"High value information came from interrogations in which those methods were used and provided a deeper understanding of the al Qa'ida organization that was attacking this country"
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“High value information” is the bureaucrat’s magic trick: it sounds empirical, almost technocratic, while smuggling in a moral conclusion. Dennis C. Blair isn’t describing what happened so much as trying to pin a legitimizing label on how it happened. The sentence is built to do two jobs at once: defend “those methods” (a careful euphemism doing the work of a full confession) and wrap them in the flag of national protection. By the time you reach “attacking this country,” the reader is meant to feel that any discomfort is not just naive but disloyal.
The intent is political insulation. Blair is staking out a narrow claim that avoids the hard questions: What counts as “high value”? Who decides? How do you weigh coerced testimony against false leads? “Provided a deeper understanding” is especially telling. It’s not merely that interrogations produced actionable intelligence; it’s that they supposedly delivered insight, the kind of strategic clarity leaders crave after a shock like 9/11. That rhetorical upgrade matters because it shifts the standard from “did it work?” to “did it help us comprehend the enemy?” Comprehension is harder to audit, easier to assert.
The subtext is an appeal to necessity: al Qa’ida is framed as an ongoing, existential threat, so the methods become regrettable tools rather than policy choices. Contextually, this is the post-9/11 argument in its polished form: not a defense of cruelty, but a defense of exceptionalism, written in the passive voice so responsibility never quite lands on a person.
The intent is political insulation. Blair is staking out a narrow claim that avoids the hard questions: What counts as “high value”? Who decides? How do you weigh coerced testimony against false leads? “Provided a deeper understanding” is especially telling. It’s not merely that interrogations produced actionable intelligence; it’s that they supposedly delivered insight, the kind of strategic clarity leaders crave after a shock like 9/11. That rhetorical upgrade matters because it shifts the standard from “did it work?” to “did it help us comprehend the enemy?” Comprehension is harder to audit, easier to assert.
The subtext is an appeal to necessity: al Qa’ida is framed as an ongoing, existential threat, so the methods become regrettable tools rather than policy choices. Contextually, this is the post-9/11 argument in its polished form: not a defense of cruelty, but a defense of exceptionalism, written in the passive voice so responsibility never quite lands on a person.
Quote Details
| Topic | War |
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