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THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 26, 2009
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9

Inside the CIA Torturers' Heads

Post: Higher-ups pushed interrogators for harsher methods than they wanted

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(Newser) – The FBI was already getting information out of a suspected terrorist in a series of relatively friendly interrogations in 2002 when the CIA stepped in, a former US official tells the Washington Post. Agency contract psychologists escalated the techniques to sleep deprivation, extreme cold, and waterboarding, which the FBI interrogators called "borderline torture." Then, CIA higher-ups escalated the process further.

Even after the CIA psychologists considered their suspect to have given up all he knew, CIA headquarters demanded 30 more days of waterboarding. "You've lost your spine," they told the team, which threatened to quit if officials didn't come to Bangkok to observe the process themselves. After watching a single interrogation session, officials immediately called a halt to the process.

Protestors demonstrate the use of waterboarding on a volunteer in front of the Justice Department in Washington in this Nov. 5, 2007, file photo.
Protestors demonstrate the use of waterboarding on a volunteer in front of the Justice Department in Washington in this Nov. 5, 2007, file photo.   (AP Photo/Manuel Balce Ceneta, file)
A new document indicates the CIA first proposed to top Bush administration officials in mid-May 2002 that alleged al-Qaida terrorist Abu Zubaydah be submitted to waterboarding.
A new document indicates the CIA first proposed to top Bush administration officials in mid-May 2002 that alleged al-Qaida terrorist Abu Zubaydah be submitted to waterboarding.   (AP Photo/U.S. Central Command, File)
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9 comments
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Observer
Jul 19, 09 12:37 PM CDT
It is too easy for wanna-be cowboy's in $2,000 suits to demand harsher treatment by the men in the dark secret dungeons. Let's see Bush, Cheney and Ashcroft get their hands stained instead of having lavish banquets and cognac at their private clubs. They are the real criminals here not the lowly spooks. Reply
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+9
IN RESPONSE:
Doctor_Zaius
Jul 19, 09 1:25 PM CDT
Better yet, waterboard them to obtain war-crimes confessions.
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+9
IN RESPONSE:
Reader64481089
Jul 19, 09 1:36 PM CDT
Cheney's mechanical heart would short our and they would have to waterboard Bush upside down because head is located up his a$$..
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+8
IN RESPONSE:
JonmarkP
Jul 19, 09 4:25 PM CDT
They're all guilty, top to bottom. How many of the "lowly spooks" said, "No. To torture is sub-human. Only a defective person tortures animals or humans. You want this done, come do it yourself." We should prosecute them from the top down. Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Rice and Yoo first, then down the line to the very bottom. We have to cleanse the pus out of this infected wound, or it will never heal.
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+4
IN RESPONSE:
SPH
Jul 19, 09 4:27 PM CDT
Nice thought Doc but even they know such confessions are not reliable or submittable in court....
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+3

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