I blame myself for our downfall in Iraq

So what does he do? Write a book...

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2007/06/10/wirq110.xml

I blame myself for our downfall in Iraq

By Tim Shipman in Washington, Sunday Telegraph

snip//

Mr Lagouranis, who held the rank of specialist, equivalent to a lance corporal, says he never beat a prisoner. But he said: "These coercive techniques - isolation, dogs, sleep deprivation, stress positions, hypothermia - crossed a legal line because they violated the Geneva Convention.

"They also crossed a moral line. If you keep a man awake for a month, that's torture. If you subject a man to hypothermia, that's torture. If you keep him on his knees off and on for a month, that's torture."

His revelations raise disturbing questions about the effectiveness of enhanced interrogation techniques. British intelligence has used information supplied under torture in Uzbekistan, and the Government has been accused of turning a blind eye to the extraordinary rendition of suspects to secret prisons where they could be tortured.

Mr Lagouranis, who has written a recently published book about his experiences, added: "These techniques were developed by the Soviet Union during the Cold War because they are successful in breaking a person's will and spirit. That doesn't mean they work in terms of extracting intelligence.

"I didn't get actionable intelligence using the harsher methods, I got it using manipulation and lying and by promising them things I didn't deliver on. No one wants to give you intelligence if they think you are going to brutalise them."


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