Khalid Sheikh Mohammed (KSM) is a senior Al Qaeda official who is currently imprisoned by the United States and held at the Guantanamo Bay detention camp. In addition to other terrorism-related charges, he is considered the main organizer of the 9/11 terrorist attacks. Gladwell explores James Mitchell and Bruce Jessen’s use of “enhanced interrogation techniques” (EITs), which some consider to be torture, in their interrogation of KSM that began after KSM’s capture in 2003. Gladwell sees KSM’s interrogation as an extreme example of discerning whether strangers are being truthful with us. While KSM eventually confessed to his involvement in a long list of terrorism-related crimes in his first public confession in 2007, many officials doubt the veracity of his confessions due to the coercive techniques his interrogators used to obtain them.
Khalid Sheikh Mohammed (KSM) Quotes in Talking to Strangers
The Talking to Strangers quotes below are all either spoken by Khalid Sheikh Mohammed (KSM) or refer to Khalid Sheikh Mohammed (KSM) . For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
).
Chapter 9
Quotes
[W]e need to accept that the search to understand a stranger has real limits. We will never know the whole truth. We have to be satisfied with something short of that. The right way to talk to strangers is with caution and humility. How many of the crises and controversies I have described would have been prevented had we taken those lessons to heart?
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Page Number and Citation:
Explanation and Analysis:
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Khalid Sheikh Mohammed (KSM) Quotes in Talking to Strangers
The Talking to Strangers quotes below are all either spoken by Khalid Sheikh Mohammed (KSM) or refer to Khalid Sheikh Mohammed (KSM) . For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
).
Chapter 9
Quotes
[W]e need to accept that the search to understand a stranger has real limits. We will never know the whole truth. We have to be satisfied with something short of that. The right way to talk to strangers is with caution and humility. How many of the crises and controversies I have described would have been prevented had we taken those lessons to heart?
Related Characters:
Page Number and Citation:
Explanation and Analysis:
