Some reports now claim that KSM gave up the information that led eventually — and with a lot more legwork — to the identification of bin Laden’s courier though more conventional means of interrogation, not as the direct result of enhanced interrogation techniques. Commenters below claim that this somehow undermines the argument that enhanced interrogation played some role in the eventual identification of bin Laden’s compound and his subsequent demise. But this argument is specious. When KSM was captured, he was resistant to any form of interrogation, conventional or otherwise. As our colleague Marc Thiessen learned in writing Courting Disaster, KSM’s resistance was “superhuman.” It was only after being subjected to waterboarding and other enhanced measures that he became compliant, and from that point forward, cooperated with more conventional techniques. As one of the CIA interrogators told Marc, “If we had not had these techniques, we would have gotten zero from him.” So enhanced interrogation methods played an integral role in all of the intelligence collected from him.
As I’ve said before, I still think the debate over the legality and morality of these measures is the subject of fair debate. Marc makes a compelling case in his book, but I respect those who articulate principled opposition. But the question of effectiveness has been answered, if these reports are correct. (Yes, I recognize these are anonymous sources, but this administration has every reason to deny the effectiveness of these interrogation methods, given the president’s firm position against them.) Critics are simply denying the obvious when they claim that the facts as reported render ambiguous claims of effectiveness.
So, you know for a fact that conventional techniques would not have worked. Since presumably you have zero inside information, can you please elaborate on how you know that?
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseYou know for a fact that conventional techniques would have worked? Since you admitedly have no inside information, can you please elaborate on how you know that?
In the defense of the author. She has information from people who claim to be insiders. You on the other hand, have ...
Reply to this commentLinkReport Abuse@MarkW:
Per Rumsfeld, it was the traditional techniques which DID work on KSM. The concept that torture was somehow necessary in order to 'soften him up' is only reported here as a third-hand assertion. It shouldn't be taken seriously, because no evidence has been presented to support that theory at all.
Shannen fails to point out that those who participated in and authorized our odious interrogation program have every reason to exaggerate the significance of their actions as well. Perhaps more of a reason.
Conservatives would be much better served by repudiating their former support for torture, rather than to endlessly fight to justify it. It is a morally indefensible position and one which does no electoral favors.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseThere is a true saying, "War is hell."
Things happen on the battlefield that do not/cannot/should not ever happen in normal civilized society. That is why there needs to be a separation between how we deal with enemy combatants captured on the battlefield and common civilian criminals.
Not 'anything goes' but battlefield rules apply, not our lawyer-up civilian rules.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseYou ignore that the people that authorized these techniques of questionable legality have reason to lie about their effectiveness as well.
They wouldn't want people to think they were torturing people and it wasn't even worth it.
Your post shows how desperate some are to find some vindication for Bush's torture, which even he stopped midway through his presidency.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseBefore you even had the basic facts you were screaming "torture works! the issue is settled!" at the top of your lungs.
"In the defense of the author. She has information from people who claim to be insiders."
He, not she.
More to the point, he has information from Marc Thiessen, whose consuming passion in life is to prove that torture is a wonderful thing that we should do far more of. Having read Mr. Thiessen's work in the past, I don't trust a word he says, and when he is cited as a source my respect for the person citing him disappears.
In addition, a number of persuasive analyses that have arisen in the past 24 hours support a conclusion diametrically opposed to the one Mr. Coffin is pushing.
Reply to this commentLinkReport Abuse@TheFish, @bobbytwotimes,
First, you wouldn't know torture from fraternity hazing! I get the idea that you believe anything that hurts the feelings or injures the dignity of someone is torture. American combat pilots are put through worse than that in survival school. Marine boot camp(1969)was worse.
Having your teeth pulled(or knocked out)with pliers is torture. Breaking or dislocating bones, electric shock, beating the bottoms of feet raw…is torture. Enhanced interrogation is not.
Does it work? You don't care, because you won't even acknowledge any facts presented. You'd rather run around screaming, "Torture! Torture!"
We face ruthless enemies who can only be defeated by warriors, not an army of Quakers.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseOstap, sorry I left you out.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseJust this morning even Matt and Meredith were calling it enhanced interrogation techniques. Apparently the word torture has now been removed from their vocabularies because of overuse and misuse. It will be back though, the next time the White House changes hands.
Reply to this commentLinkReport Abuse@Cartooner,
I would submit that, as we called the exact same actions torture when others were performing them, we ought to own up to the reality of our actions as well. Your defense, while full of chest-thumping manliness, doesn't stand up to any real examination.
Not only that, but it's not a question of willingness to 'do what it takes' to get ahead in the WoT. It's a question of what is and isn't effective. To date, there's very little evidence that torture and abuse are effective ways of getting information out of prisoners, and a great deal of evidence that it is not effective. It has also caused large problems for us both domestically and internationally.
It's erroneous to conflate opposition to a certain technique with a lack of will. Instead, let's use our heads, and figure out what actually does and doesn't work - and save the chest-thumping, because really, it impresses nobody at all.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseOstap, Fish, others, get a life. Your reflex anti-Americanism is offensive. You care more about maligning the good names of people who do dangerous work for your freedom than you do about the welfare of your fellow citizens.
Torture? What torture! A few seconds of water in the face of a KSM, who knows that he is a Very Big Prize and is useless to his captors if killed? That's TORture? Give me a break, give me a Donald Trump Big F-----g break.
What happened to my brothers and sisters on the 11th floor of the WTC was torture. What happened to KSM and a couple of others at Gitmo was not. But it saved American lives and allowed us to find OBL.
Get over it.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseAnyone who states that torture doesn't work is quite frankly, an idiot. Of course, it works, maybe not 100% of the time, but for the vast majority of us, a few hours of torture can get us to admit to killing JFK if it will make it stop. Read "When Hell was in Session" for a detailed description of how torture will break anyone.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseExcuse me, but I will take the word of the International Committee of the Red Cross, which decided we were, in fact, "torturing" people.
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And for those calling it fraternity hazing, maybe you should ask the people that died during these "interrogations" about that.
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Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseDuring the Second World War the Gestapo tortured members of the Dutch underground and broke the back of the Dutch Resistance movement. The British considered Dutch intelligence information to be of little use. Before Operation Market Garden the remants of the resistance tried to warn the British that a Panzer division was R & R in the vicinity of Arnhem which was a primary objective of the paratroop drop. The warnings were not taken seriously. Market Garden was compromised as a result. In March 1944 a low level RAF Mosquito raid bombed a French prison outside of Paris that housed French Resistance personnel. The mission objective was to either kill them before the Gestapo tortured them to the point where vital information was discovered or blow holes in the prison walls to allow the prisoners to escape. An OSS agent that knew enough information to be dangerous was killed in an Allied bombing raid because he knew too much and would not have been able to resist torture for very long. James Cagney made a movie based on the actual incident.
Reply to this commentLinkReport Abuse@Doc:
"But it [torture] saved American lives and allowed us to find OBL."
There's absolutely zero evidence that this is true. And saying 'give me a break' doesn't constitute an argument that it is true; instead, it's an emotional expression of frustration on your part, that others don't accept pat answers and blithe assertions.
A good Conservative is, in my mind, not such a credulous person. A good Conservative is skeptical. In the absence of actual evidence that actions for which we have long condemned others for taking, it behooves us to maintain a skeptical attitude.
Reply to this commentLinkReport Abuse@Landover
"but for the vast majority of us, a few hours of torture can get us to admit to killing JFK if it will make it stop."
Is this a serious post? The reason torture DOESN'T work is exactly what you've written here: people will tell you whatever you want to hear, in order to make it stop. That's the opposite of actionable intelligence.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseIf Obama is truly interested in unity, he would invite and in fact insist on Bush joining him at Ground Zero. This all began under Bush and his team starting the process of finding the name of the courier, and then hundreds of people chasing down that lead until Bin Laden's death on 5/1. Then there is the luck factor. He was there that night, but he could just as easily have been away that evening. Key point, the SOB is dead, and for that I give a huge tip of my hat to all the people in the Bush and Obama administrations, the countless people in intelligence and the military who made it possible. Hooray, he's dead.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseI think we need to define our terms to debate the issue intelligently.
Everyone's heard of "waterboarding"; I understand it was used twice - once on KSM and once on another detainee.
What other methods of interrogation were "torture"?
Reply to this commentLinkReport Abuse"The reason torture DOESN'T work is exactly what you've written here: people will tell you whatever you want to hear, in order to make it stop. That's the opposite of actionable intelligence."
That's why you have to ask the right questions (duh) -- i.e., questions to which the subject alone knows the answer. Ask the right questions and torture, of course, works like a charm.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseThose who complain endlessly about interrogation techniques ought to consider the decision process involved when their fellow humans chose to jump to an almost certain death to avoid a guaranteed demise in a burning skyscraper.
I'm sure the video footage can easily be located on the internet for anyone with a memory lapse.
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