Boris the Torturer

Glenn Carle reviews the new memoir by FBI Agent Ali Soufan:

The third theme of The Black Banners is the most disturbing, poignant and effective section of the book: Soufan's growing disgust at how the interrogation methods developed and imposed on the intelligence community by the Bush Administration undermine our principles, break our laws, and do not work-indeed, how they actually hinder our intelligence work. Soufan and his colleagues in the FBI had been successfully interrogating terrorists for years before the sudden introduction of "enhanced interrogation techniques"-"torture" is the word a layman would use. We see convincing, devastating proof in his detailed descriptions of how, in case after case (e.g., Jamal Al-Fadl, Abu Jandal, Abu Zubaydah, Khaled bin Rasheed and on and on) he and his colleagues successfully interrogated al-Qaeda members by "establish[ing] rapport" with them, by talking about religion, or family, by sharing a taste for sweets, or by laughing with them, if necessary, rather than by intimidating and physically abusing a detainee. He describes his and his colleagues' consternation when confronted with the snake oil salesmen who peddled and imposed "enhanced interrogation techniques"-a pseudo-expert the CIA brought in to oversee interrogations, whom Soufan gives the appropriately menacing and foolish sobriquet "Boris"-who had never conducted an interrogation, knew nothing about terrorism, and who knew nothing about intelligence work. "Why is this necessary" Soufan asked when first confronted with such measures as sensory deprivation, overload, or humiliation, "given that Abu Zubydah is cooperating?" As "Boris" tinkered with ever-increasingly harsh, and ever-ineffective, ways to break detainees, Soufan and his colleagues tried to oppose them, but as was the case with everyone involved in the interrogation program (myself included,) failed. Soufan and the FBI formally ceased any involvement in the case. "I can no longer remain here. Either I leave or I'll arrest [Boris]." It is telling that, to my knowledge, four individuals with first-hand experience in interrogations during the "War on Terror," have spoken out about enhanced interrogation methods: two Air Force officers (Steve Kleinman and another officer writing under the pseudonym Matthew Alexander), an FBI officer (Soufan), and a CIA officer (myself). All of us, independently, make the same points: interrogation must be based on rapport; enhanced interrogation methods are ineffective, counterproductive, immoral, illegal, and unnecessary, and they had nothing to do with obtaining much, if any, information not otherwise obtainable. It is only apologists for the Bush Administration, or Bush Administration policymakers themselves, who assert that "enhanced interrogation techniques" are legal, or work. Soufan is devastating about these methods: "The person or persons running the program were not sane....the interrogation was stepping over the line from borderline torture. Way over the line." "In FBI headquarters, the situation was clear....What Boris was doing was un-American and ineffective."