The Central Intelligence Agency told CNSNews.com today that it stands by the assertion made in a May 30, 2005 Justice Department memo that the use of “enhanced techniques” of interrogation on al Qaeda leader Khalid Sheik Mohammed (KSM) -- including the use of waterboarding -- caused KSM to reveal information that allowed the U.S. government to thwart a planned attack on Los Angeles.

Before he was waterboarded, when KSM was asked about planned attacks on the United States, he ominously told his CIA interrogators, “Soon, you will know.”

According to the previously classified May 30, 2005 Justice Department memo that was released by President Barack Obama last week, the thwarted attack -- which KSM called the “Second Wave”-- planned “ ‘to use East Asian operatives to crash a hijacked airliner into’ a building in Los Angeles.”

KSM was the mastermind of the first “hijacked-airliner” attacks on the United States, which struck the World Trade Center in New York and the Pentagon in Northern Virginia on Sept. 11, 2001.

After KSM was captured by the United States, he was not initially cooperative with CIA interrogators. Nor was another top al Qaeda leader named Zubaydah. KSM, Zubaydah, and a third terrorist named Nashiri were the only three persons ever subjected to waterboarding by the CIA. (Additional terrorist detainees were subjected to other “enhanced techniques” that included slapping, sleep deprivation, dietary limitations, and temporary confinement to small spaces -- but not to water-boarding.)

This was because the CIA imposed very tight restrictions on the use of waterboarding. “The ‘waterboard,’ which is the most intense of the CIA interrogation techniques, is subject to additional limits,” explained the May 30, 2005 Justice Department memo. “It may be used on a High Value Detainee only if the CIA has ‘credible intelligence that a terrorist attack is imminent’; ‘substantial and credible indicators that the subject has actionable intelligence that can prevent, disrupt or deny this attack’; and ‘[o]ther interrogation methods have failed to elicit this information within the perceived time limit for preventing the attack.’”

The quotations in this part of the Justice memo were taken from an Aug. 2, 2004 letter that CIA Acting General Counsel John A. Rizzo sent to the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel.

Before they were subjected to “enhanced techniques” of interrogation that included waterboarding, KSM and Zubaydah were not only uncooperative but also appeared contemptuous of the will of the American people to defend themselves.

“In particular, the CIA believes that it would have been unable to obtain critical information from numerous detainees, including KSM and Abu Zubaydah, without these enhanced techniques,” says the Justice Department memo. “Both KSM and Zubaydah had ‘expressed their belief that the general US population was ‘weak,’ lacked resilience, and would be unable to ‘do what was necessary’ to prevent the terrorists from succeeding in their goals.’ Indeed, before the CIA used enhanced techniques in its interrogation of KSM, KSM resisted giving any answers to questions about future attacks, simply noting, ‘Soon you will know.’”

After he was subjected to the “waterboard” technique, KSM became cooperative, providing intelligence that led to the capture of key al Qaeda allies and, eventually, the closing down of an East Asian terrorist cell that had been tasked with carrying out the 9/11-style attack on Los Angeles.

The May 30, 2005 Justice Department memo that details what happened in this regard was written by then-Principal Deputy Attorney General Steven G. Bradbury to John A. Rizzo, the senior deputy general counsel for the CIA.

“You have informed us that the interrogation of KSM—once enhanced techniques were employed—led to the discovery of a KSM plot, the ‘Second Wave,’ ‘to use East Asian operatives to crash a hijacked airliner into’ a building in Los Angeles,” says the memo.

“You have informed us that information obtained from KSM also led to the capture of Riduan bin Isomuddin, better known as Hambali, and the discover of the Guraba Cell, a 17-member Jemaah Islamiyah cell tasked with executing the ‘Second Wave,’” reads the memo. “More specifically, we understand that KSM admitted that he had [redaction] large sum of money to an al Qaeda associate [redaction] … Khan subsequently identified the associate (Zubair), who was then captured. Zubair, in turn, provided information that led to the arrest of Hambali. The information acquired from these captures allowed CIA interrogators to pose more specific questions to KSM, which led the CIA to Hambali’s brother, al Hadi. Using information obtained from multiple sources, al-Hadi was captured, and he subsequently identified the Garuba cell. With the aid of this additional information, interrogations of Hambali confirmed much of what was learned from KSM.”

A CIA spokesman confirmed to CNSNews.com today that the CIA stands by the factual assertions made here.

In the memo itself, the Justice Department’s Bradbury told the CIA’s Rossi: “Your office has informed us that the CIA believes that ‘the intelligence acquired from these interrogations has been a key reason why al Qa’ida has failed to launch a spectacular attack in the West since 11 September 2001.”

Additional interrogations of these two lead to learning of who and where while raids were made and stopped that plan.

Well, thank goodness we're turning this into an anti-Christian thread.

Well, thank goodness we're turning this into an anti-Christian thread.

Mine wasn't a comment about Christianity itself-- it was directed at the hypocrisy of Christians who are ok with torture yet call themselves followers of Jesus.

Man I'm going to sound like an ass, but these days now that I don't really think of myself as a Christian I feel like I can finally say it:

Aren't you a Christian? Is this what you think your Jesus would do? Are you showing the attitude and stance of someone who is trying to follow Jesus? Is this what it means to "Love your enemies?" or to "Do good to those that harm you?"

You are right my response is not very Christian. This is a failing of my Christian journey. I have always believed that there are forces in this world that you can not passively subdue and to stop them from causing more harm to others; one must use force to stop them.

And yet, you ignore the fact that I was one of the most vocal - if not THE most vocal - critics of our torture regime on the boards, and I'm also a Christian.

Like I have to occasionally say to my self-absorbed teenagers in class, it's not always about you.

According to the new narrative, which compiles legal advice provided by the Bush administration to the CIA, Rice personally conveyed the administration's approval for waterboarding of Zubaydah, a so-called high-value detainee, to then-CIA Director George Tenet in July 2002.

These are men that plot to kill innocent civillians. The more they kill the happier they are. I endorse any means to get any shred of information out of them.

These are men that plot to kill innocent civillians. The more they kill the happier they are. I endorse any means to get any shred of information out of them.

Show me the sweeping generality I made about Christianity please.

What's the point? You're just going to deny it. You're not really capable of owning up to it. Kind of like your insinuations that I was a racist during the campaign. It's either someone overreacting or you claiming it was a joke.

Congratulations. You have become that which you hate.

The problem with this point of view is you HAVE to take into context not only the waterboarding, but our policy of extraordinary rendition and holding prisoners without trial as enemy combatants.

For a long time, we just took whoever we wanted to take, and did whatever we wanted to do with them. Not everyone was picked up on the field of battle. Some were abducted on the streets of allied countries.

How is using "any means necessary" against one person any less evil than using "any means necessary" against hundreds or thousands of people?

Answer : it's not. You're trying to justify your statements with moral flexibility, but any moral that is flexible doesn't really exist.

Simple, the 1 person has instigated an action and is getting the treatment as a response to that action. The hundreds of thousands of people have not committed those same actions. They are civillians. Even if you want to label it as evil, I'm OK with evil in the described circumstance. I don't care what you call or label it as, it is a military operative that is seeking to kill thousands of civillians and he has information that could save those lives.

even if they talk, it's under duress, and statements under duress are suspect at best, if not outright misleading.

3 - Arrest them and give them a trial with full protections under the US Constitution even if it means sharing the classified evidence with them so they can pass it along to others by means of their attorney. Forget the fact that they are a) not US Citizens b) want us to not exist and c) hold us and our way of life in contempt. (welcome to the Obama plan!)

So the uncovering and stopping of the West Coast 9/11 by interrogating KSM and the two others other were totally unreliable?