Authors: Senate Select Committee on Intelligence
8. The CIA Obtains Legal and Policy Approval for Its Enhanced Interrogation Techniques: The CIA Does Not Brief the President
As described, CIA officers represented to National Security Advisor Rice that Abu Zubaydah was withholding information on pending attacks and operatives in the United States. On July 31, 2002, Rice informed Deputy DCI John McLaughlin that, in balancing the application of the CIA’s enhanced interrogation techniques against the possible loss of American lives, she would not object to the CIA’s enhanced interrogation techniques if the attorney general determined them to be legal.
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During the month of July 2002, the CIA anticipated that the president would need to approve the use of the CIA’s enhanced interrogation techniques before they could be used. Therefore, in late July 2002, the CIA prepared talking points for a briefing of the president. These draft talking points indicated that the CIA was planning to use interrogation techniques beyond what was normally permitted by law enforcement, and included a brief description of the waterboard interrogation technique. On August 1, 2002, based on comments from White House Counsel Alberto Gonzales, the talking points were revised to eliminate references to the waterboard.
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CIA records indicate, however, that the talking points were not used to brief the president. On August 2, 2002, the National Security Council legal advisor informed the DCI’s chief of staff that “Dr. Rice had been informed that there would be no briefing of the President on this matter,”
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but that the DCI had policy approval to employ the CIA’s enhanced interrogation techniques.
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CIA records state that prior to the use of the CIA’s enhanced interrogation techniques on Abu Zubaydah in 2002, the CIA did not brief Secretary of State Colin Powell or Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, two members of the National Security Council, on the techniques.
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The Committee, including the chairman and vice chairman, was also not briefed on the CIA’s enhanced interrogation techniques prior to their use.
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Approximately a year later, on July 31, 2003, senior CIA personnel believed the president had still not been briefed on the CIA’s enhanced interrogation techniques.
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In August 2003, DCI Tenet told the CIA Office of Inspector General that “he had never spoken to the President regarding the detention and interrogation program or EITs, nor was he aware of whether the President had been briefed by his staff.”
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The May 2004 CIA Inspector General Special Review included a recommendation for the DCI to:
“Brief the President regarding the implementation of the Agency’s detention and interrogation activities pursuant to the MON of 17 September 2001 or any other authorities, including the use of EITs and the fact that detainees have died. This Recommendation is significant.”
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In transmitting the Special Review to the Committee, DCI Tenet responded to the recommendation, noting only that “[t]he DCI will determine whether and to what extent the President requires a briefing on the Program.”
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On April 6, 2006, CIA Inspector General Helgerson responded to a request from Committee Vice Chairman John D. Rockefeller IV on the status of corrective actions taken in response to the Special Review recommendations. With regard to a briefing for the president, Helgerson wrote: “Consistent with this recommendation, DCI Tenet, before he left office, and Director Goss, shortly after taking office, both advised me that they had made requests to brief the President.”
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Prepared “Questions and Answers” for the National Security Council principals in connection with the disclosure of the program in September 2006 and subsequent media outreach also suggest that the president was not briefed at the outset about the CIA’s interrogation techniques. In response to the potential question: “What role did the President play . . . Was he briefed on the interrogation techniques, and if so when?” the proposed answer did not assert that the president was briefed, but rather that the “President was not of course involved in CIA’s day to day operations—including who should be held by CIA and how they should be questioned—these decisions are made or overseen by CIA Directors.”
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CIA records indicate that the first CIA briefing for the president on the CIA’s enhanced interrogation techniques occurred on April 8, 2006.
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CIA records state that when the president was briefed, he expressed discomfort with the “image of a detainee, chained to the ceiling, clothed in a diaper, and forced to go to the bathroom on himself.”
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9. The CIA Uses the Waterboard and Other Enhanced Interrogation Techniques Against Abu Zubaydah
On August 3, 2002, CIA Headquarters informed the interrogation team at DETENTION SITE GREEN that it had formal approval to apply the CIA’s enhanced interrogation techniques, including the waterboard, against Abu Zubaydah. According to CIA records, only the two CIA contractors, SWIGERT and DUNBAR, were to have contact with Abu Zubaydah. Other CIA personnel at DETENTION SITE GREEN—including CIA medical personnel and other CIA “interrogators with whom he is familiar”—were only to observe.
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From August 4, 2002, through August 23, 2002, the CIA subjected Abu Zubaydah to its enhanced interrogation techniques on a near 24-hour-per-day basis. After Abu Zubaydah had been in complete isolation for 47 days, the most aggressive interrogation phase began at approximately 11:50 AM on August 4, 2002.
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Security personnel entered the cell, shackled and hooded Abu Zubaydah, and removed his towel (Abu Zubaydah was then naked). Without asking any questions, the interrogators placed a rolled towel around his neck as a collar, and backed him up into the cell wall (an interrogator later acknowledged the collar was used to slam Abu Zubaydah against a concrete wall).
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The interrogators then removed the hood, performed an attention grab, and had Abu Zubaydah watch while a large confinement box was brought into the cell and laid on the floor.
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A cable states Abu Zubaydah “was unhooded and the large confinement box was carried into the interrogation room and paced [
sic
] on the floor so as to appear as a coffin.”
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The interrogators then demanded detailed and verifiable information on terrorist operations planned against the United States, including the names, phone numbers, email addresses, weapon caches, and safe houses of anyone involved. CIA records describe Abu Zubaydah as appearing apprehensive. Each time Abu Zubaydah denied having additional information, the interrogators would perform a facial slap or face grab.
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At approximately 6:20 PM, Abu Zubaydah was waterboarded for the first time. Over a two-and-a-half-hour period, Abu Zubaydah coughed, vomited, and had “involuntary spasms of the torso and extremities” during waterboarding.
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Detention site personnel noted that “throughout the process [Abu Zubaydah] was asked and given the opportunity to respond to questions about threats” to the United States, but Abu Zubaydah continued to maintain that he did not have any additional information to provide.
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In an email to OMS leadership entitled, “So it begins,” a medical officer wrote:
“The sessions accelerated rapidly progressing quickly to the water board after large box, walling, and small box periods. [Abu Zubaydah] seems very resistant to the water board. Longest time with the cloth over his face so far has been 17 seconds. This is sure to increase shortly. NO useful information so far . . . He did vomit a couple of times during the water board with some beans and rice. It’s been 10 hours since he ate so this is surprising and disturbing. We plan to only feed Ensure for a while now. I’m head[ing] back for another water board session.”
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The use of the CIA’s enhanced interrogation techniques—including “walling, attention grasps, slapping, facial hold, stress positions, cramped confinement, white noise and sleep deprivation”—continued in “varying combinations, 24 hours a day” for 17 straight days, through August 20, 2002.
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When Abu Zubaydah was left alone during this period, he was placed in a stress position, left on the waterboard with a cloth over his face, or locked in one of two confinement boxes. According to the cables, Abu Zubaydah was also subjected to the waterboard “2–4 times a day . . . with multiple iterations of the watering cycle during each application.”
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The “aggressive phase of interrogation” continued until August 23, 2002.
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Over the course of the entire 20 day “aggressive phase of interrogation,” Abu Zubaydah spent a total of 266 hours (11 days, 2 hours) in the large (coffin size) confinement box and 29 hours in a small confinement box, which had a width of 21 inches, a depth of 2.5 feet, and a height of 2.5 feet. The CIA interrogators told Abu Zubaydah that the only way he would leave the facility was in the coffin-shaped confinement box.
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According to the daily cables from DETENTION SITE GREEN, Abu Zubaydah frequently “cried,” “begged,” “pleaded,” and “whimpered,” but continued to deny that he had any additional information on current threats to, or operatives in, the United States.
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By August 9, 2002, the sixth day of the interrogation period, the interrogation team informed CIA Headquarters that they had come to the “collective preliminary assessment” that it was unlikely Abu Zubaydah “had actionable new information about current threats to the United States.”
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On August 10, 2002, the interrogation team stated that it was “highly unlikely” that Abu Zubaydah possessed the information they were seeking.
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On the same day, the interrogation team reiterated a request for personnel from CIA Headquarters to travel to the detention site to view the interrogations. A cable stated that the team believed that a “first-hand, on-the-ground look is best,” but if CIA Headquarters personnel could not visit, a video teleconference would suffice.
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DETENTION SITE GREEN personnel also informed CIA Headquarters that it was their assessment that the application of the CIA’s enhanced interrogation techniques was “approach[ing] the legal limit.”
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The chief of CTC, Jose Rodriguez, responded:
“Strongly urge that any speculative language as to the legality of given activities or, more precisely, judgment calls as to their legality vis-à-vis operational guidelines for this activity agreed upon and vetted at the most senior levels of the agency, be refrained from in written traffic (email or cable traffic). Such language is not helpful.”
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DETENTION SITE GREEN cables describe Abu Zubaydah as “compliant,” informing CIA Headquarters that when the interrogator “raised his eyebrow, without instructions,” Abu Zubaydah “slowly walked on his own to the water table and sat down.”
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When the interrogator “snapped his fingers twice,” Abu Zubaydah would lie flat on the waterboard.
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Despite the assessment of personnel at the detention site that Abu Zubaydah was compliant, CIA Headquarters stated that they continued to believe that Abu Zubaydah was withholding threat information and instructed the CIA interrogators to continue using the CIA’s enhanced interrogation techniques.
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At times Abu Zubaydah was described as “hysterical”
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and “distressed to the level that he was unable to effectively communicate.”
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Waterboarding sessions “resulted in immediate fluid intake and involuntary leg, chest and arm spasms” and “hysterical pleas.”
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In at least one waterboarding session, Abu Zubaydah “became completely unresponsive, with bubbles rising through his open, full mouth.”
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According to CIA records, Abu Zubaydah remained unresponsive until medical intervention, when he regained consciousness and expelled “copious amounts of liquid.” This experience with the waterboard was referenced in emails, but was not documented or otherwise noted in CIA cables.
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When two CIA Headquarters officers later compared the Abu Zubaydah interrogation videotapes to the cable record, neither commented on this session. A review of the catalog of videotapes, however, found that recordings of a 21-hour period, which included two waterboarding sessions, were missing.
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CIA personnel at DETENTION SITE GREEN reported being disturbed by the use of the CIA’s enhanced interrogation techniques against Abu Zubaydah. CIA records include the following reactions and comments by CIA personnel: