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"We Tortured Some Folks": CIA Lied To Congress, Senate Torture Report Reveals

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In what we are confident everyone will find to be absolutely shocking news, moments ago the Senate Torture report was released. The key finding, hold on to your hats, is that the CIA "misled" Congress. As for the timing of the release, which takes place at the same time as Jonathan Gruber (Ph.D) is being grilled in the House, it is hardly a coincidence that Obama does everything in his power to deflect attention to what took place under the Bush administration, commenting that "torture techniques did significant damage to America’s standing” in the world. So what did the droning of thousands of innocent civilians do to the same "standing"?

The drilldown from Bloomberg:

  • CIA provided inaccurate information about effectiveness and scope of interrogations of suspected terrorists, and mismanaged a program that was far more brutal than represented, according to 6-year investigation by Democrats on Senate Intelligence Cmte.
  • Interrogation techniques weren’t effective, didn’t produce key information that led to killing of Osama bin Laden and were significantly different from procedures authorized by Justice Dept, report says
  • CIA provided inaccurate information to White House, Congress, DOJ, CIA Inspector General, media and the public
  • “This document examines the CIA’s secret overseas detention of at least 119 individuals and the use of coercive interrogation techniques - in some cases amounting to torture,” Senate Intelligence Cmte Chairman Dianne  Feinstein says in statement
  • Agency lost track of 119 detainees and at least 26 didn’t meet standards for being held, according to executive summary of 6,000-page report
  • In fall of 2002, detainee died of hypothermia while shackled to concrete floor; another detainee was held for 17 days in the dark without anybody knowing he was there
  • Interrogation of terrorism suspect Abu Zubaydah, who was waterboarded at least 83 times, was more brutal than previously known; at one point, he was put in a 1 1/2 meter box and knocked unconscious during waterboarding session, while water and bubbles poured from his mouth
  • Other detainees with broken legs and feet were inappropriately forced to sit in stress positions
  • No evidence CIA briefed former President George W. Bush about harsh interrogations, though former Vice President Dick Cheney attended meetings where tactics were discussed
  • Report details actions taken on terrorism suspects during George W. Bush administration; Bush called report “way off base” in interview with CNN
  • CIA Torture Report Set for Senate Release Over Bush Objections
  • Full Senate Intelligence Cmte wasn’t briefed on techniques until September 2006
  • While some members, including Feinstein and GOP Sen. John McCain, raised objections, CIA informed DOJ Office of Legal Counsel in a classified setting that no senators objected

Obama chimes in:

  • The report documents a troubling program involving enhanced interrogation techniques on terrorism suspects,” President Obama says in e-mailed statement on release of CIA torture report.
  • Report “reinforces my long-held view that these harsh methods were not only inconsistent with our values as nation, they did not serve our broader counterterrorism efforts or our national security interests”
  • Says techniques did “significant damage to America’s standing” in the world

Odd: no comments by the Droner in Chief what droning thousands of innocent women and children around the world does to America's "standing" in the world.

Some more from Bloomberg:

President George W. Bush was never briefed by the Central Intelligence Agency on the details of harsh interrogation techniques and secret detention of terror suspects for the first four years of the controversial program, and when he did find out the details, he was “uncomfortable” with some of the practices, according to the long-awaited report by the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence.

 

The 500-page declassified executive summary of the majority staff’s 6,700-page investigation into CIA rendition, detention and interrogation practices after 9/11 states that despite agency efforts to keep the Bush administration informed about the program, top White House officials repeatedly resisted having the CIA brief cabinet-level figures about the details, and CIA officials were not permitted to brief Bush directly until mid-2006, more than four years after the president signed a broad executive order authorizing the program, according to Senate Democratic aides who briefed reporters ahead of Tuesday’s release.

 

When Bush finally heard the details of the harsh interrogation techniques that were used against CIA detainees, he was “uncomfortable” with some of them and expressed dismay that some detainees were required to remain in stress positions for long amounts of time, to the point that they had no choice but to soil themselves, the aides said.

 

The committee’s investigation will also state, based on CIA’s internal correspondence, that two intelligence directors, George Tenet and Porter Goss, admitted they never briefed Bush directly on the techniques, even though the CIA inspector general recommended they do so in 2004.

 

The White House also resisted CIA efforts to brief other cabinet officials in the beginning stages of the program, Senate Democratic aides said. The CIA acting general counsel at the time, John Rizzo, wrote in an internal agency e-mail that the White House had told the CIA not to brief cabinet officials in 2002 because they feared press leaks, but Rizzo said the White House’s clear implication was that if Secretary of State Colin Powell were aware of the details, “he would blow his stack.”

 

Powell and Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld were briefed on the interrogation techniques sometime in 2003, the committee report states. Other top officials, including Vice President Dick Cheney and National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice, also eventually received briefings about the details of the program, but not the president himself. The committee report states the briefings that did occur were often misleading or incomplete.

 

In one instance, Cheney was not made aware of a specific country’s hosting of a CIA "black site," which complicated his direct relations with that country, aides said. The names of countries that participated in the CIA program are not revealed in the declassified executive summary of the report.

 

“The CIA provided incomplete and inaccurate information to the White House regarding the operation and effectiveness of the detention and interrogation program,” a committee document on the report states. “In addition to inaccurate statements provided to other policymakers, there were instances in which specific questions from White House officials were not answered truthfully or completely.”

 

In an interview with CNN on Sunday, Bush defended the CIA practices but didn’t mention he was kept out of the loop.

 

Here’s what I’m going to say, that we’re fortunate to have men and women who work hard at the CIA serving on our behalf. These are patriots,” he said. “And whatever the report says, if it diminishes their contributions to our country, it is way off base.”

 

Cheney told The New York Times this week that he was properly informed and the CIA program operated within the authority given by the Bush administration, a claim vigorously disputed by the committee’s report.

 

“What I keep hearing out there is they portray this as a rogue operation, and the agency was way out of bounds and then they lied about it,” Cheney said. “I think that’s all a bunch of hooey. The program was authorized. The agency did not want to proceed without authorization, and it was also reviewed legally by the Justice Department before they undertook the program.”

 

In its response to the committee’s report, the CIA states that it is unknowable whether or not Bush was briefed on the details of the program prior to 2006 because CIA records are incomplete on the point. Rizzo, in his memoir “Company Man,” states that Bush probably wasn’t fully briefed on the details. The CIA points out that Bush claimed in his own memoir he was briefed on some details.

 

"The study asserts that the President was not briefed in a timely way on program details,” the CIA response states. “While the Agency records on the subject are admittedly incomplete, former President Bush has stated in his autobiography that he discussed the program, including its use of enhanced techniques, with then-DCIA Tenet in 2002, prior to the application of the techniques on Abu Zubaydah, and personally approved the techniques."  (Zubaydah is a Saudi citizen still held at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.)

 

Regardless, according to the report, which outgoing committee Chairman Dianne Feinstein will speak about this morning on the Senate floor, the CIA not only went well beyond the techniques and practices authorized by the Bush White House and the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel, the agency misrepresented the program to top officials and used false information to gain approval from the White House and Justice Department.

 

The CIA provided inaccurate information to the White House, Congress, the Justice Department, the CIA inspector general, the media, and the American public,” a document provided to reporters by the committee states.

And so on. The full report can be found here

But before anyone gets too excited:

... here is Mike Krieger with the best summary:

 

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Tue, 12/09/2014 - 13:27 | 5533099 Porous Horace
Porous Horace's picture

Sadly, even the un-redacted report is just a drop in the bucket compared to all of the war crimes and crimes against humanity perpetrated by the CIA and the DOD's Special Ops forces on a regular basis.

Tue, 12/09/2014 - 13:27 | 5533110 graveheart
graveheart's picture

 

 

 

From "A Clear and Present Danger"

[Cortez realizes his betrayal has been exposed] 

Felix Cortez: [referring to Jack Ryan] Whatever this man has told you is a lie. He LIES for a living!

Ernesto Escobedo: He is in the Intelligence business. 

Felix Cortez: Exactly. 

Ernesto Escobedo: YOU'RE in the Intelligence business! 

[Escobedo plays back Cortez's conversation with Cutter]

 

Tue, 12/09/2014 - 13:28 | 5533111 MsCreant
MsCreant's picture

This "report" is being put out there to diffuse something else, or distract from something else, or to normalize something else. This ain't just party politics. 

They picked this crime to publicize, to hide another one. 

Tue, 12/09/2014 - 13:27 | 5533114 I Write Code
I Write Code's picture

This report is BS.  Are we supposed to be shocked by the word "torture", or outraged that the CIA lied, and didn't put it all on YouTube?  There are a lot of these detainees who I don't much care about because they certainly did worse than anything being done to them.  If there were specific outrages (and there probably were), they need to be reviewed in detail and someone responsible give us a summary.  This report so far does not appear to be that.

Tue, 12/09/2014 - 13:32 | 5533132 Son of Captain Nemo
Son of Captain Nemo's picture

Here’s what I’m going to say, that we’re fortunate to have men and women who work hard at the CIA serving on our behalf. These are patriots,” he said. “And whatever the report says, if it diminishes their contributions to our country, it is way off base.”...

For some unknown reason this write-up appears to be intimating that Obama got rid of all of G.W.'s black sites when he came to Washington?...  This from a pathological liar and a Nation that voted for him not once but "twice" with no recognition of his school dayz either high school or college as he was too busy living the life he is praising the torturers for!  Well at least we can always say that while he never closed Guantanamo down we can find it in the big book that he released 6 of them half way into his second term for the memoirs!!!!

Now what was that again about the increase in the number of drone killings while he's been in office?....


Tue, 12/09/2014 - 13:34 | 5533144 SillyWabbits
SillyWabbits's picture

We tortured some folks, who were identified to us by foreign agents, with their own agenda for US Foreign Policy by the way, as being persons wishing harm to the Homeland.

 

This evidence was conjecture, conspiracy, consensus among coconspirators, here say, rumor, political expediency, and all other sources of information, minus facts which by scientific theory are provable.  Of course such knowledgeable facts are not enhanced by torture.  Mostly falsehoods are confirmed and thus prove to be of no value as to actionable information, by the interrogators.  A time proven and tested axiom.

Because none of us actually knows the persons involved on either side of the equation we must assume the parable, “The first causality of war is truth”, as being a truism of inestimable veracity.     

Tue, 12/09/2014 - 13:36 | 5533154 Fix It Again Timmy
Fix It Again Timmy's picture

Probably in the very remote past, our nation was a nation of laws...Now, our nation is replete with, "What, me worry?" bozos... very troubling, indeed...

Tue, 12/09/2014 - 13:38 | 5533165 Vooter
Vooter's picture

There Atta be a law!

Tue, 12/09/2014 - 13:47 | 5533198 Nico Bellik
Nico Bellik's picture

fucking pussy - waterboarding - stress position - sitting in the dark are a far cry from flying planes into buildings - public beheadings- gang rapes/sodomy

wait until your loved one dies in a terrorist attack or is captured by a muslim coward - then you may ask why we weren't using strongner methods

Tue, 12/09/2014 - 13:52 | 5533227 capltd
capltd's picture

Your loved ones are more likely to die in a choke hold.

Tue, 12/09/2014 - 14:02 | 5533268 Vooter
Vooter's picture

Oh, boo-hoo--they flew planes into our buildings! They must have just picked our poor country at random! LOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOL...

Tue, 12/09/2014 - 13:48 | 5533201 SickDollar
SickDollar's picture

WTF , this whole report and even live reporting is a fucken joke

Seriously WHO THE FUCK IS NAIVE ENOUGH TO THINK THAT THE CIA DOES NOT USE TORTURE (always have always will period and thats true for any espionage agency from any country)

 

 

 

 

Tue, 12/09/2014 - 14:01 | 5533208 Emergency Ward
Emergency Ward's picture

The Honorable Senator Feinstein, after many years of lying, condoning and covering up for the CIA torture machine, is feigning shock and dismay at the report.

Leading Honorable Republicans are proclaiming continued support of torture in the WOT.

Tue, 12/09/2014 - 13:50 | 5533221 capltd
capltd's picture

So now the 2 parties put all their war crimes behind them and can back to partisan bickering over America's real problem - illegal immigrants!  Hahaha!

Tue, 12/09/2014 - 13:52 | 5533232 esum
esum's picture

none of the "alleged" torturers were interviewed... but they have all the facts... how about the fact fienstein and pelosi were FULLY BRIEFED IN DETAIL SEVERAL TIMES.... ooops Is this coincidence with the old car smell Hillary saying we should coddle our terrorist enemies... 

just like the warren report

just like the 9/11 commission

just like the OK city investigation

just like the benghazi coverup

just like every other political "investigation'

just like if obama's lips are flapping he's lying....

and when do we get the fast and furious report, the irs report...

when do we get the report n the no-bid sweetheart cony deal diane's husband has... exclusive real estate broker on a billion us government properties... money for nothing... thanks diane you old ugly smelly twat....

Tue, 12/09/2014 - 14:07 | 5533244 Prober
Prober's picture

OUTRAGEOUS!!!!

WHY AREN'T THESE PROVEN INTERROGATION TECHNIQUES BEING USED ON GRUBER, LERNER, PELOSI, REID, ET AL ????

Tue, 12/09/2014 - 14:00 | 5533257 smacker
smacker's picture

Will GW Bush find himself making a run for it to his ranch in Paraguay?

No doubt bought for this very purpose if the net closed in.

Tue, 12/09/2014 - 14:04 | 5533277 thebigunit
thebigunit's picture

So, is there anything really NEW in this report?

Or, is it just Senator Insider Tradingstein's craven way of getting Jonathan Gruber off of the front page?

Tue, 12/09/2014 - 14:05 | 5533279 gcjohns1971
gcjohns1971's picture

If you don't realize that every public figure, every politician, and most bureaucrats, are lying, then you haven't though very deeply about the NATURE of politics.

Tue, 12/09/2014 - 14:14 | 5533341 JPMorgan
JPMorgan's picture

The CIA hide behind a veil of secrecy so they can do their pay masters (the corporatocracy) illegal dirty work.

If you accept that as the truth then nothing that comes to light about their activities is of any real surprise.

But you know the score by now, they just say stuff like... it's for the greater good of America and American's everywhere that we do what we do -or- our enemies have us at a disadvantage, as they don't follow rules and laws.

Tue, 12/09/2014 - 14:16 | 5533366 paint it red ca...
paint it red call it hell's picture

Regardless of the what, where or why these nefarious deeds were done, any notion of latent morality remaining in this corporate government imposed upon us is woefully absent.

Another lie about this country revealed. This is not my America, it is my disillusion....

Tue, 12/09/2014 - 14:22 | 5533398 22winmag
22winmag's picture

Feinstein is a dirty C U Next Tuesday.

Tue, 12/09/2014 - 14:23 | 5533401 Otto Zitte
Otto Zitte's picture

These agents of zion tortured a brave young patriotic American with a conscience who stood up to them named Bradley Manning, for years, until he's so bent he thinks he's a girl. In violation of the most basic principles of Constitution, the District of Criminals already authorized them to operate in America, and to bring their friends, all immune from prosecution.

Tue, 12/09/2014 - 15:05 | 5533622 Prober
Prober's picture

 

 

Otto Zitte - weren't you a guard at a "work camp" in Poland ????

Tue, 12/09/2014 - 15:12 | 5533658 Otto Zitte
Otto Zitte's picture

You are either totally clueless or totally indoctrinated. Either way, being you is its own punishment. Come back when you know something.

Tue, 12/09/2014 - 17:50 | 5534312 Prober
Prober's picture

So you were a guard at a "work camp" in Poland ! I thought I recognized you by the sound of your propaganda. You were a good freind with Himler, right ?

Tue, 12/09/2014 - 14:24 | 5533404 Farmer Joe in B...
Farmer Joe in Brooklyn's picture

Zzzzzzzz.....

Same as it ever was.

Tue, 12/09/2014 - 14:24 | 5533411 Farmer Joe in B...
Farmer Joe in Brooklyn's picture

As long as they're "protecting our freedom", nobody will do a damn thing.

CNBC doing a survey right now... ~75% of respondents think the report should not be released / made public. 

Tue, 12/09/2014 - 14:36 | 5533482 Cold Grub
Cold Grub's picture

Well, we did some turrible shit in the past , gawd it was really really bad. But we are the greatest nation in the world because we got the

balls to let all the world know that we used to do turrible shit. Aw, we don't do that shit no more.  But if we do , ( i'm not saying we will ,

mind) isn't it great to know that we will eventually tell the whole world (after we stop doing the turrible shit again? )

wash, rinse, repeat.

Tue, 12/09/2014 - 14:42 | 5533507 El Hosel
El Hosel's picture

Lied to Congress... LOL,    They should have said they forgot what happened like the TBTF CEOs.

Tue, 12/09/2014 - 14:59 | 5533597 Prober
Prober's picture

better: the emails were lost, the computer hard drive crashed

per Obama's persecution agents in the IRS

Tue, 12/09/2014 - 15:27 | 5533726 Obamanism
Obamanism's picture

CIA has a new Motto. "WE CANT BREATH"

Tue, 12/09/2014 - 16:05 | 5533925 whyami
whyami's picture

It's not CIA lied. It's the government lied! It's OK for the government to lie because no one is held accountable for lying ver!

Tue, 12/09/2014 - 17:54 | 5534334 Bazza McKenzie
Bazza McKenzie's picture

What a bunch of confected outrage.

Did some terrorists or associates of terrorists get tortured in an attempt to extract information?  Probably.  Did many of them end up dead? No.

How many sentient babies does the US kill each year in the most barbarous fashion, being physically torn apart as demonstrated by Kermit Gosnell?  Tens of thousands?  But that's OK because its a woman's choice.

Hypocricy runs rampant.

Tue, 12/09/2014 - 21:01 | 5534925 honestann
honestann's picture

predators-DBA-government

-----

That's the point.
That's the answer.
That's all anyone needs to know.

In case this phrase needs clarification, let me do so.  There is no such thing as "government".  What actually exists is a pack of human predators who lie, cheat, steal, abuse, threaten, enslave and kill... and call themselves "government".  But that's just a name.  What actually exists is those human predators.  Period.

To be sure, these human predators have invented a huge pile of verbal fictions to fake people out, to fake people into thinking there is something beside just them, those human predators.  But all these fictions don't exist either.  For example, none of the following exist:  laws, nations, authority.  They are nothing.  Which is to say, they are fiction.  Just because someone orders you to "transport yourself no faster than 60kph" does not mean some real "thing" popped into existence (called "law").  Just because someone drew lines on a map does not mean something real popped into existence (called "nation").  Just because someone tells you to obey them does not mean something real popped into existence (called "authority").

IT IS ALL A HOAX.  100% hoax.

-----

Every human who "works for government" is a predator.  Simple as that.

-----

Nothing has changed in a million years.  Any animal that does not evade predators is consumed by those predators.  Any animal that can defend itself against predators but does not do so is consumed by those predators.

However, unlike other animals, humans WILLINGLY allow human predators to consume them.  In fact, many humans explicitly sanction, support and defend the human predators who consume them.

Why?

Because humans are DUMBER THAN ROCKS.  Literally.  Not even a rock can be stupid enough to invent and believe blatant fictions to cause themselves to take self-destructive actions.  Of all the kinds of entities in the universe, only humans are that stupid.  Want to perform a test?  Try to convince a snake, cockroach, flock of birds or cloud that a "nation" exists, and that they must get permission to leave one and enter another.  Good luck with that!  Only humans are that stupid.  Only humans can be convinced that absolute blatant non-existent nothingness is real... and not only real, but actually the very most important aspects of reality (nations, borders, governments, corporations, laws, regulations, authorities, etc).  Only humans are this stupid.

Which is pretty sad, because humans can be the smartest entities in the universe.  But they are encouraged by the human predators to turn away from their capacity for greatness, turn against themselves, and literally become dumber than rocks.

-----

Just consider how unbelievably and willingly stupid humans must be to remain in such an extreme state of stupidity.  Seriously.  Unlike other creatures, who blend into the environment rather well, human predators are very easy to spot.  I mean, seriously!  They congregate in easily identified buildings, and many actually wrap themselves in uniforms that identify themselves as human predators!  So pretty much any human non-predator could take them out with ease, from substantial distances no less, with very little risk.  And with very cheap remote-controlled camera-carrying quadcopter drones, the human predators could be taken out from completely invisible locations by anyone.  A few thousand sane and awake non-predators could unravel the entire enforcement arm of the human predators.  But... only the human predators do this --- interestingly, appropriately and quite accurately with devices they themselves named "predator drones".

-----

To any alien orbiting around earth and watching, humans must be quite the mystery.  Obviously at least some of them are capable of rational thought and technological achievement.  Yet virtually all humans clearly believe endless fictional nonsense, and elevate those insane fictions to the status of primary motivators in their lives - even though they cause NOTHING BUT HARM.

Why do they do that?

To these aliens, this must be quite the mystery.  How can 1% or 2% of the human population set themselves up as predators and enslave the rest?  They're greatly outnumbered!  Not only that, to even function, they have to identify themselves, and even decorate themselves with what should function as targets (uniforms, badges, etc), and work in known locations!  How can this be?

Once humans exterminate themselves, some alien will probably land on earth and erect some huge stone monument, with a large inscription on the headstone that says something like:

RIP
humans
dumber than rocks
destroyed by fiction
destroyed by nothing
MORONS

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