Former Vice President Dick Cheney has taken to many stumps lately to proclaim that the CIA's "enhanced interrogation techniques" saved the United States from another terrorist attack.
That leaves the question of what prevented another terrorist attack after the torture, as some call it, of terrorist suspects stopped.
Question for Cheney: How Come No Attacks After Torture Stopped?
The CIA is said to have relinquished water boarding, roughing up, sleep deprivation and other tough interrogation techniques in 2004, according to most reports.
But between Sept. 11, 2001 and the end of 2004, Cheney claims, terrorist attacks were thwarted by physically abusing detainees in the CIA's secret prisons.
"Every senior official who has been briefed on these classified matters knows of specific attacks that were in the planning stages and were stopped by the programs we put in place," Cheney insisted.
But what stopped terrorists from attacking after the harsh interrogation techniques were aborted five years ago?
Now another former CIA official has come forward to dismiss the former vice president's claims, saying that if the Bush administration had evidence of "torture" stopping attacks, it would have surfaced long ago.
"I cannot imagine that the system would not have leaked such a story. It would have been leaked in a New York minute," says Milton Bearden, who was a CIA station chief in Pakistan among other assignments during his three decades in the spy agency.
Bearden retired in 1994, but he told Raw Story.com today that "he has communicated with contacts who agree they've heard of no evidence to support Bush officials' claims."
Bearden also maintained that the Bush administration's harsh interrogation techniques weaken U.S. standing in the world.
"I have never been able to understand how any responsible leaders could so vehemently stick to the excuse of protecting sources and methods while that very position accounted for a weakening not only of this nation's alliances, but potentially strengthened our enemies," he said.
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You guys are too funny and way to smart! The obvious reply is the non-reply: sorry your question wasn't vetted in time for a response.
as the
"We'll get back to you" standard reply #1 just won't do!
But now Cheney does not have to answer to anyone, so he just spouts out information...thinking there is someone out there that still believes him. LOL
Posted by: afisher
| June 2, 2009 4:40 PM
Jeff, Jeff, Jeff. Stop overthinking. "Torture" did not happen in a vacuum. We were seriously kicking some ass in a number of other areas. Oh and if you want to go back to thinking you can make the case that :"torture" or at least the threat of it DETERRED attacks and was not a "recruitment tool" as those from the blame the victim camp say.
If attacks happen now after we have adopted the sissified approach to war I guess we can make the case that Cheney was right and your question to him will be very beside the point. So now we wait to see what they will do. Again we assume the role of prospective victims sacrificing everyday people to prove that the elites in DC of both/either camps did some really bad things at some point in history to those that wish us harm.
Would you rather be a live top or a dead bottom?
Posted by: NY Keith
| June 2, 2009 9:12 PM
The talk centering on whether or not waterboarding, sleep deprivation or listening to a continual loop of Barry Manilow is torture will stop when operators begin to apply battlefield justice instead of bringing them back for questioning.. I would bet my left arm that guys who work in that environment have learned from the political squabbling, the ACLU court battles, and the Keith Olbermans of the world that passing them on in an effort to gain intel on future ops is worthless. The same logic can be applied to pirates operating off of Somalia. Do you think that bringing them back to New York will prevent more takeovers? No... Getting the word out that we will scuttle their boats and let them drown will slow down piracy.
You asked, "But what stopped terrorists from attacking after the harsh interrogation techniques were aborted five years ago?" Perhaps the answer lies in the above. The boots on the ground started seeing that the bad guys that they were funnelling back to the US were never going to be effectively dealt with so they just may have applied that battlefield justice that I was talking about. It's worthless taking prisoners who end up living cush lives in Gitmo and never give up jack. We all know that and I'm sure that our guys on the ground know that as well.
Posted by: osocampana
| June 3, 2009 10:07 AM
osocampana-
'The boots on the ground started seeing that the bad guys that they were funnelling back to the US were never going to be effectively dealt with so they just may have applied that battlefield justice that I was talking about.'
'I would bet my left arm that guys who work in that environment have learned from the political squabbling, the ACLU court battles, and the Keith Olbermans of the world that passing them on in an effort to gain intel on future ops is worthless.'
There's an easy way to test this 'theory' of yours. Has the US stopped taking prisoners?
If not that is too bad, since according to you this 'take no prisoners' approach can cure as much as pirates, terrorism, and torture. Too bad we don't have critical thinkers like you in charge.
Posted by: delta9
| June 3, 2009 6:32 PM
Dear Osocampana: "Battlefield justice" -- shooting prisoners, I presume you mean -- has been defined as a war crime under the Geneva Convention for a hundred years.-js
Posted by: Jeff Stein
| June 4, 2009 12:35 AM
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