Some
of this was already known or suspected by us, but the confirmation and
surprising excesses just make me ashamed to be American. It's a black
mark on all the Americans who previously or currently fight for freedom
and human rights honorably, or in some cases they do it
smartly/peacefully so they don't need to fight at all.
Of course the CIA regurgitated the same tired lines that this disclosure will put US personnel and interests in danger overseas, and their tactics (albeit ugly) prevented attacks. Well on the first point, there is no such thing as secrecy in our social media connected world. Even if there was no Senate report, people all over the world have experienced or know of relatives and neighbors getting kidnapped, tortured, or assassinated. Do you think they don't care and just forget? They hate us for it and it breeds new security threats for the US. So don't blame the Senate for exposing what foreigners already know. The Senate is just forcing the apathetic, aloof public to look at ourselves in the mirror - which is a critical requirement of a functional free society that we may overlook.
Re: their second point, that the ends justify the means - well we know where that argument leads. Technically, it will probably make America safer if we nuke Pakistan tomorrow. Are we prepared to do that? Of course not. From a utilitarian perspective, you have to draw the line on how much evil you are willing to commit to do good, and I think our society wants to have a very low bar for that (as we should). If the outcome is good, you can rationalize and make all the excuses you want. But what if you're wrong and you failed? You committed all that evil for no gain, and we have to deal with the consequences of the evil too. The Senate report suggested that torture did generate some actionable intel, but they weren't critical pieces of intel, and in many cases that info was also obtained through more ethical means. So it was a lot of evil for very little benefits, and there were better ways to get the same benefits. Of course intel under duress is full of lies and false leads, which wasted intel resources. The CIA is a gov't agency too - so hawkish conservatives need to remember that it's not immune to similar screw-ups as we've seen at the VA, HHS, IRS, etc.
Like the recent NSA abuses, this is what
happens when we as a society get so lazy/fearful/egocentric that we let
our perceived security trump everything else, and entrust it to
sociopaths with little to no scruples or accountability (and plenty of
ulterior motives). Maybe that is not fair; I do believe that many in our
security apparatus (even the criminals) do really love America and
believe that they are doing what is best for our safety. But like Wall
Street, they fail to take a broader, longer view of what safety truly
means. Their mission at hand is not necessarily compatible to the
overall mission of the US. And maybe like US law enforcement, we give
the CIA more credit than they actually deserve in terms of brainpower
and competence. Because it's pretty scary to ponder - are our protectors
actually inept and immoral? Well it's better that we ask and find out,
rather than just hope for the best and get a rude awakening (like 9/11,
or Bay of Pigs, or Iran-Contra, and the list goes on and on).Of course the CIA regurgitated the same tired lines that this disclosure will put US personnel and interests in danger overseas, and their tactics (albeit ugly) prevented attacks. Well on the first point, there is no such thing as secrecy in our social media connected world. Even if there was no Senate report, people all over the world have experienced or know of relatives and neighbors getting kidnapped, tortured, or assassinated. Do you think they don't care and just forget? They hate us for it and it breeds new security threats for the US. So don't blame the Senate for exposing what foreigners already know. The Senate is just forcing the apathetic, aloof public to look at ourselves in the mirror - which is a critical requirement of a functional free society that we may overlook.
Re: their second point, that the ends justify the means - well we know where that argument leads. Technically, it will probably make America safer if we nuke Pakistan tomorrow. Are we prepared to do that? Of course not. From a utilitarian perspective, you have to draw the line on how much evil you are willing to commit to do good, and I think our society wants to have a very low bar for that (as we should). If the outcome is good, you can rationalize and make all the excuses you want. But what if you're wrong and you failed? You committed all that evil for no gain, and we have to deal with the consequences of the evil too. The Senate report suggested that torture did generate some actionable intel, but they weren't critical pieces of intel, and in many cases that info was also obtained through more ethical means. So it was a lot of evil for very little benefits, and there were better ways to get the same benefits. Of course intel under duress is full of lies and false leads, which wasted intel resources. The CIA is a gov't agency too - so hawkish conservatives need to remember that it's not immune to similar screw-ups as we've seen at the VA, HHS, IRS, etc.
Anyone who has worked a corporate job knows how easily it is for depts and teams to get fixated on their immediate objectives and success criteria, without considering the implications/significance on the overall company's success. I think this probably occurred at the CIA and NSA. Their narrow success criteria are "intel" and kills (in the case of the CIA), and they are the ones who get to tell their "customers" how good of a job they're doing. So without due diligence, attribution, and independent scrutiny, who is to say whether their intel and kills are actually low or high value? So of course, each morsel of info they gather is a home run, and each target they murder was an immediate threat to the US. They are incentivized to get as much info as possible, by whatever means available (and under Bush and Obama, they got the keys to the kingdom).
Sure there is some federal oversight, but most of it is classified and never gets public review. I don't think that is a very smart way to structure things. But we can't really expect the CIA and NSA to not go hog wild if we give them such freedom, mandate, and budgets. The bigger blame is on our civilian leaders who let the beast out of the cage, and the US public who failed to hold any of them accountable (until it was too late). And I doubt anyone will get fired or go to jail over the report, which adds to the tragedy.
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Regarding points 1 and 2 I would offer a less cynical approach:
1. It will endanger Americans because the truth being
exposed is ugly. I heard some official say there really isn't a good
time to release this kind of info. So pragmatically speaking, they
should expect backlash. So not a reason to stop the release but an
accepted cost of release.
2. Whether this is true or not I can imagine an insider
wanting or needing it to be true. Not that the ends justify the means
but that the means, having been done, provided something worthwhile.
The alternative is all loss and nothing redeeming.
So hopefully some of these people are making these assertions for the right reasons instead of political ones.
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Thx, M. Yeah as you said, there's never really a good time to
announce bad news. But if the CIA was worried about this stuff getting
out and endangering Americans, then they shouldn't have done it in the
first place. It's the act, not the revelation, that is damaging. And so
far, I haven't heard of any attacks on US targets. An optimistic way of
looking at it might be that foreigners will respect America more for
investigating its dirty laundry rather than burying/denying it like
Putin or Kim might.
Like the VA hearings a while back,
this is of course is prompting calls for a "total review" of the Agency
and cultural change, but as we know, that stuff happens slowly or
never. Congress seems upset that they were misled/not fully informed,
although the CIA denies it. No president (incl. Obama) has tried to
stand up and rein in the CIA. There was some talk that Kennedy wanted to
after the Bay of Pigs fiasco, but obviously didn't get the chance (and
some believe that the CIA had a role in his death, but I don't mean to
bring up conspiracies).
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Why are they beyond reproach? They were created by the state, and the state represents the citizenry. It's not like they're some rogue kingdom like North Korea that we have to handle with kid gloves. But I guess they do act like a "state within a state" at times.
Maybe our leaders don't have the stomach for it, but with a stroke of a pen, Congress and the President could require the CIA to expose its finances, data, and emails each year (to the right eyes of course), and we could appoint an independent watchdog that needs to be present at all high level intel and strategy meetings - and also has to approve any tier 1 action. Just knowing that someone is watching you is often enough to clean up behavior and reduce risk taking. And if this is done delicately, it won't degrade our security readiness at all. In fact, could be the opposite. Sure the CIA will bitch about it (no one likes a micromanager), but then they should have behaved better in the first place.
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Isn't that sort of not true though? I mean the whole part that is in contention is whether and/or to what extent the CIA fed lies to the overseers. The classic who watches the watchers dilemma. So watchdog all you like there will never be a guarantee that an agency whose sole agenda is covert ops will be fully forthright with anyone but themselves. Not to say we quit and take it but these gaps in information are sort of the cost of entry to this type of game.
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I see your point, but that is why the CIA can't be trusted to self-report truthfully (just like you have to take a defendant's testimony with a grain of salt unless corroborated by others). We have to go beyond the Congressional committees (even though they swear oaths when they testify), and have non-CIA people embedded at the Agency to watch the watchmen. It's also like SOX compliance, public companies have to hire a third-party audit firm for the accounting - they just can't tell the SEC to trust them that it's all good.
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