Bush and the Torture Tapes

'Once an investigation has begun -- whether it's an attorney general or an inspector general investigation -- it's much more problematic to have destroyed any kinds of documents or tapes that fall within the scope of the investigation,' Radsan said. . . .

"Zubaydah was captured in March 2002, becoming the first of the 'high-value' detainees in CIA custody and the first to be subjected to harsh interrogation methods, which included sleep deprivation as well as waterboarding. Zubaydah, who was shot and gravely wounded during his capture, later became 'defiant and evasive,' according to Hayden, leading to the decision to apply more aggressive measures. . . .

"Hayden said the methods shown on the videotapes were legal under guidelines approved by the Justice Department and the Bush administration, and he said the interrogation provided 'crucial information.'"

Reality Check

A few days after Bush's speech, David Johnston wrote in the New York Times that "rather than the smooth process depicted by Mr. Bush, interviews with nearly a dozen current and former law enforcement and intelligence officials briefed on the process show, the interrogation of Mr. Zubaydah was fraught with sharp disputes, debates about the legality and utility of harsh interrogation methods, and a rupture between the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the C.I.A. that has yet to heal."

Zubaydah "was bloodied and feverish when a C.I.A. security team delivered him to a secret safe house in Thailand for interrogation in the early spring of 2002. Bullet fragments had ripped through his abdomen and groin during a firefight in Pakistan several days earlier when he had been captured. . . .

"According to accounts from five former and current government officials who were briefed on the case, F.B.I. agents -- accompanied by intelligence officers -- initially questioned him using standard interview techniques. They bathed Mr. Zubaydah, changed his bandages, gave him water, urged improved medical care, and spoke with him in Arabic and English, languages in which he is fluent."

But then a new C.I.A. team came in, and "concluded that under standard questioning Mr. Zubaydah was revealing only a small fraction of what he knew, and decided that more aggressive techniques were warranted.

"At times, Mr. Zubaydah, still weak from his wounds, was stripped and placed in a cell without a bunk or blankets. He stood or lay on the bare floor, sometimes with air-conditioning adjusted so that, one official said, Mr. Zubaydah seemed to turn blue. At other times, the interrogators piped in deafening blasts of music by groups like the Red Hot Chili Peppers. . . .

"F.B.I. agents on the scene angrily protested the more aggressive approach, arguing that persuasion rather than coercion had succeeded. But leaders of the C.I.A. interrogation team were convinced that tougher tactics were warranted and said that the methods had been authorized by senior lawyers at the White House."

Also soon after Bush's speech, author Ron Suskind wrote in Time: "What the President wouldn't say, especially in a political season, is that he and the rest of the government have learned quite a bit from their early errors. What is widely known inside the Administration is that once we caught our first decent-size fish -- Abu Zubaydah, in March 2002 -- we used him as an experiment in righteous brutality that in the end produced very little. . . .

"Complicating matters is that Zubaydah was more a facilitator--a glorified al-Qaeda travel agent--than the operational master the Administration trumpeted him as. Also, he suffers from multiple personalities. His diary, which the government refuses to release, is written in three voices over 10 years and is filled with page after page of quotidian nonsense about housekeeping, food and types of tea."

Suskind writes that in his speech, Bush "put special emphasis on Zubaydah--the insane travel agent--saying that, under duress, he gave interrogators information that identified Binalshibh and 'helped lead' to the capture of both Binalshibh and the prized K.S.M. This is the sort of thing that has steadily eroded Bush's relationship with the intelligence community: presidential sins of omission, or emphasis, that would be clear only if you happened to know lots of classified information. In fact, according to senior intelligence officials past and present, Zubaydah helpfully confirmed that 'Mukhtar' was K.S.M.'s code name--something key intelligence officials already suspected--and had nothing to do with identifying Binalshibh, who had come to the attention of investigators a few weeks after 9/11 because he had sent wire transfers to Zacarias Moussaoui."