When a top al Qaeda officer wants to speak about someone who has spent their career disrupting al Qaeda, perhaps we ought not take the al Qaeda officer’s testimony as given in good faith.
Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, organizer of the 9/11 attacks and senior al Qaeda operations officer, wishes to speak to Gina Haspel’s suitability to lead the CIA, the New York Times reports.
What does KSM offer?
Well, according to the Times, the information does not come from discovery findings by the terrorist’s defense team or other government files — things that might have forensic or objective evidentiary value — but rather from KSM himself.
There is thus only one justifiable response to KSM’s request: rejection.
Don’t get me wrong, Haspel’s involvement in the CIA’s Bush administration-era interrogation program is a legitimate focus for senators now considering her nomination to lead the CIA. But that legally authorized program saved thousands of lives and Haspel’s involvement in it has been badly mischaracterized.
Senators have a responsibility to listen to those American individuals and interests who support Haspel’s nomination, and those who oppose her. But senators also have a responsibility to ignore KSM. To do otherwise would be an act of abject absurdity, facilitating KSM’s effort to disrupt U.S. democracy.
And that disruption is exactly what KSM is doing here. How do we know this?
By considering al Qaeda’s operational methodology and KSM’s own record. The first point is relevant because in its peak of the late 1990s to early 2000s al Qaeda inculcated its officers with the need to deceive and manipulate the U.S. government if captured. KSM played a major role in developing these tactics which were employed to mislead interrogators and turn the U.S. system against itself.
History records that KSM was a master at applying these tactics.
When I interviewed Jim Mitchell, an architect of and senior interrogator in the CIA’s former interrogation program, he offered an example of KSM’s enjoyment at manipulating perceived American weaknesses.
“Before [KSM] was transferred to a black site,” Mitchell told me, “he had several days in which he was given tea and polite conversation. During that time he prayed and chanted. One of the interrogators during that period wore Pakistani dress [to try and earn KSM’s respect]. KSM later told me he thought those guys were clowns.”
It’s clear that KSM is now trying to render senators clowns in the same vein. Having seen the media reporting over Haspel’s nomination and the controversy it has sparked, KSM senses an opportunity. At the simple end, it’s an opportunity for revenge against a talented intelligence officer who helped smash KSM’s organization. At the more complicated level, KSM hopes to divide Americans, weaken the CIA, and negatively propagandize against U.S. counterterrorism policies.
Senators must not play KSM’s games. He remains a determined and intelligent U.S. adversary, not some guy off the street who was treated badly and thinks people should know about it.
