The Senate Intelligence Committee Report on Torture: Committee Study of the Central Intelligence Agency's Detention and Interrogation Program (32 page)

DIRECTOR HAYDEN
: “No, sir, 96, all 96.”
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In April 2007, CIA Director Hayden testified that the CIA’s interrogation program existed “for one purpose—intelligence,” and that it is “the most successful program being conducted by American intelligence today” for “preventing attacks, disabling al-Qa’ida.”
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At this hearing Director Hayden again suggested that the CIA interrogation program was successful in obtaining intelligence from all CIA detainees.
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A transcript of that hearing included the following exchange:

SENATOR SNOWE
: “General Hayden. Of the 8000 intelligence reports that were provided, as you said, by 30 of the detainees.”

DIRECTOR HAYDEN
: “By all 97, ma’am.”
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The suggestion that all CIA detainees provided information that resulted in intelligence reporting is not supported by CIA records. CIA records reveal that 34 percent of the 119 known CIA detainees produced no intelligence reports, and nearly 70 percent produced fewer than 15 intelligence reports. Of the 39 detainees who were, according to CIA records, subjected to the CIA’s enhanced interrogation techniques, nearly 20 percent produced no intelligence reports, while 40 percent produced fewer than 15 intelligence reports. While the CIA’s Detention and Interrogation Program did produce significant amounts of disseminated intelligence reporting (5,874 sole-source intelligence reports), this reporting was overwhelmingly derived from a small subset of CIA detainees. For example, of the 119 CIA detainees identified in the Study, 89 percent of all disseminated intelligence reporting was derived from 25 CIA detainees. Five CIA detainees produced more than 40 percent of all intelligence reporting from the CIA’s Detention and Interrogation Program. CIA records indicate that two of the five detainees were not subjected to the CIA’s enhanced interrogation techniques.
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F. The Eight Primary CIA Effectiveness Representations—The Use of the CIA’s Enhanced Interrogation Techniques “Enabled the CIA to Disrupt Terrorist Plots” and “Capture Additional Terrorists”

From 2003 through 2009,
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the CIA consistently and repeatedly represented that its enhanced interrogation techniques were effective and necessary to produce critical intelligence that “enabled the CIA to disrupt terrorist plots, capture additional terrorists, and collect a high-volume of critical intelligence on al-Qa’ida.” The CIA further stated that the information acquired as a result of the use of the CIA’s enhanced interrogation techniques could not have been acquired by the U.S. government in any other way (“otherwise unavailable”).
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The CIA also represented that the best measure of effectiveness of the CIA’s enhanced interrogation techniques was examples of specific terrorist plots “thwarted” and specific terrorists captured as a result of the use of the CIA’s techniques.

For example, in a December 2004 CIA memorandum prepared for the national security advisor, the CIA wrote that there was “no way to conduct” an “independent study of the foreign intelligence efficacy of using enhanced interrogation techniques,” but stated, “[t]he Central Intelligence Agency can advise you that this program works and the techniques are effective in producing foreign intelligence.” To illustrate the effectiveness of the CIA’s interrogation techniques, the CIA provided 11 examples of “[k]ey intelligence collected from HVD interrogations
after
applying interrogation techniques,” nine of which referenced specific terrorist plots or the capture of specific terrorists.
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Similarly, under the heading, “Plots Discovered as a Result of EITs,” a CIA briefing prepared for President Bush in November 2007 states, “reporting statistics alone will not provide a fair and accurate measure of the effectiveness of EITs.” Instead, the CIA provided eight “examples of key intelligence collected from CIA detainee interrogations after applying the waterboard along with other interrogation techniques,” seven of which referenced specific terrorist plots or the capture of specific terrorists.
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The Committee selected 20 CIA documents that include CIA representations about the effectiveness of the CIA’s enhanced interrogation techniques from 2003 through 2009. The 20 CIA documents, which were consistent with a broader set of CIA representations made during this period, include materials the CIA prepared for the White House, the Department of Justice, the Congress, the CIA Office of Inspector General, as well as incoming members of President Obama’s national security team, and the public. The Committee selected the following 20 CIA documents:

1. July and September 2003: CIA Briefing Documents Seeking Policy Reaffirmation of the CIA Interrogation Program from White House Officials, “Review of Interrogation Program.”
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2. February 2004: The CIA’s Response to the Draft Inspector General Special Review, CIA “Comments to Draft IG Special Review, ‘Counterterrorism Detention and Interrogation Program,’ ” and attachment, “Successes of CIA’s Counterterrorism Detention and Interrogation Activities.”
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3. July 2004: CIA Intelligence Assessment, “Khalid Shaykh Muhammad: Preeminent Source on Al-Qa’ida.”
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4. December 2004: CIA Memorandum for the President’s National Security Advisor, “Effectiveness of the CIA Counterterrorist Interrogation Techniques.”
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5. March 2005: CIA Memorandum for the Office of Legal Counsel, “Effectiveness of the CIA Counterterrorist Interrogation Techniques.”
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6. March 2005: CIA “Briefing for Vice President Cheney: CIA Detention and Interrogation Program.”
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7. March 2005: CIA Talking Points for the National Security Council, “Effectiveness of the High-Value Detainee Interrogation (HVDI) Techniques.”
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8. April 2005: CIA “Briefing Notes on the Value of Detainee Reporting” provided to the Department of Justice for the OLC’s assessment of the legality of the CIA’s enhanced interrogation techniques.
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9. April 2005: CIA “Materials of KSM and Abu Zubaydah” and additional CIA documents provided to the Department of Justice for the OLC’s assessment of the legality of the CIA’s enhanced interrogation techniques.
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10. June 2005: CIA Intelligence Assessment, “Detainee Reporting Pivotal for the War Against Al-Qa’ida.”
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11. December 2005: CIA Document entitled, “Future of CIA’s Counterterrorist Detention and Interrogation Program,” with the attachment, “Impact of the Loss of the Detainee Program to CT Operations and Analysis,” from CIA Director Porter Goss to Stephen Hadley, Assistant to the President/National Security Advisor, Frances Townsend, Assistant to the President/Homeland Security Advisor, and Ambassador John Negroponte, the Director of National Intelligence.
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12. May 2006: CIA Briefing for the President’s Chief of Staff, “CIA Rendition, Detention and Interrogation Programs,” on the effectiveness of the CIA’s enhanced interrogation techniques.
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13. 13. July 2006: CIA Memorandum for the Director of National Intelligence, “Detainee Intelligence Value Update.”
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14. September 2006: CIA documents supporting the President’s September 6, 2006, speech, including representations on the effectiveness of the CIA’s interrogation program, including: “DRAFT Potential Public Briefing of CIA’s High-Value Terrorist Interrogations Program,” “CIA Validation of Remarks on Detainee Policy,” and “Summary of the High Value Terrorist Detainee Program.”
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15. April 2007: CIA Director Michael Hayden’s Testimony to the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence describing the effectiveness of the CIA’s interrogation program.
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16. October 2007: CIA Talking Points for the Senate Appropriations Committee, addressing the effectiveness of the CIA’s Detention and Interrogation Program, entitled, “Talking Points Appeal of the $██ Million Reduction in CIA/CTC’s Rendition and Detention Program.”
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17. November 2007: CIA Director Talking Points for the President, entitled, “Waterboard 06 November 2007,” on the effectiveness of the CIA’s waterboard interrogation technique.
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18. January 2009: CIA Briefing for President-elect Obama’s National Security Transition Team on the value of the CIA’s “Renditions, Detentions, and Interrogations (RDI).”
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19. February 2009: CIA Briefing for CIA Director Leon Panetta on the effectiveness of the CIA’s enhanced interrogation techniques, including “DCIA Briefing on RDI Program—18FEB.2009,” “Key Intelligence and Reporting Derived from Abu Zubaydah and Khalid Shaykh Muhammad (KSM),” “EITs and Effectiveness,” “Key Intelligence Impacts Chart: Attachment (AZ and KSM),” “Background on Key Intelligence Impacts Chart: Attachment,” and “Background on Key Captures and Plots Disrupted,” among other CIA documents.
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20. March 2009: CIA Memorandum for the Chairman of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, including representations on the “Key Captures and Disrupted Plots Gained from HVDs in the RDI Program.”
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From the 20 CIA documents, the Committee identified the CIA’s eight most frequently cited examples of “thwarted” plots and captured terrorists that the CIA attributed to information acquired from the use of the CIA’s enhanced interrogation techniques (
see chart on next page
).

The Committee sought to confirm that the CIA’s representations about the most frequently cited examples of “thwarted” plots and captured terrorists were consistent with the more than six million pages of CIA detention and interrogation records provided to the Committee. Specifically, the Committee assessed whether the CIA’s representations that its enhanced interrogation techniques produced unique, otherwise unavailable intelligence
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that led to the capture of specific terrorists and the “thwarting” of specific plots were accurate.
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The Committee found the CIA’s representations to be inaccurate and unsupported by CIA records.

Below are the summaries of the CIA’s eight most frequently cited examples of “thwarted” plots and captured terrorists, as well as a description of the CIA’s claims and an explanation for why the CIA representations were inaccurate and unsupported by CIA records.
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1. The Thwarting of the Dirty Bomb/Tall Buildings Plot and the Capture of Jose Padilla

summary
: The CIA represented that its enhanced interrogation techniques were effective and necessary to produce critical, otherwise unavailable intelligence, which enabled the CIA to disrupt terrorist plots, capture terrorists, and save lives. Over a period of years, the CIA provided the thwarting of terrorist plotting associated with, and the capture of, Jose Padilla, as evidence for the effectiveness of the CIA’s enhanced interrogation techniques. These CIA representations were inaccurate. The CIA first received reporting on the terrorist threat posed by Jose Padilla from a foreign government. Eight days later, Abu Zubaydah provided information on the terrorist plotting of two individuals, whom he did not identify by true name, to FBI special agents. Abu Zubaydah provided this information in April 2002, prior to the commencement of the CIA’s enhanced interrogation techniques in August 2002. The plots associated with Jose Padilla were assessed by the Intelligence Community to be infeasible.

further details
: The Dirty Bomb/Tall Buildings plotting refers to terrorist plotting involving U.S. citizen Jose Padilla. Padilla and his associate, Binyam Mohammed, conceived the “Dirty Bomb Plot” after locating information, derived from what the CIA described as “a satirical internet article” entitled “How to Make an H-bomb,” on a computer at a Pakistani safe house in early 2002.
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The article instructed would-be bomb makers to enrich uranium by placing it “in a bucket, attaching it to a six foot rope, and swinging it around your head as fast as possible for 45 minutes.
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Padilla and Mohammed approached Abu Zubaydah in early 2002, and later KSM, with their idea to build and use this device in the United States.
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Neither Abu Zubaydah nor KSM believed the plan was viable,
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but KSM provided funding for, and tasked Padilla to conduct, an operation using natural gas to create explosions in tall buildings in the United States,
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later known as the “Tall Buildings Plot.”
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The capture of, and the thwarting of terrorist plotting associated with Jose Padilla, is one of the eight most frequently cited examples provided by the CIA as evidence for the effectiveness of the CIA’s enhanced interrogation techniques. Over a period of years, CIA documents prepared for and provided to senior policymakers, intelligence officials, and the Department of Justice represent the identification and/or the capture of Jose Padilla, and/or the disruption of the “Dirty Bomb,” and/or the “Tall Buildings” plotting, as examples of how “[k]ey intelligence collected from HVD interrogations
after
applying interrogation techniques” had “enabled CIA to disrupt terrorist plots” and “capture additional terrorists.”
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The CIA further represented that the intelligence acquired from the CIA’s enhanced interrogation techniques was “otherwise unavailable” and “saved lives.”
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