<i>Hard Measures</i>: Torture Is Humane

What US Taxpayers funded & What Obama's Covering Up -- 

CIA gave waterboard­ers $5M legal shield:

When the CIA decided to waterboard suspected terror detainees in overseas prisons, the agency turned to a pair of contractor­s. The men designed the CIA's interrogat­ion program and also personally took part in the waterboard­ing sessions.

But to do the job, the CIA had to promise to cover at least $5 million in legal fees for them in case there was trouble down the road, former U.S. officials said.

Turns out the contractor­s needed that secret agreement as taxpayers pay to defend the men in a federal investigat­ion over an interrogat­ion tactic the United States now says is torture. The deal is even more generous than the protection­s the agency typically provides its own officers, giving the two men access to more money to finance their defenses.

It has long been known that psychologi­sts Jim Mitchell and Bruce Jessen created the CIA's interrogat­ion program. But former U.S. intelligen­ce officials said Mitchell and Jessen also repeatedly subjected terror suspects inside CIA-run secret prisons to waterboard­ing, a simulated drowning tactic.

The revelation of the contractor­s' involvemen­t is the first known confirmati­on of any individual­s who conducted waterboard­ing at the so-called black sites, underscori­ng just how much the agency relied on outside help in its most sensitive interrogat­ions.

Normally, CIA officers buy insurance to cover possible legal bills. It costs about $300 a year for $1 million in coverage. Today, the CIA pays the premiums for most officers, but at the height of the war on terrorism, officers had to pay half.

The Mitchell and Jessen arrangemen­t, known as an "indemnity promise," was structured differentl­y. Unlike CIA officers, whose identities are classified­, Mitchell and Jessen were public citizens who received some of the earliest scrutiny by reporters and lawmakers. The two wanted more protection­.

The agency agreed to pay the legal bills for the psychologi­sts' firm, Mitchell, Jessen & Associates­, directly from CIA accounts, according to several interviews with the former officials, who spoke only on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the matter.

Read the Article at HuffingtonPost