The Al-Qaeda leader who wasn’t: How the CIA waterboarded the wrong person 83 times in 1 month

SOTT – The allegations against the man were serious indeed. Donald Rumsfeld said he was “if not the number two, very close to the number two person” in Al Qaeda.

The Central Intelligence Agency informed Assistant Attorney General Jay Bybee that he “served as Usama Bin Laden’s senior lieutenant.

In that capacity, he has managed a network of training camps…. He also acted as al-Qaeda’s coordinator of external contacts and foreign communications.”

CIA Director Michael Hayden would tell the press in 2008 that 25 percent of all the information his agency had gathered about Al Qaeda from human sources “originated” with one other detainee and him.

George W. Bush would use his case to justify the CIA’s “enhanced interrogation program,” claiming that “he had run a terrorist camp in Afghanistan where some of the 9/11 hijackers trained” and that “he helped smuggle al-Qaeda leaders out of Afghanistan” so they would not be captured by US military forces.

None of it was true.  CONTINUE READING