May 20, 2009 CNN

ACOSTA: What you're saying is that waterboarding is only the beginning?

LT. COL. YVONNE BRADLEY, MILITARY ATTORNEY FOR FREED DETAINEE: Absolutely. It's the tip of the iceberg.

ACOSTA (voice-over): Air Force Reserve Lieutenant Colonel Yvonne Bradley says she came to that conclusion as a lifelong Republican who never had questioned the war on terror, when she was appointed the military attorney for Guantanamo detainee Binyam Mohamed.

(on camera): You thought this was a terrorist I'm dealing with?

BRADLEY: I absolutely did. I mean, my government was saying this was the worst of the worst.

ACOSTA (voice-over): A British resident originally from Ethiopia, Mohamed was detained by U.S. authorities in Pakistan right after the 9/11 attacks. Bradley says Mohamed may have attended an al Qaeda training camp in Afghanistan.

(on camera): So he may have been to a camp?

BRADLEY: He may have been to a camp.

ACOSTA (voice-over): After Mohamed's arrest, Bradley says he was flown to Morocco where he was drugged, beaten, and worse.

BRADLEY: In Morocco, he also reported that they started this monthly treatment where they would come in with a scalpel or a razor- type of instrument and slash his genitals just with small cuts.

ACOSTA: Bradley says Mohamed was eventually shipped back to Afghanistan where he wrote out this confession, admitting to training at an al Qaeda camp and discussing plans for a dirty bomb. When asked if he had been abused, he wrote, no.

(on camera): You think he confessed to all of these things after he was tortured.

BRADLEY: There's no reliable evidence that Mr. Mohamed was going to do anything to the United States.

ACOSTA (voice-over): Late last year, a military commission's judge dropped the charges against Mohamed . On this third day in office, President Obama ordered Mohamed released from Guantanamo, a move blasted by one group representing military families.

BRIAN WISE, MILITARY FAMILIES UNITED: When we release these detainees, when we release these terrorists, we put America and we put America's allies in more danger.

ACOSTA: Mohamed told the BBC he is trying to move on.

BINYAM MOHAMED, GUANTANAMO DETAINEE: It's been seven years of literal darkness that I have been through with that. Coming back to life is taking me some time.

ACOSTA: Yvonne Bradley believes there are other former and current detainees on the same journey.

(on camera): Do you feel comfortable saying that in a U.S. military uniform?

BRADLEY: I do, because I raised my hand to protect the Constitution of the United States. This has nothing to do with national security. It has to do with national embarrassment.