Torture May Have Slowed Hunt For Bin Laden, Not Hastened It
And an important point as well.
Here's a little part of what it says:
"I think that without a doubt, torture and enhanced interrogation techniques slowed down the hunt for bin Laden," said an Air Force interrogator who goes by the pseudonym Matthew Alexander and located Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the leader of al Qaeda in Iraq, in 2006.
It now appears likely that several detainees had information about a key al Qaeda courier -- information that might have led authorities directly to bin Laden years ago. But subjected to physical and psychological brutality, "they gave us the bare minimum amount of information they could get away with to get the pain to stop, or to mislead us," Alexander told The Huffington Post.
"We know that they didn’t give us everything, because they didn’t provide the real name, or the location, or somebody else who would know that information," he said.
In a 2006 study by the National Defense Intelligence College, trained interrogators found that traditional, rapport-based interviewing approaches are extremely effective with even the most hardened detainees, whereas coercion consistently builds resistance and resentment.
Let's give this analysis some attention, shall we?
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It's pretty well known that torture is counter-productive. Twist my arm hard enough and I'll tell you anything you want to hear -- doesn't mean that anything I say under coercion is true.
ReplyDeleteThere are some people who get off on torturing others, if only to prove their superior strength. The fact that Bush, Cheney, and their cohorts not only approved of torture but also encouraged it, is a black eye for America and has fed into the anger against our country.