John Kiriakou

And in that position, I had access to literally everything that the CIA was doing around the world.

And it was on August 2nd that we began torturing Abu Zubaydah, who was the first high-value prisoner that we had.

I led his capture in Faisalabad, Pakistan in March, March 28th.

Yeah, you know, I was standing on a coffee table in the safe house with 60 people arrayed in front of me, and I said, listen, the orders are to take them alive.

Do not shoot them.

And of course, as soon as...

The proverbial shit hits the fan.

A Pakistani policeman just opens fire and shoots him three times with an AK-47 in the thigh, the groin and the stomach.

And yeah, the rest is history.

Well, in the immediate term, I was passed over for promotion, which was kind of funny to me because I had just captured with these two hands, the number three in Al Qaeda.

And in my promotion panel, the chief of counterterrorism said exact words.

I had displayed a shocking lack of commitment to counterterrorism.

Whoa.

Well, the deputy director then promoted me just with the stroke of his pen.

So no big deal.

But then a friend of mine at the agency who happened to be he happened to be a lot of things.

We go to the same church.

We were in the same men's group.

He happens to be a psychiatrist and he happens to also be a brigadier general in the U.S.

Army.