Tag Archives: Abdulmutallab

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How George W. Bush’s secret CIA prisons and waterboarding killed Osama Bin Laden

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UPDATE: CIA Director Leon Panetta confirms that waterboarding was used to get the tip on Osama Bin Laden’s location

Obama should NOT be getting a speck of credit for the execution of Osama Bin Laden. It was GEORGE W. BUSH who created the enhanced interrogation techniques and clandestine prisons that led to the location of Osama Bin Laden. Barack Obama voted to stop the enhanced interrogation techniques, and to close the secret CIA prisons.

The ultra-liberal Minneapolis Star Tribune reports that the secret CIA prisons led to the killing of Osama Bin Laden.

Excerpt:

Officials say CIA interrogators in secret overseas prisons developed the first strands of information that ultimately led to the killing of Osama bin Laden.

Current and former U.S. officials say that Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the mastermind of the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, provided the nom de guerre of one of bin Laden’s most trusted aides. The CIA got similar information from Mohammed’s successor, Abu Faraj al-Libi. Both were subjected to harsh interrogation tactics inside CIA prisons in Poland and Romania.

The news is sure to reignite debate over whether the now-closed interrogation and detention program was successful. Former president George W. Bush authorized the CIA to use the harshest interrogation tactics in U.S. history. President Barack Obama closed the prison system.

The UK Daily mail reports on how interrogation of Guantanamo Bay detainees led to the killing of Osama Bin Laden.

Excerpt:

Detainees at Guantanamo Bay provided the crucial breakthrough in hunting down Osama Bin Laden, American officials said last night.

Senior officials in the Obama administration said intelligence gained from interrogations at the U.S. base was directly responsible for helping security forces track down and kill Bin Laden.

The claim will fuel the international row about the Guantanamo camp – one of the most controversial legacies of the 9/11 attacks on the U.S. – and whether torture can ever be justified.

[…]Hundreds of suspects rounded up in Afghanistan and Pakistan were subjected to techniques such as water-boarding, sleep deprivation, white noise and stress positions at the U.S. Naval base in Cuba.

Human rights groups claim the techniques amounted to torture, and that many of the detainees had no link to terrorism.

But U.S. officials said interrogations had produced crucial information about a trusted courier who provided support to Bin Laden after he fled Afghanistan.

A senior source said detainees had provided the courier’s nickname and indicated he could be living with Bin Laden – although it took years to track down his true identity and location.

The official said: ‘Detainees flagged for us individuals who may have been providing direct support to Bin Laden and his deputy after their escape from Afghanistan. One courier in particular had our constant attention.’

Remember how the Democrats wanted to ban interrogations and close CIA prisons in 2009? (H/T Michelle Malkin)

Excerpt:

Officials say CIA interrogators in secret overseas prisons developed the first strands of information that ultimately led to the killing of Osama bin Laden.

Current and former U.S. officials say that Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the mastermind of the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, provided the nom de guerre of one of bin Laden’s most trusted aides. The CIA got similar information Mohammed’s successor, Abu Faraj al-Libi. Both were subjected to harsh interrogation tactics inside CIA prisons in Poland and Romania.

And Obama campaigned on closing down Guantanamo Bay. He had nothing to do with the killing of Bin Laden. If anything, he was completely against the techniques and policies that worked to find and kill Bin Laden.

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Democrats favor terrorist rights over national security in latest intelligence bill

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Story here from National Review. (H/T ECM)

Excerpt:

While the country and the Congress have their eyes on today’s dog-and-pony show on socialized medicine, House Democrats last night stashed a new provision in the intelligence bill which is to be voted on today.  It is an attack on the CIA: the enactment of a criminal statute that would ban “cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment.” (See here, scoll to p. 32.)

The provision is impossibly vague — who knows what “degrading” means? Proponents will say that they have itemized conduct that would trigger the statute (I’ll get to that in a second), but it is not true. The proposal says the conduct reached by the statute “includes but is not limited to” the itemized conduct. (My italics.) That means any interrogation tactic that a prosecutor subjectively believes is “degrading” (e.g., subjecting a Muslim detainee to interrogation by a female CIA officer) could be the basis for indicting a CIA interrogator.

The act goes on to make it a crime to use tactics that have been shown to be effective in obtaining life saving information and that are far removed from torture.

[…]What’s more, the proposed bill is directed at “any officer or employee of the intelligence community” conducting a “covered interrogation.” The definition of “covered interrogation” is sweeping — including any interrogation done outside the U.S., in the course of a person’s official duties on behalf of the government.

[…]Here is the fact: Democrats are saying they would prefer to see tens of thousands of Americans die than to see a KSM subjected to sleep-deprivation or to have his “phobias exploited.” I doubt that this reflects the values of most Americans.

They would rather put us all at risk of a terrorist attack than upset the terrorists. National security, Democrat style.

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What are the consequencs of treating terrorism as a law enforcement issue?

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Story from the UK Telegraph. (H/T Weasel Zippers via ECM)

Excerpt:

The chance to secure crucial information about al-Qaeda operations in Yemen was lost because the Obama administration decided to charge and prosecute Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab as an ordinary criminal, critics say. He is said to have reduced his co-operation with FBI interrogators on the advice of his government-appointed defence counsel.

[…]”He was singing like a canary, then we charged him in civilian proceedings, he got a lawyer and shut up,” Slade Gorton, a member of the 9/11 Commission that investigated the Sept 2001 terror attacks on the US, told The Sunday Telegraph.

[…]Abdulmutallab could have been held and interrogated in military custody under existing US legislation before a decision was taken whether to charge him before a military tribunal or a civilian court, according to Michael Mukasey, the last Attorney General under President George W Bush.

Mr Mukasey argues that it was crucial to gain intelligence from him immediately as details about locations, names and other plots is subject to rapid change. For the same reason, he dismissed the argument by John Brennan, Mr Obama’s chief counter-terrorism adviser, that investigators will garner valuable data during any plea-bargaining talks.

Democrats are not serious about counter-terrorism.

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