President Obama has dramatically raised the legal standards that govern whether and how U.S. officials can interrogate terrorists. Consequently, the United States has had to rely increasingly on foreign intelligence services to obtain information from terrorists that could prevent future attacks and save American lives.
The Obama Administration has stepped up its rendition program, under which terrorists are sent for questioning to other countries, where Obama's interrogation restrictions don't apply. But as the Administration has come to learn, along with the outsourcing of terrorist interrogations comes a problem American consumers have long been familiar with: the dreaded call to an overseas customer support technician.
This newspaper has recently obtained a message left on a U.S. defense official’s voicemail in response to a technical support request to a foreign intelligence agency. The anonymous source who forwarded the voicemail said “Getting essential intelligence information is now as frustrating as getting technical support from Dell or Microsoft.” Many fear America's intelligence capabilities will suffer as a result.
Readers are invited to listen to the voicemail by clicking the image below.
Associated article: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/05/29/AR2009052902989.html
