Those videotapes of the CIA torturing prisoners would have shown the world how much the US is becoming like the countries it used to condemn for torture. Another crowning achievement for the Bush administration.

REMEMBER. There are always two reasons for everything, A good reason and the real reason.
A good reason is that the cia guys identities would be revealed. the real reason is more likely they were recorded torturing.
Why would anyone trust anything from the agency that brought you the biggest security failure in American history? 9/11

Hey, if they get useful intel out of these terrorists, use it. They did and I would expect nothing less for our government to do this. This is indeed an achievement for the Bush Administration. He shows he will do what it takes to protect Americans. Bush '08'.

Proud American

CIA, when are you going to dump all that heroin on the market that you confiscated in Afghanistan? You know, just like the heroin you dumped on the U.S. during the Iran Contra affair.

They were destroyed because the GOP Congress in 2005 was not interested in preserving evidence of its own legacy - nor certainly was the Bush admin. Besides which, Fawn Hall was widowed in early 2005, and needed some fill-in work.

What goes around comes around. DO NOT YELL or Complain when the shoes is on the other foot!!! The next enemy can do this now also to our captured service personnel !!!!

When tortured, people will tell you what you wanna hear. Like the witches were tortured (by the Christians) until they "admitted" they were "witches." Witches don't exist thus proving the point. Plus, torture by us silently condones torture to our fighting men and women. But, since Bush and Cheney dodged the draft, they wouldn't understand now would they.

Boy, all these people (and the media) that scream about the rule of law and judge these tapes without even seeing them.

To Rudy T... every enemy the US ever fought has tortured, really tortured, US POW's like hanging them upside down for a month or two. Vietnam, Germany, USSR, Korea, etc. And wasn't the victims of 911 tortured by being burned alive, or thrown 1300 feet to their death or buried under tons of rubble for a few days before they died. I'm sure not one prisoner the US holds would trade places with earlier US POW's or 911 victims that survived. So basically, who cares because we have always been REALLY tortured before (not just kept from sleeping or a fake drownding for a few minutes-- thats just college prank level stuff.

It took 3 years for those tapes to become useless?More like 3 years before anyone asked any questions.And as to the use of torture,what about the geneva convention?

This is just unreal. They claim these people were so dangerous that they had to deny them lawyers, the complete legal processes and any contact. They claim they has all the evidence. Now the most crucial pieces of evidence have been destroyed. They claim this was done on their own by, not the Justice department who has the authority to prosecute crimes. They have been held 5 years no trial, no one really knows what is happening. This has been the largest abuse of justice in our history. You have been duped again by the Bush Mafia. Anyone who has been in the military and served in CID or any other investigative agency, is aware torture is the most ineffective means of gaining information.

terriosts dont have any rights, other than the day they should be shot..sooner the better

Porter Goss, the fired CIA head had his hands in this mess. We should add the charges of Obstruction of Justice, Destruction of Evidence, and Perjury. The claim that they informed Congress means they only told the Republican committee heads, just as they did with the Illegal Wiretapping of American Citizens.

It is past time we convene a Impeachment Investigation for both Bush and Cheney. Nancy Pelosi should step down if she refuses to start the trail. Democratic party members don't need people like her dragging this country down. We have enough problems with the Bush Admin., without her blocking them from being brought to justice.

Impeach, Impeach, Impeach.

America ruled waterboarding was inhumane torture when the Japanese used it in World War II. Now it's OK since America decided to use it? Those tapes were most likely destroyed because they were too hideous, inhumane and barbaric and they feared the world would find out.

Bush should revise his torture statement: you cannot PROVE we tortured.

Dear Brian, but America is suppose to be more "civilized" than the rest. That's what separate U.S. from the barbarians and wicked devils of the world. Or does it? Is America really any different when put to the test?

So once again America sat through another cherade called a Senate Investigation where senators ask questions where they already know the answers, and nod as the lying answers are what they already know to be the opposite of the truth. What a lot of wasted TV watching and paid government employees who probably are also in on the pack-of-lies show. Where did the concept of treason go?

IMPEACH THE PRESIDENT!!!!

Waterboarding doesn't come close to my view of torture. It is far too mild. Those prisoners haven't been tortured. They still have their eyes in their sockets, their fingers on their hands, they have not been de-limbed, bruised, or held under water til they pass out, and they have no electrical burns, or broken bones, and so on. Waterboarding doesn't even come close to what a nice little Iron Maiden can do, and it's not even as good as a decent Stretching Rack. Just because waterboarding is reasonably effective doesn't mean it's torture. Waterboarding is more like a dose of "attitude adjustment". Actually, I think it's kinda funny those dirty little terrorists finally got some kind of a bath. I'm glad those tapes are gone, because those do-gooder "human rights" activists would use them to incite hate and violence and get more of us killed.

Fantastic!! Lets double the size of every govt agency and throw more money and power to them....maybe it will get better. Right?

If you log on to the CIA website you will no doubt read a bunch of hypocritical sentimentality.The ones I read with the most revulsion are the ones where they refer to themselves as a family and a community.I have much more respect for the Gambinos than I do for them.Philip Agee did the right thing.What America needs is a couple of dozen people like Philip Agee.

Sure makes you proud to be an American, eh?

Innocence is for children. For the rest of us, let's be realistic for a moment. There's no way to convince whoever engages in these sort of barbaric practices that what they are doing is wrong, utterly immoral, or illegal-- they will justify it regardless. And when confronted, they will deny it. After torturing and killing another human, does anyone really believe these spooks will have any qualms about lying or destroying evidence to cover it up? These are the same people, after all, who are documented as having used chemical, biological and radioactive agents on US civilians to "see what would happen". Just the declassified crimes alone read like a Machiavellan horror story. Unfortunately, we have a long hypocritical history of condemning the crimes of other nations while engaging in the identical behavior ourselves.

yeah it is important for us to torture it keeps the civilians of the united states safe so those human right activists should just shut their mouths because without the torture then we wouldn't be here for crying out loud.

Shane Dawson, do you really believe what you just wrote? My God man, have you served in the military, I bet the answer is no, well I will tell you I have served in our military, and I do not believe in torture, nor does our government period!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! It is the law, we do not torture, period!!!!! If our government has done so, and there is any proof, they will pay.

Destroying of evidence which no doubt shows criminal wrongdoing such as the countless emails and and now videotapes has become de rigeur for this administration. Outright contempt for the laws these public servants were sworn to uphold occurs each and every day, thanks largely to a Democratic leadership which as of yet has failed to enforce the rule of law so flagrantly and openly violated.

If it's NOT TORTURE, let's do it to all criminals, next speeding ticket, up on the torture platform until they confess and repent. Suspected molester, up on the waterboard until they agree to sign the confession. Next shooting in the "hood", bring everyone in for a water-party and see how many confessors we can create.

America is better than this and Americans should be angry that Bush and his corporate fascist machine has ruined our good reputation around the world. And now simply because we are Americans we can not travel anywhere a feel secure or liked or safe. Lie after Lie and the people i.e. Sheeples continue to buy it with the same stupid look on their faces and the ring in their nose. Have someone hold your head under water for two minutes over and over or tie you up and punch you in the kidneys or face and tell me its not torture. Toture is wrong, ineffective, and cowardly. "Hi daddy what did you do today at work?" As he bounces his child on his knee "Oh I placed electrods to someone and shocked them into jelly...Honey can you pass the rolls" Get Real!!

Criminal behavior by a criminal administration.

Bush gets away with it because WE ARE LETTING HIM. Some are protecting his image by argueing about every little thing and defending his every little action, but, real Americans cannot get our voices heard, where do we sign-up to permit impeachment hearings?

If it's not torture....Lets do it to accused people and see how many confessions we can get, what if we did it when someone wasn't up-front about owning a dog/cat in the area. If it's NOT TORTURE, let the FUN begin!

Call it hate, call it bigotry, call it whatever America's self-haters want to call it. The only thing we've done wrong in Iraq is not conducting war the way Sherman did during the Civil War. Total, complete destruction of the enemy and anything that would enable him to wage war against us. Horrible? Yes. Effective? Absolute. I don't care what the rest of the world thinks of us.

Oh my God! The CIA is keepig secrets!
Perhaps they should publish all their techniuqes, you know, so the bad guys can be better prepared. They can show all the intel too, maybe make it a weekly sit-com on ABC.

"Beyond their lack of intelligence value ... and the absence of any legal or internal reason to keep them, the tapes posed a serious security risk." Destroying the tapes is a records management issue. Having said that, three years seems a very short time for records documenting an operational activity of an organization. No organization has to keep records, in the absence of an ongoing or imminent criminal investigation, because it is incriminating. But there has to be a pre-existing records management plan in place with clearly identified events defining when it is appropriate for them to be destroyed for it to be considered acceptable records management. I don't think "security risk" (which appears to be the real reason fir mtheir destruction) is an acceptable criteria. It is too easy to hide ad-hoc decisions as a security risk and it seems too much like covering their backside. They could have burned them to a CD, stored the CD in a secure vault and deleted the records from their network if they were afraid of copying, hackers, etc. If the CIA does not have secure storage facilities, then the CIA itself is a national security threat.

Can anyone believe or trust 100% the CIA actually destroyed those tapes? Or are they just saying the tapes were destroyed, because if revealed the tapes still exist, members of the CIA could be tried as war criminals? Because the tapes are so brutal, inhumane that they could sicken the psyche of humanity and go against the grain of anything considered civilized?

Euphemise it any which way you want but "torture" is wrong: a sign of yellow-bellied weakness and repression practised by those too afraid to deal on an even-playing field! Why do we spend time encouraging children not to bully if we're only going to turn and claim that the same act in adulthood somehow makes one a "proud American"? Jeez, how stupid is this!

This only adds Peter Goss (and probably several other CIA executives) to the list of folks who need to be prosecuted for violations of the War Crimes Act (among other laws). What Hayden did not say was among the factors considered before the tapes' destruction was whether they were evidence of a crime. If waterboarding was on those tapes - and it appears it was - then under our nation's prior prosecutions they evidenced a crime - a nationally and internationally recognized war crime (The U.S. has prosecuted, convicted and ordered years of prision at hard labor for numerous war criminals for waterboarding - the Dolittle raid interrogators among many). Destruction of the tapes with that knowledge (which the decision makers surely had) is a crime as well.

This is what one can expect from the CIA overseen by President Bush. The Democratic Congress needs to censor the CIA and President BUSH.

Hey all you supporters of torture tactics,what if your son or daughter who was in the military was tortured? You would be partially responsible for your childs torture,because you endorse it. Torture supporters would have made excellent Nazis! I hear Cheney gets his pacemaker racing,when he hears about our people torturing others. And why are you torture supporters sooo scared? Afraid the boggeyman will get you no doubt! Like the scared little wimps you people are,and oh so gullible!

Oh Boo hoo, whould you rather us torture them...or us have another 9/11??? Thats what I thought.

Does the government hire anyone who can tell the truth? All they have to do is cover the face of anyone in the videos. I think this has been done. No big deal. Their excuse is really stupid and merely done to hide the facts of the beatings, and other forms of torture they use. please. under bush, we are moving back to the third reich. thank god he is leaving office. the worst president.

Helloo I agree with you. God save us from this Dr. Spock generation.
When its at their front door! you watch how fast they will turn and ask why we were not doing more.

PS: Citizen, I could care less if I miss spelled any word again.

there's a man running for president who was tortured in Vietnam. He's a republican candidate. he condemns what's going on. Why do noecons not realize and accept this? The point is simple: we in the west condemned torture and were instrumental in pulling the geneva Convetion together. When torturors have been catured in the past, they have been put before world courts and tried, then punished. Is this administration and the CIA exempt for some reason?

I think I am a reasonably intelligent person. This story is like the excuse" My dog ate my homework" We send these people billions of dollars a year and they could not have found a way to exclude the faces of these people on tape. This is beyond thinking we are dumb. If they have no secure place to save these tapes, then they are just as useless as the president the serve.

The big secret: Cheney and Bush did not exist.

I have always said that it is neither our duty to criticize nor judge, but I think I'll make an exception.

Terrorists are human, though they may not act it. They too are composed of DNA, have blood running through their veins, and believe it or not, feelings.

These methods were uncalled for, regardless of the person. The CIA destroying these tapes shows that they took it a step too far. Why destroy it if they did follow the law, as they claim? This shows they did something not even a terrorist deserves.

Then again, I'm a humanitarian at heart than anythin' else. Yeah, I'm an American, but there are ways you don't treat people.

Torture always produces the right results -- people apparently don't get it -- if you torture someone, they'll say anything. That's why the government is using it... they need pliant scapegoats to cover their tracks in light of their involvement with 911. Torture, especially the fear of torture, is essential to the program of civil rights destruction, known as the "war on terror."

This is just the destruction of evidence that the U.S. does in fact use torture. This makes the U.S. no better than the terrorists we are trying to defeat. Disgraceful.

This blog brings out the US Government haters in force. They condem them if they do their job then condem them if they don't. I am beginning to believe these people that write to these blogs don't have any idea what they want except just to complain. I personally don't understand why the government would want to video tape the water boarding process to begin with. Also there have been many more people that volunteered to be water boarded than they actually have water boarded for information gathering purposes. Wacko society that kicks itself endlessly. Must be the Law Schools that put these nut cases out.

While it is true that the CIA might have had to destroy the tape for security, the timing is a little too coincidental.

It doesn't matter what that tape contained because it is now gone, but there was nothing good on it, I assure you. Terrorists do have rights, because they are human too, which is something we all forget. However, why destroy it now, at such a controversial time in the world? It's almost as if it was done on purpose to sway the public to move in a certain direction.

What do I know? I'm only a American who blindly believes what she sees.

Waterboarding is NOT torture!! These people didn't just "say what we wanted to hear". They provided real world intelligence that led to subsequent arrests and, more than likely, prevented other attacks against us. Kudos to these CIA agents for using their skills to elicit this information from these terrorists.

RudyT: If you don't think that our enemies torture our soldiers when they are captured, you a LIVING IN NA-NA LAND.

The U.S. will regret this, and unfortunately the torture that these acts beget, will be taken out on soldiers who weren't involved in the decision to waterboard. The Bush administration clouds reality with legalistic definitions and logistical shell games. How can anyone who has not experienced waterboarding condone it and say definitively it's not torture. The gold standard here should be someone like John McCain, who has stated unequivocally that he believes we are involved in torture. There was a time when the U.S. stood on principle and refused to engage in activities. Such times seem to be gone now. Intead we involve ourselves in questionable tactics and use jingoistic, scarily one dimensional explanations and scare tactics to justify our actions. It's pathetic, and anyone who condones waterboarding should voluteer to experience it first hand.

Try to imagine being on a plane that is hijacked and knowing the hijacker is about to crash the plane into a building. I would call THAT torture. Yes, I feel sorry for the suspected terrorists but yet I don't. They were the FIRST ones who decided to torture.

You "Humanists" (communists) are all insane! Who is torturing whom? Remember the be-headings of AL Qeada? I think the CIA methods are way more sane then having your fingers or head cut off and your genitals electrocuted. I'm glad they destroyed that information, the media would have loved to get their hands on that data and broadcast it over to their terrorist friends.

War is all about having critical information about your enemies whereabouts and upcoming tactics. If this were WWII right now, Hitler would be winning. You people make me sick!

Wake up you peacenics or are you too damned stoned and willing to do anything even to give away your freedom and tear down your nation to get your next hit on your bong? The 60's are dead and have been dead from the very beginning! I remember you Hippies as a child and I came to my own conclusion without my parents influence that you were all just stupid moonlightning loosers!

Oh, while you were out fighting for you love not war and flowers not guns initiative, Russia was and is making a comeback to its former Soviet self. Rasputin "Putin" wants Russia back to the way it was and Bush had nothing to do with that!

Also, Gen. Hayden and Sen. Lindsey Graham have no business being in the military and in the Government at the same time. Choose one or the other, stop the obvious conflict of interest. IMPEACH BUSH AND CHENEY!!!

I dont understand you people that are writing all this stuuf about the cia using waterboarding to get the info from the badguys, i think they are being to nice to them, i mean come on look at what they are doing to our men and woman when they catch us they cut off our heads and god only knows what eles they do to us that we dont know about. be for real people i would rather them use any force they have to , to keep us safe, and if you are gonna take the side of the bad guys for the tourture we do to them then get the hell out of this country and go live with the terrorists, thats why there is so much bad things in this country cause the terrorist see that people like you agree with them and the media needs to stop letting everybody in the worl know what we do here cause that just gives them better ideas how to get us, like it says in the bible an eye for an eye a tooth for a tooth i have no sadness for the torture of terrorist that want to do harm to this country they get what they deserve.

Common Sense: Republicans used to hate the government, too--remember? When did Republicans decide the government can do no wrong? Isn't that a liberal idea?

As a Republican, I'm not going to stop criticizing the government just because a Republican sits in the Oval Office. If our government is doing things that we'd complain about under Democratic leadership, we ought to complain about it under Republican leadership, too.

After all, isn't that "common sense?"

Funny how everyone [especially Human Rights groups] can sit there and chastise the CIA for all the 'abuses' they're doing... I don't approve or condone unnecessary abuse or torture- to be certainly clear. However, no one speaks of the 'dreadful' things done by the CIA during the Cold War to protect us from the evil Communists for five decades! True, it would be wrong of them to destroy evidence of 'unlawful' activity(s), but remember that they are a vital line of defense of this nation and the current GWB Administration has screwed them over more than once in favor of the NSA, [which is a potentially more dangerous agency]. For all we know, there's an internal power struggle between the CIA and the NSA; which would make for a good Clancy novel! I'd rather deal with the CIA than the KGB [or the NSA] any day! Let them do their jobs and do the 'dirty' work that most of us [with weaker stomachs] won't dare do!

I won't comment on whether waterboarding is or isn't torture; nor whether torture is or isn't morally justified. There are rational argument that can be made on both sides. (OK, I will comment: it is torture and it can be but very very rarely justified and there has probably not been any really good enough reasons so far.) On the question of the reliability of the confessions extracted under torture:
how do you know the co-conspirators named in a confession are in fact co-conspirators; you extract a confession from them under torture. You verify the reliability of a method of interrogation by using the very same method whose reliability is being questioned.

We like to think we are above torture, and in an ideal world, we really should strive to be so, but it is terribly naive of people to believe it will not happen, especially when human lives are presumed to be at stake. Under the right circumstances, we would all do it. "We cannot fight them the way we are."

You should be ashamed to not report the reality that torture has backfired badly. That the CIA used our secret renditions program to force Ibn Shaykh al-Libi into lying that Saddam gave al-Qaeda WMDs. Colin Powell unwittingly reported these lies to the world, in his Feb. 2003, UN speech, as Newsweek, the NY Times and others have reported on inside pages. This news should be shouted from YOUR rooftops in NYC. We went to war based on lies from a tortured man. Don't be pushover for this administration.

True Americans and especially Christians should not be involved in torture. It's against American law,and Christain principles. The excuses being used are pathetic,like Were're sooo scared! realize,real men don't torture.

Doe says: "terrorists don't have any rights, other than the day they should be shot..sooner the better" Do you not see the whole point of America?? When the government eventually sees YOU as a problem (and they will if you continue to give them broad powers) - It will be YOU who is hauled off without rights and tortured. There is a reason America is free, and to become the enemy in order to defeat them, is terrible strategy.

Suspects have rights, regardless of what they are suspected of. Everyone has rights, that's why they're not called "privileges". I very much doubt that torture really provided any useful information in the "war on terror". The fact that this administration claims something is no reason to believe it.

shane dawson
"yeah it is important for us to torture it keeps the civilians of the united states safe so those human right activists should just shut their mouths because without the torture then we wouldn't be here for crying out loud."

So your physical survival is more important than being a decent human being? That's called being a coward. So much for the "home of the brave". US government policy kills far more americans than terrorist ever did (by increased AIDS cases alone).

"Waterboarding is NOT torture!! These people didn't just "say what we wanted to hear". They provided real world intelligence that led to subsequent arrests and, more than likely, prevented other attacks against us. Kudos to these CIA agents for using their skills to elicit this information from these terrorists."
Posted by: Proud Vet

Then you're OK with us doing it to you? Thought not "Vet". As for the claim that they provided useful information, how do you know? Do you trust the CIA? you swallowed.

CIA should have shown all those tapes on the Youtube and let everybody see all is fine.

I served in the military and I absolutely do not believe in torturing people. Short of a movie moment Jack Bauer 24 episode where that suspect has his finger on the button thats going to rain 400 nukes down on apple pie america homes, use common sense and do not use torture.

Now...if we waterboarding is not torture? Can the police use this any time they think they can get further information. Sure beats the evil taser right?

The terrorists you se naively rush to protect would make lampshades out of the lot of you if they had the chance.

You dialoge is sure proof you do not deserve the freedom you enjoy.

Let's try that without the creative spelling someone inserted.... Originally wrote: The terrorists you so naively rush to protect would make lampshades out of the lot of you if they had the chance.
Your dialogue is sure proof you do not deserve the freedom you enjoy.

This Bush's Administration and his group of self righteous idiots. Have drug the nation throw the mud, soiled our reputation to fighting the fair and honest fight. To putting our laws above our religious beliefs. Now the world sees a greedy nation, of liars, thieves and despots.
They self righteous has become the self serving wickedness that they espouse daily in their rhetoric. There is scandals of sexual impropriety with Congressional aides. Drug and theft deals, Hidden tapes as well agendas.
They lie about what is truth and real so many ways our head spin as to what is right and what is wrong.

well to bad that we had to torture them to get some answers!!! I can't believe that in a time where hard working people are loosing their homes we are worrying about some selfish b######s that decided that is right for them to kill a bunch of people because they don't agree with the way others leave their lives...enough please!!!their people are still leaving in fear. they have contribue nothing to the world or their own country... try to explain for the numbers of children that today dont have a mother or a father or a mother that dont have a son or a daughter... and all for what? billions of their own children are dying everyday while they hide inside their caves... they are nothing but a bunch of cowards... if they really want to change the world they would have started in their own back yards!

It's This Simple the Gov. knows it went too far, so it destroyed evidence. Give me a break, if you believe they were destroyed to protect national security, you too are gullible. If you condone Torture and Water boarding then, you also Condone it being done to a U.S. soldier's/citizens.

People can really embellish some stories. I wish these comments could be cleared of this foolishness. Please look back to: Brian @ 38.21 PM, he says, "like hanging them upside down for a month or two" Brian was referring to our own soldiers - captured by enemy combatants. Now, come on, "hanging them upside down for a month or two?". Let's get real, Brian.