Ex Spy Chief: "U.S. used waterboarding, but no longer does"

Ex Spy Chief: "U.S. used waterboarding, but no longer does"

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WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The United States used waterboarding in terrorism interrogations but no longer does, a former U.S. spy chief said in the Bush administration's most explicit confirmation of the technique's use.

U.S. officials have been reluctant to acknowledge the CIA's use of the simulated drowning technique, which human rights groups call an illegal form of torture.

The remarks by former Director of National Intelligence John Negroponte in an interview with National Journal magazine come as senators are expected on Wednesday to grill Attorney General Michael Mukasey on a promised review of the legality of interrogation methods.

Asked by the magazine if debate over U.S. counterterrorism techniques was hampering its effort in a "war of ideas," Negroponte said, "We've taken steps to address the issue of interrogations, for instance, and waterboarding has not been used in years."

Negroponte served as the first director of national intelligence, a position created by President George W. Bush in the wake of the September 11 attacks, from 2005 to 2007. He is now deputy secretary of state. He spoke in an interview published in the National Journal's January 25 issue.

"It (waterboarding) wasn't used when I was director of national intelligence, nor even a few years before that," he said. "I get concerned that we're too retrospective and tend to look in the rearview mirror too often at things that happened four or even six years ago."

Negroponte's remarks appear to confirm earlier reports that the CIA discontinued waterboarding in 2003, after using it on three "high-value" detainees. Vice President Dick Cheney once suggested waterboarding was "an important tool" used to interrogate September 11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed.

Bush has regularly insisted that the United States does not torture but has declined to discuss what interrogation techniques are used. The CIA declined comment on Negroponte's remarks.

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Well, perhaps there was some truth to the decider's "We don't torture" declaration. If we're talking in present terms. lol!

www.reuters.com
(visit the link for the full news article)

Sometimes I am a little slow so please bear with me while I figure this out...

The U.S. used waterboarding, claimed it was not torture, praised the results achieved by using this technique, but now claims that we do not use it anymore.

Am I the only person that says "Hogwash" to this? I do not believe for one minute that the US has stopped using torture and I would suspect that waterboarding was the more peaceful method used for interrogations. This is nothing more than damage control.

reply to post by MrWendal


I would tend to agree. We know that Pinnochio Bush lives in his own alternate reality anyway, so in his own twisted logic there was nothing inhumane with waterboarding. We saw pics of Guantanamo with the dogs being sicked on the POWs. Who knows what else has gone on. But I'm sure it's MUCH worse than what we have seen exposed.

Dont worry the changed the name its now simulated drowning.

just like the mercury if I change the name its good for you.

Why should society give terrorists the right to strap a bomb on themselves to kill indescriminate civillians or worse like ramming airplanes into civillian structures? These people do not value their own lives yet people with nothing better to do will argue for them, that is the real sickness. Go find a real cause worth supporting that involves people that are not suicidal. I could care less if they had rabbid dogs chewing on their wankers while they spilled the beans.

reply to post by SectionEight


Of course...why care about some brown people half way across the globe right? History has proven that as you continue to blur the lines of what is acceptable, eventually there comes a time when these "techniques" are used against your own citizens.

A follow up to this-US. attorney general Michael Mukasey testifying before congress today:


Attorney general says CIA interrogations legal

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The CIA's current techniques for interrogating terrorism suspects are legal and do not include a widely condemned method known as waterboarding, U.S. Attorney General Michael Mukasey told Congress on Tuesday.

Mukasey declined, however, in a letter to Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy on the eve of testimony before the panel, to say whether he considered waterboarding, a form of simulated drowning, to be illegal.

A U.S. official confirmed last week that waterboarding was used in the past but had not been used for several years.

"The interrogation techniques currently authorized in the CIA program comply with the law," Mukasey wrote Leahy. "A limited set of methods is currently authorized for use in that program. ... Waterboarding is not, and may not be, used in the current program."

Leahy, a Democrat from Vermont, and other lawmakers repeatedly pressed Mukasey in his confirmation hearings last year and afterward to say whether he considered waterboarding an illegal form of torture, as do many human rights groups and other critics.


Continued:
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Looks like congress and the AG are butting heads today on the issue. This is not going to go away anytime soon IMO...


Attorney General, Congress clash on Torture

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Attorney General Michael Mukasey drew congressional fire on Wednesday for refusing to rule on the legality of waterboarding, and said the CIA may again seek to use the harsh interrogation method.

But Mukasey said that before CIA turns to the simulated drowning technique condemned by much of the world as torture, he or any of his successors would determine if it is lawful and the matter would go to the president.

"Those steps may never be taken, but if they are I commit to you today that this committee will be notified," Mukasey told the Senate Judiciary Committee.

The Bush administration has come under heavy scrutiny from critics at home and abroad over harsh interrogation methods used on terrorism suspects since the September 11, 2001, attacks.

continued:
www.reuters.com...

[edit on 30-1-2008 by DimensionalDetective]

Latest developements on this story:

CIA says it used waterboarding three times

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.

"The circumstances are different than they were in late 2001, early 2002," Hayden said.

He said he opposed limiting the CIA to using interrogation techniques permitted in the U.S. Army Field Manual, which bans waterboarding. CIA interrogators are better trained, and it works with a narrower range of suspects in its interrogations, he said.

Hayden told the committee fewer than 100 people had been held in the CIA's terrorism detention and interrogation program, with fewer than one-third of them subjected to any coercive interrogation techniques.

The CIA said in December that it had destroyed videotapes depicting the interrogations of Zubaydah and Nashiri, prompting a Justice Department investigation.

Full story
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The latest developments on this:


Bush approved CIA disclosure on waterboarding

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. President George W. Bush authorized the CIA to give its most detailed public account of its use of a widely condemned interrogation technique known as waterboarding, the White House said on Wednesday.

CIA Director Michael Hayden testified before Congress on Tuesday that government interrogators used waterboarding, often described as simulated drowning, on three suspects captured after the September 11 attacks of 2001.

Hayden's admission, the first time a U.S. official publicly disclosed the number of people subjected to waterboarding and named them, drew calls for a criminal investigation. Critics worldwide condemn waterboarding as torture, but the Bush administration has refused to define it as such.

"The president authorized Gen. Hayden to say what he said in the testimony yesterday," White House spokesman Tony Fratto told reporters.

Bush's decision to allow testimony on waterboarding, a major shift from his policy of keeping it under wraps, was prompted by heated public debate and a consensus in the administration on the need "to be very clear about how those techniques were used and what the benefits were," Fratto said.

Hayden told the Senate Intelligence Committee that waterboarding was used on suspected September 11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and senior al Qaeda leaders Abu Zubaydah and Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri.

He said waterboarding has not been used in five years, though U.S. officials say it could potentially be revived if the president and the attorney general authorize it.

Full story:
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