The Senate Intelligence Committee Report on Torture: Committee Study of the Central Intelligence Agency's Detention and Interrogation Program (34 page)

On May █, 2003, Ammar al-Baluchi and Khallad bin Attash were rendered to CIA custody and immediately subjected to the CIA’s enhanced interrogation techniques.
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The next day, the CIA disseminated two intelligence reports on the Karachi Plot(s) from the interrogations of Ammar al-Baluchi and Khallad bin Attash.
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The reporting relayed that: (1) al-Qa’ida was targeting Western interests in Karachi, including the U.S. Consulate and Western housing in a specific neighborhood of Karachi; and (2) the attack could have occurred as early as “late May/early June 2003,” but the plotters were still in the process of finding vehicles, a safe house, and the suicide operatives at the time of their arrest.
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These disseminated intelligence reports were used to support CIA representations in finished intelligence products,
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talking points, briefing documents, and President Bush’s September 6, 2006, speech that the Karachi Plot(s) was “thwarted,” “disrupted,” or “uncovered” as a result of the CIA’s enhanced interrogation techniques. However, within 24 hours of the dissemination of these intelligence reports, CIA personnel in Karachi responded in an official cable that the information acquired from the CIA detainees and disseminated was already known to the CIA and U.S. Consulate officials. The cable stated:

“[w]hile reporting from both [al-Baluchi and bin Attash] was chilling- [CIA officers] had become aware of most of this reporting either through previous information or through interviews of al-Baluchi and [Khallad bin] Attash prior to their transfer out of Karachi.”
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The CIA personnel in Karachi reassured addressees that, in December 2002,
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the U.S. Consulate in Karachi took increased steps to protect U.S. Consulate personnel based on similar terrorist threat reporting. According to the cable, Americans in the referenced housing area had already been vacated from the “area for several months,” the potential for “attacks targeting Americans at the airport” had been “recognized several months ago,” and new procedures and security measures had been put in place to minimize the risks associated with the potential terrorist attacks.
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As noted, in November 2007, the CIA prepared and provided a set of talking points to the CIA director for an “upcoming meeting with the President regarding the Waterboard Enhanced Interrogation Technique.” Under a section entitled, “Plots Discovered as a Result of EITs,” the document lists the “Karachi Plot,” stating the disruption was the result of “key intelligence collected from CIA detainee interrogations
after applying the waterboard
along with other interrogation techniques,” and that the plotting was “
uncovered
during the initial interrogations of Khallad Bin Attash and Ammar al-Baluchi and later confirmed by KSM.”
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While Ammar al-Baluchi and Khallad bin Attash were subjected to the CIA’s enhanced interrogation techniques, there are no CIA records to indicate that either was ever subjected to the CIA’s waterboard interrogation technique. KSM did provide information on the plotting, but was assessed by CIA personnel to be withholding information on the plotting, more than a month after the CIA stopped using its enhanced interrogation techniques against KSM. In late April 2003, CIA interrogators confronted KSM with photographs demonstrating that Ammar al-Baluchi and Khallad bin Attash had been captured. When the CIA interrogators asked what Ammar al-Baluchi and Khallad bin Attash were “up to” in Karachi, KSM provided information regarding potential targets in Karachi.
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KSM’s belated reporting prompted the CIA’s ALEC Station to write a cable stating:

“We were disappointed to see that KSM only made these new admissions of planned attacks in Pakistan after seeing the capture photographs of Ammar al-Baluchi and Khallad. We consider KSM’s long-standing omission of [this] information to be a serious concern, especially as this omission may well have cost American lives had Pakistani authorities not been diligent in following up on unrelated criminal leads that led to the capture of Ammar, bin Attash, and other probable operatives involved in the attack plans . . . Simply put, KSM has had every opportunity to come clean on this threat and, from our optic, he deliberately withheld the information until he was confronted with evidence that we already knew about it, or soon would know about it from Ammar and Khallad . . . KSM’s provision of the Pakistan threat reporting—only after he was made aware of the capture of the attack planners—is viewed as a clear illustration of continued and deliberate withholding of threat information which he believed had not yet been compromised.”
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Ammar al-Baluchi, Khallad bin Attash, and KSM remained in CIA custody until their transfer to U.S. military custody at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, in September 2006.
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All three remain in U.S. military custody.

3. The Thwarting of the Second Wave Plot and the Discovery of the Al-Ghuraba Group

summary
: The CIA represented that its enhanced interrogation techniques were effective and necessary to produce critical, otherwise unavailable intelligence, which enabled the CIA to disrupt terrorist plots, capture terrorists, and save lives. Over a period of years, the CIA provided the “discovery” and/or “thwarting” of the Second Wave plotting and the “discovery” of the al-Ghuraba group as evidence for the effectiveness of the CIA’s enhanced interrogation techniques. These representations were inaccurate. The Second Wave plotting was disrupted with the arrest and identification of key individuals. The arrests and identifications were unrelated to any reporting acquired during or after the use of the CIA’s enhanced interrogation techniques against CIA detainees. Likewise, the al-Ghuraba group was identified by a detainee who was not in CIA custody. CIA detainees subjected to the CIA’s enhanced interrogation techniques provided significant fabricated information on both the Second Wave plotting and the al-Ghuraba group.

further details
: Al-Qa’ida’s “Second Wave” plotting refers to two efforts by KSM to strike the West Coast of the United States with airplanes using non-Arab passport holders. While intelligence reporting often conflated the “Second Wave” plotting, KSM viewed the plotting as two separate efforts.
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Neither of the two efforts was assessed to be imminent, as KSM was still engaged in the process of identifying suicide operatives and obtaining pilot training for potential participants when each effort was disrupted through the arrest or identification of the suspected operatives and operational planners.
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The al-Ghuraba student group was established in late 1999 by Jemaah Islamiyah (JI) leaders primarily to educate the sons of jailed JI leaders and to groom the students for potential leadership and operational roles in JI. Some members of the al-Ghuraba group reportedly completed militant training in Afghanistan and Pakistan while enrolled at Islamic universities in Karachi.
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Despite CIA representations to the contrary, intelligence and open source reporting indicate the group was not “tasked with,” witting, or involved in any aspect of KSM’s Second Wave plotting.
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The “discovery” and disruption of the “Second Wave Plot” (also known as the “West Coast Plot” and the “Tallest Building Plot”),
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along with the associated identification, discovery, and capture of the al-Ghuraba “cell,” is one of the eight most frequently cited examples provided by the CIA as evidence for the effectiveness of CIA’s enhanced interrogation techniques.
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Over a period of years, CIA documents prepared for and provided to senior policymakers, intelligence officials, and the Department of Justice represent the thwarting and discovery of the “Second Wave” plotting and the identification, discovery, or arrest of the al-Ghuraba group members as an example of how “[k]ey intelligence collected from HVD interrogations
after
applying interrogation techniques” had “enabled CIA to disrupt terrorist plots” and “capture additional terrorists.”
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The CIA further represented that the intelligence acquired from the CIA’s enhanced interrogation techniques was “otherwise unavailable” and “saved lives.”
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For example, in November 2007, the CIA prepared a briefing for President Bush. Under a section entitled, “Plots Discovered as a Result of EITs,” the CIA represented that the CIA “
learned
” about the “Second Wave” plotting and the al-Ghuraba group only “after applying the waterboard along with other interrogation techniques.”
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Likewise, on March 2, 2005, the CIA provided the Department of Justice Office of Legal Counsel (OLC) with a document entitled, “Effectiveness of the CIA Counterterrorist Interrogation Techniques.” The CIA memorandum stated that the “Central Intelligence Agency can advise you that this program works and the techniques are effective in producing foreign intelligence.”
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The CIA stated that “enhanced interrogation techniques . . . [have] enabled CIA to disrupt plots” and “capture additional terrorists.” The document then listed 11 examples of “key intelligence collected from HVD interrogations
after
applying interrogation techniques,”
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including:

“The ‘Second Wave’: This was a KSM plot to use East Asian operatives to crash a hijacked airliner into the tallest building on the US West Coast (Los Angeles) as a follow-on to 9/11.
We learned this during the initial interrogation of KSM
and later confirmed it through the interrogation of Hambali and Khallad.

“. . . The Guraba Cell:
We learned of this 17-member Jemaah Islamiyah cell from Hambali
, who confirmed that some of the cell’s operatives were identified as candidates to train as pilots as part of KSM’s ‘second wave’ attack against the US . . .”
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The ensuing May 30, 2005, OLC memorandum, now declassified and publicly available, states:

“[The CIA has] informed us that the interrogation of KSM—once [enhanced] interrogation techniques were employed—led to the
discovery
of a KSM plot, the ‘Second Wave’ . . . and the
discovery
of the Ghuraba Cell, a 17-member Jemaah Islamiyah cell
tasked with executing the
‘
Second Wave
.’ ”
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The CIA provided similar inaccurate representations regarding the “discovery” and thwarting of the Second Wave plotting and/or the “discovery” of the al-Ghuraba Group in 18 of the 20 documents provided to senior policymakers and the Department of Justice between July 2003 and March 2009.
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A review of CIA operational cables and other documents found that the CIA’s enhanced interrogation techniques played no role in the “discovery” or thwarting of either “Second Wave” plot. Likewise, records indicate that the CIA’s enhanced interrogation techniques played no role in the “discovery” of a 17-member “cell tasked with executing the ‘Second Wave.’ ”
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Intelligence Community records indicate that the initial “Second Wave” effort began in parallel with the planning for the September 11, 2001, attacks and included two operatives who were tasked with seeking pilot training. The thwarting of this plotting was unrelated to the use of the CIA’s enhanced interrogation techniques. The two operatives, Zacarias Moussaoui and Faruq al-Tunisi (aka Abderraouf Jdey), were known to be engaged in terrorist activity prior to any reporting from CIA detainees.
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On August 16, 2001, Zacarias Moussaoui, a French citizen, was arrested on immigration charges by the FBI in Minnesota.
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At the time of his arrest, the FBI informed the CIA that the FBI considered Moussaoui to be a “suspected airline suicide attacker.”
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On January 17, 2002, the FBI publicly released a statement identifying Faruq al-Tunisi, aka Abderraouf Jdey, a Canadian citizen, as an al-Qa’ida operative possibly “prepared to commit future suicide terrorist attacks.”
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Intelligence indicates that al-Tunisi, who remains at large, withdrew from participating in al-Qa’ida operations.
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His whereabouts remain unknown.
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The subsequent “Second Wave” effort began with KSM’s tasking of several Malaysian nationals—led by Masran bin Arshad—in late 2001 to attack the “tallest building in California” using shoe-bomb explosive devices to gain access to a plane’s cockpit.
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The thwarting of this plotting was also unrelated to the use of the CIA’s enhanced interrogation techniques. This plot was disrupted with the arrest of Masran bin Arshad in January 2002. This arrest was unrelated to CIA detainee reporting.
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Bin Arshad claimed the effort had “not advanced beyond the initial planning stages” when KSM “shelve[d] the plan” in December 2001 when Richard Reid exposed the “shoe bomb” explosive method.
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Beginning in July 2002, while in the custody of a foreign government, and after the extensive use of rapport-building interrogation techniques,
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bin Arshad provided detailed information on this “Second Wave” plotting, the Malaysian operatives (details on Affifi, Lillie, and “Tawfiq”), and the proposed method of attack.
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This information would later be corroborated by other intelligence collection, including, to a limited extent, reporting from CIA detainees in the spring of 2003.
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Another Malaysian national associated with Masran bin Arshad, Zaini Zakaria, was identified by a foreign government as a potential operative seeking pilot training as early as July 2002.
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Zakaria was tasked with obtaining such training by al-Qa’ida, but failed to follow through with the tasking.
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Zakaria turned himself in to Malaysian authorities on December 18, 2002. Malaysian authorities released Zakaria in February 2009.
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In 2006, in a White House briefing on the “West Coast Terrorist Plot,” the Assistant to the President for Homeland Security and Counterterrorism announced that the plot had been disrupted with the arrest of the cell leader, Masran bin Arshad.
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