Reddit mentions of Hard Measures: How Aggressive CIA Actions After 9-11 Saved American Lives

When Bush left office, America marked 2,688 days without a terrorist attack on its soil. It was an achievement few thought possible in the days after September 11, 2001.Al Qaeda tried repeatedly to strike us during those seven years,but they failed because Bush put in place a set of tools that successfully protected the country for more than seven years after 9/11.

Consider the Justice Department memo of May 30, 2005. It notes that:

>"The CIA believes 'the intelligence acquired from these interrogations has been a key reason why al Qaeda has failed to launch a spectacular attack in the West since 11 September 2001.' In particular, the CIA believes that it would have been unable to obtain critical information from numerous detainees, including Khalid Sheik Mohammed and Abu Zubaydah, without these enhanced techniques."

The memo continues:

>"Before the CIA used enhanced techniques KSM resisted giving any answers to questions about future attacks, simply noting, 'Soon you will find out.'Once the techniques were applied, "interrogations have led to specific, actionable intelligence, as well as a general increase in the amount of intelligence regarding al Qaeda and its affiliates."


The memo notes that "interrogations of Abu Zubaydah -- again, once enhanced techniques were employed -- furnished detailed information regarding al Qaeda's 'organizational structure, key operatives, and modus operandi' and identified KSM as the mastermind of the September 11 attacks." This information helped the intelligence community plan the operation that captured KSM. It went on: "Zubaydah and KSM also supplied important information about al-Zarqawi and his network" in Iraq, which helped our operations against al-Qaeda in that country.

But just as the memo begins to describe previously undisclosed details of what enhanced interrogations achieved, the page is almost entirely blacked out. The Obama administration released pages of unredacted classified information on the techniques used to question captured terrorist leaders but pulled out its black marker when it came to the details of what those interrogations achieved.

Yet there is more information confirming the program's effectiveness. The Office of Legal Counsel memo states "we discuss only a small fraction of the important intelligence CIA interrogators have obtained from KSM" and notes that "intelligence derived from CIA detainees has resulted in more than 6,000 intelligence reports and, in 2004, accounted for approximately half of the Counterterrorism Center's reporting on al Qaeda." The memos refer to other classified documents -- including an "Effectiveness Memo" and an "IG Report," which explain how "the use of enhanced techniques in the interrogations of KSM, Zubaydah and others has yielded critical information." Why didn't Obama officials release this information as well? Because they know that if the public could see the details of the techniques side by side with evidence that the program saved American lives, the vast majority would support continuing it.


Critics claim that enhanced techniques do not produce good intelligence because people will say anything to get the techniques to stop. But the memos note that, "as Abu Zubaydah himself explained with respect to enhanced techniques, 'brothers who are captured and interrogated are permitted by Allah to provide information when they believe they have reached the limit of their ability to withhold it in the face of psychological and physical hardship." In other words, the terrorists are called by their faith to resist as far as they can -- and once they have done so, they are free to tell everything they know. This is because of their belief that "Islam will ultimately dominate the world and that this victory is inevitable." The job of the interrogator is to safely help the terrorist do his duty to Allah, so he then feels liberated to speak freely.

Marc Thiessen in his book Courting Disaster documents the evidence for the efficacy of the CIA interrogation program — based not on the testimony of the actual interrogators, interivews with top CIA and other intelligence officials, the evidence presented in the CIA inspector general’s report, and other top-secret documents declassified by the Obama administration. I urge you to read it and judge for yourself. The evidence is overwhelming.

Before these documents were released, there was room for debate on the efficacy of CIA interrogations — because the facts had not been declassified. No longer.

Released Docs by Wikileaks actually support the claim that EIT's worked. Furthermore I recommend reading Hard Measures by Jose Rodriguez:How Aggressive CIA Actions After 9-11 Saved American Lives.

Also read page 520 of the SSCI Minority Report. Waterboarding was how we in fact got Bin Laden. Something the Obama administration never gave these Patriots credit for.


The evidence that CIA interrogations played a key role in the operation that got Osama bin Laden is overwhelming. Countless intelligence officials, including CIA Director Leon Panetta, have confirmed that detainees interrogated by the CIA provided information that helped lead us to bin Laden. But the CIA deniers continue to insist it is all a “big lie.” Despite this testimony, and the mountains of documents declassified by the Obama administration in 2009, they contend that CIA interrogations did not work.

So did EIT's work? Yes. Does Torture work? That's another debate entirely. And like you, this is a subject that I will not compromise on. I oppose Torture in most instances (Save for ticking time bomb scenarios), But I wholeheartedly support Enhanced Interrogation Techniques, Waterboarding etc and hope Trump Brings them back.I view them as both Moral and Just