So the WaPo says "the CIA's harshest interrogation methods" helped turn Khalid Sheik Mohammed into a guest lecturer, teaching Al Quada 101.
Speaking in English, Mohammed "seemed to relish the opportunity, sometimes for hours on end, to discuss the inner workings of al-Qaeda and the group's plans, ideology and operatives," said one of two sources who described the sessions, speaking on the condition of anonymity because much information about detainee confinement remains classified. "He'd even use a chalkboard at times."
Known entomophobe Andrew Sullivan is both beside and beclowning himself:
They (the WaPo) have described John McCain's experience in Vietnam as torture, and yet what he endured was nothing like as brutal as what was done to KSM.
Let that statement sink in for a moment.
Glenn Greenwald is equally upset:
The article's headline is "How a Detainee Became An Asset -- Sept. 11 Plotter Cooperated After Waterboarding" -- though an equally appropriate headline would be: "The Joys and Virtues of Torture -- how Dick Cheney Kept Us Safe."
You know who they remind me of? Dubya. Or, rather, they remind me of their caricatured vision of Dubya. Remember when he was a simpleton cowboy who saw everything in black and white? Them bad, us good?
People like Sullivan and Greenwald wanted nuance back then. Now? Now everything really is black and white.
Torture isn't something to take lightly, and it isn't something to be used lightly, if at all. There are actual practical reasons for that: under torture, a captured soldier will answer your questions whether he knows the answers or not. He'll tell you what he thinks you want to hear, just to make you stop.
That gets you bad intelligence, which costs lives. Not to mention, if an enemy knows you torture your prisoners, they'll be less likely to surrender in the first place.
But when you know your prisoner has information, and you know that information will save lives...
Mohammed was an unparalleled source in deciphering al-Qaeda's strategic doctrine, key operatives and likely targets, the summary said, including describing in "considerable detail the traits and profiles" that al-Qaeda sought in Western operatives and how the terrorist organization might conduct surveillance in the United States.
It would be interesting to find some parallel universe - maybe a place where Ted Kennedy was "shamed into private life" - where we didn't extract that information from Mohammed. Where al-Queda was, therefore, stronger. Where people died because of it.
It would be interesting to put the might-have-been victims in a room with people like Sullivan and Greenwald, just to find out what they would say. What would they say to the families? How would they answer the question: why was it more important to protect terrorists from simulated drowning, cigarette smoke, harmless insects, "attention slaps," than it was to protect an innocent from a bomb?
(Lance Burri is The TrogloPundit)
