CIA says used waterboarding three times

[swag]

Source: Reuters

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The CIA on three occasions shortly after the September 11 attacks used a widely condemned interrogation technique known as waterboarding, CIA Director Michael Hayden told Congress on Tuesday.

"Waterboarding has been used on only three detainees," Hayden told the Senate Intelligence Committee, publicly specifying the number of subjects and naming them for the first time, as Congress considers banning the technique.

Those subjected to waterboarding were al Qaeda suspects Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, Abu Zubaydah and Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri, Hayden said.

He said waterboarding has not been used in five years, but it was used then because of concerns of imminent catastrophic attacks on the United States and because authorities had limited knowledge of al Qaeda.



Read more: http://www.reuters.com/article/politicsNews/idUSN0517815120080205

[Barrett808]

1. Well, then, that puts my mind at ease

:eyes:

[papau]

28. I think that means there are 3 still alive that might testify

[DCKit]

35. Alive, maybe.

Brain damaged from lack of oxygen and insane from torture, definitely.

They can't afford to let any of the victims of torture appear in an open court.

[flyarm]

2. well then he admitted war crimes..now who ordered it..they should be arrested immediately!

and turned over to the international courts!

fly

[swag]

3. US has prosecuted waterboarding as torture in the past

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Waterboarding

The United States has a historical record of regarding waterboarding as a crime, and has prosecuted individuals for the use of the practice in the past. In 1947, the United States prosecuted a Japanese military officer, Yukio Asano, for carrying out a form of waterboarding on a U.S. civilian during World War II. Yukio Asano received a sentence of 15 years of hard labor.<31> The charges of Violation of the Laws and Customs of War against Asano also included "beating using hands, fists, club; kicking; burning using cigarettes; strapping on a stretcher head downward."<74>

In its 2005 Country Reports on Human Rights Practices, the U.S. Department of State formally recognized "submersion of the head in water" as torture in its examination of Tunisia's poor human rights record,<75> and critics of waterboarding draw parallels between the two techniques, citing the similar usage of water on the subject. On September 6, 2006, the U.S. Department of Defense released a revised Army Field Manual entitled Human Intelligence Collector Operations that prohibits the use of waterboarding by U.S. military personnel. The department adopted the manual amid widespread criticism of U.S. handling of prisoners in the War on Terrorism, and prohibits other practices in addition to waterboarding. The revised manual applies only to U.S. military personnel, and as such does not apply to the practices of the CIA.<76> However, under international law, violators of the laws of war are criminally liable under the command responsibility, and could still be prosecuted for war crimes.<77>

[RuleOfNah]

50. Who handles reports of war crimes?

Does a Nation have to file the paperwork? Are there filing fees? A long line (take a number)?

[zabet]

4. Wonder how many

more they are not admitting
to, and how much further they
have pushed the boundaries of
so called enhanced interrogation
techniques.

:puke:

[sharp_stick]

5. Didn't we hang Japanese Officers

for water boarding during WWII? Now that this administration has come out and admitted to war crimes I'd really like to see the whole fucking bunch in front of a judge in The Hague.

I can't believe that one single administration has been able to make me embarrassed to be an American, it's pathetic it truly is.

[Ian David]

10. I think we hung our own soldiers for waterboarding prisoners, too. n/t

[sofa king]

6. So that's three times the cat got out of the bag.

We can safely assume that thereafter, a system was put in place so that their interrogation techniques were better concealed.

[leveymg]

7. Not three "times", three victims. CIA already admitted it waterboarded KSM repeatedly.

Wouldn't be terribly surprised if it comes out the other two also suffered partial drowning more than once.

[Hand]

45. Exactly--glad you saw that, too.

The media are spinning it as "three times". That's NOT what he said--as you observe, they used it on three prisoners (at least that they're willing to admit). Maybe they're the only three still alive, of course... :grr:

[alfredo]

8. That doesn't mean shit. The CIA isn't the only agency that can do

the deed. And what about mercenaries like Dynacorp, Blackwater, and others?

[Ian David]

11. I wouldn't be surprised if park rangers and the GSA waterboarded suspects.

Picnic basket? I didn't take the picnic basket... No, ranger, NOOOoOOOoo!

[alfredo]

20. It's hard to talk with a rag shoved in your mouth.

[RUMMYisFROSTED]

30. Damn! And to think I was almost convinced of the Yogi Bear scenario.

:cry:

[Ian David]

31. Sure, you'd torture Yogi to find a picnic basket. But would you have sex with him? n/t

[alfredo]

42. His voice is grating. The rag is self defense.

[Ian David]

9. When did he stop waterboarding his wife? Oh, 5 years ago? Well, it's okay then? n/t

[greengestalt]

12. 3 times too many

And that's even if true. I'm sure counting "Rendition" there's a torture count to approach the Spanish Inquisition.

[Mithreal]

43. Agreed and they have given us zero reason to believe them, welcome to DU : ) nt

[ncrainbowgrrl]

44. So True- Welcome to DU, greengestalt

:hi:

[Swede]

13. Since breakfast............

[thecrow]

14. If they waterboarded three times "shortly after 9-11"

that would be seven years, right?
And they haven't used it in 5 years...
was it that it's been five years SINCE they've used it?
or that it hasn't been used for five years after they waterboarded three men after 9-11?
Does that mean they can still use it?
I get so mixed up when the WH people talk..

[L. Coyote]

15. "because of concerns of imminent catastrophic attacks" do something that results in

cause for imminent catastrophic attacks. Yes, that's about the IQ I expect from Bush!

[libodem]

16. what they didn't have a lie detector?

they couldn't round up some truth serum? They can't play good cop bad cop? I doubt they are telling the truth. I think a lot of the torture was out-sourced to Egypt, or wherever the CIA secret prisons are. These are the same spooky cretins that used dunking stools to ferret out witches in the 1700's. F-ing primitive bastards.

[Deny and Shred]

32. Correctomundo

The CIA drops them off to someone else, what Amnesty Intl referred to as the US version of a gulag - secret prisons in Eastern Europe, Africa, Arabian countries, probably others. It is no coincidence that they didn't bring them to the US, then the persons involved could be subject to US law. Hayden is probably only referring to actual US installations, i.e. Gitmo.
The waterboarders are probably not career CIA operatives, or even contracted US citizens. BushCo set this up with avoiding the potential for crimes in mind. The more international and further from any chain of command, the murkier the illegality.

[The Stranger]

17. Then arrest all who were involved. Immediately.

[Solly Mack]

18. Arrest and charge them with war crimes

[Supersedeas]

51. not peep about War Crimes in the GoP Media Establishment

[alcibiades_mystery]

19. Three times a day, more like it

:rofl:

[catnhatnh]

ANOTHER LIE......

...in the past week there was another thread (probably in the dungeon now) regarding the 911 commission and a second set of waterboardings in 2004....so that part about "not in the past 5 years"-yeah, that's another whopper.....

[catnhatnh]

21. Dupe N/T

[RedSock]

22. yeah the CIA did it 3 times, then

yeah the CIA did it 3 times, then the US had other agencies/people do it countless times more.

[Hand]

46. See? Outsourcing works wonders!

Keeps your hands clean as a... backed-up sewage line. :grr:

[lebkuchen]

23. The most glaring lies in this piece:

1) only three

2) shortly after Sept. 11

3) has not been used in five years

4) authorities had limited knowledge of al Qaeda


If the CIA was so concerned about "imminent catastrophic attacks on the U.S.," shortly after 9-11, why would they stop at three suspects?

So painfully pathetic.

[truthisfreedom]

24. More psy-ops.

[rosetta627]

25. Have you guys ever heard the term "limited hangout"?

The CIA uses this strategy a lot.

[Solly Mack]

26. Of course it's a limited hang-out

but they are still admitting to war crimes and they should be arrested for it. And we should keep digging for the rest of what they're hiding.

[rosetta627]

27. You're absolutely right Solly Mack

Will keep digging...

[Deny and Shred]

33. No, what is limited hang-out?

[Solly Mack]

36. It's where you tell a bit of the truth, once it becomes apparent

that you have to give up something, to keep the full(often worse) truth hidden...because people jump all over the little bit of truth and don't (usually) look deeper.

[Deny and Shred]

47. Thanks Mack

Yes, certainly a strategy used often. Iran-Contra comes to mind. Add many CIA-backed coups since WWII - Allende in Chile, the Shah in Iran in '53, the Goulart coup in Brazil, as well as the new evidence showing the Gulf of Tonkin incident was completely overstated, possibly even staged, and the use of Muhjahadeen to fight the Soviets in Afghanistan, off the top of me head.

A little info can be dangerous. It allows them to paint the picture they want the masses to see. The Pentagon tried to do the same thing over the Iranian speedboats in the Persian Gulf recently. The rest of the info showed what a farce this incident was.

Those who try to dig deeper they try to discredit (Joe Wilson) or worse. In this Administration, it seems the CIA has been used as a scapegoat for Neocon hawk blunders (pre 9/11 intel, WMD, curveball, no link between Saddam and Osama) and some at CIA are not happy about that. They are not all torturers, and that's important to remember.

BushCo knows to keep key leadership positions filled with loyalists who'll do a 'heckuva' job.

[Solly Mack]

34. We also know that "evidence" used against others came from statements

made by people who were being tortured.

http://www.slate.com/id/2179607/

"One of the two men tortured on the CIA tapes is Abu Zubaydah, whose confession supplied the main evidence supporting the warrant issued for Jose Padilla's arrest in May 2002 at O'Hare Airport. Padilla was promptly labeled a "dirty bomber" and an enemy combatant and tossed in a brig for 43 months. When he was finally prosecuted on a conspiracy theory, in a Florida federal court in 2007, Padilla's lawyers claimed Zubaydah had implicated him under torture. The Justice Department dismissed these allegations as "meritless," since there was no proof Zubaydah had been tortured. It's bad enough that the DoJ just "lost" the tapes of Padilla himself being interrogated. It now also seems clear he was first grabbed on the say-so of a crazy person who was willing to say anything to stop the abuse he experienced. One of Padilla's lawyers tells us that if these tapes had been disclosed, it would have been far more likely that the Supreme Court would have taken up the case for a second time, when Padilla tried to go back to the high court in April 2006.

Next: Moussaoui, who, let's not forget, faced the death penalty. The same fall that the CIA tapes were destroyed, according to the Post's timeline, federal district court Judge Leonie Brinkema ordered the government to turn over evidence of specific interrogations relating to the allegations against Moussaoui. His lawyers reportedly wanted to know whether the al-Qaida trio of Zubaydah, Ramzi Binalshibh, and Khalid Sheikh Mohammed had inculpated Moussaoui, or failed to name him. According to the New York Times, CIA lawyers told federal prosecutors that the CIA did not possess any such evidence.

That means the two biggest terror trials we've had since Sept. 11 were predicated on torture evidence that was then destroyed. The government has argued that al-Qaida operatives cannot be tried because the evidence against them is secret and threatens national security. But the real rationale is much worse: The evidence against them is wholly unreliable."

And then CIA didn't tell the 911 Commission about the existence of the tapes

http://thinkprogress.org/2007/12/24/kean-cia-tapes/


"In its attempts to uncover all materials related to the 9/11 attacks, the 9/11 Commission specifically requested material about the interrogations of Abu Zubaydah and Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri. The New York Times has revealed that the CIA destroyed tapes of the two men’s interrogation without informing the 9/11 Commission about their existence."




And there was a "new" round of "interrogations" in 2004, even though the CIA claims they stopped 5 years ago...

http://deepbackground.msnbc.msn.com/archive/2008/01/30/624314.aspx


"The 9/11 Commission suspected that critical information it used in its landmark report was the product of harsh interrogations of al-Qaida operatives - interrogations that many critics have labeled torture. Yet, commission staffers never questioned the agency about the interrogation techniques and in fact ordered a second round of interrogations specifically to ask additional questions of the same operatives, NBC News has learned.

The analysis also shows - and agency and commission staffers concur - there was a separate, second round of interrogations in early 2004, done specifically to answer new questions from the Commission."

[newspeak]

53. yeppers

and during the Inquisition where unimaginable torture was administered-people were having fun, perverted sex with the devil and flew on broomsticks at midnight. And, when asked the name of other "evildoers"--you gladly give up your neighbor--because maybe, just maybe they'd let you die. Torture is not the answer!!!!


Of course, they can always give out money to betray their neighbor--how's that working in Afghanistan?
So, can we call it war crimes, yet?

[sakabatou]

29. 5 admitted, how many are the keeping secret?

Still, five is five too many.

[katty]

37. gee, ONLY 3 times?!! what a crock

[HelenWheels]

38. Officer I only had two drinks

Yeah right.

[Dangerously Amused]

39. Riiiiight. And Iraq has WMD.

And the mission is accomplished.

And Pat Tillman died at the hands of the enemy.

And no one could foresee the levees breaking.

And global warming is liberal hype.

And the economy is stable.

etc. etc. etc. ...

[tabasco]

40. An admission like this is usually part of a cover-up.

If they admit to three, they probably did 300.

[reggie the dog]

41. torturing

bastards, and they say we are the free democratic country.

[louis-t]

48. So their defense is "We only broke the law 3 times"?

Oh, well then.......

[Demeter]

49. Well, Hardy Ever!

I am never known to quail
At the furry of a gale,
And I'm never, never sick at sea!
ALL. What, never?
CAPT. No, never!
ALL. What, never?
CAPT. Hardly ever!
ALL. He's hardly ever sick at sea!
Then give three cheers, and one cheer more,
For the hardy Captain of the Pinafore!


CAPT. Bad language or abuse,
I never, never use,
Whatever the emergency;
Though "Bother it" I may
Occasionally say,
I never use a big, big D--
ALL. What, never?
CAPT. No, never!
ALL. What, never?
CAPT. Hardly ever!
ALL. Hardly ever swears a big, big D--
Then give three cheers, and one cheer more,
For the well-bred Captain of the Pinafore!

[LynnTheDem]

52. CIA says used illegal TORTURE three times.

We are the "bad guys".

We are the enemy.

We torture people.

And the entire world knows it.

[comfycouch]

54. I say they tortured dozens, but are lying about the number

Why would the CIA, one of the least honest entities, tell us the exact number of tortured victims?

[struggle4progress]

55. We don't abuse prisoners! I mean, we abuse them sometimes but would never ever torture them!

That is to say, we might torture them if it were a good idea, which it isn't. In other words, it might be a good idea that we can't discuss for national security purposes! Let me make this perfectly clear: we did do this three times long ago and then we stopped and never ever ever did it again. I mean ...