July 16, 2003: CIA Inspector General Interviews Counterterrorist Center Officer about Usefulness of Detainee Reporting

The CIA’s inspector general interviews a female CIA officer about the efficacy of the agency’s custody and interrogation practices for high value detainees. The officer is not identified, but as the topic discussed is the involvement of the CIA’s Counterterrorist Center (CTC) in the practices, and the highest known female officer at the CTC at this time is Alfreda Frances Bikowsky, it may be her. (Note: Bikowsky is involved in rendition—see Before January 23, 2004—and torture—see After March 7, 2003). The officer says that the value of the program is taking terrorists off the streets, and if the CIA gets unique valuable information from a detainee then an operation is judged a success. The officer also makes a number of statements about information provided by detainees:
Training camp facilitator Abu Zubaida provided information about al-Qaeda’s modus operandi and that led to the arrest of Ramzi bin al-Shibh, an associate of the 9/11 hijackers;
Alleged 9/11 mastermind Khalid Shaikh Mohammed (KSM) provided information that led to the arrest of a truck driver in Ohio named Iyman Faris, a smuggler named Uzair Paracha, a sleeper operative in New York named Saleh Almari, an operative named Majid Khan, and Ali Abdul Aziz Ali, KSM’s nephew, who was involved in financing 9/11;
Detainees have also provided a wealth of information about al-Qaeda plots, including potential attacks on the US consulate in Karachi, a plan to fly planes into Heathrow Airport and Canary Wharf in London, a plot where spikes in track would be loosened in an attempt to derail a train, a plot to blow up some gas stations, a plot to fly planes into the Library Tower in California, and a plot to collapse a suspension bridge by cutting lines.
The manager adds that as some operatives potentially involved in these plots have been arrested and the plans have not come to fruition, then the operations must have been thwarted by the CIA. [Central Intelligence Agency, 7/17/2003 ]