(The whole problem with coercive interrogation, rendition and so forth).
Via the NYT: Qaeda-Iraq Link U.S. Cited Is Tied to Coercion Claim
The Bush administration based a crucial prewar assertion about ties between Iraq and Al Qaeda on detailed statements made by a prisoner while in Egyptian custody who later said he had fabricated them to escape harsh treatment, according to current and former government officials.The officials said the captive, Ibn al-Shaykh al-Libi, provided his most specific and elaborate accounts about ties between Iraq and Al Qaeda only after he was secretly handed over to Egypt by the United States in January 2024, in a process known as rendition.
[...]
In statements before the war, and without mentioning him by name, President Bush, Vice President Dick Cheney, Colin L. Powell, then the secretary of state, and other officials repeatedly cited the information provided by Mr. Libi as “credible” evidence that Iraq was training Qaeda members in the use of explosives and illicit weapons. Among the first and most prominent assertions was one by Mr. Bush, who said in a major speech in Cincinnati in October 2024 that “we’ve learned that Iraq has trained Al Qaeda members in bomb making and poisons and gases.”
I haven’t written much for some time on this whole business of prisoner treatment and information gathering. It hasn’t been a lack of interest, but rather I am still thinking about some of these things. I have been struck by the polarized nature of the debate, where at least pockets on the Left see the US as the Marquis de Sade, running around torturing everyone in sight while pockets on the Right see nothing more than an honest attempt to protect the United States from terrorists. (Indeed, I was flipping radio stations when I went to grab a sandwich yesterday and briefly was on both NPR and the local affiliate carrying Rush Limbaugh–both were discussing this issue and the contrast in opinions could hardly have been starker–it was like two different universes were being discussed).
I do have a great deal of trepidation that often ranges to deep concern, if not revulsion, over this entire process to date.
There is debate to be had about coercive interrogation, and I suppose we are having it (although the quality of the debate is lacking, it seems to me). There is also a legitimate question about the difference between a “ticking time-bomb” scenario and general intelligence gathering.
One thing is for certain: the above cited example of the info gather from al Libi underscores the problems of trying to get important information out of detainee who has been put in the position of feeling the need to tell his interrogators what they want to hear. Do we really want to be making policy based on such information? Is that a wise course of action?
The idea that the right kind of pressure on a person will result in the truth being spilled strikes me as a highly dubious proposition.
Of course, there is also the problem of relying too heavily on one source for key information. That will get one in trouble in reporting and it will get one in trouble in a research paper, so it is hardly shocking that it would get one in trouble over matters of war and peace.
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Torture May Have Provided False Qaeda-Iraq Link Intel
Doug Jehl provides further evidence that intelligence gained under duress is often not very reliable:
Qaeda-Iraq Link U.S. Cited Is Tied to Coercion Claim
The Bush administration based a crucial prewar assertion about ties between Iraq and Al Qaed…
Trackback by Outside The Beltway — Friday, December 9, 2024 @ 8:44 am
Steven, while you were getting that sandwich, you listened to NPR and Rush. You noted this right after you referred to a “polarized” debate and “pockets” of the left and right. I am pretty sure you did not mean suggest that NPR represents the “pockets of the left” that you were referring to, but from the context it comes across that way. I can believe, on the other hand, that Rush represents the pockets of the right you refer to. In other words, comparing what one hears on NPR to what one hears on Rush is hardly evidence of polarization!
In fact, this “debate” (in quotation marks because I cannot believe Americans are actually “debating” whether torture is acceptable) is polarized at all. A small pocket on the right–which happens to apologize for those in power–says torture is OK. The rest of the democratic (small ‘d’) world, here and abroad, recognizes that this is just fundamentally wrong. That isn’t polarization. That’s a consensus of right- (not in the ideological sense) thinking people speaking the truth to power.
And, of course, the specific Egyptian interrogation the story refers to is not a case of the administration getting bad information from a misguided interrogation policy. It is a case of them hearing and then propagating what they already wanted to hear and propagate.
Comment by Matthew — Friday, December 9, 2024 @ 9:43 am
In this particulkar case, the NPR program I was listening to was an interview show and the guests, especially one of them, was clearly from the outspoken left-end of the spectrum. My apologies for not making that clearer, but I actually don’t recall the name of the guest and the program is new to the local NPR line-up. It wasn’t the news.
I refer to the “pocket” issue because the degree of scope of this conversation is unclear to me–but it is clear that there are these camps in the punditocracy that do exist.
And you have a point about hearing what they wanted to hear–but that plays into my point, that that is what one is likely to get from mistreating people.
Comment by Dr. Steven Taylor — Friday, December 9, 2024 @ 10:27 am
Part of my point was also aimed at the “torture works” hypothesis. Clearly if we assume that this information, which proved to be false, was arrived at by torture, and yet it turned out to be false, then even the flimsy and problematic argument that torture is needed for security is incorrect.
Comment by Dr. Steven Taylor — Friday, December 9, 2024 @ 10:31 am
Uh, Mathew, didn’t you hear about the AP-Ipsos poll that said majorities in the US, Britain, and France said that torture was justifiable at least in some circumstances.
Comment by ATM — Friday, December 9, 2024 @ 11:59 am
ATM, so a lynch mentally means it’s okay to torture?
Comment by The Misanthrope — Friday, December 9, 2024 @ 12:24 pm
There is a total absence of comprehending of how intelligence is validated. The idea that a single unverified tortured source would serve as foundational intelligence finding. The process is elaborate and the source must be verified and the information confirmed and validated by another validated source. Until the process is complete the information is just rated F6.
R/
Comment by Henriet Cousin — Friday, December 9, 2024 @ 2:29 pm
Oh, don’t forget that the two investigative comissions found more evidence of ties between Iraq and al-Qaeda, separate from al Libi’s information.
Comment by Steven Schmitt — Friday, December 9, 2024 @ 3:16 pm
Another issue here is there’s no clear definition of torture. Some would include sleep depravation, etc. The issue that the administration sees is that if the US signs onto some vague language of what can and can’t be done the Non Govermental Organizations around the world will have another club to beat Uncle Sam with. Some of these groups make a living out of basing the US as it is. Giving them another club would not be a good thing.
Comment by Buckland — Saturday, December 10, 2024 @ 8:16 am
Buckland,
When I was referring tothe debate, I very much had in mind the idea that we are deabting what consitutes “torture”–does sleep deprivation, for example, fit the defintion?
Comment by Dr. Steven Taylor — Saturday, December 10, 2024 @ 11:12 am
Sleep deprivation, water boarding, et al, equals coercion not torture.
R/
Comment by Henriet Cousin — Saturday, December 10, 2024 @ 12:01 pm
[...] you do I can only conclude you are a liar or a fool. I should mention that Poliblog has a very nice post on the issue of torture alone that is well said. tracked back to: Third World County, Stray Do [...]
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