Ramzi bin al-Shibh

As promised, some further analysis of Bush's contention that torture is awesome because torturing Abu Zubaydah led him to "identif[y] one of KSM's accomplices in the 9/11 attacks -- a terrorist named Ramzi bin al Shibh." Spencer Ackerman writes:

A Nexis search for "Ramzi Binalshibh" between September 11, 2001 and March 1, 2002--the U.S. captured Abu Zubaydah in March 2002--turns up 26 hits for The Washington Post alone. Everyone involved in counterterrorism knew who bin Al Shibh was. Now-retired FBI Al Qaeda hunter Dennis Lormel told Congress who Ramzi bin Al Shibh was in February 2002. Abu Zubaydah getting waterboarded and spouting bin Al Shibh's name did not tell us anything we did not already know.

That's a month before Zubaydah's capture, for the record. And, presumably, the FBI knew something about this matter before revealing it in public statements to congress. Bush is, once again, just making stuff up. Will he get called on it? I'm not optimistic. Obviously, it will be difficult to convince the American people of this, but Bush-style routine application of torture is a genuinely unsound investigative technique. There's a reason this is the best example Bush can come up with of the utility of his methods -- his methods don't work. Historically, the main use of torture has been to generate bogus confessions. Sometimes, this is deliberate policy -- Stalin very much wanted a lot of bogus confessions and using torture he got them. Why, exactly, Bush is so interested in ginning up this kind of pseudo-information I couldn't say, but pseudo-information is precisely what he's getting.

Comments

However, Ackerman omits to note that prior to Zubayadah's revelation, we believed Ramzi bin Al Shibh was a second string kicker for the Detroit Lions.

("What? Al Qaeda? Are you sure? Hmm... that would explain why he was wide right twice against the Packers.")

Posted by alkali | September 7, 2006 10:17 AM

"Historically, the main use of torture has been to generate bogus confessions."

jeebus, this is a sweeping observation. any proof?

the problem with torture - properly defined - is that it's immoral, and places the person asked to do the torturing in an awful position. (even in the ticking bomb scenario, do you want to be the guy asked to apply the pliers? do you want to have the echoes of that moment in your mind for the rest of your life?)

but you have to be a naif to assume it never works. of course it works. there aren't that many sadists in the world - if it worked only to gin up bogus confessions, it would not be nearly as prevalent as it's been throughout history. we shouldn't do it regardless.

Posted by chris | September 7, 2006 10:28 AM

Matthew and Ackerman say we knew "who Ramzi bin Al Shibh was in February 2002."

Knowing "who [he] was" and identifying him as "accomplice[] in the 9/11 attacks" (which is what Bush said) are two completely different things.

Nice try, though.

Posted by Al | September 7, 2006 10:35 AM

"there aren't that many sadists in the world"

Any proof?

I don't see how the fact that a number of people have engaged in torture in history supports your contention that it must necessarily be at least occasionally effective. The number of people who have tortured is, first of all, quite trivial -- although the number of people who have supported it, of course, directly or indirectly, is of course nontrivial.

For contrast, an absolutely tremendous number of people have been known to use heroin. Their goal is ostensibly to have a really great time. This is effective in the short run, but obviously in anything resembling the long term it's disastrous -- not even remotely a good time. It's not an effective way of accomplishing the stated goal.

And yet lots of people do it. So either these people are morons, nobody told them heroin is bad for you, their judgment is poor, or they have unspoken motives -- like a predeliction toward self-destructive behavior, for instance.

So your argument is a non-starter. Just because some people did torture doesn't mean it's necessarily effective.

In short, there's no reason to believe torture is ever effective, plenty of reason to believe it isn't, and this is a point we can't afford to concede to the right.

Posted by Mike Meginnis | September 7, 2006 10:40 AM

Also, Matthew says torture doesn't work. The facts would seem to be otherwise.

Torture can, in fact, be a very effective tool. That of course doesn't make engaging in it right. But it is silly to question its effectiveness.

Posted by Al | September 7, 2006 10:43 AM

Al -

Everyone already knew about the British terror plot. The terror-derived information appears to have been wrong - there's little to link them to Al Qaeda, and it seems they were a long way away from being operationally dangerous. That's a really bad example.

I would also note that the Army disagrees with you:

Let me answer the first question. That is a good question. I think -- I am absolutely convinced -- the answer to your first question is no. No good intelligence is going to come from abusive practices. I think history tells us that. I think the empirical evidence of the last five years, hard years, tell us that.

Moreover, any piece of intelligence which is obtained under duress, through the use of abusive techniques, would be of questionable credibility, and additionally it would do more harm than good when it inevitably became known that abusive practices were used. And we can't afford to go there.

Some of our most significant successes on the battlefield have been -- in fact, I would say all of them, almost categorically all of them, have accrued from expert interrogators using mixtures of authorized humane interrogation practices in clever ways, that you would hope Americans would use them, to push the envelope within the bookends of legal, moral and ethical, now as further refined by this field manual.

Link to briefing.

Posted by DivGuy | September 7, 2006 11:02 AM

Al:

Dennis Lormel didn't just say who al-Shibh was. He identified him as Mohammed Atta's roommate and a member of the same al-Qa'eda cell as Atta and another Sept. 11 hijacker. The FBI were also aware of al-Shibh's habit of wiring money to the Sept. 11 hijackers before Zubaydah was captured (and Mueller announced as much publicly). So what again did Zubaydah tell us that we didn't already know?

Posted by S. Tarzan | September 7, 2006 11:02 AM

And, of course, even if Al's link actually had solid evidence that torture both obtained reliable information and that this information was cruical to stopping the attacks--and it doesn't--so what? Interrogation that doesn't involve torture often works too. To say that "torture doesn't work" means that "it produces information that is generally much less reliable," not that it will never produce an isolated example of truth.

"That of course doesn't make engaging in it right."

Oh, spare us. That's why you are always found defending torture as a technique, and always engaging in full-throated, egregiously hackish defenses of the administration that endorses and practices it. If you actually think torture is wrong--and I, for one, don't believe you--it would actually make your actions worse.

Posted by Scott Lemieux | September 7, 2006 11:19 AM

Isn't torture to be avoided because that means your guys will be tortured when they get caught? Sort of, we won't if you don't. I think that's McCain's reasoning, and he should know.

Posted by Mal | September 7, 2006 11:36 AM

Mike M, it's more complciated than you think. read Mark Bowden's piece in the Atlantic a few yrs back. http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/200310/bowden

I'm not in favor of torture. but if you want to oppose it, you do so more effectively if you put aside dubious notions like 'it never works'.

Posted by chris | September 7, 2006 11:41 AM

Every time we sit around casually debating whether torture might be "effective," our country loses a little more of its soul.

Torture is not only immoral, but contrary to our national interest because the practice of torture sacrifices an indispensable tool in seeking to make the world a better place, that being the moral high ground. Some Bush supporters have fooled themselves into thinking that as long as we remain better human beings than al-Qaeda, that's all that matters and everyone should automatically be on our side against them. That's not the benchmark by which the world judges us, and it definitely shouldn't be the benchmark by which we judge ourselves.

Posted by Steve | September 7, 2006 11:53 AM

My sense is that the goal of torture is usually less to extract information tahn to terrorize, demoralize, and dehumanize the victims and their potential victims. Military regimes throughout Latin America tortured opponents and critics without, I think, usually even the pretense of extracting information. All kinds of militaries have tortured prisoners. Nazis* tortured Jews -- why? Someone mentioned McCain -- what information were the North Vietnamese trying to get out him? Torture terrifies the target population, and it reassures the torturers that their enemy is less than human -- not a trivial thing.

Yes, it's fair to say that the widespread use of toture means that in some sense "it works." But we shouldn't take for granted what that actually means.

* Sorry! But I'm talking about the real thing here, not comparing someone to them.

Posted by lemuel pitkin | September 7, 2006 12:32 PM

James Taranto comes out in favor of torture:

Some administration critics have argued (a) that any harsh interrogation amounts to torture, and (b) that torture cannot yield useful intelligence. These claims cannot both be true. This column accepts the president's assurances that the techniques the CIA used did not amount to torture--but if you disagree, then you have to admit "torture" works. Opponents of aggressive questioning, then, are willing to sacrifice the lives of American civilians, including women and children, for the sake of their own moral vanity.

That's right, friends! Opposing torture is nothing but a "moral vanity." And if you oppose torture, it means you want American women and children to die.

Nothing more need be said about the moral emptiness of this administration's defenders.

Posted by Steve | September 7, 2006 2:16 PM

for a second i thought the title of the post was referring to me :)

Posted by razib | September 7, 2006 3:54 PM

The only explanation for why Bushco are so committed to the use of torture that I can really imagine is that they are convinced that it does work. Even like some posters here, I think there is a feeling that somehow torture must be effective. Its delusional thinking, but once you have tortured people, its probably pretty hard to admit to yourself that what you did was ineffective and therefore even more immmoral.

Posted by mpowell | September 7, 2006 4:03 PM

That's not the only explanation. An alternative explanation is that they believe the willingness to do "whatever it takes" is an indication of strength, and the idea that we should worry about "moral vanity" or what anyone else might think of us is typical of liberal weakness.

Posted by Steve | September 7, 2006 4:19 PM

Alternately, they know that interrogations do "work" -- if "working" is defined as getting a confession that may or may not be true.

I neve claimed, Chris, that torture "never works." I'm sure every now and then somebody under torture actually says a true thing.

The point is that if you look at the actual mechanism involved in torture, there's very little genuine incentive on the part of the victim to give true information.

The situation is that a guy is hurting you really bad, so bad you're frightened for your life, so bad that maybe you want to die, and you know he wants information. He doesn't have the information, presumably, or he wouldn't be torturing you -- so you can tell him what you want. What you want to tell him is whatever will make him stop hurting you so bad. This may happen to coincide with the truth, but there's a much better chance it doesn't. Again, if his guesses were all that dependable, this guy wouldn't have cause to be torturing you.

Posted by Mike Meginnis | September 7, 2006 5:13 PM

Well, there is the political angle. I just find it hard to believe that they're gaining much from their torture position politically. Also regards looking for confessions: this also only has political value. I know the pessimist will say this is not true, but I honestly believe that the torture stuff has hurt the Republicans politically. Sure, people defend the policy by accusing liberals of weakness, but the fact is that it is a tough policy to defend which is why we see these arguments. Just b/c it gives the Republicans an opportunity to describe Democrats as weak does not mean its beneficial as a whole.

Posted by mpowell | September 7, 2006 5:26 PM

Everyone already knew about the British terror plot. The terror-derived information appears to have been wrong - there's little to link them to Al Qaeda, and it seems they were a long way away from being operationally dangerous.

That's just downright false, DivGuy.

Here's the Guardian again: "Reports from Pakistan suggest that much of the intelligence that led to the raids came from that country and that some of it may have been obtained in ways entirely unacceptable here. In particular Rashid Rauf, a British citizen said to be a prime source of information leading to last week's arrests, has been held without access to full consular or legal assistance. Disturbing reports in Pakistani papers that he had "broken" under interrogation have been echoed by local human rights bodies."

Now I've given you TWO articles that say that the information from Rauf, obtained by torture, lead to the arrests in Britain. If you dispute that, please give me some facts to the contrary.

Posted by Al | September 7, 2006 6:32 PM

Scott Lemieux says: And, of course, even if Al's link actually had solid evidence that torture both obtained reliable information and that this information was cruical to stopping the attacks--and it doesn't--so what? Interrogation that doesn't involve torture often works too. To say that "torture doesn't work" means that "it produces information that is generally much less reliable," not that it will never produce an isolated example of truth.

The implication of "torture doesn't work" - which is what Matthew said - is that no reliable information is ever produced by torture. And, as the evidence I provided shows, that's just outright false.

No interrogation technique produces 100% reliable information. Now, if you want to say that evidence produced by torture is less reliable that evidence produced by saying "pretty please", that's fine. I don't expect you'll have any evidence to provide me either way.

Scott Lemieux continues: Oh, spare us. That's why you are always found defending torture as a technique, and always engaging in full-throated, egregiously hackish defenses of the administration that endorses and practices it. If you actually think torture is wrong--and I, for one, don't believe you--it would actually make your actions worse.

No, I'm engaging in defenses of techniques that don't constitute torture. That *you* call something torture doesn't make it so.

Torture is wrong. Techniques that aren't torture - not so wrong.

Posted by Al | September 7, 2006 6:39 PM

S Tarzan says: Dennis Lormel didn't just say who al-Shibh was. He identified him as Mohammed Atta's roommate and a member of the same al-Qa'eda cell as Atta and another Sept. 11 hijacker. The FBI were also aware of al-Shibh's habit of wiring money to the Sept. 11 hijackers before Zubaydah was captured (and Mueller announced as much publicly).

That doesn't make al-Shibh an accomplice in the 9/11 plot, though, does it?

So what again did Zubaydah tell us that we didn't already know?

I don't know. But at a minimum it appears that he was identified by Zubaydah as part of the plot. And that Zubaydah gave information helping to locate al-Shibh.

So it appears to me that Ackerman is the one lying here. Ackerman says that the only thing Zubaydah tald us is al-Shibh's name. That just seems to be downright false. Not that I'd expect the truth out of Ackerman anyway.

Posted by Al | September 7, 2006 6:44 PM

I hate feeding the trolls...especially Al...who must be some sort of collective hive-mind to be so obnoxious on so many fronts in so many hours of the day... But I can't resist this.

"The implication of "torture doesn't work" - which is what Matthew said - is that no reliable information is ever produced by torture."

No, Al, that is decidedly not the implication. The implication is the actual meaning of the sentence -- torture doesn't reliably produce good information, or even often produce good information, or even infrequently but notably produce decent information. In other words, it's not functional. It doesn't accomplish the goal. None of this means it's never happened to unearth something that actually was, against all odds, true.

I'm not sure reliable information ever is produced by torture, though, since anything I say with nipple clamps on is by definition pretty suspect.

Posted by Mike Meginnis | September 7, 2006 7:09 PM

Now I've given you TWO articles that say that the information from Rauf, obtained by torture, lead to the arrests in Britain. If you dispute that, please give me some facts to the contrary.

Of course it led to the arrests. But the British police had already infiltrated the group and they were monitoring them. Rauf didn't identify anyone. Your rhetoric of "led to the arrests" implies that the British would-be terrorists were unknown to law enforcement before Rauf was tortured, and that is not correct.

The question is whether Rauf gave them new, true information. That is very much in doubt. From John Judis' TNR piece:

Was the plot an Al Qaeda operation? Rauf himself had been busted by the Pakistanis the day before the London arrests, and, according to the Pakistanis, had admitted--allegedly under torture--to having made contact with Matiur Rehman, whom the Pakistanis claim is an Al Qaeda operative. But that's hardly proof of Al Qaeda direction. Moreover, Rauf's role remains unclear. A British counterterrorism official told the Los Angeles Times that Rauf was not the plot's "mastermind." And Rauf's actual connection to Al Qaeda is also suspect. Rauf has been linked to Jaish-e-Mohammed, which operates in Kashmir. There could still be an Al Qaeda link. But, like all the initial details of this case, it remains in doubt.

As the details have become murky, what has also been cast in doubt is the explanation of why the arrests were made in the first place. According to British officials, the Brits did not want to arrest the plotters; they preferred to see who else, over the next months, the plotters recruited and made contact with. But their hand was forced when the Pakistanis arrested Rauf on August 9. Why the Pakistanis did so remains unclear, but there is a speculation that they did so at U.S. urging. "There have been reports that U.S. officials pushed for the arrest," the Los Angeles Times reported on August 20.

Posted by DivGuy | September 7, 2006 8:49 PM

No, I'm engaging in defenses of techniques that don't constitute torture. That *you* call something torture doesn't make it so.

Torture is wrong. Techniques that aren't torture - not so wrong.

I'd be interested if you can inform us of which aspects of the Geneva Conventions, or which aspects of hte new Army Field Manual you have determined are incorrect.

Is waterboarding torture? Is it torture to beat a suspect?
Is the use of cold rooms to induce hypothermia a form of torture? Each is considered illegal under Geneva and not one is allowed in the Field Manual.

And, of course, all three of these forms of torture have been used under the Bush administration, and Bush is currently working hard to maintain his authority to authorize this torture.

Posted by DivGuy | September 7, 2006 8:56 PM

That doesn't make al-Shibh an accomplice in the 9/11 plot, though, does it?

What else would al-Shibh have been giving money to the Sept. 11 hijackers for? Was the FBI under the impression that he was using them to build the world's most bitching Magic: The Gathering deck?

Posted by S. Tarzan | September 7, 2006 9:21 PM

Also, Bush himself doesn't say that Zubaydah helped locate al-Shibh, so I'm not sure why you think he did.

Posted by S. Tarzan | September 7, 2006 9:22 PM

What else would al-Shibh have been giving money to the Sept. 11 hijackers for?

Dunno exactly. Nonetheless, the CIA agrees with me, not you:

A C.I.A. spokesman said Thursday that the agency had vetted the president’s speech and stood by its accuracy.

“Abu Zubaydah was the authoritative source who identified Khalid Shaikh Mohammed as the mastermind of 9/11 and the man behind the nickname Muktar,” the spokesman, Paul Gimigliano, said in a statement. “His position in Al Qaeda — his access to terrorist secrets — gave his reporting exceptional weight and it gave C.I.A. insights that were truly unique and vital. Abu Zubaydah not only identified Ramzi Bin al-Shibh as a 9/11 accomplice — something that had been done before — he provided information that helped lead to his capture.”

(emphasis added)

Also, Bush himself doesn't say that Zubaydah helped locate al-Shibh, so I'm not sure why you think he did.

You're right. I was imprecise. Zubaydah didn't "help locate" him, instead Zubaydah "provided information that helped lead to his capture". Maybe there's a difference, although I can't conceive of what it might be.

Posted by Al | September 7, 2006 10:33 PM

"A CIA spokesman said yesterday that the agency had not vetted the President's speech, and that it contained serious inaccuracies."

What are the chances of ever seeing a line like that in print? I wonder why not.

Posted by brooksfoe | September 7, 2006 10:41 PM

DivGuy, I'll take your word for what the Judis piece says, as I can't read it. And no, I don't think that making someone too cold, or too hot, or making them stand up for a long time, constitutes torture. The fact that the Field Manual bans such techniques doesn't mean that they are. There are perfectly good prudential reasons to ban the military from using them even if they aren't.

Posted by Al | September 7, 2006 11:30 PM

And no, I don't think that making someone too cold, or too hot, or making them stand up for a long time, constitutes torture.

1) You can die of being "too cold". I'm going to assume that you think that US interrogators shouldn't kill people. Given that, is every other level of "too cold" acceptable? How about if it causes permanent damage? Or if it requires long hospitalization? There are recorded cases of prisoners being treated for severe hypothermia stemming from these interrogations, and these are practices hte president wants to keep.

Your rhetoric consistently gives the impression that no real harm is being done, which does not comport with hte facts in any way. The president wants to defend "cold rooms" because he wants to defend the option of inducing severe hypothermia as an interrogation procedure.

2) I asked about beatings and waterboarding, both of which are clearly part of the Abu Ghraib / Gitmo axis of interrogation which the president defends. Do you support those practices?

Posted by DivGuy | September 7, 2006 11:48 PM

The fact that defenders of torture routinely argue that if they can locate a single instance where torture has worked, they win the debate, just shows you how weak their position is, in both a moral and a logical sense.

Posted by Steve | September 7, 2006 11:50 PM

Why, without torture, our ancestors would not have been able to identfy all those witches, and Satan would rule the world!

Posted by rea | September 8, 2006 7:21 AM

....American officials had identified Mr. bin al-Shibh’s role in the attacks months before Mr. Zubaydah’s capture. A December 2001 federal grand jury indictment of Zacarias Moussaoui, the so-called 20th hijacker, said that Mr. Moussaoui had received money from Mr. bin al-Shibh and that Mr. bin al-Shibh had shared an apartment with Mohamed Atta, the ringleader of the plot.

A C.I.A. spokesman said Thursday that the agency had vetted the president’s speech and stood by its accuracy.

“Abu Zubaydah was the authoritative source who identified Khalid Shaikh Mohammed as the mastermind of 9/11 and the man behind the nickname Muktar,” the spokesman, Paul Gimigliano, said in a statement. “His position in Al Qaeda — his access to terrorist secrets — gave his reporting exceptional weight and it gave C.I.A. insights that were truly unique and vital. Abu Zubaydah not only identified Ramzi Bin al-Shibh as a 9/11 accomplice — something that had been done before — he provided information that helped lead to his capture.”....

from
THE INTELLIGENCE AGENCY; Questions Raised About Bush’ s Primary Claims in Defense of Secret Detention System
By MARK MAZZETTI September 8, 2006

Posted by artappraiser | September 8, 2006 1:31 PM

Link above did not take; article is here:

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/09/08/washington/08intel.html

Yglesias: can you put a list of html that works in comments somewhere for commenters--I am finding it tough to make links.

Posted by artappraiser | September 8, 2006 1:35 PM

Stalin did use torture to generate confessions, but selectively, as only a few of his millions of vistims rated show trials. He didn't need a confession to ship ordinary people off to the Gulag. A lot of Cheka/NKVD torture was pure sadism.
The atrocity that best fits your account is the Cambodian genocide. Tuol Sleng became a torture assembly-line to get the confessions of sabotaged harvests etc, to give a pretext for mass executions.

Remember that torture is a crime as well as an atrocity. Bush has just admitted to very serious criminal acts. A Democratic-controlled Congress must launch investigations, without prejudicing future prosecutions, Any Democratic candidate for President must promise a criminal investigation and rule out amnesty.

Posted by James Wimberley | September 8, 2006 5:09 PM