My written testimony to the Senate Judiciary Committee hearing on the torture memos

by: MajorMatthew

This is my full testimony to the Committee. Senator Sheldon Whitehouse read a portion of this statement near the end of the hearing. I also recommend the reading of Ali Soufan's testimony, available on the Senate Judiciary Committee website.
Chairman Leahy and Esteemed Members of the Committee,

Thank you for the opportunity to address the Committee on the issue of interrogation. I especially thank Senator Sheldon Whitehouse for his invitation to submit this written testimony.

I submit this testimony as a private citizen and not as an official representative of the United States Air Force or as a representative of the Department of Defense. I am currently still in the Air Force Reserves. I have served for seventeen years in the United States Air Force and Air Force Reserves and have completed five combat deployments to three wars. I feel that nothing less than our national soul is at stake in the debate concerning the torture and abuse of prisoners.

In 2006, I deployed to Iraq as an interrogator at the bequest of the Army. Prior to my deployment I was a special agent for the Air Force Office of Special Investigations, both on Active Duty and in the Reserves. Before I was a special agent, I was a special operations helicopter pilot. I've served in the conflicts in Bosnia, Kosovo, Colombia, and Iraq.

As an interrogator in Iraq, I conducted more than 300 interrogations and supervised more than 1,000. I led the interrogations team that located Abu Musab Al Zarqawi, the former leader of Al Qaida in Iraq, and one of the most notorious mass murderers of our generation. At the time that we killed Zarqawi, he was the number one priority for the United States military, higher than Osama Bin Laden.

I strongly oppose the use of torture or abuse as interrogation methods for both pragmatic and moral reasons.
There's More... ::