The CIA isn't Jack Bauer

Some interesting thoughts on the real live practices involved in interrogating and de-briefing, among others, jihadists including Khalid Sheikh Mohammed appeared in the recent National Review article Meet the Real Jack Bauers.

The tidbits that most intrigued me were:

"...there is a difference between “interrogation” and “de-briefing.” Interrogation is not how we got information from the terrorists; it is the process by which we overcome the terrorists’ resistance and secure their cooperation — sometimes with the help of enhanced interrogation techniques.

Once the terrorist agreed to cooperate, I was told, the interrogation stopped and “de-briefing” began, as the terrorists were questioned by CIA analysts, using non-aggressive techniques to extract information that could help disrupt attacks."

"Just the experience of being brought into CIA custody — the “capture shock,” arrival at a sterile location, the isolation, the fact that they did not know where they were, and that no one else knew they were there — was enough to convince most of them to cooperate. Others, like KSM, demonstrated extraordinary resistance. But even KSM’s interrogation did not take long before he moved into debriefing. He had been captured in early March, they said, and before the end of the month he had already provided information on a plot to fly airplanes into London’s Heathrow airport."

"...interrogations involved strict oversight. There was no freelancing allowed — every technique had to be approved in advance by headquarters, and any deviation from the meticulously developed interrogation plan would lead to the immediate removal of the interrogator."

"He said that the interrogators’ credo was to use “the least coercive method necessary” and that “each of us is put through the measures so we can feel it.” He added: “It is very respectful. The detainee knows that we are not there to gratuitously inflict pain. He knows what he needs to do to stop. We see each other as professional adversaries in war.” (Indeed, Mike Hayden told me years later that K[halid] S[heikh] M[ohammed] referred to Harry as “emir” — a title of great respect in the jihadist ranks.)

Critics have charged that enhanced interrogation techniques are not effective because those undergoing them will say anything to get them to stop. Soufan, the FBI agent and CIA critic, has written: “When they are in pain, people will say anything to get the pain to stop. Most of the time, they will lie, make up anything to make you stop hurting them. . . . That means the information you’re getting is useless.”

What this statement reveals is that Soufan knows nothing about how the CIA actually employed enhanced interrogation techniques. In an interview for my book, former national-security adviser Steve Hadley explained to me, “The interrogation techniques were not to elicit information. So the whole argument that people tell you lies under torture misses the point.” Hadley said the purpose of the techniques was to “bring them to the point where they are willing to cooperate, and once they are willing to cooperate, then the techniques stop and you do all the things the FBI agents say you ought to do to build trust and all the rest.”

"CIA interrogators like Harry would ask detainees questions to which the interrogators already know the answers — allowing them to judge whether the detainees were being truthful and determine when the terrorists had reached a level of compliance."

And most interesting of all:

"Several senior officials told me that, after undergoing waterboarding, Zubaydah actually thanked his interrogators and said, “You must do this for all the brothers.” The enhanced interrogation techniques were a relief for Zubaydah, they said, because they lifted a moral burden from his shoulders — the responsibility to continue resisting." (emph. mine)

Very interesting, this last part. Even jihadists who are hardened to the murder of women and children feel the weight of God's law on their hearts, convicting them of guilt. May the Holy Spirit be pleased to bring them all to repentance, not just conviction of moral burden.

Don't imprison those suicide bomber guys

I just can't resist. merkur, who prides himself on his powerful insights into this question, has been weighing in on the question of waterboarding. Here's his latest offering. I love it. Rarely does the argument ad absurdum yield such striking results, and I wasn't even really applying it all that heavily!

I said:

Shoot, being in prison has been known to cause severe mental suffering.

merkur responded:

Which is why the Convention explicitly excludes being in prison and other legal incidences.

I can only assume he means the Geneva Convention but I invite his correction on that. But just look at the splendor of that idea! These bombings and things are not acts of war. They're not even crimes. Or, they might be crimes, but surely we, an enlightened society, won't be so inhumane as to put people in prison for doing bad things to others, will we?

Anyway, getting to the rest of his comment, I'm also curious who are the lawyers? The statement's name? Is it the Geneva Convention or does it derive its authority therefrom?
On what basis does it apply to, say, everyone, everywhere, at all times? Does it apply to the jihadists? Since they do worse to their prisoners such as cutting off body parts just for changing their religion, throwing acid in Christian young women's faces for refusing to marry a Muslim, etc, what does that mean for this question?

Depriving someone of sleep is torture, really? A tour of the gallows? Systematic feeding them pork chops (say, once a week)?

Man, you're strict! Next thing you'll say is that imprisonment is torture.
Oh, oops...


(Edit: See at least the 1st 3 comments, as I apparently mistook merkur's meaning. He's still being inconsistent and baselessly pontificating his morality all over the place, but I was wrong about what he meant on imprisonment.)

Liberalism and waterboarding

I grew up United Methodist but never kept up with the varying and competing influences within the denomination. By the time I actually met Jesus, I was moving away from the UMs in conviction, especially given the liberal tendencies within the denom's government and within the local church in which I grew up. But anyway, I noticed a very interesting post on a UM blog. There are a few interesting things to go after in this post, actually, and I'll have to divide them up.

First,

My suggestion is that we replace all of our "open minds, open hearts, open doors" slogans and commercials, which are completely devoid of any theological content whatsoever, and instead start using, "United Methodists Do Not Torture."

As if "We don't torture" contains any theological content, but I agree 100% with the 1st part of the statement that the current slogan does not.

Here, we have been congratulating ourselves on how open-minded and tolerant we are for the past four decades. We don't care what you believe or what you do, so long as you are sincere. Well, at last, that line of thinking has come to its limits, having been exposed as a lie. There really is a conviction that we share: we don't torture. Yes, I know, that's setting the bar pretty low, but at least we have discovered there is a bar.

One might be encouraged by the first two sentences, as it would appear Jonathan is coming to the realisation that liberal pluralism is a bankrupt worldview. Unfortunately, the soaring optimism comes crashing down when he then deviates into politics and morality rather than theological (ie, dealing with God) content for his "bar". As I said in comment 3 on the thread:

Well, what I'm saying is, why make your denomination's entire slogan a negative stance against ONE issue?
Why not "United Methodists do not murder babies," or "United Methodists do not put criminals to death" or something like that? Why this one issue?

If you abandon what should be your central reason for existence - serving Jesus Christ - then God help you.

I know that both sides of the lib/conservative debate mix their politics with religion, but I don't see any conservatives calling for making their church's Official Slogans into political statements.


I then moved on to the topic of waterboarding, because he brought it up, linking to this article.
I parse here the fallacies point by point:

1) Moral equivocation on the subjects of the interrogation techniques. If it's bad for the enemies to do it, it's bad for us.
2) Poisoning the well by discussing extraneous and irrelevant topics:

-He told his interrogators everything they wanted to know including the truth. They rarely stopped.
-Whether the victim is allowed to comply or not is usually left up to the interrogator. Many waterboard team members, even in training, enjoy the sadistic power of making the victim suffer and often ask questions as an after thought.
-Taking a pregnant woman and electrocuting the fetus inside her? Executing a captive’s children in front of him?

No one is arguing that it's OK to inflict wanton suffering on someone. The question is whether it's permissible or even preferable to do so to obtain actionable intel to save American lives, preventing an attack.


3) Equivocation on the definition of torture.
I don't see an argument for why "painful psychological experience" - which should be stated "experience that lasts about 30 seconds, leaves no physical aftereffect and can cause painful psychological experience later in life, including fear of rain and taking a shower" - that should be defined as "torture".

4) Equivocation on who is who. As if jihadists will stop their torturous activities if we stop waterboarding.
-If you support the use of waterboarding on enemy captives, you support the use of that torture on any future American captives.

He even admits as much later in the article:
-We must now double our efforts to prepare for its inevitable and uncontrolled use of by our future enemies.

5) -Torture. Does. Not. Work.

Except when it does.
Obviously the interrogator must frame his questions carefully. No one is arguing with that.

-The torturer will trigger within the subject a survival instinct, in this case the ability to breathe, which makes the victim instantly pliable and ready to comply.

Good - I want jihadists to tell American captors actionable intel so that fewer American troops and civilians will die, don't you?


6) Further equivocation on the label of "torture" to waterboarding:
-What next if the waterboarding on a critical the captive doesn’t work and you have a timetable to stop the “ticking bomb” scenario? Electric shock to the genitals?

I wouldn't necessarily support that - it's a whole different question b/c it's serious PHYSICAL pain, of a disgusting nature, and can have physical consequences in the future.
To quote an article linked-to below, "to say that 30 seconds of waterboarding is torture trivializes the concept of torture. If that’s torture, then torture is grossly overrated."

7) Unwarranted assertions that, again, poison the well:
-It is not a far leap from torture to murder, especially if the subject is defiant.

Defiant? I thought torture doesn't work. Which is it - does it work or not?

8) Self-loathing and justifying jihadists. Why does he think America is the only bad guy here?
-Brutal interrogation, flash murder and extreme humiliation of American citizens, agents and members of the armed forces may now be guaranteed because we have mindlessly, but happily, broken the seal on the Pandora’s box of indignity, cruelty and hatred in the name of protecting America.

Amazingly, the very next sentence contradicts his point.
-To defeat Bin Laden many in this administration have openly embraced the methods of by Hitler, Pinochet, Pol Pot, Galtieri and Saddam Hussein.

I thought *WE* broke the box open, but now we hear that Hitler, Pol Pot, and Saddam did so.
You think they stopped at waterboarding (as I would argue we probably should)? And didn't they come chronologically 1st? And somehow this is America's fault?


You linked to an article, here are some more to consider from a blog that was recently discussing this very issue:
On waterboarding
How not argue against waterboarding
On Christians and waterboarding

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For your edification, as always.