There are many techniques, but it seems like we have forgotten it is fundamentally manipulative and abusive. I mean, we are surprised to find that threats are used? What?
We are, if not surprised, rightfully offended that our government does not obey its own laws, which define and punish torture -- acts "intended to inflict severe physical or mental pain or suffering (other than pain or suffering incidental to lawful sanctions) upon another person within his custody or physical control", where "severe physical or mental pain or suffering" is defined as:
---[quote]---
(A) the intentional infliction or threatened infliction of severe physical pain or suffering;
(B) the administration or application, or threatened administration or application, of mind-altering substances or other procedures calculated to disrupt profoundly the senses or the personality;
(C) the threat of imminent death; or
(D) the threat that another person will imminently be subjected to death, severe physical pain or suffering, or the administration or application of mind-altering substances or other procedures calculated to disrupt profoundly the senses or personality; and
---[end quote]--- (18 USC Sec. 2340)
(And its worth noting that this interpretation enshrined into law has often been criticized itself as an attempt to minimize the scope of US limitations on torture and for the government to shirk obligations under the Convention Against Torture, and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment by limiting the understanding of torture to something much narrower than the international understanding underlying the convention, so that can enhanced the degree to which it is disturbing that having narrowed the definition of torture, the government still isn't serious about combatting it, or even just not actively engaging in it, under the narrowed definition.)
Causing the death of a detainee is not a threat. Perhaps negligence which should have consequences for those who were responsible for this person while in their custody.
You can get plenty of information out of someone without laying a finger on them.
In my opinion the question is the extent to which it's OK to play with people's psychology through isolation and misinformation, while still giving them 3 hots and a cot. The important thing to note here is that you can still damage people this way if you take it too far; solitary makes people go crazy especially when they're being fed false info about what's going on outside the walls.
Then again, these guys did not get rolled up for signing too loud in church. They have valuable intel in their heads. We're not going to beat it out of them, but how far are we willing to go? Should they get the same rights and protections as suspects in the US judicial system? This is the conversation we should be having in my opinion.
According to the report, "Of the 119 known detainees, at least 26 were wrongfully held and did not meet the detention standard in the September 2001 Memorandum of Notification (MON). These included an "intellectually challenged" man whose CIA detention was used solely as leverage to get a family member to provide information, two individuals who were intelligence sources for foreign liaison services and were former CIA sources, and two individuals whom the CIA assessed to be connected to al-Qa'ida based solely on information fabricated by a CIA detainee subjected to the CIA's enhanced interrogation techniques.
Why does terrorism frighten people so much that they're willing to throw away basic principles like "innocent until proven guilty"? Honest question. I see comment after comment after comment in this thread that indicates the commenters are unbelievably frightened of terrorism, to the extent that they're willing to sanction anything, even acts that they admit are otherwise reprehensible, to prevent it. Why are apparently intelligent people so frightened of it?
The condemnation of torture seems to be far more widespread here.
Great question, and one we should always keep in mind. The death toll from terrorism on US soil since 9/11 is indeed very low. That said, the people plotting against us are intelligent and adaptive and wish to do us harm. If they succeed, they might destroy the free society which we've built for ourselves.
Put another way, I'm scared of the physical consequences of a nuclear weapon going off in midtown Manhattan and even more scared of what would happen to our society in the wake of it. You think we'd be having these conversations about which techniques may or may not be torture if there were half a million dead in NYC and the entire tri-state region were irradiated?
There isn't even any evidence that the threat of nuclear terrorism is credible. Nukes aren't something you pick up at the local Safeway on your way home from the daily jihad. Compare to 30 years ago, where the threat was absolutely, 100% credible. Literally hundreds of missiles ready to go at a moment's notice. One bad decision or bad hangover away from a billion deaths. And yet, we weren't having debates like this then.
That's not to say that the US was all innocent and pure. But at the very least, torture was secretive, hidden, not defended in public as being a worthwhile and justifiable act.
And then combine all that with the simple fact that torture doesn't even work. All it does is make their friends angry. Do you really think that torturing suspected terrorists reduces the chances of a future terrorist nuclear detonation in Manhattan? I don't see how.
Edit: Oh yeah, I forgot to point out that those hundreds of missiles and hundreds of nuclear warheads are still there and still ready to go at a moment's notice and we are still one person's bad decision or bad hangover away from total annihilation. We just manage to pretend it's not there.
Look at what the US has done. Really, look at all the things it has done -- the surveillance, the drone strikes, the infiltration of civil protests, the use of military equipment by the police force, the lies to justify the war in Iraq, the lies to justify the torture, the violations of international human rights, the targeted killings of "enemy" US citizens, the re-definition of every single one of these words -- and then tell me how the US has upheld its values against terrorism.
Then look at countries like Iceland where the nation apologizes over a single justified death at the hands of a police officer, or Norway where after a killing spree and bomb attacks the first consideration by government officials is not about how to punish the murderer, but how to guarantee due process for someone evidently guilty of such heinous crimes.
The United States are not the good guys. I'm sorry, but you're not. No matter how much you want it to be true.
And of course, it doesn't help that the folks who are captured are mostly objectively bad people. There are some people who can muster a lot of moral outrage for the rights of bad people, and there are ones who can't. This isn't a new phenomenon.
You've spent this entire thread making poor excuses for completely irrational behaviors and trying to justifying sickening, ineffective actions on the part of US personnel.
Just stop.
No, I don't know it. Care to explain it to me?
I beg to differ.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2868419/Thrown-roof-...
Can you give examples? Do they work against hardened interogees? Do they involve threats of violence?
Geneva Convention states clearly - either POW status or suspect in the judicial system. There is no 3rd option.
> This is the conversation we should be having in my opinion.
there is no conversation to have. Only charges (of crimes against humanity which torture is) to bring in.
None of the Geneva Conventions actually say this. OTOH, torture is subject to a universal prohibition under international law independently of the status of the tortured person, whether a protected person under the any of the Geneva Conventions, a regular criminal suspect in a domestic court system, or any other status that may or may not exist.
>None of the Geneva Conventions actually say this.
One way or the other it is mentioned in various places through the Conventions. In particular http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Third_Geneva_Convention :
for internal conflict
" The passing of sentences must also be pronounced by a regularly constituted court, affording all the judicial guarantees which are recognised as indispensable by civilised peoples. "
for international:
"It also specifies that when there is any doubt whether a combatant belongs to the categories in article 4, they should be treated as such until their status has been determined by a competent tribunal."
http://www.outsidethebeltway.com/an_fbi_interrogator_on_the_...
It just seems like people are shocked to find fundamentally abusive/manipulative behavior going on at all. Virtually any form of extracting information from an unwilling informant is going to be. Feeding them lies to make them lose hope ("We've captured your co-conspirators") is abusive. Cozying up to them with donuts and backrubs is manipulative. Practically by definition, interrogation on unwilling informants cannot be some friendly, respectful thing.
"Scharff was opposed to physically abusing prisoners to obtain information. Learning on the job, Scharff instead relied upon the Luftwaffe's approved list of techniques, which mostly involved making the interrogator seem as if he is his prisoner's greatest advocate while in captivity."
And this guy was successful as well.
"Scharff's approach has been admiringly cited by top US interrogators, such as Ali Soufan"
Anyway, that's really counter-intuitive. I mean, I guess I could deal with pain, but losing body parts, skin or eyes? I would talk pretty fast.
Its also been shown to be a fairly poor technique, compared to other alternatives, to get accurate, actionable information.
As the Senate report itself notes, this was the conclusion of the CIA's own work on interrogation techniques prior to 9/11, which was disregarded in the aftermath of 9/11.
Which frankly makes me think they believe it does. The easy political win is to say it doesn't, and they aren't taking it.
https://twitter.com/peterbakernyt/status/542382617711370240
"Obama official: White House won’t take sides between CIA, which says interrogations worked, and Senate, which says they didn’t."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hanns_Scharff
http://www.k-state.edu/actr/2010/12/20/suspect-interrogation...
It gets even worse when the subject doesn't actually know anything useful. Waterboard most people and they will confess to anything they think will make it stop.