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<blockquote data-quote="Jones" data-source="post: 532957" data-attributes="member: 4805"><p><span style="color: blue"></span></p><p><span style="color: blue"></span>[FONT=times new roman, times, serif]<span style="font-size: 12px"><em>The single most pertinent question that Dick Cheney is never asked -- at least not by the admiring interviewers he has encountered so far -- is whether he, Donald Rumsfeld and George W. Bush used torture to justify the illegal invasion of Iraq. As he tours television studios, radio stations and conservative think tanks, the former vice-president hopes to persuade America that only waterboarding kept us safe for seven years.</em></span></p><p><span style="font-size: 12px"> </span></p><p><span style="font-size: 12px"><em> Yet evidence is mounting that under Cheney’s direction, "enhanced interrogation" was not used exclusively to prevent imminent acts of terror or collect actionable intelligence -- the aims that he constantly emphasizes -- <strong>but to invent evidence that would link al-Qaida with Saddam Hussein and connect the late Iraqi dictator to the 9/11 attacks.</strong></em></span></p><p><span style="font-size: 12px"> </span></p><p><span style="font-size: 12px"><em> In one report after another, from journalists, former administration officials and Senate investigators, the same theme continues to emerge: Whenever a prisoner believed to possess any knowledge of al-Qaida’s operations or Iraqi intelligence came into American custody, <strong>CIA interrogators felt intense pressure from the Bush White House to produce evidence of an Iraq-Qaida relationship </strong>(which contradicted everything that U.S. intelligence and other experts knew about the enmity between Saddam’s Baath Party and Osama bin Laden’s jihadists). Indeed, the futile quest for proof of that connection is the common thread running through the gruesome stories of torture from the Guantánamo detainee camp to Egyptian prisons to the CIA's black sites in Thailand and elsewhere.</em></span></p><p><span style="font-size: 12px"> </span></p><p><span style="font-size: 12px"><em> Perhaps the sharpest rebuke to Cheney's assertions has come from Lawrence Wilkerson, the retired Army colonel and former senior State Department aide to Colin Powell, who says bluntly that when the administration first authorized "harsh interrogation" during the spring of 2002, <strong>"its principal priority for intelligence was not aimed at pre-empting another terrorist attack on the U.S. but discovering a smoking gun linking Iraq and al-Qaida." </strong></em><a href="http://www.salon.com/opinion/conason/2009/05/14/cheney/print.html" target="_blank"><span style="color: Blue"><u>More</u></span></a></span></p><p><span style="font-size: 12px"></span></p><p><span style="font-size: 12px"></span></p><p><span style="font-size: 12px">From Lawrence Wilkerson:</span></p><p><span style="font-size: 12px"></span>[/FONT]<em>First, more Americans were killed by terrorists on Cheney's watch than on any other leader's watch in US history. So his constant claim that no Americans were killed in the "seven and a half years" after 9/11 of his vice presidency takes on a new texture when one considers that fact. And it is a fact. </em></p><p> <em>There was absolutely no policy priority attributed to al-Qa'ida by the Cheney-Bush administration in the months before 9/11. Counterterrorism czar Dick Clarke's position was downgraded, al-Qa'ida was put in the background so as to emphasize Iraq, and the policy priorities were lowering taxes, abrogating the ABM Treaty and building ballistic missile defenses. </em></p><p> <em>Second, the fact no attack has occurred on U.S. soil since 9/11--much touted by Cheney--is due almost entirely to the nation's having deployed over 200,000 U.S. troops in Iraq and Afghanistan and not to "the Cheney method of interrogation." </em></p><p> <em>Those troops have kept al-Qa'ida at bay, killed many of them, and certainly "fixed" them, as we say in military jargon. Plus, sadly enough, those 200,000 troops present a far more lucrative and close proximity target for al-Qa'ida than the United States homeland. Testimony to that fact is clear: almost 5,000 American troops have died, more Americans than died on 9/11. Of course, they are the type of Americans for whom Cheney hasn't much use as he declared rather dramatically when he achieved no less than five draft deferments during the Vietnam War. </em><a href="http://www.thewashingtonnote.com/archives/2009/05/the_truth_about/" target="_blank"><span style="color: Blue"><u>More</u></span></a></p><p><a href="http://www.thewashingtonnote.com/archives/2009/05/the_truth_about/" target="_blank"><span style="color: Blue"><u></u></span></a></p><p></p><p> Can you be more specific here? Exactly what intelligence did we get through torture that we wouldn't have gotten any other way, and how many lives were saved because of it?</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Jones, post: 532957, member: 4805"] [COLOR=blue] [/COLOR][FONT=times new roman, times, serif][SIZE=3][I]The single most pertinent question that Dick Cheney is never asked -- at least not by the admiring interviewers he has encountered so far -- is whether he, Donald Rumsfeld and George W. Bush used torture to justify the illegal invasion of Iraq. As he tours television studios, radio stations and conservative think tanks, the former vice-president hopes to persuade America that only waterboarding kept us safe for seven years.[/I] [I] Yet evidence is mounting that under Cheney’s direction, "enhanced interrogation" was not used exclusively to prevent imminent acts of terror or collect actionable intelligence -- the aims that he constantly emphasizes -- [B]but to invent evidence that would link al-Qaida with Saddam Hussein and connect the late Iraqi dictator to the 9/11 attacks.[/B][/I] [I] In one report after another, from journalists, former administration officials and Senate investigators, the same theme continues to emerge: Whenever a prisoner believed to possess any knowledge of al-Qaida’s operations or Iraqi intelligence came into American custody, [B]CIA interrogators felt intense pressure from the Bush White House to produce evidence of an Iraq-Qaida relationship [/B](which contradicted everything that U.S. intelligence and other experts knew about the enmity between Saddam’s Baath Party and Osama bin Laden’s jihadists). Indeed, the futile quest for proof of that connection is the common thread running through the gruesome stories of torture from the Guantánamo detainee camp to Egyptian prisons to the CIA's black sites in Thailand and elsewhere.[/I] [I] Perhaps the sharpest rebuke to Cheney's assertions has come from Lawrence Wilkerson, the retired Army colonel and former senior State Department aide to Colin Powell, who says bluntly that when the administration first authorized "harsh interrogation" during the spring of 2002, [B]"its principal priority for intelligence was not aimed at pre-empting another terrorist attack on the U.S. but discovering a smoking gun linking Iraq and al-Qaida." [/B][/I][URL="http://www.salon.com/opinion/conason/2009/05/14/cheney/print.html"][COLOR=Blue][U]More[/U][/COLOR][/URL] From Lawrence Wilkerson: [/SIZE][/FONT][I]First, more Americans were killed by terrorists on Cheney's watch than on any other leader's watch in US history. So his constant claim that no Americans were killed in the "seven and a half years" after 9/11 of his vice presidency takes on a new texture when one considers that fact. And it is a fact. [/I] [I]There was absolutely no policy priority attributed to al-Qa'ida by the Cheney-Bush administration in the months before 9/11. Counterterrorism czar Dick Clarke's position was downgraded, al-Qa'ida was put in the background so as to emphasize Iraq, and the policy priorities were lowering taxes, abrogating the ABM Treaty and building ballistic missile defenses. [/I] [I]Second, the fact no attack has occurred on U.S. soil since 9/11--much touted by Cheney--is due almost entirely to the nation's having deployed over 200,000 U.S. troops in Iraq and Afghanistan and not to "the Cheney method of interrogation." [/I] [I]Those troops have kept al-Qa'ida at bay, killed many of them, and certainly "fixed" them, as we say in military jargon. Plus, sadly enough, those 200,000 troops present a far more lucrative and close proximity target for al-Qa'ida than the United States homeland. Testimony to that fact is clear: almost 5,000 American troops have died, more Americans than died on 9/11. Of course, they are the type of Americans for whom Cheney hasn't much use as he declared rather dramatically when he achieved no less than five draft deferments during the Vietnam War. [/I][URL="http://www.thewashingtonnote.com/archives/2009/05/the_truth_about/"][COLOR=Blue][U]More [/U][/COLOR][/URL] Can you be more specific here? Exactly what intelligence did we get through torture that we wouldn't have gotten any other way, and how many lives were saved because of it? [/QUOTE]
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