The Senate Torture Report

[maxparrish]

The Democratic Senator Torture Report should be viewed for what it is: a prosecutoral and partisan attack, dropping all pretense at objectivity. I have seen similar tones in a few management audits, and the tip-off to the reader of a scape-goating is when the tone is over the top, and the finger pointing is limited to a select target within a much larger controversy. And when the audit author(s) were actually part of the original management screwup, you know it is a frame job.

Note that:

- The report danced around the fact that both the administration and Congress endorsed enhanced interrogations, and pushed the CIA to be less risk averse. In fact the CIA obtained legal review and approval from the Justice department, and informed Congress on all the basic aspects of the program.

- The numbers have not changed. 39 terrorists were subjected to the program. Of them, three were water-boarded, including the two most vicious and high ranking terrorists. The others were subjected to other treatment, like the dreaded "belly slap" and "attention grasp". Others were doused with water, required be naked, or threatened. Nothing that US inmates and fraternity pledges don't already suffer. (Yawn)

- The CIA "torture" was almost exclusively the approved tactics, which the DOJ found not to be torture.

- The ready conflation of abuse with true torture seems to be pervasive- its also an insult to those who have suffered real torture. When teeth are knocked out, bones broken, bodies bruised by beatings, eyes scooped out, testicles crushed heads chopped off THAT is torture - you know, the stuff routinely and delightfully done in the axis of evil nations and by Islamo terrorists. Any reader familiar with interrogation in the Soviet Gulag, in Nazi Germany and its occupied nations, in N. Korea or N. Vietnam POW camps should know what real torture is.

Sometimes, in the real world, even civilized nations must do a little dirty work - its not a 'tea and cakes if you please' world. Too bad the former Senate adult, Feinstein, is regressing back into puberty.

It matters not that congress danced, they and the american people were being systematically lied to.

No one is disputing that some information was misleading, or that errors were made, or that sometimes the CIA personnel were misleading, but federal employees are well aware that politicians often encourage actions, and then turn into a CYA denialist lynch mob that throws their employees under the bus. That they don't trust their 'bosses' in Congress not to stab them in the back, on occasion they are less forthcoming (and often Congress does not wish to know, for fear of being held accountable by the public).

But the bottom line is that I am not aware of any "systematic lies" that were more than collateral matters to misrepresentations of the enhanced interrogation program...and many of those came from testimony by former CIA Director Michael Hayden reporting on events prior to his tenure. On the pivotal essentials and basics, nothing has changed. Only three were water boarded, and all the tear shedding over scumbags Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and Abu Zubaydah is not going to change that.

Crimes were being committed and assertions were being made both that crimes weren't being committed and that the procedures used in those crimes were effective.

Pontificating drivel. Denial taht certain actions committed were "crimes" is a matter of opinion, not the denial of fact. Moreover, procedures were effective and, under the circumstances, warranted.

The report lays out the crimes and debunks the assertions with documented histories and data points secured from documentation recovered from CIA, FBI, the Bush administration, and the Military. If that is a political gesture then maybe we'd better make logic and reason optional human investigative tactics.

Sorry, what is a political gesture is to misuse, misinterpret, and/or ignore the documents WHILE not bothering to interview ANYONE involved or accused. Rolling Stone's methods are not exactly an endorsement for a fair-minded investigation to determine the truth of the events.

Your challenge is toppled by the evidence provided. We appreciate your hand waving for the accused. Your argument has already been debunked and published (see the report based on 6.2 million documents).

The "debunkers" have been debunked. Cherry picked readings and analytic pratfalls were reviewed by many sources, including the folks the committee refused to interview. Any serious investigative work that ONLY relies on documents is flawed - attend any trial for a white collar crime and it may open your eyes when you see ACTUAL witnesses.

BTW what is your rationale for excluding rectal feeding, harsh take down, humiliation, multi-day forced wakefulness and the like form your list of techniques used on the 39, or the fact that all 39 we treated in ways deemed illegal by international agreement signed by presidents Truman and Reagan.

It depends on when, who, and how some of these alleged actions took place - and on what basis you think these were illegal. The "legality" of certain actions is a large and complex subject, often based on vague law. If you are trying to claim that Reagan signed an agreement, approved by the Senate, that explicitly said "water boarding is illegal" then perhaps you can provide evidence thereof.

 

[Valjean]

I heard on NPR last night that they paid these two psychologists 80 Million dollars to design and implement the torture protocols. And these guys didn't even have a background in interrogation.

Did you hear NPR's Morning Edition piece on torture this morning? It doesn't work and everyone in intelligence knows it doesn't work - except, apparently, the CIA. http://www.npr.org/2014/12/12/37026...nt-work-in-the-real-world-tv-has-us-convinced.

 

[maxparrish]

You mean like when the GOP led House Intelligence Committee Report on Benghazi is joined by Democrats and is touted as "more than fair" to the State Department?

Yeah. In that one, politically motivated and lead by republicans, they found there were no State department or administration lapses or misdeeds or cover ups even though the republicans reopened the inquiry three times to find the truth about administration wrong doing.

How charitable of you to admit republicans were forced to report they had gone on a fruitless witch hunt.

I was asked what is not a partisan attack when Democrats are involved. I provide an example of a committee headed by Republicans with Democrats giving a touted 'fair minded' non-partisan investigation and report.

So now your claiming that ANYTHING that involves democrats is "partisan", that for the House Intelligence Committee to even dare to exercise its oversight and investigative duties it MUST be deemed partisan because the departmental actions being investigated were done by Democrats?

LOL...a toast to the untouchables.

 

[Valjean]

Of course they never bothered to read the results of CIA and other enhanced interrogations of the past that would have told them:

1) Torture information is notoriously unreliable
2) If the prisoner can survive two weeks of torture, they will never give in
3) Good cop / good cop is the most effective form of interrogation.

The most effective prisoner interrogation methods are isolation from comrades, friendship, rapport building, empathy, sharing food, &c: https://globalecco.org/learning-from-history-what-is-successful-interrogation-

 

[maxparrish]

KT,

So many unsupported claims, so little 'beef'. As such, I find it most parsimonious to reply to your aimless rantings as a single quote, with comments inserted.

Prosecutorial? When no one has been, or will be prosecuted over it? Hardly. On the other hand you are font of knowledge when it comes to the partisan, as every post you pen simply reeks of partisanship. We are speaking of the prosecutoral tone of the report, no one is saying it will be used for a prosecution

Who was the "select target"?The CIA

No dancing needed, it drives home the fact that that the W administration endorsed torture. Only a few select members of Congress were informed on any aspects of the torture program.You mean like the House and Senate Democratic party and related oversight committees?

The numbers don't matter, who it was that we tortured does not matter. If the administration condoned the torture of only one person, who was the most vile human on earth, and the CIA enacted that torture, both are guilty of violating human rights.Sentimental nonsense. Numbers always matter. A few illegal killing by an armed force, for example, is not the same as the genocide of 6,000,000 in a concentration camp.

And which any objective person can clearly see falls under the definition of torture. "Objective" like you?

Torture is well defined, and although most of the things you mention are torture, there are many other things that are torture as well. The administration and the CIA condoned and carried out torture under the world wide definition of torture. I will note, however, that beheading is not torture, it is either murder or execution. Prove that it was well defined at the time of the enhanced interrogation "misdeeds"

Every time, in the real world, that you compromise your values by stooping to the level of your enemies who use reprehensible tactics like torture, you become more like those enemies, and you lose the right to call yourself the good guy. You mean like trying to kill the other guy because he is trying to kill you?

 

[untermensche]

What is the hardest thing to swallow is what we have done in our madness to people who are completely innocent.

The bombings and mutilations and the arrests and the torture.

How does one quantify the crimes against the innocent in the last 13 years?

How many innocent are we allowed to maim kill or torture in our holy quest?

Where do we get this right?

 

[Tom Sawyer]

Where do we get this right?

If I've read my Texas history books correctly, you got it when Jesus gave George Washington the flaming sword he used to defeat Hitler and the British armies so that he could introduce the concept of freedom to the world for the first time ever.

America. Fuck yeah.

 

[fromderinside]

I was asked what is not a partisan attack when Democrats are involved. I provide an example of a committee headed by Republicans with Democrats giving a touted 'fair minded' non-partisan investigation and report.

... and you failed to do so.

Repiblicans had no evidence, they had no choice, they tried three times is why I say that. Your selection is not a selection it is an example of failed overreach by partisan Repiblicans in the House.

 

[Nexus]

I heard on NPR last night that they paid these two psychologists 80 Million dollars to design and implement the torture protocols. And these guys didn't even have a background in interrogation.

Did you hear NPR's Morning Edition piece on torture this morning? It doesn't work and everyone in intelligence knows it doesn't work - except, apparently, the CIA. http://www.npr.org/2014/12/12/37026...nt-work-in-the-real-world-tv-has-us-convinced.

They mentioned that last night but they also said the CIA aware it wasn't effective too but they ignored their earlier findings of that fact because these two psychologists convinced them they could make it work.

 

[ZiprHead]

I don't understand Max's argument. Is he saying these things didn't happen?

 

[GenesisNemesis]

I don't understand Max's argument. Is he saying these things didn't happen?

For Max, all democrats are liars.

 

[maxparrish]

I don't understand Max's argument. Is he saying these things didn't happen?

My "argument" is:

a) The Senate Report should be viewed skeptically. While the initial purpose of the report (started and written years ago) was to objectively review and determine the effectiveness of CIA detention and interrogations and to make recommendations for the future it turned into a one-sided 'frame-up' of the agency (without substantive recommendations).

b) The Senate Report ignores any and all evidence that is contrary to its pre-determined line of attack. It refused to interview those most knowledgeable, those directly involved, and ignored CIA evidence of where enhanced interrogation did work, or why some misinformation was provided to Congress. It also contained numerous disputed and factual errors on the interrogations, discussed in the Senate Minority Report, the CIA response, and in the response of former employees and directors.

c) It ignores the mitigating context and causes behind some of these agency choices, and seeks to unfairly portray most CIA agents as working in bad faith.

d) For the most part, nothing the agency did was done without the knowledge of the administration, the Justice Department, key Congressional leaders of both parties, and their respective oversight committees.

e) My own moral and legal view of 'torture' is quite different than that of the authors of the Democratic Torture Report, and most on this board. Enhanced interrogation techniques are effective in certain circumstances, they were legal at the time they were used, and should be legal today for use on captured unlawful, non-citizen, combatants...especially for those held outside the United States.

 

[Ford]

I don't understand Max's argument. Is he saying these things didn't happen?

If I understood the last post correctly, the short version is "yeah, these things happened...so fucking what?"

It is basically the line that Dick Cheney has taken...that we tortured people, everybody knew we were torturing people, and we make no apologies for anything, ever.

 

[Wiploc]

Of course they never bothered to read the results of CIA and other enhanced interrogations of the past that would have told them:

1) Torture information is notoriously unreliable
2) If the prisoner can survive two weeks of torture, they will never give in
3) Good cop / good cop is the most effective form of interrogation.

Then they wouldn't have gotten the 80 million dollars.

 

[Valjean]

More on the CIAs botched interrogations:
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/dec/12/interrogated-terrorist-cia-senate-report

One of the hardest things we struggled to make sense of, back then, was why US officials were authorizing harsh techniques when our interrogations were working and their harsh techniques weren’t.

 

[fromderinside]

Yeah. In that one, politically motivated and lead by republicans, they found there were no State department or administration lapses or misdeeds or cover ups even though the republicans reopened the inquiry three times to find the truth about administration wrong doing.

How charitable of you to admit republicans were forced to report they had gone on a fruitless witch hunt.

I was asked what is not a partisan attack when Democrats are involved. I provide an example of a committee headed by Republicans with Democrats giving a touted 'fair minded' non-partisan investigation and report.

So now your claiming that ANYTHING that involves democrats is "partisan", that for the House Intelligence Committee to even dare to exercise its oversight and investigative duties it MUST be deemed partisan because the departmental actions being investigated were done by Democrats?

LOL...a toast to the untouchables.

No. I'm saying that a party that investigates the same thing three times and each time comes up empty needs to come clean that it was on a political witch hunt.

touche

Quit crying.

 

[fromderinside]

I don't understand Max's argument. Is he saying these things didn't happen?

My "argument" is:

a) The Senate Report should be viewed skeptically. While the initial purpose of the report (started and written years ago) was to objectively review and determine the effectiveness of CIA detention and interrogations and to make recommendations for the future it turned into a one-sided 'frame-up' of the agency (without substantive recommendations).

b) The Senate Report ignores any and all evidence that is contrary to its pre-determined line of attack. It refused to interview those most knowledgeable, those directly involved, and ignored CIA evidence of where enhanced interrogation did work, or why some misinformation was provided to Congress. It also contained numerous disputed and factual errors on the interrogations, discussed in the Senate Minority Report, the CIA response, and in the response of former employees and directors.

c) It ignores the mitigating context and causes behind some of these agency choices, and seeks to unfairly portray most CIA agents as working in bad faith.

d) For the most part, nothing the agency did was done without the knowledge of the administration, the Justice Department, key Congressional leaders of both parties, and their respective oversight committees.

e) My own moral and legal view of 'torture' is quite different than that of the authors of the Democratic Torture Report, and most on this board. Enhanced interrogation techniques are effective in certain circumstances, they were legal at the time they were used, and should be legal today for use on captured unlawful, non-citizen, combatants...especially for those held outside the United States.

a) It was always intended to be a political report. In such reports objective data are interpreted politically. Its the nature of the beast. It is quit different from the republican led Benghazi report which had objective data of no wrong doing three times. This report had evidence the CIA actively tried to cover it;s track and assertions.

b) The Senate report puts the attempts by the CIA to 'play the data' in context of what actually took place in timelines. Quite the opposite of ignoring the CIA's disinformation and definition shopping, it debunks CIA these efforts to make a silk purse from the CIA sow's ear, all with a timeline that works very well. Even McCain, he's no democrat, knows what the CIA and he Administration tried to foist is contrary to the facts (he was a tortured detainee so he does know something about how such works). After a few exposures to a disinformation source that source is no longer contacted explains why some didn't get contacted. The 'errors' are the disputes. When times are included it becomes clear which interpretation rings true.

c) There are no mitigating circumstances that permits debunked techniques that are also outlawed techniques to be employed. You can't justify murder (torture) by saying "he yelled at my wife". Existential threats are the stuff of international relations. There are laws and guidelines for handling these. Just because its not a nation state does not permit one to use a convenient rationales to set aside these rules.

d) BS. Its a clear case of hinting then doing the good old 'hear no evil, say no evil, see no evil' song and dance.

e) So feeding by anal injection isn't torture, chaining to floor until dead isn't torture, hard and repeated take downs, what DI's used to call 'throwing your shirt at the wall with you in it' tactics isn't torture? It was legal by shopping. It was not legal by considered and universal understanding. and text. Further one should not contract places for out of the country holding of captured people other than where they were captured or to where thosewho hold them in custody reside.

 

[arkirk]

I don't understand Max's argument. Is he saying these things didn't happen?

My "argument" is:

a) The Senate Report should be viewed skeptically. While the initial purpose of the report (started and written years ago) was to objectively review and determine the effectiveness of CIA detention and interrogations and to make recommendations for the future it turned into a one-sided 'frame-up' of the agency (without substantive recommendations).

b) The Senate Report ignores any and all evidence that is contrary to its pre-determined line of attack. It refused to interview those most knowledgeable, those directly involved, and ignored CIA evidence of where enhanced interrogation did work, or why some misinformation was provided to Congress. It also contained numerous disputed and factual errors on the interrogations, discussed in the Senate Minority Report, the CIA response, and in the response of former employees and directors.

c) It ignores the mitigating context and causes behind some of these agency choices, and seeks to unfairly portray most CIA agents as working in bad faith.

d) For the most part, nothing the agency did was done without the knowledge of the administration, the Justice Department, key Congressional leaders of both parties, and their respective oversight committees.

e) My own moral and legal view of 'torture' is quite different than that of the authors of the Democratic Torture Report, and most on this board. Enhanced interrogation techniques are effective in certain circumstances, they were legal at the time they were used, and should be legal today for use on captured unlawful, non-citizen, combatants...especially for those held outside the United States.

This says a lot about your own bias and willingness to resort to inhumane activity...something that is an international crime.

 

[arkirk]

I do not fault anybody for labeling this report as a political act rather than one seeking justice. I have a strong hunch that Senator Feinstein (who was on a committee that should have been privy to this information) sat on this investigation till it became politically useful to release it. In other words, I feel she was a contributor to the wrong by her tacit acceptance at the time these things occurred. She definitely was being informed of the torture by Amnesty International and other human rights organizations and played clam at the time. Similarly, her outrage at the releases of information by Manning and Asange and others showing all manner of spying and killing has the reek of political intrigue to which she is no stranger. Despite her seeming lack of conscience, this report coming from her committee still contains factual information that calls for actions against the offending torturers.

Put quite simply, we should not countenance torture or murder of any human being by our government or any of its agencies or contractors.

 

[untermensche]

This report should be on the front page every day.

It should be the lead story every day.

Callousness has a way of seeping out and polluting others.

First we are barbaric to the people we attack and capture.

Soon we accept barbarity towards some citizens. Perhaps the killing of unarmed black men.

And then soon the cancer will spread further.

Acceptance of barbarity because the government tells you it is necessary, despite the evidence that shows otherwise, just leads to greater barbarity.