Keep Paying the Water Bill
The catharsis continues with the Obama administration’s release of a Bush-era memo revealing that two Al Qaeda leaders had been waterboarded 266 times.
CIA interrogators used waterboarding at least 266 times on two top al Qaeda suspects, according to a Bush-era Justice Department memo released by the Obama administration.
The controversial technique that simulates drowning — and which President Obama calls torture — was used at least 83 times in August 2002 on suspected al Qaeda leader Abu Zubaydah, according to the memo.
Interrogators also waterboarded Khalid Sheikh Mohammed 183 times in March 2003. Mohammed is believed to be the mastermind behind the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on the United States.
For those clamoring for investigations and trials of evil-doers, this is like catnip. But this story reminds me of the macabre joke about a person found dead with dozens of fatal stab wounds and, after the investigation, the death is ruled a suicide. I mean, 183 times? That’s a lot of “severe pain or suffering”. Or maybe it is not. I’m thinking that these large number of incidents actually militate against torture, unless the waterboarding was carried out for purely sadistic pleasure. Maybe Khalid Sheikh Mohammed can share with us his thoughts on whether his interrogators were extracting sadistic pleasure. Mohammed surely understands the concept, what with his murder of journalist Daniel Pearl.
I don’t know. The enhanced interrogation techniques, including the enhanced insect technique, don’t seem so bad to me. We are, after all, trying to extract information from psychopaths that participate in a neural net of jihadist murderers. I say, keep paying the water bill.