Be honest: Even if you supported extreme interrogation techniques for terrorists, sometimes you wondered just how extreme they were?
Now you know.
After the September 11 attack on America, the U.S. Government did all it could to find out who was responsible.
Now it looks like the C.I.A. went too far–torturing potential informants while–in the words of the report– it “provided inaccurate information to the White House, Congress, the Justice Department, the C.I.A. Inspector General, the media and the American public” about what it was actually doing:
“The fact is there’s a big gap between the two,” Sen. Ron Wyden, (D) Oregon, said.
So what we have is another government agency running itself,ignoring laws it doesn’t like and decreasing public trust in government.
And for what?
When Osama bin Laden was captured and killed in May 2011, former Vice President Cheney praised the CIA:
“I would assume that the enhanced interrogation program we put in place,” said Cheney, “produced some of the results that led to bin Laden’s ultimate capture.”
But, according to the report, that assumption is wrong.
Given its content, releasing the report was controversial.
“Our foreign leaders have approached the government and said you do this, this will cause violence and death. Our own intelligence community has assessed that this will cause violence and deaths.” US Rep. Mike Rogers, (R) Michigan, said..
But committee chair, Sen. Dianne Feinstein, (D) California, said “This clearly is a period of turmoil and instability in many parts of the world. Unfortunately, that’s going to continue for the foreseeable future whether this report is released or not.”
The report doesn’t attack Republicans or Democrats, but–instead–an agency that’s overseen by both parties.
Proving the dysfunction in Washington is deeper than Congress and the White House.