Hard Measures: Ex-CIA head defends post-9/11 tactics

[Jefferson23]

Jose Rodriguez has no regrets about the CIA using "enhanced interrogation techniques" -- methods that some consider torture - on suspected al Qaeda members detained and questioned after 9/11. Lesley Stahl interviews the former head of the CIA's Clandestine Service about waterboarding and other methods he says were essential to getting information from suspected terrorists, and he denies claims that these harsh measures caused detainees to provide false or unreliable information that misled the CIA. In fact, Rodriguez says that high-level detainees Khalid Sheik Mohammed and Abu Zubaydah provided their best information only after harsh treatment, a claim that the CIA's own investigator general has challenged.

The following script is from "Hard Measures" which originally aired on April 29, 2012. Lesley Stahl is the correspondent. Richard Bonin, producer.

After the attacks of 9/11, the CIA sought and was granted unprecedented authority to capture al Qaeda suspects, whisk them off to secret sites and interrogate them with harsh techniques, including waterboarding.

The man who ran the interrogation program was Jose Rodriguez, a CIA spy in Latin America, who rose to become head of the Clandestine Service, the CIA's dark side.

in full: http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-18560_162-57423533/hard-measures-ex-cia-head-defends-post-9-11-tactics/?tag=contentMain;cbsCarousel


* The retired cretin defends his torture days on camera, and through his new book.

[MannyGoldstein]

1. Thanks for the link. nt

[Jefferson23]

5. You're very welcome Manny. n/t

[teddy51]

2. Funny how that works though, shortly after the second world war, the US and other countries

couldn't contain themselves in getting both the Japanese and Nazis who used torture off to the Hague. The penalty would be death, no questions asked. Here we are years later and the Bush Administration justifies the same torture that these people were put to death for. Go figure!

[Nostradammit]

3. Headline re-write for veracity: War Crimes: Ex-CIA head tries to defend the indefensible

[Jefferson23]

4. Yes, that works for me too.

[lastlib]

7. I wholeheartedly agree. This individual should be frogmarching with Bush,

Cheney As?croft, Yoo, Bybee, and all the other war criminals!!

They all committed war crimes. They degraded America in the eyes of the world. They made a mockery of the U.S. Constitution and the Geneva Convention! They endangered our soldiers in the battle lines. They are not fit to wipe my ass with. If they can't face the music here on earth, may they burn in hell.

[lordsummerisle]

6. I can't believe

this isn't getting more response here...this is virtually a war criminal who has written a book and stands to profit for what he has authorized...

[Jefferson23]

8. I agree, his attitude was quite macho, " I want in"...To profit from this is beyond the pale imo. n/