Yeah, so I guess this revelation was coming, but it still stings a bit. Papers found in the fomer Libyan head of intelligence's office show that Libyan help with the CIA program of kidnap and torture known as "extraordinary rendition" was bought by the United States and the Britain with information on Libyan dissidents living outside that country. This included spying on the leader of the revolution, Abdel-Hakim Belhaj.
Currently the CIA is refusing to comment, but I don't imagine their non-denial denial will be much different from MI6's. They're currently hoping the "that happened under the last guy" defense will hold them through. I don't think they really have much to worry about. Since it's likely that the NSA and the FBI are still spying on Americans to keep democracy safe from us, so I doubt most of us will put down our deep-fried butter long enough to utter a adnoidal moan of protest. Besides, thems brown people who can't even be bothered to speak English, so what do we care, right?
I know we have to do things we don't like during times of war. Hell, I'm a Veteran, and I can damn sure tell you that I did not want to be anywhere near the places I went to do the things that I did. But the program we're talking about, snatching people off the street, flying them to oubliettes in the darkest, despairingest quarters of this benighted globe, and attaching car batteries to their nurples, this ain't what I signed up for. When the recruiter showed up and set a rickety folding table outside the principal's office and harrassed passers-by about their future and what-are-you-going-to-do-for-college-money, he never once mentioned an "insult slap" being one of the weapons they'd teach me to use.
Do we have less honor than when I served? I can't believe that. These men who did these things at the behest of the Bush Administration, they're mostly former military. That's where the CIA likes to get its interrogators, because the Army has a top-notch program that turns out some really effective questioners. Do they have no honor? I know that they do. They signed up for low pay and dangerous work. They have tons of honor. Seriously, I don't have an answer here. I know this question's been raised time and again, but each time, the answers are insufficient. So I'll ask again.
How did it come to this?
Video below the fold.
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