Dirty Secrets in the War on Terror

In the global war on terror, the unofficial motto of America's intelligence agenies is "The end justifies the means." For an overview of the extralegal powers the Bush Admistration has granted the CIA as it wages a largely covert war read "On the Trail of the CIA."

There's no point in making a moral case against state-sponsored kidnapping, torture, and murder - all techniques apparently used by the CIA and authorized by the Bush Administration. It's apparent that the US intelligence agencies operate according to a morality that it beyond good and evil. But perhaps some people in the US government with the power to dictate policy in the CIA will insist that, in the long run, these violent abuses of power will serve to undermine US interests around the globe. These days who can take seriously the US's claims that it is fighting for freedom? It's disturbing to see America become (some would say this is nothing new) everything that it purports to be fighting against.