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Why Did CIA Hide Dick Cheney’s Role in Briefing?

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Thanks to the WaPo for confirming something I guessed last month. Back then, I wrote,

I’m going to make a wildarsed guess and suggest that when the CIA lists "not available" in a series of 2005 torture briefings to Republicans in Congress, they really mean "Dick Cheney attended, but we don’t want to tell you that."

Today, the WaPo reports,

Former vice president Richard B. Cheney personally oversaw at least four briefings with senior members of Congress about the controversial interrogation program, part of a secretive and forceful defense he mounted throughout 2005 in an effort to maintain support for the harsh techniques used on detainees.

[snip]

The CIA made no mention of his role in documents delivered to Capitol Hill last month that listed every lawmaker who had been briefed on "enhanced interrogation techniques" since 2002. For meetings that were overseen by Cheney, the agency told the intelligence committees that information about who oversaw those briefings was "not available."

[snip]

The CIA declined to comment on why Cheney’s presence in some meetings was left out of the records.

[snip]

Several members of Congress who took part in the Cheney meetings declined to comment on them, citing secrecy concerns.

In one of my most unsurprisingly correct wildarsed guesses ever, Cheney was working with the CIA to keep his little torture program, and neither the CIA nor the Republicans he was arm-twisting want to talk about it.

But that ought to be worth some closer attention. WTF did the CIA hide Cheney’s role in these briefings (not to mention the date of their briefing with McCain)? It reveals not only a desire to hide the degree to which these "briefings" under Porter Goss became active lobbying in support of torture, but also the degree to which the CIA is working actively, with a former Administration official (Cheney) to hide their collaboration.

The article does provide two more important details that add to the damning story.

Cheney’s briefings on interrogations began in the winter of 2005 as the top Democrats on the Senate and House intelligence committees,  Sen. John D. Rockefeller III (W.Va.) and  Rep. Jane Harman (Calif.), publicly advocated a full-scale investigation of the tactics used against top al-Qaeda suspects.

On March 8, 2005 — two days after a detailed report in the New York Times about interrogations — Cheney gathered Rockefeller, Harman and the chairmen of the intelligence panels,  Sen. Pat Roberts (R-Kan.) and  Rep. Peter Hoekstra (R-Mich.), Read more →

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Cheney ‘Fesses Up that Rapport, Not Torture, Got Intelligence

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Greg Sargent catches Cheney parsing carefully about whether the two CIA documents he’s trying to get released will prove that torture works.

The key moment came when his interviewer said: “You want some documents declassified having to do with waterboarding.” Cheney replied:

“Yes, but the way I would describe them is they have to do with the detainee program, the interrogation program. It’s not just waterboarding. It’s the interrogation program that we used for high-value detainees. There were two reports done that summarize what we learned from that program, and I think they provide a balanced view.”

Greg speculates:

My bet is Cheney is planning to cite the valuable intel in the docs and say that the program — of which torture was only a part — was responsible for producing it. He’ll fudge the question of whether the torture itself was actually responsible for generating that information. Cheney is as experienced as any Washington hand at using precise language to obfsucate, and this is the game plan. You heard it here first.

Greg’s right–Cheney’s making a key retreat off his claims. That’s because we know the CIA got a ton of intelligence from some of the detainees, particularly KSM. But I’ve shown repeatedly, with my half-completed review of the KSM intelligence used in the 9/11 Report, that the bulk of this information came long after KSM was waterboarded in March 2003. The first big chunks of intelligence came from him in July 2003, and there were big chunks in the months that followed. This is important because the CIA started using rapport as well as abuse. Though we don’t know when they did so, it is likely that much of the intelligence they got from KSM came at least partly because of this rapport based interrogation. 

So I’m not surprised that the program–including rapport–got intelligence. I’m just curious why Cheney is backtracking on his big claims now.

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Richard Clarke Reminds Cheney and Condi of Their Incompetence

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When I saw Condi saying, "unless you were there, in a position of responsibility, you cannot possibly imagine the dilemmas we faced in trying to protect Americans," to Stanford students, my instinct was to remind everyone that she was forced to admit, "I believe the title was ‘Bin Laden determined to attack inside the United States.’"

Richard Clarke, after listening to Cheney and Condi make similar statements for a month, has a similar instinct (and of course, he’s in a position to make the argument more strongly than I). Today, he’s got an op-ed reminding readers of how Cheney and Condi refused to take terrorism seriously until it was too late. And once they did, they overreacted.

He describes the panic with which Cheney responded on 9/11.

I remember that morning, too. Shortly after the second World Trade Center tower was hit, I burst in on Rice (then the president’s national security adviser) and Cheney in the vice president’s office and remember glimpsing horror on his face.

And then he catalogs how the excessiveness of Cheney’s and Condi’s response led to more failures (click through for his discussion of the Iraq debacle).

On detention, the Bush team leaped to the assumption that U.S. courts and prisons would not work. Before the terrorist attacks, the U.S. counterterrorism program of the 1990s had arrested al-Qaeda terrorists and others around the world and had a 100 percent conviction rate in the U.S. justice system. Yet the American system was abandoned, again as part of a pattern of immediately adopting the most extreme response available. Camps were established around the world, notably in Guantanamo Bay, where prisoners were held without being charged or tried. They became symbols of American overreach, held up as proof that al-Qaeda’s anti-American propaganda was right.

Similarly, with regard to interrogation, administration officials conducted no meaningful professional analysis of which techniques worked and which did not. The FBI, which had successfully questioned al-Qaeda terrorists, was effectively excluded from interrogations. Instead, there was the immediate and unwarranted assumption that extreme measures — such as waterboarding one detainee 183 times — would be the most effective.

Finally, on wiretapping, rather than beef up the procedures available under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), the administration again moved to the extreme, listening in on communications here at home without legal process. Read more →

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Bush’s Approved Torture … in 2003?

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A number of people have pointed to a comment Bush made in MI on Thursday about his role in approving torture. Here’s how CNN described it:

Bush spoke in broad strokes about how he proceeded after the capture of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed in March 2003.

"The first thing you do is ask, what’s legal?" he said. "What do the lawyers say is possible? I made the decision, within the law, to get information so I can say to myself, ‘I’ve done what it takes to do my duty to protect the American people.’ I can tell you that the information we got saved lives."

Here’s how Eartha Jane Meltzer from MI Messenger described it:

But the former president spoke indirectly of his administration’s authorization of the use of torture against detainees captured during the War on Terror, avoiding the words “torture” and “abuse.”

“You have to make tough decisions,” Bush said. “They’ve captured a guy who murdered 3,000 citizens … that affected me … They come in and say he may have more information …and we had an anthrax attack … and they say he may have more information. What do you do?“

Bush was firm and defended his record as president: “I will tell you that the information gained saved lives.”

And here’s how the Detroit Free Press described it:

Former President George W. Bush defended on Thursday his decision to allow harsh interrogation of the terrorist who ordered the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on the United States, saying it was cleared by his lawyers to prevent what his advisers believed was another, imminent attack.

"I made a decision within the law to get information so I can say, I’ve done what it takes to do my duty to protect the American people," he said. "I can tell you, the information gained saved lives."

Here’s how SW MI’s Herald-Palladium described it:

He defended his decision to authorize waterboarding on the 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed. 

Now, I’m trying to get clarification on this point, particularly since Bush used to claim frequently that Abu Zubaydah ordered up 9/11, but between CNN and H-P, they seem to be clear that Bush was referring specifically to KSM, not AZ. [See updated below.]

If his reference to KSM was explicit, I find that very odd. 

Why would Bush talk about the seminal moments in his tenure as President, and refer to approving the torture of the third guy we waterboarded, and not number one or number two? Wouldn’t the first approval of waterboarding be the most important?

Read more →

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Carl Levin to Cheney: You’ve Got Nothing

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Carl Levin better watch out for Liz "BabyDick" Cheney and her cries of "libel!" Because he just called her Daddy a liar, using words like "false statements" and "colossal misrepresentation."

Now, Levin is actually the second person who has seen those documents who says they don’t say what PapaDick says they do.  A couple of weeks ago, Russ Feingold accused PapaDick of lying using somewhat more gentle language.

Nothing I have seen – including the two documents to which former Vice President Cheney has repeatedly referred – indicates that the torture techniques authorized by the last administration were necessary, or that they were the best way to get information out of detainees. The former vice president is misleading the American people when he says otherwise.

But I’m specifically interested in Levin’s statements for the very specific way he rebuts PapaDick’s claims (note, I’ve got nothing on my senior Senator in my appreciation for weeds). 

But those classified documents say nothing about numbers of lives saved, nor do the documents connect acquisition of valuable intelligence to the use of abusive techniques.

I’m interested in those specific details for the way they flesh out the details from the May 30, 2005 Bradbury memo which appears to have details from two documents related to those Cheney is seeking. As I suggested in April, it appears Cheney may be seeking one of the documents, and a version of another, that Bradbury used to rebut the CIA IG report’s conclusion that the torture was not all that useful. 

Here’s what the three documents cited by Bradbury for his "efficacy" argument say. I’ve left off all reference to the IG Report; my discussion of Bradbury’s use of that is in this post and this post. And I’ve noted which claims–really, the most critical ones–he offers no citation for. I bring it back to Levin below.

CIA Directorate of Intelligence, Khalid Shaykh Muhammed: Preeminent Source on Al-Qa’ida (July 13, 2004) ["Preeminent Source"]

After the September 11 attacks, KSM assumed "the role of operations chief for al-Qa’ida around the world." [citation omitted] KSM also planned additional attacks within the United States both before and after September 11.

[snip]

And, indeed, we understand that since the use of enhanced techniques, "KSM and Abu Zubaydah have been pivotal sources because of their ability and willingness to provide their analysis and speculation about the capabilities, methodologies, and mindsets of terrorists."

Memorandum for Steven G. Bradbury, Principal Deputy Assistant Attorney General, Office of Legal Counsel, from [redacted], DCI Counterterrorist Center, Re: Effectiveness of the CIA Counterintelligence Interrogation Techniques (March 2, 2005) ["Effectiveness Memo"]

Your office has informed us that the CIA believes that "the intelligence acquired from these interrogations has been a key reason why al-Qa’ida has failed to launch a spectacular attack in the West since 11 September 2001." [citation omitted] Read more →

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Liz Cheney: Calling My Daddy a Torturer Is Libelous

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I just got home and am wiped out (bmaz kept me out partying in NYC), so I thought I’d throw put this up for discussion [JimWhite is probably right I don’t want to say "throw"]. 

BabyDick says:

  • She hasn’t seen the memos she’s convinced show torture was effective (no mention of whether she saw the IG report which says torture isn’t effective)
  • She still ignores the part of Admiral Blair’s statement that shows we only got general info from torture–like the 10 pieces of intelligence we got after waterboarding Abu Zubaydah 83 times
  • She says respect for the law is a "policy difference"
  • She invokes libel if we call her Daddy or those incompetent contractors who waterboarded KSM 183 times torturers

You want to argue that last point in court, BabyDick? Because I sure do think that PapaDick and Mitchell’s contractors are torturers.

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Dick Cheney’s Torture Kabuki

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I wanted to pull three threads together in this post, which suggest how Cheney instituted torture in this country:

  • Alberto Gonzales may have been approving torture even while Condi Rice and others went through the show of getting an OLC opinion to authorize it;
  • CIA claimed to be briefing Congress when it wasn’t;
  • The Bush Administration then claimed Congress had bought off on torture to persuade those objecting to torture within the administration.

There are also certain parallels with the way Cheney implemented his illegal wiretap program.

Alberto Gonzales’ approvals

As Ari Shapiro reported last week, Alberto Gonzales was personally approving the techniques Mitchell’s torturers would use on a daily basis.

The source says nearly every day, Mitchell would sit at his computer and write a top-secret cable to the CIA’s counterterrorism center. Each day, Mitchell would request permission to use enhanced interrogation techniques on Zubaydah. The source says the CIA would then forward the request to the White House, where White House counsel Alberto Gonzales would sign off on the technique. That would provide the administration’s legal blessing for Mitchell to increase the pressure on Zubaydah in the next interrogation.

We know there’s cable traffic from the field back to CIA HQ every day. And we know there’s a May 28, 2002, 4-page cable from HQ back to the Field that roughly corresponds to when Ali Soufan has said the torturers brought out the small box in which they eventually confined Abu Zubaydah. This may mean there’s a seven-week gap between the time the harshest techniques were first okayed, and the time Condi purportedly gave the torture program its first okay on July 17, 2002. As I noted the other day, this raises the possibility that the OLC approval process was all just show, basically endorsing torture that had gone on for some time already.

Is it possible that when Bellinger and Condi asked for an OLC opinion, the CIA’s torturers were already hard at work, and it’s only because Bellinger asked for an opinion that they even bothered? If Gonzales was relaying daily approvals for torture directly to the torturers in the field, then why would it appear that Condi was the one who "approved" the program in mid-July? Why not Gonzales?

It’s a possibility that one of Shapiro’s sources is contemplating.

"I can’t believe the CIA would have settled for a piece of paper from the counsel to the president," says one former government official familiar with those discussions.

Read more →

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Gallup Polls Public Approval on Innocent Bystanders, But Not Torturers

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gallup-torture.thumbnail.gif

You guys are all really smart people. So here’s a quiz. What’s wrong with this picture?

I know. Too easy: Gallup apparently decided to poll who was winning the battle of torture public opinion.

And forgot to poll public approval on the actual torturers!

I don’t have the crosstabs or actual questions, but by all appearances, Gallup asked, 

Do you approve or disapprove of how each of the following has handled the matter of interrogation techniques used against terrorism suspects?

  • Barack Obama
  • The CIA
  • Democrats in Congress
  • Republicans in Congress
  • Nancy Pelosi

I’m sorry to be crude, but was it Crazy Pete Hoekstra or Dick Cheney himself who sucked your dick, Gallup, to persuade you to do this poll?  Because there’s really no other legitimate excuse for this poll. You didn’t poll on approval on the "handling of interrogation techniques used against terrorism suspects" for:

  • Dick Cheney, the architect and main apologist of the torture program
  • James Mitchell and Bruce Jessen, the contractors who had no experience in interrogation, but nevertheless made big money off of torturing prisoners
  • John Yoo, Jay Bybee, and Steven Bradbury, who wrote crazy legal opinions to pre-authorize torture
  • The torturer who said he used more water than legally permitted because that made the whole process "more poignant and convincing"  
  • Alberto Gonzales, who was giving daily, meticulous approvals for torture even before it had been declared "legal"

Instead, Gallup polled on a bunch of people who weren’t involved in the actual torture. Hell, even the CIA’s significantly off the hook, given that contractors did the torture, and people like George Tenet and Jose Rodriguez who oversaw it are retired.

What’s your opinion of the handling of the members of Congress who were illegally not briefed before the torture started? What’s your opinion of those chump Democrats who tried to make the Army Field Manual (for all its faults) the standard for interrogation? What’s your opinion of a bunch of dead-ender Republicans who are clinging to some political scandal to stay relevant?

But not, "What’s your opinion of Dick Cheney, who tried to get an Iraqi tortured so he could claim there were ties between Iraq and al Qaeda that had long since been discredited?"

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Dick Asks Obama to Wave His Magic Wand

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During the week that Dick Cheney ordered Libby to out Valerie Plame, Mary Matalin told Libby that "Bush" should order everything on the Wilsons declassified (it’s not clear whether Matalin meant this to include Plame’s identity or not). She said "the President should wave his magic wand" to declassify the oppo on the Wilsons. (She said this in the same conversation, IIRC, in which she called Joe Wilson a snake.)

I thought of that today when I read Cheney’s latest attempt to pressure Obama to declassify his propaganda on torture. (h/t Bob Fertik)

I saw that information as vice president, and I reviewed some of it again at the National Archives last month. I’ve formally asked that it be declassified so the American people can see the intelligence we obtained, the things we learned, and the consequences for national security. And as you may have heard, last week that request was formally rejected.

It’s worth recalling that ultimate power of declassification belongs to the President himself. President Obama has used his declassification power to reveal what happened in the interrogation of terrorists. Now let him use that same power to show Americans what did not happen, thanks to the good work of our intelligence officials.

C’mon, Obama, wave that magic wand, Dick appears to be begging. A wonder, huh, that he’s resorting to selective declassification again to try to win a political argument.

Selective declassification, that is, and a selective memory. Central to Cheney’s narrative, you see, is that Obama "used his declassification power to reveal what happened in the interrogation of terrorists." Now, to be fair, Obama did participate in discussions of whether or not to release those documents. But ACLU didn’t get the documents from Obama or the White House. It got them from DOJ, the originator of the memos.Those memos got handed over in the same way any routine successful FOIA request would  (even if this did end up being a non-routine FOIA request). 

I guess in Dick Cheney’s little mind, it always has to be about the executive waving his magic wand.

Update: Ah jeebus. As if working from a script, Fox’s Major Garrett rushed off to the press conference and started waving Dick’s magic wand for him.

Q A follow-up on Mark’s question, does the President agree or disagree with the Vice President’s contention that he has the authority to declassify the CIA memos? Does he agree with that?

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Liz Cheney’s Non-Denial #2: Daddy Suggested–But CIA Refused to Execute–Waterboarding

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A few weeks ago, Liz "BabyDick" Cheney took the the airwaves to defend her Daddy’s torture regime. But she very pointedly and repeatedly refused to deny a charge Norah O’Donnell challenged her to deny: that PapaDick was the "prime mover" of torture.

Check: According to his daughter, PapaDick Cheney was the prime mover on the torture policy.

Yesterday, BabyDick was refusing to deny allegations again. This time, that PapaDick had ordered up torture of an Iraqi so he would "reveal" ties between Iraq and al Qaeda.

STEPHANOPOLOUS: There were some reports this week that the Vice President’s Office, back in 2003, in April 2003, I believe, sent some sort of word, to Iraq, that a detainee in custody should be waterboarded in order to get information, to establish whether there’s a connection between Iraq and al-Qaeda or more information on weapons of mass destruction.

[snip]

You’ve explained one part of it, I just want to ask you to explain another part of it. The report though that the vice president’s office did ask specifically to have information about Iraq-al Qaeda connections presented to this detainee, do you deny that?

LIZ CHENEY: I think that it’s important for us to have all the facts out. And and, the first and most important fact is that the vice president has been absolutely clear that he supported this program, this was an important program, it saved American lives. Now, the way this policy worked internally was once the policy was determined and decided, the CIA, you know, made the judgments about how each individual detainee would be treated. And the Vice President would not substitute his own judgment for the professional judgment of the CIA. [my emphasis]

More generally, BabyDick’s non-denial makes four points:

  • Two CIA officials said waterboarding was not used (with Abu Zubaydah and Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, but BabyDick doesn’t note that) to establish such a link
  • The people claimed to be waterboarded are not any of the three on whom waterboarding was used
  • Lawrence Wilkerson’s story should not be trusted because he has made a cottage industry of attacking Cheney
  • CIA made the final decision on torture

But see what she doesn’t deny? That Cheney suggested–but CIA refused–to waterboard Muhammed Khudayr al-Dulaymi. Look at precisely what the Daily Beast reported.

In his new book, Hide and Seek: The Search for Truth in Iraq, and in an interview with The Daily Beast, Duelfer says he heard from “some in Washington at very senior levels (not in the CIA),” Read more →

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