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In an Emptywheel post that is getting a lot of deserved attention, we learn that Kahlid Sheikh Mohammed was waterboarded 183 times in a one month period. It seems to me that both the excessive number of waterboard treatments for KSM and the timing of when they were carried out are of significance.
Why on earth would such a barbaric procedure be carried out so many times? To me, the most compelling answer is that a very specific answer was being sought and KSM refused to provide that answer.
There is historical precedent for such an interpretation. In the Spanish Inquisition, waterboarding and other torture methods were used until the desired confession of a particular sin was extracted.
In the case of KSM, the timing of the waterboarding seems to be a potentially big clue in answering both the question of why so many waterboard treatments were carried out and what desired confession was being sought. He was captured on March 1, 2003, although there were conflicting reports that he may have been captured as early as September, 2002.
The US invasion of Iraq began late on the night of March 19, 2003 (New York time, it was already March 20 in Iraq).
Was KSM waterboarded that many times in that particular month with the aim of extracting a confession of a Saddam Hussein link to 9/11?
After all, KSM was widely reported to have been the mastermind of the 9/11 attacks and the Bush Administration wanted nothing in the world more than it wanted a Saddam-9/11 link to justify the Iraq invasion. With time running out for the invasion to begin, the pressure to get such a confession seems a very likely driving force such depraved treatment.
36 Comments
I was thinking along the same lines as you. What jumped out at me was Khalid Sheikh Mohammed’s capture date you posted above: September 2002.
Looking through media reports, his capture date is March 01, 2003. Of course if the world doesn’t know about Sept 2002 capture and thinks he was just captured in March 2003, then interrogation in March 2003 makes sense to the outside world. Else they will wonder as you do, why wait so long to interrogate?
There is something here.
Oh, I see you changed the KSM Sept 2002 capture date to March 1, 2003.
Crap! I got that part wrong. He was captured March 1. His children were captured in September, 2002, although there were conflicting reports at the time that he also had been captured or killed.
I edited the post to show the more widely accepted March 1 capture date.
Excellent question!
Well if the March 1, 2003 arrest is later proved to be a fictional arrest date (and that KSM was captured/killed earlier) then the story has legs.
Now if KSM died earlier I wonder if the missing CIA tapes would have documented it…
Any information obtained through torture is tainted. That includes anything KSM may have said after he was tortured. If I had the sort of mind that ran toward conspiracy theories, I might wonder if the Bush Administration deliberately pursued the power to use torture so that it could obtain convenient “confessions” of that sort. Personally, I think such an idea gives those guys more credit than is warranted, but you do have to wonder, don’t you?
I agree completely that the information is tainted, but so is the rest of the information they used to invade Iraq. They wanted this link more than anything, and this would suggest that there was virtually nothing that would stop them from “getting” the link.
Actually it sounds right up the alley of folks like Cheney, Addington, and the child of former President Bush Sr.
However, as someone mentioned a couple of days ago (Raven?) .. why go through all of that… just claim they confessed to whatever you wanted to hear.
The only value of breaking someone so that they’ll confess is if you want to have video or other evidence of those confessions that you can use later. As it was, they had to throw that out, because the procedures they used were illegal.
So, either Addington, Yoo, Abu, etc., didn’t foresee this, or didn’t think through the idea that they could get about the same quality of evidence by simply lying. Either way, they’re crappy lawyers and wastes of oxygen.
KSM is very much alive. He is one of the five defendants who were in the process of their kangaroo court when Obama was inaugurated and the thing was stopped.
The subject of where his little boys are and whether they and their mother are alive or not is whole ‘nother question.
I read somewhere that the ICRC has been asking the CIA for info on them ever since they ‘disappeared’ and the CIA has been mum on the subject.
Actually, the real point of torture is for the people doing the torture to get their jollies.
In the ICRC report, one of the detainees said he had information that probably would have been valuable but never told his torturers. He was asked why he didn’t and his response was that the torturers were so ‘in to their work they quit asking questions’. Niiiice.
In another report – interrogators/torturers were ordered to stop what they were doing. As soon as the superior officer left, they began again. They finally had to be transferred because they kept coming in on their off-duty time and torturing the prisoners – in violation of a direct order.
Torture doesn’t just harm the person being tortured. It does something horrible to the person doing the torture.
And to the people who order it knowing full well it doesn’t work, it’s illegal and all the other reasons against it. They do it because they can. And they enjoy it. And I am sure that Bush and Cheney viewed all those tapes before they were destroyed. Just for the fun of it. Yech!
Insanity is repeating the same process and expecting different results.
Waterboarding 183 times? What were they expecting? A full eye witness confession of Christ’s Crucifixion?
” March 23, 2007
The Sheikh and The Torture Senator
By US Army Reserve Colonel (Retired) Ann Wright
Last week senior al-Qaeda operative Khalid Sheikh Mohammed reportedly confessed during his Combatant Status Review Tribunal (CSRT) at the US prison in the US Naval Station, Guantanamo, Cuba to having planned virtually every al-Qaeda attack on the United States. But during the military tribunal proceedings, he also said he was tortured during his four year confinement in CIA secret prisons. Senators Levin and Graham viewed the Guantanamo proceedings over a special video link into the US Senate. Afterwards, Senator Levin said that Sheikh Mohammed’s allegations of torture by US officials must be investigated.
Senator Levin, you don’t have to go far to find someone who knows about Sheikh Mohammed’s torture.
I was in the audience February 12, 2007 during the Washington, DC screening of the new HBO documentary The Ghosts of Abu Ghraib. After watching the documentary, panelists Senators Lindsey Graham and Ted Kennedy discussed prisoner abuse and torture at Abu Ghraib.
To the amazement of the audience, Graham said, with a twinkle in his eye, that Americans don’t mind torture, they really don’t. Then he smiled broadly, almost gleefully, and said that the US had used certain interrogation techniques on Shaikh Mohammed, one of the “high value” targets, techniques that “you really don’t want to know about, but they got really good results.”
I firmly believe that Graham’s statement acknowledged that US officials have tortured prisoners, and he, as a Senator, knew what was done and agrees with the torture because it got results. “
http://www.craigmurray.org.uk/…..e_and.html
MLDU stands for Military Liaison and Detainee Unit. The – is caused by blackouts on the e-mail.
*********
” Date: Fri, Dec 5, 2003 9:53 AM
Subject: Fwd: Impersonating FBI at GTMO
I am forwarding this EC up the CTD chain of command. MLDU requested this information be documented to protect the FBI. MLDU has had a long standing and documented position against use of some of DOD’s interrogation practices, however, we were not aware of these latest techniques until recently.
Of concern, DOD interrogators impersonating Supervisory Special Agents of the FBI told a detainee that -. These same interrogation teams then – -. The detainee was also told by this interrogation team -.
If this detainee is ever released or his story made public in any way, DOD interrogators will not be held accountable because these torture techniques were done the “FBI” interrogators. The FBI will left holding the bag before the public.”
http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/…..tanamo_Bay
-
” Last Updated: 1:26AM GMT 09 Mar 2003
Two young sons of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the suspected mastermind of the September 11 attacks, are being used by the CIA to force their father to talk.
Yousef al-Khalid, nine, and his brother, Abed al-Khalid, seven, were taken into custody in Pakistan last September when intelligence officers raided a flat in Karachi where their father had been hiding.
The boys have been held by the Pakistani authorities but this weekend they were flown to America where they will be questioned about their father.
Last night CIA interrogators confirmed that the boys were staying at a secret address where they were being encouraged to talk about their father’s activities.
Their father, Mohammed, 37, is being interrogated at the Bagram US military base in Afghanistan. He is being held in solitary confinement and subjected to “stress and duress”-style interrogation techniques.
“His sons are important to him. The promise of their release and their return to Pakistan may be the psychological lever we need to break him.” “
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/new…..chief.html
” Last Updated: 1:11AM GMT 05 Mar 2003
While Ari Fleischer, President George W Bush’s spokesman, said his treatment would be “humane”, CIA agents said he was being held outside America so that he would not be subject to constitutional protections.
In September, Cofer Black, then head of the CIA counterterrorism centre, was said to have testified that interrogators had been given greater leeway in interpreting the law because the importance of the information they were seeking.
Larry Johnson, a former CIA officer, said a “sleep deprivation and a reward system” would be used to toy with Mohammed.
His conditions would be less than comfortable. “I don’t see a constitutional right to have eight hours of sleep,” he said. “You shouldn’t subject someone to freezing but they don’t get to wear mink coats, either.” “
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/new…..chief.html
Jim,
I reckon you are right. We know that Bush tortured to get his beliefs reinforced. Look at the Zubaida case:
And straight after 9/11 Bush wanted security people to find a connection between Al Qaeda and Iraq.
So it fits Bush’s profile.
And they ran with every bit of rubbish evidence they could find to support their propaganda for Iraq. They’d take anything they can get or create.
There were massive protests in the lead up to war, so Bush was motivated.
KSM would hate Saddam so he would resist saying there was a link even if forced.
The torture tapes might have been erased partly because they were all full of lame questions that Bush wanted answered!
“Go on, tell us you are pals with Saddam and this will all be over.”
There’s a big problem with the KSM timeline no matter how you look at it. If he really was captured March 1, then they went directly to “enhanced interrogation techniques” without determining if conventional interrogation was going to work. I wouldn’t put much stock in thinking about the September, 2002 possibility if it weren’t for the way the Aafia Siddiqui case was handled. She clearly was held for several years at secret sites and then was “captured” last year under very mysterious circumstances that still have not been adequately explained–especially the gunshot wound.
I need to go back and look through Marcy’s posts on the torture tape destruction case. It seems to me that there is a time period where DOJ is still trying to block release even of written records. I wonder if September, 2002 to March, 2003 is in the time CIA wants to hide records…
Thank you, Jim. Recommended. Below is my comment at the DIGG:
/s/ pup34
Then you wonder, why did they stop at 183? Water rationing? Fatigue? Great article, Jim, and probably pretty close to the truth.
Yeah, that was actually going to be the point of this post until I stumbled onto the issue of the date. Once they had the memo justifications lined up and got all the way to 183 times, what possible reason would they have for stopping?
Their dilemma: “Help, I’ve fallen into a waterboarding justification trap and I can’t get out!”
Good point. Scratch off the death in ‘02 theory.
WRT March 1 2003 capture date, there were some initial reports that KSM was not spotted during the raid. How to sort through the fact from fiction there?
Like many I’m amazed that KSM is alive after 183 waterboardngs in such a short time. Obviously his body (and brain) would have suffered from lack of oxygen. I found the WIKI segment below on the effects of waterboarding:
He was being tortured to confess to the Iraq-Al Qaeda connection AND having seen Michelle Obama talk about “whitey”.
Geez…this guy Panetta seems like a goddam enabler, or like he is complicit, or why would he have taken the CIA Director job?
Good post! Hasn’t it been said/documented that KSM is now CRAZY? Think it was the 2nd or 183rd waterboarding that did it?
It would fit with their other rationales for invading Iraq and a few other things they did.
The Bush administration consistently committed the logical fallacy of beginning with a conclusion and then seeking facts to support it, while throwing away without consideration all that was contrary.
The very notion that Saddam would be buddy-buddy with someone dedicated to his overthrow is ridiculous, and there was an abundance of information to argue against any al Qaeda/Iraq connection.
As with the interrogation of Abu Zubaida, the White House was certain there was something there and leaned heavily on our intelligence agencies to support Bush and Cheney’s conclusion.
Then……………………………………….. the truth came out..
Incredible. Those are some very sick puppies.
” Former Vice President Dick Cheney slammed President Obama again on Monday night during an interview with Fox News’ Sean Hannity at Cheney’s home in McLean, Virginia.
Cheney pointedly questioned the president’s leadership, criticized Obama’s overseas trips as “disturbing,” said his handshake with Venezuela’s Hugo Chavez was “not helpful,” and strongly disagreed with the release of the torture memos.
Finally, Cheney defended the use of waterboarding and other interrogation techniques, saying, “It worked. It’s been enormously valuable in terms of saving lives and preventing another mass casualty attack on the US.” “
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/…..89268.html
Actually the capture date was right after the ruse about the invasion being related to WMD started falling apart. Al-Baradeh’s UN team disclosed that the Niger intel was bogus and went public with it. Then the media started reporting on some “Ambassador” who went to Niger and said the same thing about Bush’s 16-words. There was also earlier pressures from Tenet and others about the lack of support for the “African ” yellowcake claims.
So in March 2003 there would have been a lot of incentive to get KSM to bolster the Al Qaida-Saddam link. Their their rationale was collapsing around them. They needed a diversion. If they could get one taped “confession” they could make KSM disappear by accidental death, perhaps self-inflicted due to mental illness. Heck, they might get that on tape as well. “We had the tapes running when Khalid hung himself, but the observer was called to deal with another incident.”
“The boys [KSM’s sons] have been held by the Pakistani authorities but this weekend they were flown to America where they will be questioned about their father.
Last night CIA interrogators confirmed that the boys were staying at a secret address where they were being encouraged to talk about their father’s activities.”
So if they were brought to the United States they were on undisputed US territory. Any mistreatment or abuse should have followed US law. They should have had access to a gaurdian with THEIR best interests in mind. Note, as well, that they were not brought in as “illegals” but with the full approval of US officials. They were legally within the US. Yet they were held without “habeas corpus”…essentially kidnapped. I wonder what they were told about their father and mother (where is she) and what would happen to them. Were RHEIR interviews recorded? I’m sure they were! And since these occurred in the US they should be existant!
I wonder what President Obama would think, as a father, that two kids (7 and 9 years old!!!) under the age of his daughters were mistreated in this manner.
Where are they? Were they returned to obvious mistreatment in Pakistan or Afghanistan? Who authorized any of this! Where are the tapes?
While many Americans are willing to allow anything to happen to KSM, would they tolerate the abuse of his children?
Excellent comment, cinnamonape. Since the CIA admits to having them and to have brought them to America, how can we demand that CIA reveal what they have done with these children? I’ve read statements that they were captured 09/11/2002 and held for 4 months – - then what?
Most reports state that the children were sons, but I read one excerpt from a statement by KSM himself which states that they were a boy and a girl. I’ll look for that and provide link in a later post.
There is a thought that is too horrible for the normal mind to bear: Did you ever hear of a CIA program called Operation Monarch? It grew out of their old MKULTRA program.
The study of this darkest of the dark side is something we each must undertake for ourselves, but these unspeakable CIA programs must be shut down.
burqa, I replied to one of your comments back on EW but it’s about # kazillion so don’t imagine you saw it. In your comment you told of the Marine Col. on Guadacanal in WWII who interrogated Japanese prisoners the humane way successfully even in the time of hot battle. That, for me, shoots down every conceivable argument for torture that Cheney & Co. can dream up. Please write a diary using the info you relate in that comment. It deserves to be a front page story, not just a comment.
burqa, here’s the link to the EW story where you tell of the Marine Col. who successfully interrogated the Japanese on Guadacanal in WWII. Your comment is @ 99. I repeat, please do a full diary on this.