Waterboarding, Rough Interrogation of Abu Zubaida Produced False Leads, Officials Say

[babylonsister]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/03/28/AR2009032802066.html

Detainee's Harsh Treatment Foiled No Plots
Waterboarding, Rough Interrogation of Abu Zubaida Produced False Leads, Officials Say

By Peter Finn and Joby Warrick
Washington Post Staff Writers
Sunday, March 29, 2009; Page A01


When CIA officials subjected their first high-value captive, Abu Zubaida, to waterboarding and other harsh interrogation methods, they were convinced that they had in their custody an al-Qaeda leader who knew details of operations yet to be unleashed, and they were facing increasing pressure from the White House to get those secrets out of him.

The methods succeeded in breaking him, and the stories he told of al-Qaeda terrorism plots sent CIA officers around the globe chasing leads.

In the end, though, not a single significant plot was foiled as a result of Abu Zubaida's tortured confessions, according to former senior government officials who closely followed the interrogations. Nearly all of the leads attained through the harsh measures quickly evaporated, while most of the useful information from Abu Zubaida -- chiefly names of al-Qaeda members and associates -- was obtained before waterboarding was introduced, they said.

Moreover, within weeks of his capture, U.S. officials had gained evidence that made clear they had misjudged Abu Zubaida. President George W. Bush had publicly described him as "al-Qaeda's chief of operations," and other top officials called him a "trusted associate" of al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden and a major figure in the planning of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. None of that was accurate, the new evidence showed.

Abu Zubaida was not even an official member of al-Qaeda, according to a portrait of the man that emerges from court documents and interviews with current and former intelligence, law enforcement and military sources. Rather, he was a "fixer" for radical Muslim ideologues, and he ended up working directly with al-Qaeda only after Sept. 11 -- and that was because the United States stood ready to invade Afghanistan.

more...

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/03/28/AR2009032802066.html

[Bolo Boffin]

1. This was the mentally challenged person that they tortured, right?

Excuse me, that they used as a guinea pig to figure out how best to torture the others, right?

[babylonsister]

2. I don't know if he was mentally challenged prior to his torture,

but who knows now? What would that do to a person? There's lots of info on him here, and it makes me ill to think what we have done...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abu_Zubaydah

[Bolo Boffin]

5. It is the person I was talking about, but the Wiki shows

there's a lot of controversy on that point. And he could have been sane as anyone and the torture wouldn't have been justified.

[malaise]

3. Isn't Abu Zubaida the Ethiopian who helped the

US fight the Soviets?

[Bolo Boffin]

4. Zubaida was born in Saudi Arabia. n/t

[malaise]

6. Who is the Ethiopian

I heard a discussion about him on BBC this morning.

[babylonsister]

7. Binyam Ahmed Mohamed ...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Binyam_Mohammed

[malaise]

8. Thanks sis

:hi: