Why did we torture people?
There was very interesting testimony, under oath, yesterday at the Senate subcommittee meeting. A former FBI interrogator, Ali Soufan, who questioned al-Qaida prisoners testified Wednesday that the Bush administration falsely boasted of success from extreme techniques like waterboarding, when those methods were slow, unreliable and made an important witness stop talking.
He said his team's non-threatening interrogation approach elicited crucial information from al-Qaida operative Abu Zubaydah, including intelligence on "dirty bomb" terrorist Jose Padilla. He also said that the involvement in the Sept. 11 attacks of al-Qaida mastermind Khalid Shaikh Mohammed was discovered in April 2002, months before waterboarding was introduced.
He also said that when CIA contractors took over and began using harsh methods, that Zubaydah "shut down".
SHUT DOWN!
What if the purpose of torture was to SHUT UP people? Not to get reliable information - as some people have said. Not to get false testimony - as some people have said.
No, but to make sure that people do not give any information. It quickly became clear that Zubaydah had information about 9/11. He is the source of Khalid Shaikh Mohammed's involvement. Once they knew that, they brought in the torturers.
I think it was to shut him up, not get more information.
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Interesting thought, although I don't credit the past administration with that much logic. I think torture was a way to demonstrate power for them.
ReplyDeleteJeez Jerry, be careful! If you lived in a free country you could say things like this, but you live in America!
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