Former CIA Director Porter Goss penned a strongly worded op-ed in the Washington Post today, lambasting the administration for releasing the so-called “torture memos” and for hinting that it’s open to prosecuting the architects of post-9/11 interrogation policy.
“We can’t have a secret intelligence service if we keep giving away all the secrets,” Goss wrote. “Americans have to decide now.”
Goss’s thoughts are particularly interesting because of his past role as Chairman of the House Intelligence Committee. He ridiculed Nancy Pelosi’s claim–without naming her specifically–to never have been informed that waterboarding would be used.
“Today, I am slack-jawed to read that members claim to have not understood that the techniques on which they were briefed were to actually be employed; or that specific techniques such as ‘waterboarding’ were never mentioned,” he wrote.
He continued:
Let me be clear. It is my recollection that:
— The chairs and the ranking minority members of the House and Senate intelligence committees, known as the Gang of Four, were briefed that the CIA was holding and interrogating high-value terrorists.
— We understood what the CIA was doing.
— We gave the CIA our bipartisan support.
— We gave the CIA funding to carry out its activities.
— On a bipartisan basis, we asked if the CIA needed more support from Congress to carry out its mission against al-Qaeda.
In 2002, Goss was Chairman of the House Intelligence Committee while Pelosi was ranking member.
Goss reserved his strongest criticism for Obama, who first ruled out prosecuting those involved in interrogation policy but last week left the door open to investigating those who penned the legal justifications.
“It is certainly not trust that is fostered when intelligence officers are told one day ‘I have your back’ only to learn a day later that a knife is being held to it,” Goss wrote. “After the events of this week, morale at the CIA has been shaken to its foundation.”