Senator Diane Feinstien (D) gives a speech about the report to the Senate. Reuters
The CIA mislead the government and the american public about the enhanced interrogation program, which was much more brutal then previously reported. Reuters. The Senate report claims that between 2002 and 2006 no terror plots were disrupted through the use of the program. The program was developed by contractors and the interrogations took place in countries like Afghanistan, Romania and Poland. Some of the new actions described in the report include sleep deprivation for 180 hours, water boarding and "rectal feeding". Criminal prosecutions are unlikely. Of the 39 detainees detailed in the report 7 gave no information at all. Others made up stories. The CIA also did not use trained and vetted personnel.
My Comment:
There isn't too much new here in this report. It did confirm a suspicion I had about the CIA interrogators not knowing what they are doing. I believe that torture can work in certain situations but not in the way the CIA was doing it. In short you have to combine the stick with a carrot. Of course, since the program failed to turn up any intelligence that hadn't been revealed by other sources, I doubt that the government will ever try this again.
As to whether it was justified in the first place, it seems clear that it wasn't. And not just because they didn't get any intelligence from the program. From what I understand there was no major 9/11 style plot discovered with this program and no greater good served by torturing the prisoners. I've always said that torture may be justified if there is some immediate disaster to prevent, but it is clear from this report that they didn't even have that flimsy justification.
Hopefully there aren't any repercussions from this. Terror groups need little justification for terror attacks but it is possible that some embassies could be the target of protests. I haven't heard of anything yet but who knows what could happen.
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