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As the US’s offshore detention center in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, marked its tenth anniversary earlier this year, a judge in Spain has “re-launched an investigation into the alleged torture of detainees” there (McClatchy). The development came on the heels of a British probe into the US CIA’s so-called renditions of war prisoners to Libya. Today, we turn to Glenn L. Carle who spent 23 years in the CIA as a spy who, in his own words, “broke laws… stole… and lied every day, about almost everything… to everyone around me.” Carle worked the spectrum of CIA spy assignments, gathering intelligence wherever it could be found, whether in a war zone or a high-brow salon in Europe. He was inspired to join the agency because he was devoted to its mission, and to ideals larger than his own self-interest. He also thrived within what he calls the “gray world” of the CIA where he could, “accept doubt… realize there is no certainty, and yet act with principle, finding meaning and purpose in confusion.” His belief in the goals of this storied agency were unshaken until he was called on to become an interrogator, assigned to squeeze intelligence from a man believed to be a high-level al-Qa’ida terrorist. As an interrogator within the shadowy borders of the Global War On Terror, Carle came to believe his captive was innocent, and that he had become part of a world where fear-fueled delusions reigned. In his new memoir, The Interrogator: An Education, Glenn Carle analyzes his own role in the “War on Terror” and the larger political context in the post-9/11 world that led his agency and others to value brute force over thoughtful strategy. He is the most senior CIA member to write about his experience as an interrogator and his book is an essential guidepost for anyone mapping the US government’s trajectory to a nation that today scoffs at the Geneva Convention and undermines its own Constitution.

GUEST: Glenn L. Carle, spent 23 years in the Clandestine Service of the Central Intelligence Agency, where he worked in a number of overseas posts on four continents and in Washington DC. He worked on terrorism at various times since the mid-1980s and he worked extensively on Balkan, Afghan, Central American, and European political, security, and economic issues. His last position was as an Acting and then Deputy National Intelligence Officer for Transnational Threats on the National Intelligence Council, the US Intelligence community’s most senior position for strategic analysis of critical national security issues. He retired from the CIA in March of 2007.

Visit www.glenncarle.com.

Listen to Uprising on Tuesday January 24th and Wednesday January 25th for parts 2 and 3 of Sonali’s interview with Glenn L. Carle.

See Glenn L Carle in Los Angeles on Wednesday January 25th, at 7 pm at Park La Brea Auditorium, 6200 W 3rd St, Los Angeles, CA 90036, where he will discuss his book. More information at www.rarebirdlit.com/events