not yet acted on the administration's proposal for the wiretapping law.
"But within hours of sending that letter, administration officials told lawmakers on the House and Senate intelligence committees that they had prevailed upon all of the telecommunications companies to continue cooperating with the government's requests for information while negotiations with Congress continue." (LA Times)
That was not the first time that Mr. McConnell had made an untrue statement to Congress. It wasn't ven the second time.
In September, McConnell told the House Intelligence Committee that Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) requirements prevented agents form quickly tapping Iraqi insurgents' communications, which enabled insurgents to capture three U.S. soldiers in May.
IN REALITY: officials didn't even seek wiretapping approval until 86 hours after the soldiers had been captured.
McConnell also told the Senate Intelligence Committee that the "Protect America Act" had led to the capture of terrorists in Germany.
IN REALITY: German agents had uncovered the terrorist plot based on info they'd received 10 months before the Act was passed. After other intelligence officials shared the facts with Congress, McConnell retracted that statement.
So, whom should one believe?
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