New York Reps. Anthony Weiner and Jerry Nadler want to hand the $50 million bounty for Osama bin Laden’s capture to groups that help 9/11 families and first responders.
They say there was “no single person responsible for putting investigators on his trail” — and, thus, it’s not clear who should get the reward.
But there were people responsible: the CIA agents whose “harsh” interrogations produced key info that made it possible to find the 9/11 terror kingpin.
And dispatch him, for good.
If anyone deserves that bounty, it’s these guys.
CIA Director Leon Panetta admits that information obtained through “enhanced interrogation techniques against some of those [terror] detainees” paved the way to bin Laden’s secret compound.
Jose Rodriguez, the CIA counterterror boss from 2002 to 2005, notes that Khalid Sheik Mohammed and Abu Faraj al-Libbi tipped off agents about bin Laden’s couriers after harsh questioning. (KSM was waterboarded, though key info he provided came later.)
Yet instead of giving these agents a medal, Team Obama has actually targeted them for possible prosecution based on their invaluable questioning. Even though the Justice Department has already concluded that they broke no laws.
And President Obama canceled the entire interrogation program — which means that critical, life-saving info from future captured terrorists will remain unknown to US authorities.
Already, Washington is passing up a golden opportunity to acquire a possible trove of info from Umar Patek, a suspect in the 2002 Bali bombings thought to have enormous knowledge of South Asian al Qaeda-linked groups.
Patek was nabbed in Pakistan this year, but — stunningly — there are no plans for US agents to question him.
This is nuts.
Those CIA interrogators who extracted the breakthrough tips about bin Laden’s couriers are heroes.
Their job was no doubt physically and emotionally challenging — but they succeeded. And now the world’s greatest terrorist is dead.
Surely, they deserve that $50 million.
If nothing else, they can use it as a legal defense fund — to protect themselves from a misguided, counterproductive prosecution by Obama & Co.