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CIA Bans Waterboarding in Terror Interrogations
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ShareSeptember 14, 2007 5:00 PM
The controversial interrogation technique known as waterboarding, in which a suspect has water poured over his mouth and nose to stimulate a drowning reflex, has been banned by CIA director Gen. Michael Hayden, current and former CIA officials tell ABCNews.com. (Image above is an ABC News graphic.)
The officials say Hayden made the decision at the recommendation of his deputy, Steve Kappes, and received approval from the White House to remove waterboarding from the list of approved interrogation techniques first authorized by a presidential finding in 2002.
The officials say the decision was made sometime last year but has never been publicly disclosed.
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One U.S. intelligence official said, "It would be wrong to assume that the program of the past moved into the future unchanged."
A CIA spokesman said, as a matter of policy, he would decline to comment on interrogation techniques, "which have been and continue to be lawful," he said.
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The practice of waterboarding has been branded as "torture" by human rights groups and a number of leading U.S. officials, including Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., because it amounted to a "mock execution."
Today, in New Hampshire, Sen. McCain told ABC News, "I have sought that result for years. Waterboarding is a form of torture. And I'm convinced that this will not only help us in our interrogation techniques, but it will also be helpful for our image in the world."
While new legislation reportedly gave the CIA the leeway to use waterboarding, current and former CIA officials said Gen. Hayden decided to take it off the list of about six "enhanced interrogation techniques."
While welcoming the move, some critics say the CIA did not go far enough.
"I can say it's a good thing, but the fact remains that the entire program is illegal," John Sifton of Human Rights Watch told ABCNews.com.
As a result of the decision, officials say, the most extreme techniques left available to CIA interrogators would be what is termed "longtime standing," which includes exhaustion and sleep deprivation with prisoners forced to stand, handcuffed with their feet shackled to the floor.
"It is a very severe form of torture which causes tremendous psychic toll to people," said Sifton.
It is believed that waterboarding was used on fewer than five "high-value" terrorist subjects, and had not been used for three to four years.
Its most effective use, say current and former CIA officials, was in breaking Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, known as KSM, who subsequently confessed to a number of ongoing plots against the United States.
A senior CIA official said KSM later admitted it was only because of the waterboarding that he talked.
Ultimately, KSM took responsibility for the 9/ll attacks and virtually all other al Qaeda terror strikes, including the beheading of Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl.
"KSM lasted the longest under waterboarding, about a minute and a half, but once he broke, it never had to be used again," said a former CIA official familiar with KSM's case.
Kappes' role at the CIA puts him in charge of day-to-day CIA operations.
A career intelligence officer, he left the CIA in disagreement with the leadership of Porter Goss, the former Republican congressman, who George Bush chose to replace George Tenet in 2004.
When Goss in turn was replaced in May 2006 by Gen. Hayden as director of Central Intelligence, he moved quickly to get Kappes to return.
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September 14, 2007 | Permalink | User Comments (105)
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When another 3,000 Americans are murdered because the weak-stomached politicians could not bear to do what needed to be done, I'd like to see them try soothing the families of those lost with talk of the moral high ground. You know what happens when you turn the other cheek? You get two black eyes instead of one.
Posted by: Ed | Sep 14, 2007 5:29:32 PM
Next to be banned, yelling.
Posted by: travis | Sep 14, 2007 5:39:54 PM
Wow, this is really going to disappoint King George. Maybe he'll just authourize the use of the Rack instead!
Posted by: Honorfirst | Sep 14, 2007 5:45:57 PM
Good news for terrorists. Bad news for the security of America.
Posted by: James | Sep 14, 2007 5:59:49 PM
King George, the dictator, who lets anyone and everyone insult him without taking away their freedom of speech, a dictator who wants to waterboard people and yet it has been banned. The genius who fooled all the dems into buying the "lies" for the Iraq war, who was intelligent enough to pull off 9/11, and yet is really really duuuumb.
BDS is a serious mental disorder, people.
Posted by: MehMeh | Sep 14, 2007 6:17:49 PM
Does that include "black site" prisons?
Posted by: Steve | Sep 14, 2007 6:21:44 PM
Ed, Your attitude is the reason Americans are hated all over the world.
Posted by: norseman | Sep 14, 2007 6:27:11 PM
When another 3000 Americans POW's are tortured by their captors I hope the weak stomached politicians will....
Enjoy.
Posted by: Tim Fuller | Sep 14, 2007 6:29:03 PM
Ed, gosh, I never thought about torture from the tough-guy perspective before...but you're absolutely right.
So why do George Bush and Michael Hayden hate America?
Posted by: smintheus | Sep 14, 2007 6:29:10 PM
"And in the future, all terrorists are to be treated with the utmost respect, and served tea during questioning."
-- from the new CIA training manual
Posted by: dks0442 | Sep 14, 2007 6:32:06 PM
Hooray! 70 years after the Nazis declared waterboarding too inhumane for their enhanced interrogation techniques, this administration follows suit.
Posted by: Dread Pirate Robert | Sep 14, 2007 6:34:04 PM
After he was subjected to waterboarding, KSM also took responsibility for the surprise attack on Pearl Harbor.
Posted by: Anonymous CIA Official | Sep 14, 2007 6:34:21 PM
About time. The use of waterboarding, while doubtless effective and less "disturbing to the conscience" than other torture techniques, has alienated much of the civilized world. It has also made rather a mockery of George Bush's speeches about "freedom and democracy" - a pretty foolish thing to do during a war that is mostly about ideas and winning hearts and minds. And apparently it was used just "five times". Glad to hear that, but five terrorists broken versus the good name of the United States sullied for a generation hardly seems like a very good deal.
By the way, I am a Canadian. I support the war in Iraq and think that in General Petraeus you may have finally found the guy who can win it. Petraeus, like John McCain and most other patriots, is against torture. Leave torture to Castro, Ahmadinejad and Kim Jong-Il. America should stand for decency and human rights.
Posted by: John | Sep 14, 2007 6:34:39 PM
Did Alexis Debat consult on this story, too. Why do you go with these half-baked stories when the CIA refused to comment on it?
Posted by: Edward Allen | Sep 14, 2007 6:37:14 PM
I'd like to see how some of the people defending waterboarding and other torture methods would respond if (or when) it happens to Americans captured by hostile forces. I'm guessing they'd be outraged, just like they were when those soldiers taken prisioner by the Iraqi Army were paraded on TV (and yet they were silent about Hussain or others being shown on US TV).
Hypocrisy, anyone?
Posted by: TNY | Sep 14, 2007 6:38:16 PM
About time. The use of waterboarding, while doubtless effective and less "disturbing to the conscience" than other torture techniques, has alienated much of the civilized world. It has also made rather a mockery of George Bush's speeches about "freedom and democracy" - a pretty foolish thing to do during a war that is mostly about ideas and winning hearts and minds. And apparently it was used just "five times". Glad to hear that, but five terrorists broken versus the good name of the United States sullied for a generation hardly seems like a very good deal.
By the way, I am a Canadian. I support the war in Iraq and think that in General Petraeus you may have finally found the guy who can win it. Petraeus, like John McCain and most other patriots, is against torture. Leave torture to Castro, Ahmadinejad and Kim Jong-Il. America should stand for decency and human rights.
Posted by: John | Sep 14, 2007 6:47:03 PM
A good rule for allowed interrogation techniques would be if I wouldn't mind if they were used on my teenaged daughter or son in my presence while I was tied to a chair and could not move. Why such an unusual rule. Because once you give the government a power it's living Hell to get them to forget how to use it. The next time my or your kids gets mistaken for a bad guy they might just well recall how to "break" them.
Nothing used on so-called terrorists is off limits to use on American citizens. Just ask John Walker Lindh and Jose Padilla.
The entire upper eschelon of the Bush Administration are war criminals and need to be hauled off to the Hague along with the torturers and murderers of the CIA and U.S. military by Hillary. It would then be my hope they'd be found guilty and hanged.
Posted by: David Walters | Sep 14, 2007 6:47:51 PM
You must be joking. Do you really think we are going to fall for this.
Please!
You can't fool ALL the people ALL the time Brian!
They are just outsourcing this to private contractors.
Posted by: Matt | Sep 14, 2007 6:51:53 PM
Cheney must be saddened. This was his favorite torture technique.
Posted by: bob | Sep 14, 2007 6:55:18 PM
Lets hope Brian's scoop on this story didn't come from Alexis Debat.
Posted by: Andrew Bryant | Sep 14, 2007 6:58:43 PM
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