Indictments And Arrests, Get But Naked!

I can't be sure whether this is big news or not, although it sounds like it is to me, but Laura Rozen is reporting (warning politico link) that the FBI just rounded up a bunch of military contractors in a "Foreign Bribe Sting". I know everybody is focused on Scott Brown beating Martha Coakley and for all intents and purposes scuttling health care reform and possibly the rest of President Obama's agenda for the foreseable future or until somebody in the White House or the Senate Majority Leader's office grows some balls, but I am thinking this story will get some burn in the days and weeks to come.

It Was All Bullshit

If you needed any more proof that in fact the Bush administration was full of shit and NOT acting in good faith in ordering torture on GITMO detainees you don't have to look any further than the very recently released FBI memos which are now redacted further to show just how far the FBI and the CIT went in trying to convince the Pentagon and the adminstration not to use those techniques. And as you can see for yourself there objection had as much or more to do with the fact that the techniques were unreliable at best and counterproductive at worst as it did to do with the legality of it which still was not a minor point.

I'll say this, we have a major health care fight on our hands and I understand that, but after we win this long standing battle we simply MUST look back. No ifs ands and buts about it. This can not be allowed to stand. Not just because of the crimes committed against the people we tortured, but also because the Bush administration put all of our lives in danger by experimenting with unproven and unsuccessful torture techniques instead of relying on tried and true approaches just so they could satisfy their own repugnant blood lust. These fucking imbeciles thought it was more important to be able to beat their chest and claim some kind of macho toughness than actually catching the sons of bitches who wish to do us harm!

I am getting pissed off all over again just thinking about it.

Breaking: Dick Cheney FBI Interview Ordered Released To The Public

Looks like Jon Stewart will get his crack at Dick Cheney after all!

(h/t Ethan)

Who Did We Have To Torture?

Surely we couldn't have broken up a terror plot with out torturing somebody:

DENVER – Counterterrorism officials are warning mass transit systems around the nation to step up patrols because of fears an Afghanistan-born immigrant under arrest in Colorado may have been plotting with others to detonate backpack bombs aboard New York City trains.

Investigators say Najibullah Zazi, a 24-year-old shuttle van driver at the Denver airport, played a direct role in a terror plot that unraveled during a trip to New York City around the anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks. He made his first court appearance Monday and remained behind bars.

Zazi and two other defendants have not been charged with any terrorism counts, only the relatively minor offense of lying to the government. But the case could grow to include more serious charges as the investigation proceeds.

Now to be sure its still early in the investigation but this is just another case that shows how far out of the mainstream Dick Cheney is. To hear him tell it there is no way we could possibly track down terrorists without torturing somebody. I'll bet he is some where now mad as hell just because the FBI proved him wrong.....again. I can only hope the people he has convinced that they need to be scared of their own shadow and President Obama will now start to realize just how full of shit he is.

Tainted By Torture

Many of us on the left applauded when FBI interrogator Ali Soufan came forward to refute some of the allegations by Dick Cheney and the rest of the pro torture crowd about Abu Zubaydah giving up critical information under torture. For some time there has been a general feeling that the FBI took the higher moral ground than the CIA when it came to interrogating enemy combatants. But Spencer Ackerman actually did some digging and unfortunately it would seem that neither Soufan nor the FBI in general were all that heroic either.

It is likely “Thomas” is Soufan. “Gibson,” the other FBI agent in the Abu Zubaydah interrogation, said he “did not have a ‘moral objection’” to Abu Zubaydah’s harsh treatment and “remained at the CIA facility until some time in early June 2002, several weeks after Thomas left.” Gibson did not object, he told the inspector general, because “he himself had undergone comparable harsh interrogation techniques as part of U.S. Army Survival, Evasion, Resistance and Escape (SERE) training.” Soufan, according to an extensive profile by the New Yorker’s Lawrence Wright, does not have a history of military service. “Gibson’s” role in the harsh interrogation, moreover, suggests that there was no early FBI consensus against torture.

snip

One such interrogation involved “Thomas.” At Guantanamo Bay, beginning in late July or early August 2002 — very soon after being withdrawn from the Abu Zubaydah interrogation — “Thomas” interrogated Mohammed al-Qatani, who was suspected of being a part of the 9/11 conspiracy and who was detained in Afghanistan after he was unable to enter the U.S. through Orlando in the summer of 2001. “Thomas,” the report reads, “had already obtained confessions from several detainees” at Guantanamo; the commander of the detention facility called him “a national treasure.”

“Thomas” does not appear to have objected to the interrogation of al-Qatani, whatever his objections to the interrogation of Abu Zubaydah a few months prior. According to the report, “Thomas” recommended the use of non-FBI interrogation techniques on al-Qatani, including moving him “to a more remote location at GTMO so that he would not get social support from the other detainees.” The FBI case agent at Guantanamo, known by the pseudonym “Demeter,” noted to the inspector general that “isolation is not normally employed by law enforcement agencies” but could be “a very effective technique,” and so “Demeter” and “Thomas” received approval from unnamed “senior officials… up their chain of command” for use of the technique.”

In an interview with the inspector general in 2007, al-Qatani said that the place where “Thomas” interrogated him was “the worst place I was taken to.” His sense of time was displaced “because the window was covered up” and so he did not know when to pray in accordance with Muslim traditions. “The lights in his cell were left on continuously for the entire time he was there, which he said was half a year,” the report read. “Al Qatani also described the Brig as very, very cold.” (A 2005 Pentagon study, known as the Schmidt-Furlow report, found that the cold was so severe that it eventually gave al-Qatani an irregular heartbeat, for which he was hospitalized; it is not clear exactly when this took place.) “Thomas,” however, “spoke Arabic” (as Soufan does) and had “some sense of humanity,” al-Qatani told the inspector general. While he “never used aggression or physical violence” on the detainee, al-Qatani quoted “Thomas” as saying “You will find yourself in a difficult situation if you don’t talk to me” and “this is your place until you change your story.”

It is not clear when “Thomas” left Guantanamo Bay and the al-Qatani interrogation, and an interrogation log spanning 50 days between November 2002 and January 2003 published by Time magazine in mid-2005 suggests the harshest period of al-Qatani’s treatment later that year. But even before that — and before October 11, 2002, when Guantanamo officials sought approval of severe interrogation techniques based on CIA and SERE techniques, from their chain of command — al-Qatani was subjected to a snarling dog by military interrogators who had told two new FBI agents to “step aside” by early September 2002. The agents described al-Qatani being subject to “sleep deprivation, loud music, bright lights, and ‘body placement discomfort.’” They emailed superiors that these techniques had “‘negative’ results” and al-Qatani was “as fervent as ever not to cooperate.”

Yet through January 2003, the FBI remained at Guantanamo, despite Mueller’s apparent “decision” against FBI participation in the abusive interrogations, although its agents tried unsuccessfully to modify the harsh interrogation plan. Some other FBI officials, according to the inspector general’s report, joined with other agencies, including the CIA and the Defense Department, in proposing an interrogation regimen “used with subjects including [Abu Zubaydah]” in either late 2002 or early 2003. Few people would speak conclusively about this “alternative” regimen and few documents were made available to the inspector general about it. Fewer still admitted knowledge of specific techniques the plan proposed. But the report suggests that it played a role in weakening bureaucratic resistance to al-Qatani’s torture, and gives the bottom-line assessment that it “clearly would never have been permitted for FBI agents in the United States under any FBI policy.”

snip

It is unclear whether any such reports for criminal referral occurred. Literally hundreds of FBI agents reported to an inspector general-solicited survey that they either observed or heard about detainee abuses in Afghanistan, Iraq and Guantanamo Bay. The report — as Marcy Wheeler blogged on Monday — however, notes “a total of five referrals” by the CIA’s inspector general to the Justice Department concerning detainee abuse “between February 6, 2003 and March 30, 2004.” It is less clear over whether FBI observations of institutionalized abuse resulted in any concrete action. “On a broader level,” the inspector general writes, “we were unable to determine definitely whether the concerns of the FBI and DOJ about DOD interrogation techniques were ever addressed by any of the structures created for resolving inter-agency disputes about antiterrorism issues.” Similarly, the report states, “We found it difficult to assess the response of FBI Headquarters and senior DOJ officials to reports from FBI agents about detainee issues,” largely due to “vague recollections” and the “paucity of written communications.”

It does not appear as if FBI agents who observed abuses stopped such abuses from occurring. The report chides FBI senior leadership for putting agents who witnessed detainee abuse “in a difficult position, because FBI agents were trying to establish a cooperative working relationship with the DOD… FBI agents had many reasons to avoid making reports regarding potential mistreatment of detainees.” Most trials for detainee abuse have occurred under the military, not civilian, justice system, with an exception being a CIA contractor named David Passaro, who was convicted of assault in reference to a 2003 detainee death in Afghanistan.

Much remains unclear from the inspector general’s report. When the now-retired Soufan testifies before Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse’s (D-RI) Senate Judiciary subcommittee on Wednesday, it will be the first time the public has heard a first-hand account from an FBI agent about torture — and what the bureau did and did not do about it.

That's a pretty sobering look at the the FBI's role in the torture program. This is exactly why torture should never be ordered in the first place. Because it spreads like a plague and ends up infecting every single aspect of our national security apparatus. The military, the CIA, and the FBI are all now tarred with the brush of torture. Hopefully one day someone will be held to account for that.

Marc Thiessen Is a Liar And Propagandist

Marc Thiessen who continues to spout pro torture propaganda to defend the Bush administration has a post up over at NRO purporting to prove that torture saved lives. Here is an excerpt.

In fact, what Abu Zubaydah disclosed to the CIA during this period was that the fact that KSM was the mastermind behind the 9/11 attacks and that his code name was “Muktar” — something Zubaydah thought we already knew, but in fact we did not. Intelligence officials had been trying for months to figure out who “Muktar” was. This information provided by Zubaydah was a critical piece of the puzzle that allowed them to pursue and eventually capture KSM. This fact, in and of itself, discredits the premise of the Post story — to suggest that the capture of KSM was not information that “foiled plots” to attack America is absurd on the face of it.

Now first of all lets get something straight. Marc Thiessen is not some expert on national security. Marc Thiessen is nothing more than a speech writer. By trade he was the spin doctor for the Bush Administration. Why the mainstream media is giving this guy any credibility on this issue is beyond me because he doesn't deserve any. But lets get to why its dangerous to allow propaganda into legitimate policy discussions. First and foremost its because propaganda is usually built on false premises and lies. Such is the case with Theissens's post as we find from this Newsweek story on Ali Soufan, the actual FBI interrogator who was intimately involved in evidence gathering on al Qaeda post 9-11.

But Soufan had poured through the bureau's intelligence files and stunned Abu Zubaydah when he called him "Hani"—the nickname that his mother used for him. Soufan also showed him photos of a number of terror suspects who were high on the bureau's priority list. Abu Zubaydah looked at one of them and said, "That's Mukhtar."

Now it was Soufan who was stunned. The FBI had been trying to determine the identity of a mysterious "Mukhtar," whom bin Laden kept referring to on a tape he made after 9/11. Now Soufan knew: Mukhtar was the man in the photo, terror fugitive Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, and, as Abu Zubaydah blurted out, " the one behind 9/11."

Not only was it NOT the CIA that Zubaydah revealed that Khalid Sheik Muhammed was "Mukhtar", it also wasn't the result of any torture techniques committed BY the CIA. Rather normal FBI interrogation techniques lead to perhaps the biggest break in the case of trying to find the mastermind behind 9-11.

The rest of the Newsweek piece is full of other important revelations and its definitely worth the full read. But for now I just want to say that it is totally irresponsible for the MSM to continue allowing Thiessen to take part in the public debate over whether or not we should investigate the torture of enemy detainees. He has now shown that either he lacks the knowledge to be credible on the issue or, more nefariously, is willing to lie about the facts in order to sway public opinion his way. Whichever is the case what is apparent is that his words are not to be trusted and I really hope that his microphone is taken away from him.

Some other useful excerpts from the Newsweek piece:

The agent, Ali Soufan, was known as one of the bureau's top experts on Al Qaeda. He also had a reputation as a shrewd interrogator who could work fluently in both English and Arabic. Soufan yelled at one CIA contractor and told him that what he was doing was wrong, ineffective and an affront to American values. At one point, Soufan discovered a dark wooden "confinement box" that the contractor had built for Abu Zubaydah. It looked, Soufan recalls, "like a coffin." The mercurial agent erupted in anger, got on a secure phone line and called Pasquale D'Amuro, then the FBI assistant director for counterterrorism. "I swear to God," he shouted, "I'm going to arrest these guys!"

D'Amuro and other officials were alarmed at what they heard from Soufan. They fretted about the political consequences of abusive interrogations and the Washington blowback they thought was inevitable, say two high-ranking FBI sources who asked not to be identified discussing internal matters. According to a later Justice Department inspector general's report, D'Amuro warned FBI Director Bob Mueller that such activities would eventually be investigated. "Someday, people are going to be sitting in front of green felt tables having to testify about all of this," D'Amuro said, according to one of the sources.

Mueller ordered Soufan and a second FBI agent home. He then directed that bureau personnel no longer participate in CIA interrogations. In the corridors of the White House, Justice Department and U.S. intelligence agencies, heated debates ensued. Three months later, on Aug. 1, 2002, Justice lawyers issued a chilling memo blessing everything the CIA contractors had proposed—including waterboarding, or simulated drowning, a ghoulish technique that was administered to Abu Zubaydah 83 times.

snip

As the sessions continued, Soufan engaged Abu Zubaydah in long discussions about his world view, which included a tinge of socialism. After Abu Zubaydah railed one day about the influence of American imperialist corporations, he asked Soufan to get him a Coca-Cola—a request that prompted the two of them to laugh. Soon enough, Abu Zubaydah offered up more information—about the bizarre plans of a jihadist from Puerto Rico to set off a "dirty bomb" inside the country. This information led to Padilla's arrest in Chicago by the FBI in early May.

But the tenor of the Abu Zubaydah interrogations changed a few days later, when a CIA contractor showed up. Although Soufan declined to identify the contractor by name, other sources (and media accounts) identify him as James Mitchell, a former Air Force psychologist who had worked on the U.S. military's Survival, Evasion, Resistance and Escape training—a program to teach officers how to resist the abusive interrogation methods used by Chinese communists during the Korean War. Within days of his arrival, Mitchell—an architect of the CIA interrogation program—took charge of the questioning of Abu Zubaydah. He directed that Abu Zubaydah be ordered to answer questions or face a gradual increase in aggressive techniques. One day Soufan entered Abu Zubadyah's room and saw that he had been stripped naked; he covered him with a towel.

The confrontations began. "I asked [the contractor] if he'd ever interrogated anyone, and he said no," Soufan says. But that didn't matter, the contractor shot back: "Science is science. This is a behavioral issue." The contractor suggested Soufan was the inexperienced one. "He told me he's a psychologist and he knows how the human mind works." Mitchell told NEWSWEEK, "I would love to tell my story." But then he added, "I have signed a nondisclosure agreement that will not even allow me to correct false allegations."

The tipping point came when, after a few weeks, Soufan saw the coffinlike box that Mitchell had constructed. Soufan refuses to say what he was told the box was for. But other sources who heard accounts of the confrontation say the idea was to stage a "mock burial." (A CIA spokesman says, "The CIA's high-value-detainee program did not include mock burials. That wasn't done.") When an incensed Soufan told his superior what was happening, the response was quick: D'Amuro told him to leave the scene of the interrogations. Then, a few days later, he was told, "Come on home." Now the debate Soufan began in Thailand has come home, too. If given the opportunity, he may again play a starring role

What FBI Director Mueller Said Last Year

When will the MSM remember that Bush FBI Director Robert Mueller himself said this past December that he didn't believe that any information gleaned from torture helped to disrupt an attack?

The Truth On Torture

Former FBI supervisory special agent Ali Soufan decided to come out and debunk a lot of the conjecture flying around from the pro torture crowd in an op-ed today. I know there will be a lot of howling today from this article but its going to be hard to get around the uncomfortable truths in the op-ed.

One of the most striking parts of the memos is the false premises on which they are based. The first, dated August 2002, grants authorization to use harsh interrogation techniques on a high-ranking terrorist, Abu Zubaydah, on the grounds that previous methods hadn’t been working. The next three memos cite the successes of those methods as a justification for their continued use.

It is inaccurate, however, to say that Abu Zubaydah had been uncooperative. Along with another F.B.I. agent, and with several C.I.A. officers present, I questioned him from March to June 2002, before the harsh techniques were introduced later in August. Under traditional interrogation methods, he provided us with important actionable intelligence.

We discovered, for example, that Khalid Shaikh Mohammed was the mastermind of the 9/11 attacks. Abu Zubaydah also told us about Jose Padilla, the so-called dirty bomber. This experience fit what I had found throughout my counterterrorism career: traditional interrogation techniques are successful in identifying operatives, uncovering plots and saving lives.

There was no actionable intelligence gained from using enhanced interrogation techniques on Abu Zubaydah that wasn’t, or couldn’t have been, gained from regular tactics. In addition, I saw that using these alternative methods on other terrorists backfired on more than a few occasions — all of which are still classified. The short sightedness behind the use of these techniques ignored the unreliability of the methods, the nature of the threat, the mentality and modus operandi of the terrorists, and due process.

Defenders of these techniques have claimed that they got Abu Zubaydah to give up information leading to the capture of Ramzi bin al-Shibh, a top aide to Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, and Mr. Padilla. This is false. The information that led to Mr. Shibh’s capture came primarily from a different terrorist operative who was interviewed using traditional methods. As for Mr. Padilla, the dates just don’t add up: the harsh techniques were approved in the memo of August 2002, Mr. Padilla had been arrested that May.

One of the worst consequences of the use of these harsh techniques was that it reintroduced the so-called Chinese wall between the C.I.A. and F.B.I., similar to the communications obstacles that prevented us from working together to stop the 9/11 attacks. Because the bureau would not employ these problematic techniques, our agents who knew the most about the terrorists could have no part in the investigation. An F.B.I. colleague of mine who knew more about Khalid Shaikh Mohammed than anyone in the government was not allowed to speak to him.

Don't miss what he is saying here. Not only did torture not work, it also created the same kind of wall between the FBI and the CIA that hurt our intelligence agencies before 9-11. So not only did it hurt our reputation around the world, it in point of fact made us less safe by interfering with the communications between intelligence agencies.

The debate after the release of these memos has centered on whether C.I.A. officials should be prosecuted for their role in harsh interrogation techniques. That would be a mistake. Almost all the agency officials I worked with on these issues were good people who felt as I did about the use of enhanced techniques: it is un-American, ineffective and harmful to our national security.

Fortunately for me, after I objected to the enhanced techniques, the message came through from Pat D’Amuro, an F.B.I. assistant director, that “we don’t do that,” and I was pulled out of the interrogations by the F.B.I. director, Robert Mueller (this was documented in the report released last year by the Justice Department’s inspector general).

My C.I.A. colleagues who balked at the techniques, on the other hand, were instructed to continue. (It’s worth noting that when reading between the lines of the newly released memos, it seems clear that it was contractors, not C.I.A. officers, who requested the use of these techniques.)

So contrary to the musings of Joe Klein and David Ignatius the CIA themselves didn't want to have to torture these people. Its about time for all of this to come to light. If we are a nation of laws, we have to start acting like it.

Dirty Bomb + White Supremecist

Talk about your underplayed story of the day

Trust fund millionaire James G. Cummings, an American Nazi sympathizer from Maine who was slain by his wife Amber in December, allegedly had the radioactive components necessary to construct a "dirty bomb," a newly released threat analysis report states.

The man, allegedly furious over the election of President Obama, purchased depleted uranium over the Internet from an American company.

"According to an FBI field intelligence report from the Washington Regional Threat and Analysis Center posted online by WikiLeaks, an organization that posts leaked documents, an investigation into the case revealed that radioactive materials were removed from Cummings’ home after his shooting death on Dec. 9," reported the Bangor Daily News.

"Amber (Cummings) indicated James was very upset with Barack Obama being elected President," reported the Washington Regional Threat and Analysis Center (PDF link). "She indicated James had been in contact with 'white supremacist group(s).' Amber also indicated James mixed chemicals in the kitchen sink at their residence and had mentioned 'dirty bombs.'"

"Also found was literature on how to build 'dirty bombs' and information about cesium-137, strontium-90 and cobalt-60, radioactive materials," said the Bangor Daily. "The FBI report also stated there was evidence linking James Cummings to white supremacist groups. This would seem to confirm observations by local tradesmen who worked at the Cummings home that he was an ardent admirer of Adolf Hitler and had a collection of Nazi memorabilia around the house, including a prominently displayed flag with swastika. Cummings claimed to have pieces of Hitler’s personal silverware and place settings, painter Mike Robbins said a few days after the shooting."

After Amber Cummings admitted to the murder and entered an insanity plea, Belfast, Main police felt it necessary to bring the FBI on the scene. Bangor Daily reporter Eric Russell followed up in a filmed interview with Belfast Police Chief Jeffrey Trafton:

Why in the hell isn't this running on every news station in this country?!?! The story isn't really new. RawStory has been on top of it almost from the start. When does the fact that some whacked out racist who was upset about President Obama winning the election and who owned the parts to make a dirty bomb rise to the level of importance to get a frikkin mention in the mainstream media? They have all the time in the world to talk about the First Lady's arms but not THIS story? Especially when you have jerk offs on Faux Nooz exhorting people to oppose the government?! This is the height of irresponsibility and someone needs to step up to the plate and bring this story to the nation. Rick Sanchez and David Shuster I am looking directly at you!