The Washington Independent - U.S. news and politics - washingtonindependent.com: Comments by Ed Denver

Ed Denver — Tue, 29 Jan 2008 05:44:48 GMT

I find the idea that the CIA knew so little about torture that they turned to Egypt, Saudia Arabia, et al, to learn torture methods to be totally baseless. I refer you to:

http://www.zmag.org/content/showarticle.cfm?ItemID=8310

...whereby the CIA trained SAVAK agents of the Shah of Iran on torture methods they themselves learned from the Nazis. I thought this was common knowledge. You don’t suppose whatever methods were presented to the SAVAK agents 30 years ago have since been improved and refined, do you? Maybe something worse than waterboarding?

I suspect the CIA and the Bush administration are at this point willing to try anything to divert attention and cause confusion as to what the truth is. No Tenet interviews? Who’d a thunk it.

Ed Denver — Tue, 29 Jan 2008 20:40:25 GMT

Sorry about that link. Try this…

http://www.zmag.org/content/showarticle.cfm?ItemID=8310

Ed Denver — Tue, 05 Feb 2008 04:32:08 GMT

Sean:

Appreciate your comments. However I find it hard to believe the CIA had no interrogation program, official or otherwise, prior to the years before 9/11, and would find it easier to believe the CIA advised Egypt and Saudi Arabia on interrogation methods rather than what the article suggested. I believe Isreal would support that opinion since they themselves are a benefactor of certain CIA interrogation methods. Or am I presumptious to think that is also common knowledge?

The sad irony of the waterboarding issue, or any discussion of torture, is that it is an issue. And as AJ Hill expressed, we will pay for this for a very long time indeed.