My views on this issue are still in flux, so I'm just going to present a link to this article by Andrew Sullivan without much comment. He documents that the concerns about abuse and torture by our government in the war on terrorism go much deeper than a few complaints by anti-war journalists. Thousands of pages of documents have been made public through the Freedom of Information Act, including memos and reports from internal military commissions, FBI interrogators and much more. And those documents paint a fairly disturbing picture, one that fills me with ambivalence.
I frankly don't think most people care. If coercive and abusive interrogation techniques are being used on someone who can genuinely be called a terrorist, someone who would fly a plane into a building full of innocent people or engage in suicide bombing, I have trouble working up much sympathy over it and I suspect most other people can't feel any at all. If those techniques used on such people are effective in getting information that may prevent such attacks, who could reasonably oppose them? But I have no way of knowing if they are effective in doing so, and neither does anyone else here.
But I'll say this - they better be worth it. If we are not getting specific and credible information that is genuinely and directly helping prevent further attacks, then it is not worth the damage we are doing to our international standing and our ability to occupy the moral high ground. I understand that this is a catch-22 for the government to some extent - if they don't prevent attacks, they get criticized and if they act aggressively to prevent them, they get criticized. But I'm also concerned, as Sullivan is, about the migration of techniques whereby interrogation tactics that should be reserved only for those with real operational knowledge to be extracted are used against low-level, run of the mill detainees who don't know a thing.
I also share Sullivan's two-way thinking about the nature of these revelations. On the one hand, it's laudable that we are able to view these memos precisely because we have legal procedures and protections such as the Freedom of Information Act that allows them to come to light. On the other hand, sometimes what is revealed is disturbing to the mind of someone who values human rights. It's too trite and easy to dismiss it all by saying, "Hey, they cut off people's heads and fly planes into buildings. Why should we treat them any differently?" It's also too trite and easy to take the opposite position, that the military is a big machine of evil intent only on destroying human rights. There are genuinely competing interests, values and goals here. And there is no easy, simple answer to these questions. And the last thing in the world I want to hear are the simpleminded cries of "how dare you criticize the men and women of our military" in response to any criticism of government policy. If that's all you have to say about this subject, keep it to yourself and save the humiliation.
Update: Jason Kuznicki has replied to this post in a predictably thoughtful manner, and no I don't mind being taken to task a bit. As I said, my thoughts on this matter really are in flux and that is why I only tentatively offered a few self-contradictory and confused thoughts on the matter. I don't have time to give his thoughts the attention they certainly warrant right now as I have to leave my office shortly to drive to a meeting an hour away, but I'll return to them as soon as I can. Initially, let me just note, as I did in my comment replying to flatlander, that the phrase "coercive interrogation techniques" does not necessarily refer to torture. Certainly we can, and should, discuss what distinguishes torture from non-torture in that context, and we may well not be able to agree. But I start from the assumption that some types of coercive interrogation techniques have proven effective in some circumstances, that they are an effective means of extracting valuable information if used correctly, on the right people, and in the right circumstances. I know, that's a lot of weasel words and qualfications on my statement, but please bear with me. I'm not coming down from the mountain with the words of God here, I'm trying to work out my own understanding in full view of everyone else.
Secondly, let me note that I'm not sure his invocation of the principle of innocence before being proven guilty really applies in this context. There is an obvious distinction between a domestic police arrest and someone detained by the military in a terrorist safehouse in Kabul or Tikrit. We do not put POWs on trial; indeed, it would violate the Geneva Conventions to do so. But we do interrogate them, as all nations do. At issue is not whether we must presume them innocent, but what are the limits on the interrogation techniques we may justly use in these circumstances? Please understand that I am not - I repeat NOT - advocating torture. I am saying that there are some techniques that do not rise to the level of torture that may be effective and that we may justly use. Where are those limits? I honestly don't know. I'm entirely open to suggestion on that question and interested in the views of others here. But I don't think it's reasonable to rule out any and all coercive interrogation in these circumstances, particularly on the grounds that they are innocent until proven guilty. Still, I fully understand the revulsion and commitment to principle that Jason expresses, and I feel profoundly uncomfortable over the whole situation myself. That's why I'm trying to work out my thinking on the issue and still admittedly waffling in the middle somewhere.
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Couple of comments. First, with respect to your statement that no one really knows if torture works as an interrogation tactic: that's perhaps overstated. From what I have been reading since all this hit the news, the military's studies on interrogation indicate that torture is not a particularly effective way to garner accurate information. The MSM has quoted excerpts from these studies and from the manuals used to train military interrogators. Presuming the people who did the studies and prepared the manuals know what they are talking about [and they are the pros, and have the best possible incentive for studying the matter carefully and reaching sound conclusions --- Americans die if they don't], I wonder if your "nobody knows" claim is sound.
Second: you briefly allude to what I think [and many commenters in the press columns evidently think] is a major drawback of resorting to torture of prisoners ["enemy combatants" or "detainees" or "persons of interest" or whatever the euphemism-du-jour is]: the impact on the rest of the witnessing world. If the practices increase opposition to American policy overseas significantly [and that seems to be so], if they make potential allies reluctant to participate or to continue as allies, then in fact the result may be more American dead, not fewer. Granted, most of those in the press who comment along these lines are no friends of the Bush administration. Still, it seems a not-trivial outcome of engaging in torture as an interrogation tactic that deserves serious thought.
Finally, we need to think as well about the assumption that those we torture for information are all black-hearted mass murderers or wannabes. The reports out of Iraq and Afghanistan talk of "sweeps" pulling in hundreds of suspects at a time, some of them, apparently, for happening to be where the sweep swept. It is, I think, dangerously easy for those on the ground to start assuming that anyone detained is, simply by right of they fact that they were detained, a terorist. That seems to have happened in Afghanistan in some cases [including at least one involving a death by torture] and it is alleged to have happened in Iraq as well. The presumption of guilt seems to attach by means of being arrested.
All of which suggests to me, that absent the "imminent attack" scenario [if we know there is a terrorist attack imminent and torturing a captive will get the information needed to stop it], the downside potential of American torture as an interrogation tactic significantly outweighs the upside.
On a slow Saturday afternoon recently, I watched half an hour of one of those Chuck Norris "back to Viet Nam" potboilers, in which he goes in alone to rescue American PWs presumably still held deep in the jungles by NVN troops for reasons never made clear. In this one, Chuck, now a prisoner, is hauled out of his tiger cage, stood before camp guards and their prostitute girlfriends in from the local village. Chuck is stripped in front of them. The back shot shows him with his trousers around his ankles as the guards and women jeer at him. The idea, clearly, was to indicate the depravity of "them" and the stoic dignity of our guy, unmoved as they mocked his nakedness. The movie of course was made years before the Abou Grahb hit the news. Wonder if Norris and Company would have included the scene if they were making the film now. Somehow, I doubt it.
Ed, your trackback doesn't seem to be working. I've posted a reply.
flatlander wrote:
The problem here is the word "torture". You seem to be applying it to mean any technique that is coercive or inflicts hardship, but that is not how those military studies use the term. I don't think any interrogator, even those who argue strongly that torture is not an effective technique of extracting information, would say that coercive or harsh interrogation techniques as a whole are ineffective. This covers a very wide range of tactics, from sleep deprivation to hacking off of limbs. Some are more effective than others, and some are only effective in certain circumstances. I think most agree that torture - the far end of this scale - isn't terribly effective, though the threat of it initially may be in some circumstances. But I don't think anyone schooled in interrogation would say that coercive techniques in general do not work. The issue is far more complex than that blanket statement could possibly suggest. I agree with most everything else you said.
I have no such ambivalence over what's going on (or did go on) at Gitmo and Abu Ghraib. Whether you call it torture or something else doesn't matter much. There have been people who have died due to such "interrogation", so clearly physical abuse is implicated here.
It may be an interesting exercise in ethical reasoning to see under what circumstances torture might be appropriate. Would it be okay to torture someone if by doing so we save a hundred lives? Most people would say yes. But such an academic exercise is mostly irrelevant to what's going on.
The consensus among professionals seems to be that torture (or whatever you call it) doesn't work very well. You get much further by developing a positive relationship with the captive. Furthermore, with a few possible exceptions, we cannot say that these detainees are actual terrorists. Most of them are merely suspects who have no legal status. Many of them clearly shouldn't be there, as evidenced by the fact that about 100 of them were unceremoniously set free from Gitmo awhile back, presumably because they were rounded-up by mistake. Indeed, stories keep surfacing that people in Afghanistan and Iraq were turning in their neighbors because they were getting paid, or to satisfy a vendetta. So putting all this together, it's hard to see how there could be any benefit to these tactics.
What's worse of course is how this is affecting our reputation. Winning the so-called War on Terror will ultimately require winning over moderate muslims and convincing them that they're better off with us than with the extremists. If we lose the moderates, there's no way we can win. Diplomatic disasters like Gitmo and Abu Ghraib do more damage to our cause than any military faux pas could possibly do. It's truly hard to calculate just how far these things have set us back. I believe we could have had an entire Army division surrounded and wiped out and not suffered as greatly.
I am, or at least was, one of those who believed that all torture, all the time, was a bad thing for states to allow or engage in. I don't know that this is my position any more, but i'm certainly leery of any use of this technique. The question seems to be how we can get all the information we need from the 'bad' people without doing anything inhumane to anyone who hasn't earned it or at least who could have avoided their mistreatment by being more forthcoming. I don't think such a solution exists in the real world, so something has to be compromised. How many people are we willing to torture to stop one terrorist attack? How many lives have to be at risk for us to round up a group of potentially innocent people and press them for information they might not have? How many sadists do we give carte blanche in the hopes that they will uncover something useful?
I'm not sure where I would fall on these issues, and I imagine my position would change dramatically if I had relatives in New York or Tikrit, Gitmo or serving in the US military in Iraq. I think that the people who make these decisions, who I do not envy, need to make them clearly, need to set down a policy and defend it, and need to harshly deal with those who overstep. From what I can see, security has trumpted human rights at nearly every juncture, and that needs to be admitted to or put to a stop. I don't like Bush for reasons apart from Iraq, but I think that if he wants to avoid a legacy of having dragged down teh US human rights record with little to show for it, he needs to make clear what he's going to allow, for how long, and stick to it.
It is hard for me to conceive of a defense of torture based on any ethical reasoning. That leaves only pragmatic reasoning, and it seems apparent to me that pragmatism alone is sufficient reason not to torture large groups of people when it results in converting even larger groups of people into people who hate us. I haven't seen claims, much less evidence, that interrogation of any of those whom we have tortured has resulted in an objective benefit to the US.
Secondly, let me note that I'm not sure his invocation of the principle of innocence before being proven guilty really applies in this context. There is an obvious distinction between a domestic police arrest and someone detained by the military in a terrorist safehouse in Kabul or Tikrit.
As Steve notes above, however, where and how these men came into custody - whether they were ever involved in any kind of military action, much less anti-American military action, is open to question. Whether we agree that these men are subject to the Geneva convention, or whether they should be dealt with under the "innocent until proven guilty" value, they are all covered by the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. That declaration specifically includes not being locked up for no reason. One of the greatest Americans of all time wrote that declaration, and I am sure she would be appalled to see where we have come since then.
We know that several hundred of these men were completely innocent, but it still took years for them to receive any kind of hearing and be let free. And IIRC, there have been news reports that at least some of the men were innocent of any crime or military involvement when they were arrested, but cannot now be let go because our treatment of them is so horrific they have now sworn to fight the US on behalf of Al Queda - we created terrorists by locking up innocents.
I also think the question of whether these "interrogation" techniques are useful is basically moot at this point. We are so far removed from 9/11, and dealing with an entirely different Al Queda operation - one much less centrally operated - can these men really tell us anything about what is happening now if they have been under lock and key for 4 years? Not to mention, thanks to the military's short sighted "we don't want no fags" policy, we are chronically short-staffed for translators - we can barely communicate with these men.
Finally, I keep coming back to the story of the innocent taxi driver from Afghanistan who was murdered by American forces while in prison in Afghanistan. His three passengers were packed off to Gitmo, and freed this year, but the driver never made it that far. He was horrifically beaten and died of what appears to be a blood clot - possibly the same kind of thing that causes "economy class syndrome" and killed the NBC correspondent. Except that the taxi driver's clot was not caused by being in one position too long, it was caused because his legs had been so badly beaten his blood vessels actually broke down.
To flip your question around Ed - if there are effective "techniques" in this category, how do we ensure they don't go any farther into torture? And wouldn't it be better to avoid all hints of violence and ill-treatment to avoid any possibility of torture?
In other words - when does a human being lose their humanity?
I raise the idea of "innocent until proven guilty" only insofar as one partial justification for coercive techniques is punishment of the detainee. It seemed that you were close to supporting that rationale, and I wanted to caution you against it.
Jason wrote:
Oh, definitely not. The only justification for it, in my view, is extracting useful information that would aid in stopping further attacks, help us infiltrate cells, and so forth. And I don't really doubt that some forms of coercive interrogation are useful in that regard. But that doesn't mean the use of torture. And I share everyone else's concern about using such techniques on the innocent or the irrelevant, and I also have no doubt that we've done that quite a bit as well. We should do everything we can to avoid that, certainly. And yes, I blame the mixed messages coming from the White House for both the migration of tactics from the dangerous to the not-so-dangerous, and for blurring the line between acceptable coercive tactics and outright torture.
I never thought you would take this sort of position, Ed. It's not about moral high ground, it's about keeping the geneva conventions legitimate. We can't rightly participate in torture ourself and then use Saddam's "torture chambers" as propaganda against him, can we? Can we complain about what happens in Cuban prisons if we are doing similar things? I think not, and I think the geneva conventions are extremely important in making war as humane as it can possibly be. I don't think we should be undermining them; we should be their most ardent supporters.
I lieu of trackback, I too have replied. here.
We do not put POWs on trial; indeed, it would violate the Geneva Conventions to do so.
I'm sorry Ed, I don't understand this. On genevaconventions.org I found the following statement which seems to contradict what you are saying:
"Depriving combatants, prisoners of war, refugees, or medical or religious personnel of a fair trail is a grave breach of the Geneva Convention. (Protocol I, Art. 85, Sec. 4e)"
Can you reconcile these two statements?
"There is an obvious distinction between a domestic police arrest and someone detained by the military in a terrorist safehouse in Kabul or Tikrit."
What about the distinction between a domestic police arrest and people handed over en masse by Northern Alliance warlords in return for a bounty? Or between a domestic police arrest and people rounded up in neighbourhood sweeps? Or between a domestic police arrest and someone sent to Gitmo on the basis of the testimony of someone who was being tortured or had a grudge?
Matthew wrote:
You never thought I'd take this sort of position, but you're misrepresenting that opinion rather significantly. I made very clear that I was not advocating torture - "Please understand that I am not - I repeat NOT - advocating torture." As I've said several times now, there is a huge range of coercive interrogation techniques and it's unreasonable to classify them all as torture. I think it's also unreasonable to rule them all out as a means of gaining useful information. But there is clearly a point at which a line is crossed and it becomes torture and it cannot be allowed, and there is also the risk of using even allowable techniques on the wrong people. My point has been that both extremes - the "let the government do whatever they want because they're terrorists anyway" group and the "innocent until proven guilty, so you can't do anything to make them uncomfortable" group - are oversimplifying the situation and ignoring the need to balance a range of concerns.
Let's get specific. Let's say we capture Zarqawi, the man who by all indications is the primary organizer of the insurgency in Iraq and is responsible for the deaths of thousands of innocent Iraqis and American soldiers over the last couple years. This man will undoubtedly have information about who his underlings are, where their hideouts are, how they communicate, where their weapons are stored, where they are likely to hit next, and so forth. And surely it's obvious that he is not going to just give us that information, nor are we going to be able to gain his trust. The only means of getting that information is through interrogation. Are you really going to argue that we can't get tough with him at all to get that information? We both agree that torture is ruled out, but what about sleep deprivation to weaken his resolve? What about sodium pentathol? There is a continuum here, and we may well disagree about where exactly on that continuum that line should be drawn, but I just don't think it's reasonable given the situation to say that it's wrong to use any tactic at all along that continuum.
worm eater-
My understanding was that under the Geneva Conventions, you cannot put prisoners of war on trial and punish them for some crime, you could only hold them until the end of the war. Perhaps that understanding is wrong.
It is legitimate to put POWs on trial for war crimes, but it is not legitimate to put them on trial for, say, murder or arson, provided that these otherwise criminal acts were conducted through legitimate means of warfare.
Ginger Yellow wrote:
I agree - and have already agreed - that we may well have used coercive interrogation or worse on people who didn't have anything to tell us. I think that's a very bad thing and I wish it would stop. Everyone here is beating the hell out of this straw man, as though I've defended hacking off the limbs of anyone the government doesn't happen to like. I have not, and do not. My point from the start has not been to defend torture, or to defend our government's often misguided policies in this regard, but only to say that it's not reasonable to rule out all coercive interrogation techniques in all circumstances applied to all detainees. There are many factors to balance here and it just isn't as simple as either extreme is making it out to be.
I'd point you in the direction of Crooked Timber and Obsidian Wings for strong arguments as to why it's intolerable to legalise torture under any circumstances. That's not to say it might be morally (ethically?) justified in very specific cases, but the effect of legalisation and routinisation is too corrosive on both individuals and institutions to be allowed. We've seen this time and time again where torture has been made legal.
Ginger Yellow,
Ed has argued against legalizing torture. The problem is, what is torture? Is sodium pentathol injection considered torture? Is "Koran abuse" considered torture? Sleep deprivation? Are we talking about physical torture, or does this extend to psychological torture? If I doctor an image to to make it appear that a detainee's wife has been killed, and then tell him that his chilren are next, is that torture?
In other words, where is the line? To get information out of someone, you may need to weaken them psychologically and/or physically. Perhaps giving them one meal a day. Or only allowing them to sleep for 3 hours each night. Is this torture?
I'm always perplexed by this sort of argument. It's not as if nobody has ever thought about this before. Or there aren't plenty of serviceable definitions of torture around. Look at the convention on torture and you'll see it's perfectly clear. As is the US statute on torture, in a slightly different way. Or the Israeli supreme court rulings on torture, which specify in precise detail what is allowable and what is not, and under what circumstances.
i can't believe the fbi reports on gitmo "fill you with ambivalence." or the taguba report, for that matter. our military is torturing people that they often pull in just at random. if you haven't figured this out by now, you need to inform yourself more fully.
a more appropriate reaction might be disgust. or even a desire to see the people ordering the torture put on trial.