Obama's interrogation screw up--A pinnacle of near perfect ignorance
...This screw up combines liberal arrogance and moral preening with liberal ignorance of the enemy and his methods of operation. Useful idiots like Froomkin only perpetuate the myths about the program while they work to make us all less safe and make this war last much longer with their naive assumptions about interrogations.
With all due respect, Froomkin is speaking from a pinnacle of near-perfect ignorance. In the summer of 2006, I was asked to prepare a speech revealing the details of the CIA program. I sat down with the people who actually ran the program—the people responsible for breaking up the plots—and, over the course of several months, we painstakingly reconstructed how the questioning of these terrorists led to the disruption of plots. Let me give some details on just one example—the West Coast plot.A few months after 9/11, a terrorist named Abu Zubaydah was captured. He was a close associate of Osama bin Laden, and ran a camp in Afghanistan where some of the 9/11 hijackers had trained. And he helped al Qaeda leaders escape from Afghanistan after the start of Operation Enduring Freedom, including the future leader of al Qaeda's Iraqi branch, Abu Mussab al Zarqawi.
Zubaydah was captured in a gun battle and severely injured. The CIA arranged medical care, saving his life. After he recovered, Zubaydah provided what he thought was nominal information—including that KSM's alias was "Muktar," something our intelligence community did not know. But he soon ceased all cooperation. It was clear to his interrogators that he had received interrogation resistance training, and the traditional methods were not working. So the CIA employed alternative interrogation techniques. And Zubaydah started talking.
He provided information that led to the capture of Ramzi bin al Shibh—one of the key plotters of the 9/11 attacks and a close associated of KSM. Bin al Shibh was the mastermind behind a plot for a follow-on attack to hijack airplanes in Europe, and fly them into Heathrow airport. Now he was off the street and the Heathrow plot was setback.
Together, bin al Shibh and Zubaydah provided information that led to the capture of KSM.
Once in custody, KSM refused to cooperate, until enhanced interrogation techniques—including waterboarding—were used. Then he began to talk.
He gave us information about another terrorist in CIA custody named Majid Khan. KSM told us that Khan had been tasked to deliver $50,000 to a Southeast Asian terrorist named Zubair—an operative with the terrorist network Jemmah Islamiyah, or JI.
Confronted with this information, Khan confirmed KSM's account and gave us information that led to the capture of Zubair.
Zubair then provided information that led to the capture of a JI terrorist leader named Hambali—KSM's partner in developing the West Coast plot. Their strategy was to used Southeast Asian operatives, since KSM knew we would be on the lookout for Arab men.
Told of Hambali's capture, KSM identified Hambali's brother "Gun Gun" as his successor and provided information that led to his capture.
Hambali's brother then gave us information that led us to a cell of 17 JI operatives that were going to carry out the West Coast plot.
Of course, according to Froomkin, I just made all that up.
...
Actually there is something to notice here.
ReplyDeletethe key difference is wether the known person is connected or not, which is a very different situation than everyones imagination. most people imagine using it randomly to find a thread or potentially with people that are operating on a need to know basis.
however, the description above is a very different beast because the first thread was not a nothing nobody, so each connection in turn led to somebodies by "skating the top rim" starting with the top rim.
if a group did this with the average joe soldier, it wouldnt go far... but being used on a confirmed and known key leader, it leads to other upper people that that person knew, and so on... they wouldnt be upper people unless they knew people. unknowns arent upper people unless placed there by others (thats a general rule so when ya see it, watch out).
looks like the tin hatters have done their job and created so much smoke, the comentators are not playing a game of facts, they are playing a game of "guess whats real" as our body politic loses touch with reality by doing so.