Yet amid the political brawl, testimony Wednesday from a former FBI interrogator, Ali Soufan, and a Bush State Department deputy, Philip Zelikow, revealed a sobering portrait of fear-struck officials resorting to simulated drowning - or waterboarding - extreme sleep deprivation, prolonged confinement in small spaces, humiliation and other interrogation methods without examining their history, their efficacy or their larger consequences in the battle against extremism.
Soufan, testifying behind a screen to shield his identity, painted a picture of incompetence by outside contractors hastily flown in from Washington using "amateurish, Hollywood-style interrogation methods." He also accused Bush administration officials of making false claims about their success.
Soufan said his own interrogations of captured al Qaeda suspect Abu Zubaydah, using proven methods of psychological manipulation, had within one hour yielded the identity of the Sept. 11 mastermind, Khalid Shaikh Mohammed. Until then, he said, "we had no idea of KSM's role in 9/11 or his importance in the al Qaeda leadership structure."
Within a few more hours of questioning, Soufan said, he and other interrogators elicited information about alleged "dirty bomber" Jose Padilla.
Inexperienced contractors
But Soufan said he was pulled off the interrogation within a few days, to be replaced by contractors with no expertise in al Qaeda. They soon introduced nudity and sleep deprivation, loud noise and temperature manipulation and confinement in a small box. Zubaydah stopped talking, Soufan said. As the methods progressed, Soufan testified, FBI Director Robert Mueller pulled his agents off the case, saying, "We don't do that (torture)."
Soufan said the harsh techniques ignore knowledge of the detainee, his mind-set, culture and vulnerabilities, trying to force submission rather than elicit cooperation.
Aside from legal and diplomatic complications, he said, torture poses practical problems. Terrorists are trained to resist it. That is why, he said, "the contractors had to keep getting authorization to use harsher and harsher methods until they reached waterboarding and there was nothing they could do but use that technique again and again." Abu Zubaydah was subject to waterboarding 83 times, and Khalid Shaikh Mohammed 183 times.
