The Committee makes the following findings and conclusions:
#1: The CIA‘s use of its enhanced interrogation techniques was not an effective means of acquiring intelligence or gaining cooperation from detainees.
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#2: The CIA‘s justification for the use of its enhanced interrogation techniques rested on inaccurate claims of their effectiveness.
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#3: The interrogations of CIA detainees were brutal and far worse than the CIA represented to policymakers and others. (…)
At least five CIA detainees were subjected to „rectal rehydration“ or rectal feeding without documented medical necessity. The CIA placed detainees in ice water „baths.“ The CIA led several detainees to believe they would never be allowed to leave CIA custody alive, suggesting to one detainee that he would only leave in a coffin-shaped box. One interrogator told another detainee that he would never go to court, because „we can never let the world know what I have done to you.“ CIA officers also threatened at least three detainees with harm to their families— to include threats to harm the children of a detainee, threats to sexually abuse the mother of a detainee, and a threat to „cut [a detainee‘s] mother‘s throat.“
#4: The conditions of confinement for CIA detainees were harsher than the CIA had represented to policymakers and others.
Conditions at CIA detention sites were poor, and were especially bleak early in the program. CIA detainees at the COBALT detention facility were kept in complete darkness and constantly shackled in isolated cells with loud noise or music and only a bucket to use for human waste.10 Lack of heat at the facility likely contributed to the death of a detainee. The chief of interrogations described COBALT as a „dungeon.“11 Another senior CIA officer stated that COBALT was itself an enhanced interrogation technique.“ At times, the detainees at COBALT were walked around naked or were shackled with their hands above their heads for extended periods of time. Other times, the detainees at COBALT were subjected to what was described as a „rough takedown,“ in which approximately five CIA officers would scream at a detainee, drag him outside of his cell, cut his clothes off, and secure him with Mylar tape. The detainee would then be hooded and dragged up and down a long corridor while being slapped and punched.