A 2004 report from the CIA inspector general details coercion tactics employed when the CIA really, really wanted information. From CNN:
The gun and drill were used in two separate interrogation sessions against Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri, one of the sources said. Al-Nashiri is accused of plotting the 2000 attack on the USS Cole, which left 17 U.S. sailors dead.
The sources did not want to be identified because the report, completed by the CIA's inspector general in 2004, has not yet been made public. A federal judge in New York has ordered a redacted version of the report released Monday as part of a lawsuit filed by the ACLU.
The interrogations took place in the CIA's secret prisons before 2006, when then-President George W. Bush moved all detainees from such facilities to the federal prison in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, both sources said.
Newsweek also said that, according to its sources citing the inspector-general's report, interrogators staged mock executions to try to frighten detainees into talking. In one instance, Newsweek reported, a gun was fired in a room next to one terrorism suspect so he would think another prisoner was being killed.
A CIA spokesman would not talk about specifics of the inspector-general's report but said all the incidents described in it have been reviewed by government prosecutors.
Get the full scoop here.
A question for the Commentariat: If advanced interrogation methods work but are illegal, do you care whether or not they are employed?