Committee ranking member, Christopher Bond (R, Missouri) met no challenge from Panetta when Bond enlisted another familiar canard; i. e., that the Bush-era harsh interrogation programs—described by Bush as an "alternative set of procedures"—helped to prevent future attacks. There is not a shred of evidence to support this claim. On the contrary, there is abundant evidence that those same interrogation programs have been the most effective recruiting tool for al-Qaeda and other terrorists.
Again, Panetta's ignorance on this key issue, or—more likely—his bending over backwards to be conciliatory, can hardly have impressed committee members.
Replying Thursday to a question from committee chair, Sen. Diane Feinstein, Panetta gave assurance that the CIA would perform no more extraordinary "renditions for torture." The very suggestion that this might have been the case in the past raised hackles with Sen. Bond, who went off in dogged pursuit. And at Friday's session, Bond was able to squeeze a retraction out of Panetta, who would not stick to his guns.
Rendition Can Be Useful
It took Sen. Levin to adduce on Friday the quintessential example of the "effectiveness" of extraordinary rendition. "When you mistreat or torture people, particularly with waterboarding, then they can give you false information and you can end up taking action on the basis of false information," said Levin—a little too subtly for the TV audience. With tongue in cheek, Levin referred to the case of Ibn al-Shaykh al-Libi, an al-Qaeda functionary who was captured and "rendered" to Egypt, where, under torture, he told his interrogators what he knew they wanted to hear.
Levin duly noted that al-Libi's "false information was part of the reason adduced for going to war." But then—too much the gentleman to risk causing unpleasantness with Bond and his colleagues on the other side—Levin pretended not to remember whether al-Libi had been tortured.
Al-Libi had been identified by the Defense Intelligence Agency as a likely fabricator months before the Bush administration began to use his statements to "prove" that Iraq had been training al-Qaeda. Without mentioning al-Libi by name, President Bush, Vice President Cheney, then-Secretary of State Colin Powell and other administration officials repeatedly cited information from his interrogation as credible evidence that Iraq was training al-Qaeda members in the use of explosives and chemical weapons.
So, you see, torture can indeed provide the information you may lust after to grease the skids for war. Al-Libi was the poster boy for the Cheney/Bush torture regime; that is, until he publicly recanted and explained that he only told his interrogators the magic words he knew would stop the torture.
Where's Your Homework, Leon?
A pity that Panetta appeared completely unaware of the case of al-Libi and how the proceeds of his extraordinary rendition and interrogation in Egypt had been used. Or perhaps he was aware, but reluctant to feed Bond's distemper.
A pity, too, that the nominee did not consult with former intelligence officers like Milt Bearden, a 30-year veteran of CIA's operations directorate who rose to the most senior managerial ranks. He has written:
"The administration's claims of [torture] having 'saved thousands of Americans' can be dismissed out of hand because credible evidence has never been offered … It is irresponsible for any administration not to tell a credible story that would convince critics at home and abroad that this torture has served some useful purpose … this is not just because the old [intelligence] hands overwhelmingly believe that torture doesn't work — it doesn't — but also because they know that torture creates more terrorists and fosters more acts of terror than it could possibly neutralize."
Bearden argued that if the claims of the Bush White House were true, it ought to stop hiding always behind the all-too-readily-adduced need to protect sources and methods. He noted that in 1986 after the U. S. bombed Libya in retaliation for a Libyan operation that killed U.S. servicemen in Berlin, there was worldwide skepticism and consternation.
The Reagan administration decided it owed the world an explanation and decided it would be worth sacrificing a very sensitive method; namely, the ability to intercept Libyan encoded messages. Ironically, the Libyan message that was made public bragged that the operation had been carried out "without leaving a trace behind."
Prosecution Worries
In his opening remarks Thursday, Sen. Bond expressed concern that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D, CA) has said, as Bond put it, "certain people associated with the interrogation program should be prosecuted." Bond wondered aloud if Panetta would agree with Pelosi, but then droned on and did not afford him a chance to answer.
