Article:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/12/09...d%3D578635
The report is highly critical of the CIA, not only for the conduct of the torture program itself but for the way the CIA lied to Congress, the White House and the public.
I also took note of one special remark, the report says the deputy director of the CIA's CounterTerrorism Center informed them that the CIA used leaks by "senior intelligence officials" but in truth, those "leaks" came from the CIA's Office of Public Affairs.
Interesting also to see the title page has been redacted in regard to the classification of the report. Something is haunting the space between the words "top secret" and "noforn", which clearly is a very high classification title that remains classified.
Off to read the thing.
Despite its popular name the T-word 'Torture' is not used once in the report....I've heard.::face.palm::
http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/politic...053239.php
So the redacted summary of the "torture report" is out, which means Senate Democrats brushed aside GOP complaints and that the administration overruled both State Department and CIA objections to the timing or to the release itself. But it seems the CIA has decided it doesn't have to take it (per a report from The Telegraph's Raf Sanchez):In the moments before the Senate's report into torture by the CIA was released, the agency's director, John Brennan, released a statement of his own.
In it, he acknowledges that "the detention and interrogation programme had shortcomings and that the Agency made mistakes" and that "we did not always live up to the high standards that we set for ourselves and that the American people expect of us".
But on the fundamental point - was America right to brutalise these terror suspects in an effort to extract information that could prevent the next September 11? - Brennan refuses to give ground.
"Interrogations of detainees on whom [enhanced interrogation techniques] were used did produce intelligence that helped thwart attack plans, capture terrorists, and save lives." He also disputes the Senate's claim that America's spies misled the public about the torture program. He says:
"While we made mistakes, the record does not support the Study's inference that the Agency systematically and intentionally misled each of these audiences on the effectiveness of the program."
The bottom line: the battle over what really happened during one of the darkest periods in recent American history is far from over.
If so, does the current leadership of the CIA get to have its own position on the basics that contradicts the president's?
If Brennan issues another such statement, it really ought to be quickly followed by a letter of resignation.
Am I right in thinking that the only person to go to jail over CIA torture was John Kiriakou?
Let's hope that this report builds up enough political willpower in the White House/Congress to unclassify the last million pages of CIA records re: JFK.
I wonder how the CIA is going to respond to the inevitable blowback here. Might just be worse than any time since the Bay of Pigs. I wonder if they will just "lay back and think of England" (to borrow a phrase), or if they will attempt to level the playing field a bit, with disclosures of thier own, to retain a bit of self-respect. They are, or were (before today), the most powerful intelligence agency in the world.
They'll claim they were acting legally. I never heard the torture professors mentioned like Yoo.