Interrogator: Torture Policy Led to Deaths of Thousands of American Soldiers

[EFerrari]

U.S. Interrogator in Iraq Says Torture Policy Has Led to Deaths of Thousands of American Soldiers

We speak with a former special intelligence operations officer who led an interrogations team in Iraq two years ago. His non-violent interrogation methods led special forces to Abu Musab Al Zarqawi, the head of Al-Qaeda in Iraq. He has written a new book, “How to Break a Terrorist: The U.S. Interrogators Who Used Brains, Not Brutality, To Take Down the Deadliest Man in Iraq.” The publication date for the book was delayed for six weeks due to the Pentagon’s vetting of it. The soldier wrote it under the pseudonym, Matthew Alexander, for security reasons. He says the U.S. military’s use of torture is responsible for the deaths of thousands of U.S. soldiers by inspiring foreign fighters to kill Americans.

A former special intelligence operations officer who led an interrogations team in Iraq two years ago has written a stunning OpEd in the Washington Post. It"s called “I’m Still Tortured by What I Saw in Iraq.”http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/11/28/AR2008112802242_pf.html In it, he details his direct experience with torture practices put into effect in Iraq in 2006. The soldier personally conducted more than 300 interrogations and supervised more than a thousand. He was awarded a Bronze Star for his achievements in Iraq.

In the article he says that torture techniques used in Iraq consistently failed to produce actionable intelligence and that methods outlined in the US Army Field Manual, which rest on confidence building, consistently worked and gave the interrogators access to critical information.

He writes, “My team of interrogators had successfully hunted down one of the most notorious mass murderers of our generation, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the leader of al-Qaeda in Iraq and the mastermind of the campaign of suicide bombings that had helped plunge Iraq into civil war. But instead of celebrating our success, my mind was consumed with the unfinished business of our mission: fixing the deeply flawed, ineffective and un-American way the U.S. military conducts interrogations in Iraq. I’m still alarmed about that today,” he says.

http://www.democracynow.org/2008/12/3/us_interrogator_in_iraq_says_torture

Audio, video at link.

[BoneDaddy]

1. Ya think?

That is what I never understood about the policies of Bush. It made the world, the US and our soldiers MORE vulnerable rather than less. This lack of ability to see connections is amazing. They simply just didn't care and were acting out their satanic fantasies.

[EFerrari]

2. Bush doesn't give a sh!t about our soldiers and torture proves that. n/t

[madokie]

7. Personally I think they did it knowing full well it would have the effect you are saying

These mo fo's need to all be found and jailed, every last one of them. They know what they're doing you can bet on that. We would be fools to continue to believe they don't. IHMO

[EFerrari]

10. I hope you get a chance to watch the interview.

The former interrogator was very good and very clear. Scott Horton, who has written about torture for a long time now, was also on.

[madokie]

12. So do I

I spent a tour of duty at the navy's s.e.r.e. camp in warner springs back in the late 6o's so I have some experience in all this. Some people will tell you all they know and then some, some will die before they say a word. It all depends on the person being interrogated. Torture is not done to gather information as much as torture is done to instill fear in the others.

[BoneDaddy]

13. no argument from me there...vulnerability was their

intention.

[Joe Chi Minh]

3. A vital contribution to a restoration of sanity in the conduct of American military

affairs - quite apart from the most basic morality.

The most egregious sign of this Neocon regime's fathomless degeneracy was arguably its scorn for the notion of winning "hearts and minds", in favour of the "iron heel". The reason for such prisons as Abu Ghraib holding so many Iraqis they knew to be innocent can only be to terrorise the population.

[EFerrari]

4. And what has it done to us -- to know our government tortures?

Two populations. The sekurity planning for the RNC Convention shows a deliberate plan to intimidate the population by attacking the media in the most open way.

[TahitiNut]

5. In February 1969, I was present during the treatment and initial interrogation of 2 NVA (PAVN) ...

... 'soldiers' in the medical facilities adjacent to the POW compound at Long Binh Post the day after they (an augmented battalion of NVA) attacked us along our southern perimeter for Tet 1969. These kids, no more than about 16 years old, were terrified and in shock, both causing them to be very pale and trembling and pasty. They each had about a dozen shrapnel wounds scattered on their bodies, possibly from claymores or M79 fragmentation rounds.

They were told by their command authorities that they'd be vivisected (sliced and diced) during interrogation if they were captured. They believed it.

One of the reasons the PAVN were, despite youth and limited training, a formidable adversary was their belief that there would be no worse Hell on earth than being captured. Sadly, there was just enough truth in that (if only at the hands of ARVN, ROK, etc.) that it couldn't be entirely dismissed. Indeed, USARV/CIA/MACV/ARVN interrogators took advantage of this as well.

The same fears are spread on our 'side' in the wars in which we've engaged. Listen to John McCrash. (Have grains of salt handy.)

This is consistent with the dehumanization of the 'foe' in ANY war. It's part of 'motivating' one's own troops to fight more unrelentingly.

We've done the job for Al Queda. We've engaged in torture and done so in the most reckless and pointless manner. Guantanamo and Abu Ghraib have done the 'work' for any adversary far more than that adversary could ever do it.

[EFerrari]

6. Maybe we need to redefine "adversary".

And Cheney/Rumsfeld did a brilliant job of dividing and conquering. Remember the rendition flight to Gitmo that we saw? Prisoners in orange jumpsuits sitting on the ground in the sun. Rumsfeld had us identifying with both our own people AND with the shackled, helpless prisoners. Brilliant, when you think about it. We were effectively neutralized as a people for a long time.

[Joe Chi Minh]

19. Those guys in orange had all my sympathy. Or leaders set out to make

enemies.

[Solly Mack]

8. ...

...

[anonymous171]

9. K&R

:kick:

[formercia]

11. Losing friends and making enemies

the goal was an endless war against Islam and bringing forth Armageddon.


The Fifth Prophesy.

[pinto]

14. Kick. n/t

[merh]

15. Haven't you heard?

It is not a policy that is to blame but the media's reporting of the torture.

If they hadn't said anything the bad guys wouldn't even know we were torturing.

I kid you not, that is what the hard core nuts say. It's maddening.

:argh:

[EFerrari]

17. What the hell do they think they were seeing when Rumsfeld had his parade

into Gitmo? But, that is what Rumsfeld said, too.

:argh:

[pokerfan]

16. We have met the enemy

[EFerrari]

18. Kick

[MountainLaurel]

20. Of course it did

Is anyone surprised by this?

[DeepModem Mom]

21. K&R