Poll: Americans Back Tough Interrogations
By a nearly 2-to-1 margin, Americans support U.S. interrogators doing "whatever it takes" to get information from terrorist suspects who might be planning attacks against U.S. interests.
An NBC/Wall Street Journal poll shows 55 percent of those surveyed support the current policy that allows tough interrogation tactics - while just 30 percent say that techniques now being employed by U.S. intelligence go too far.
"They don't want to know what the specifics are," NBC's Andrea Mitchell said Sunday while discussing the previously unreported survey. "They agree with whatever it takes."
The finding would be a boost for Vice President Dick Cheney, whose been under fire from the press for opposing Sen. John McCain's proposal to reign in U.S. interrogators.
One technique, waterboarding - which has been decried as "torture" by critics - was used on 9/11 operations chief Khalid Sheik Mohammed.
The tactic yielded "rich and important information about terrorist operations" - according to the New York Times.
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