Torture doesn't work. Film at 11.

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NOG,

But there we go with the hypotheticals again. I agree that if you torture someone, and the infromation you gained through torture allowed you to successfully prevent a terrorist from blowing up a school bus filled with kids, then yes, it would be justifiable. The only thing is, I've never seen such an example (or one similar to it), and I think the likelihood of seeing a scenario like that is extremely remote. Certainly remote enough to say that torture is unjustifiable, and should not be part of official policy.

Look, if you're willing to place extreme conditions on things, you can justify almost anything. I think that killing someone is wrong, but I certainly would kill someone to prevent them from causing immediate harm to my child. That doesn't mean that I think it's OK to kill anyone at anytime to prevent potential harm to someone else. Unfortunately, that's how I see the toture arguement, because you never know for sure if the subject has the information you seek, nor do you know if what information he gave you was accurate, or was just said to stop you from toturing him.

 

Excellent point, Aldeth. It reminds me about the stories regarding witchhunts - you throw a suspected witch into a lake, and if they don't sink, they're guilty; if they do sink, they're dead, but at least they're proven innocent.

 

I would have to see statistics on how successful torture is in producing actionable intelligence. Even if it doesn't lead to disarming a bomb, but rather to preventing someone from having ever placed that bomb, it worked.

But that same arguement can be applied against killing someone who's holding a gun to your child's head. You can't actually know that they're willing to pull the trigger until they do, and then it's too late. There are problems on both sides of the extreme, which is why cases like this are handled on a case-by-case judgement basis. There can be sufficient evidence that the person knows something. Maybe coded documents were found in the person's possession. It is reasonable to assume that they know how to break the code.

Again, any use of torture must be accompanied by verifying information both beforehand and afterward, or it will turn into a witch-hunt just like Splunge said, but the simple fact that an investigaion can turn into a witch-hunt doesn't mean we should stop all investigations. There comes a point when logical laws and procedures governing the process must rely on individual human judgement, but that doesn't mean that the process is faulty, just that we have to be careful with it.

 

Ding! Ding! Ding! This man deserves a prize!

The Shaman speaks the truth. Having been in intelligence, I know first-hand that this is exactly how it works. The last thing the intelligence community needs is more bad information to sort through. T2, I'm sure, can corroborate this, too.

 

I think the last thing the intel community is likely to do is announce the comparative success of its interrogation methods complete with statistical breakdown.

Okay, second to last, behind 'overthrowing Obama because of the color of his skin'

 

You are aware that, in wanting to read statistics that you don't know but that you are sure to confirm your view, you're grasping at straws?

That torture, allegedly, worked in that one instance you referred to, doesn't mean that other means would not have worked as well, or worked better. There are many ways to skin a cat, as they say. Your argument still rests on the assumption of guilt and it assumes perfect knowledge on the side of the authorities on who they have and what he knows.

Add to the picture uncertainty: If it is unclear whether the suspect is, say Ahmed the terrorist (those towel heads look all the same), who knows something and if torturing him could prevent someone from having ever placed that bomb - would you torture him? Even at the risk that it turns out he's the wrong guy, say Ahmed the baker, who knows nothing - which you find out after you deprived him of sleep, whacked him up, shackled him into 'stress positions' (which is an euphemism for something extremely painful), exposed him to cold or heat, and for good measure made him perform tricks on a dog leash and perhaps got him a psychosis? Or maybe after you, oops, 'overreached' and killed him, because his heart was weak? That sort of thing happened in Iraq and Afghanistan all the time. Are you ready to approve that too?

Many woman want to have children. Rape them gets them pregnant. Rape works. Does that means it's ok because it 'works'? Or is your view that we should we not deprive us of a potentially effective tool by ruling out rape?

Certainly not. After all, ends don't justify the means. Woman who have been raped are innocent, and victims of crimes. However, criminals are another matter - they are per definition guilty, so applying torture to them is another matter? Let me point out that criminals have been found guilty. The people who are being investigated are merely 'accused of a crime'. The very essence of that distinction is that their guilt is still in doubt. It cannot be stressed enough that torture and the the assumption of guilt put on its head the cornerstone of all western criminal justice systems - the rule that you are innocent until proven guilty. I question the wisdom of digging under that stone.

It appears that cranking out confessions is about the only thing torture is good at. The Spanish inquisitors had a rational reason to want confessions - they needed to extract a confession because they believed it was their duty to bring the accused back to the faith. And torture was an effective way to achieve that - they knew the suspect was guilty of some sort of heresy, and sinners don't repent easily, and they knew what they wanted to hear - so they only needed to crank up the rack and ask according to this original form:

Code:

* Did you commit the grave sin of X?

( ) yes
( ) no

* And what else?

............................................................................
............................................................................
............................................................................
.................... (Oh dear, it was THAT bad! Even worse than we thought!)

Under catholic faith a true confession results in the accused being forgiven, even though that usually involves penances (absolution doesn't come free), in their case usually some form of atonement, such as pilgrimages or wearing multiple, heavy crosses. In that view, the Inquisition did those sinners a favour. If the accused didn't confess, the inquisitors could sentence him to life imprisonment. Repeat offenders would be "abandoned" as irredeemable to the "secular arm" and executed by the secular authorities. From a theocratic point of view the reign of terror which we today associate with the Spanish Inquisition was an act of mercy (which one should keep in mind when one looks at the practice of Islamic regimes).

The torture debate puts a peculiar emphasis on confession. What is it that people get out confessions? Oral testimony, or worse, eyewitness account, is probably about the least reliable evidence you'll ever encounter in court. Why do people think confessions are any more reliable? Criminal history is replete with examples of retarded idiots who wanted to meet their interrogators expectations and falsely confessed to murder - and were then sent to death row, innocent. Is it because confessions soothingly remove doubt about guilt?

If that is so, the cost of fallacy of conflating punishment and 'truth finding' in calling for torture becomes even higher - in combination with the assumption of guilt it does nothing but cranking out confessions. Confessions is not what intelligence or law enforcement is about. Confessions are no surrogate for evidence, and no substitute for investigation. There is no instant fix, like torture, to either crime or terrorism.

 

Who said I was sure it would confirm my views? I certainly didn't. Ragusa, you're reading into my writings a great many assumptions that simply aren't there. I would appreciate it if you would be more careful.

So now you're dismissing documented evidence as 'alleged' and pulling the "you'll never know for sure" bit. Well, I can just as easily say that further interrogation short of torture may have caused his head to spontaneously implode, and thus torturing him saved his life. After all, since we didn't do it, we don't know.

Ragusa, to use any level of logic on any discussion requires the acceptance of certain base assumptions. Given that we know that some information was extracted from him prior to his torture, I think it's safe to assume that the interrogators switched to torture because they felt, in their expert opinions, that they were unlikely to produce further information without torture.

No it doesn't. No more than the legal system works on an assumption of perfect knowledge. You can never have perfect knowledge in anything, but sometimes you have to act anyway. Certain precautions of verifying information can be made, but you can never know 100%. I can accept that as one more concern with torture, like it is with the death penalty, but honestly, I'd say that's far less of a concern than, say, the effectiveness of torture.

No, I'm not, and I already said that. If you don't know with a reasonable amount of certainty that the subject is in a position to know anything, then DO NOT engage in torture. Interrogation, maybe, but if you're not even sure who this person is, then I'd be careful even there.

Ragusa, you seem to believe that I am saying torture is good fun all the time, regardless of circumstances. This is ridiculous. I'm not some gung-ho torture fanatic.

... Ok, Ragusa, I don't know where your brain when just now, but it wasn't in the conversation at hand... at all. To say this again because apparently you didn't read it in my previous posts, torture is not about punishment and should be applied only in the most careful of situations, with information (such as who the subject is and what he is likely to know) verified beforehand and (such as what he has said and who he has accused) afterward.

Ragusa, again, this has nothing to do with the discussion at hand. The closest you got was that "It appears that cranking out confessions is about the only thing torture is good at." which is blatantly false, as we have at least one recorded instance (and I'm guessing a lot more if you got records, good luck at that, though) of it working to produce actionable intelligence.

Who on earth said anything about getting a confession?! Ragusa, you seem to be assuming that I will say something, or that I believe something, which I have never said and do not believe. I'd appreciate it if you'd actually read my responses and respond to them. At the moment, I'm starting to worry you may be having a delusional psychotic event here.

Here we completely agree. This is the worst way to apply torture. It also has little to nothing to do with what we're talking about.

I think this is the first intelligent thing you've said in this post. I don't treat torture as an instant fix for anything, not even a lack of intelligence.

 

NOG,

First, who are you kidding? You're hedging when you say:

And let me make this clear to you: I did not say that you want a confession. I said that a confession is about all you get out of someone with torture. The inquisition is just a historical case where torture was successfully used to that end.

And why are riding that one recorded instance to death, the case of Abu Zubaydah? This is apparently what you're referring to as the link as provided by martaug is the only pro torture story in the entire thread. And it turns out might have been reported to you in a way that doesn't accurately reflects the case, mind you, it's from NRO, and an opinion piece. I rather put my bets for journalistic accuracy on the Washington Post account referred to in the article. One recorded instance is just that, which is of course why you 'need to see the statistics'. Well, nonsense. You don't care about the statistics.

Or well, you do, if only to a point. You are intelligent enough to want returns from something that you apparently recognize as abhorrent. If it produces nothing of great value, torture descends from interrogation to mere torment. Therefor the case of Abu Zubaydah must be true. Torture works. Abu Zubaydah's case proves it. I need not feel bad about myself. Do I read too much out of your posts?

Speaking of strawmen, I will tell you my personal opinion on our views: You cling to this story, because it confirms a view that you already hold. You didn't come to support torture of terrorists because of the story of Abu Zubaydah. I am curious, can you provide a justification for torture without secret statistics and your token 'case where it worked'? Spill your guts.

Zubaydah's case, if read critically, is far more ambiguous than you like to admit. So you prefer a sympathetic account, courtesy of NRO's 'opinions on the shelve', and hold it up as 'proof'? Well, what we also have are plenty of recorded instances, and testimony of experienced interrogators, from this one and other wars, who dealt with other really bad apples, who stress that torture demonstrably yielded nothing but dirt that sent out investigators on wild goose chases and that diverted limited resources. I find their accounts far more convincing than NRO's hackery.

And about torture and punishment. Let me make that clear to you as well, in short sentences. You aren't mandating torturing every suspect (I hope), you only call for torturing 'known bad guys'. That makes it easier to justify. Well, in for a penny, in for a pound. My problem with torture? Torture makes a mockery out of 'innocent until proven guilty', the presumption of innocence. It turns it on hits head. As I said, I question the wisdom of digging under that stone. Torture replaces it with the 'assumption of guilt'. That's why torture is so good at producing confessions.

Torture in interrogations, as opposed to mere sadism, is purpose driven. The purpose of this is the extraction of information. This use of coercion is based on the assumption that the subjects know something. They know something because they have been involved in it - because they are bad guys. That is the assumption of guilt. I presume to you these persons being bad guys justifies torture because they brought it on themselves, because they deserve it. Now that line of thought is about punishment. That is the bottom line and it is very transparent. You can as well be honest about it.

 

Military manuals always said to follow the Geneva Convention. However, most military seemed to believe certain circumstances allowed for deviation -- which was undoubtedly a contributing factor in Abu Ghraib. The stories of torture that came from both sides in the Viet Nam war were horrific.

 

That's not hedging, Ragusa, any more than asking to see statistics on how risky it is would be hedging. It's asking in detail. You may assume hedging, because you seem to expect it, but any attempt to detail the kind of statistics to be seen would require 'hedging' in that manner. After all, just asking to see statistics on torture would include things like how often it's used, or who uses it most, without regards to the results of the torture.

The fact that you were responding to me when you wrote that led me to assume you were targeting it at me. Either way, you significantly diverged from the discussion at hand and reverted to an already agreed upon conclusion that torture can be misused.

I would be happy to discuss other instances of torture successfully providing actionable intelligence if you have any. My point is that the facts (regardless of the opinion nature of the piece, it made factual claims) in that piece demonstrate that torture can work, and thus you throwing out that it can only be used to produce confessions appears wrong on it's face. Basically, while a single case example can't prove many absolutes, it can disprove them.

You seem to assume that I have come to a conclusion. I haven't. I am quite uncertain myself, but I can see the potential for successful use if it is shown to be reasonably reliable. If the original story in this thread is a fluke, not a reasonable representation of the average case under the conditions I've already proscribed, the I agree that the potential benefits of torture are not worth the great deal of risk involved. Essentially, I am not relying on any 'secret statistics' at all.

It is unfortunate that statistics governing torture, even from the Cold War period, are not likely to be readily available, but that simply means this debate is likely to end nowhere, not that I'm assuming anything about those statistics.

Did or did not Zubaydah provide information through torture? Did or did not that information lead to arrests of confirmed terrorists? These answers are either yes or no, and they are not opinions, they are facts. As to the other cases, while I would like to hear actual examples, I readily admit that torture can be misused. The question is whether or not it can possibly be used appropriately.

Ragusa, you are agian making unfounded assumptions. Whether torture assumes guilt or simply assumes the reliability of evidence entirely depends on when it is applied. It is the same with incarceration, fines, and execution of criminals. Any punishment, if based on an assumption of guilt, relies on that assumption. If it is based on legal fact-finding processes, on the other hand, it makes no such assumption at all. I have already detailed the preconditions necessary before I would even consider torture, and if you want to read them, you can go back to my earlier post in which I numbered them. One of these conditions is the confirmation beforehand (within reasonable limits of knowledge) that the subject is highly likely to know something. Similarly, I also required that other fact-finding and interrogation methods be exhausted first.

As I have said above, it is only an assumption if you assume it, and do not act to verify that assumption. Unless you are arguing that all potentially negative actions should be forbidden the State (punishment for criminals, taking children away from neglectful parents, etc.) because they all assume the guilt of the subject, this entire arguement is moot.

Let me put a hypothetical case before you. It is set in the 1970s, at the height of the Cold War. US counter-espionage agents have identified an individual as a Russian spy, we'll call him A. Under interrogation (not torture), a name is produced, a name who is supposed to be another agent, a US citizen who has been turned. It is also produced that this agent has information regarding a plan to deploy nuclear weapons within the US. No more details than that are given, even under torture. The individual named, we'll call him B, is watched for several weeks. He seems to lead an ordinary life, except for occasional odd excursions to remote areas where he either leaves a package or picks up a package. When he leaves a package, it is watched, and known cohorts of A always pick it up. No one knows for sure who is leaving the packages for B. It is deemed that B can now be arrested for espionage, and his home searched. They do this right after he's picked up a package, and manage to secure the package. In B's home are numerous top-secret documents he has procured during his work, along with a large map of the US detailing potential entry points, which seem to focus on out-of-the-way entrances to the US. In the package are a number of sheets of paper with apparent code on them. The crytologists can't crack the code. Under interrogation, B confirms he was turned by Russian agents, and that he was working on a project to bring something into the US, but not what. Interrogation is intense, and the expert interrogaters are sure he knows more, but will not talk under further interrogation. Torture has not yet been employed.

Under these circumstances, when it has been confirmed to almost 100% certainty that B is a spy and can provide details about a plan to deploy USSR goods within the US, likely nuclear weapons, is torture acceptable? We're not looking for a confession, as we already have one and even without one there's plenty of evidence for a conviction. At the same time, it is likely that torture may provide means to prevent the deployment of nuclear weapons within the US, though there is no certain 'ticking clock'. The plan may not go into effect for months, or even years. The plan may even fall through if B isn't there to do his part. It may already be foiled, but it may not.

 

Oh no my friend. You're making the case for torture. You do the work.

 

That's a good point. We have a process for determing the "bad guys" from ordinary bystanders. I realize in a combat zone that it is not the same as in civilian society. But nevertheless, what is in your subtext is that a policy of torture crafts a criminal element into our own process of dealing with "enemy combatants."

It is no surprise that GWB had to make such a foolish liar out of himself by telling the entire world that "we do not torture," when in fact, everyone under the sun knew that we did, and that he was a part of it. It's hard to seize the moral high ground when you are in the act of decieving those whose trust you wish to gain and circumventing your own standards for morality. Cheney, of course, made no fine distinctions. His pronouncements were his justifications, and the law or morality can be damned. If we tortured, injured or murdered a number of bystanders in the process, well that's "just the cost of doing business."

Yet most everyone else in the "chain" is an accomplice. Remember those at Abu Ghraib were just out-of-control subordinates. The naked human piles, the people beat to death, the electric wires, the dead bodies kept in the icebox were all a "breakdown in discipline" and the result of "poor command."

While he is busy with double-talk to the media and the American people, he fails to grasp that the entire command chain, which leads back to him eventually, has not been able to make that ridiculous distinction as well. Unless, of course, he has the unoffical, unstated policy that "torture is OK." If the policy is unstated then the distinction between abuse and torture is wholly absurd without specific guidelines for subordinates to follow along with. But GWB & company always have their "go-to" solution: Just change the meanig of the word "torture."

http://www.cfr.org/publication/9209/

The bottom line is that most Americans don't like torture. They see torture as unAmerican. If not, then why all the legal gymnasitcs and gyrations? It is to lower our standards, to lower the bar, once again. How typical. Again at Gitmo:

I guess we wanted to learn from the "masters" of torture. How comforting.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guantánamo_Bay_detention_camp

 

One, why does that put the work on me? Why shouldn't those opposing it have to do the work? Two, it's completely unnecessary work. Will a second case study go far in showing how useful or dangerous torture can be? The point of the first was to prove if it were possible for torture to produce useful results. Anything on top of that would have to be overarching statistics, which I really doubt anyone can get their hands on here.

 

+++ Torture comes at a price +++ Torture doesn't work +++ Torture is a (war)crime +++

So I then have to do the homework that you refuse to do. Which is probably for the better. I remember this is a pattern with you. Well, this is going to be a long one. In no particular order:

I underlined my comments, for ease of reading.

Also, you're putting torture same category as death penalty. Interesting. Why? Death penalty is about punishment. Someone did something so bad, he deserves death. Torture in interrogations is something about fact-finding. It is not punishment. My impression is, read carefully, that your mantra that torture works, comes from the same direction as your support for the death penalty. That are considerations about whether people deserve protection, or forfeit them, and the decision is solely based on the judgement on a sentiment level that they don't. Because they are bad people and they have it coming and that they don't deserve mercy. Period. It is, in the end as simple as that. And yes, that train of thought is about punishment, whether you like to admit it or not.

Your simple view starts to unravel when you introduce error. Say you executed or tortured the wrong guy. But that doesn't happen in your argument loop because torture is only to be applied when it is crystal clear that the accused knows something and that there is no other way to get at it. May I laugh now? I dare say that death penalty verdicts are only handed when the jury is convinced 'beyond reasonable doubt' that the accused is indeed guilty. Well, if that is so, how comes then that there are innocents on death row? Because humans are fallible.

Also, torture comes with a cost. Legitimacy. There has been one instance where torture was extensively used and that was by the French in the Battle of Algiers. The French army won the Battle of Algiers but soon lost the war for Algeria, in part because their systematic torture delegitimated the larger war effort in the eyes of most Algerians and many French. "You might say that the Battle of Algiers was won through the use of torture," observed British journalist Sir Alistair Horne, "but that the war, the Algerian war, was lost." But it appears, that there is nothing the US can learn from the French.

Well, there's help for you, never mind your presumable gut feelings. There are statistics, metrics, on how torture works, and they apparently don't support your position, at least according to Army Deputy Chief of Staff for Intelligence John Kimmons.
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• Kimmons on the intelligence value of torture:
  
  But then, what does he know?
  .
• A former US Army interrogator about is experiences in Iraq:
  
  
  
  
  
  
  ​
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• Former FBI Interrogator Jack Cloonan:
  He explains that regular interrogation tactics work well on even the worst terrorists.
  .
  
  ​
  .
  There are no ticking time bombs. It doesn't happen in the real world. Without the ticking time bomb, or (when I read it I thought you were kidding) that Russian nuke, your argument falls apart. After all, it is only the urgency that justifies to you torture after the exhaustion of everything else! You cling to fiction ... 'what if ... ?!' Get real. Watch less TV.
  .
• Rear Admiral (ret.) John Hutson, former Judge Advocate General for the Navy
  .
• Bob Baer, former CIA official
  
  .
• Michael Scheuer, formerly a senior CIA official in the Counter-Terrorism Center
  
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• Dan Coleman, retired FBI agent
  
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• Army Field Manual 34-52 Chapter 1
  
  .
• Declassified FBI e-mail dated May 10, 2004, responding to the question of whether FBI in agents Guantanamo agents were instructed to "stand clear" due to interrogation techniques utilized by Department of Defense and Department of Homeland Security
  
  .
• The story of Hanns Scharff - perhaps the best interrogator the Luftwaffe had in WW-II. Speaking of urgency, he was not so much concerned with speculative ticking time bombs, but with very real bomber fleets burning down German cities and killing people in the hundreds of thousands.
  I let that speak for itself, in reply to your as ridiculous as fictitious Russian nuke scenario. Obviously, considering how many lives had been at stake, he really ought to have not forfeited the option to torture - which is exactly the Nazi view on the 'Verschärfte Vernehmung' (on that, some good work by the otherwise insufferable Andrew Sullivan).

Back to you:
I am a practical person. If you want to torture, you need to establish rules and add them to the US code. Just to mention those trifles - here's your to do list: You'd need to edit that bit about 'cruel and unusual punishments' in the Eighth Amendment to the United States Constitution, and the protections of the right to life and liberty, personal freedom and physical integrity in the Fourth, Fifth and Eighth Amendments. You'd need to quit a few (fun fact: largely US initiated) international treaties as well, off the top of my head .... the Convention against Torture, the Geneva Conventions, the UN Charter to get rid of that ghastly Universal Declaration of Human Rights (Art. 3, 5) ... etc.

Then you'd need to write that list.

I think it is healthy for you to read a prime example for such a list of criteria, the, rather restrictive, Gestapo rules on the 'Verschärfte Vernehmung'. It will be reassuring to you that your views on the question when to apply torture are largely shared by SS-Gruppenführer Heinrich Müller. You will feel familiar with the first list item. Well, you might want to weed out the second list item, that the 'Verschärfte Vernehmung' is to be applied only against Communists, Marxists, bible researcher sects, terrorists, saboteurs, members of the resistance movement, parachute agents, asocial persons (read: gypsies, hobos, alcoholics, prostitutes, pimps, homeless) - and of course Polish or Russian persons who refuse to work, or idlers. Also, the 'Verschärfte Vernehmung' was not to be used to extract confessions on the subjects own crimes (read: only for the subject to denounce others), and after a certain severity allowed only in the presence of a doctor and with the approval of high superiors. Isn't that reasonable? You may want to change the details of the fourth list item.

After all that, we haven't even started to address the (il)legality of torture, and that it constitutes crimes under US criminal code (which is why former President George W. Bush felt he needed to retroactively immunise everyone who acted on his orders). It constitutes crimes under international law. There are no exceptions to the prohibition against torture. On that you find excellent stuff at the blog Balkinization (which is very much in legalese, but very rewarding to read) and also on Scott Horton's excellent blog at Harper's magazine.

 

Yes, Ragusa, I do seem to remember that you always ask everyone else to find information, especially when the information is entirely unnecessary to begin with. Tell me, if I found one more single case of torture producing useful information, would you suddenly change your tune and claim it is usefull and practical? I seriously doubt it. Nor would I, when confronted with two cases of torture being used effectively, suddenly resolve my moral conundrum in it's favor. To what end, then, do you want a second case study? What possible purpose could it serve?

My responses bolded for easier reading:

Thank you, that was a good idea. I've followed your inspiration.

No, I'm not. What I said is that the logical process of determining involvement is the same for both torture and the death penalty. You don't execute people to find out if they were involved in the crime, you execute them because you've already determined they were and want to punish them/deter future criminals. Likewise, you don't torture people to find out if they were involved in a terrorist organization. You torture them because you've already determined that they were and want more information.

Then you are wrong. On both counts. While I know torture can work, I am not certain it is practical. Likewise, the death penalty as it is currently employed in the US is impractical. It doesn't really seem to help anything. For it to be practically effective, it would have to be virtually immediate after the trial. That, of course, would prevent any attempt to re-examine the evidence. Just so we're all clear here, that would be a bad thing.

Yes, that train of thought is. Aren't you glad I don't follow it. You really seem to need to re-read my minimum criteria for employing torture, as you seem to have completely missed it. I really think it would change your perceptions of my arguement.

Yes, humans are fallible, and when we have the luxury to wait and see before making an irrevocable decision we should. Unfortunately, in war and similar circumstances, that's not always the case. Certain precautions have to be made, but we ultimately have to accept that mistakes are possible. It's possible that that building is sheltering a bunch of nuns, not the massive weapons depot that all our intelligence tells us is there. Do you destroy the building in case that intelligence is right, or let it go on the off chance that it is wrong?

Basically, Ragusa, it comes down to this: would you rather torture one uninvolved individual who knows nothing, or let 9/11 happen again? Now yes, there is a huge gray zone between those two, and yes it's possible that you could do both, or neither, but that is the hypothetical situation that we are faced with. Unfortunately, there is no simple 'right answer'.

Unfortunately, the situation is far more complex than that, but that is one thing to remember. Yes, torture may get you useful information, but how many new enemies will it make you at home and abroad? The answer is very situationally dependant. In the modern day, the answer would probably be 'many' on both counts, but in the Cold War, for example, it would probably be 'very few' on both counts.

The practical summation of that article, for our purposes at least, seems to be that the army no longer condones torture. This is practically useless, as it only addresses a situation in which, as I've already said, torture is least likely to be practical. It is unlikely to work on a hardened, idealogically extreme enemy and it is very likely to produce sympathy for the enemy both at home and abroad.

Sounds to me like he's describing an abusive arrest system and interrogations that range from legitimate, if extreme, to downright abusive, and badly amateurish attempts at torture. Breaking bones? Smashing feet with axe-heads? Not the way to go. More than anything, though, that last video seemed to sum it up when he said the reason he wasn't getting any intel was because these people weren't terrorists. They were the uninvolved, exactly who I've been saying should be left out of this since nearly the beginning.

Actually, the one case example he gave said that the terrorist wanted to talk, which is unusual, not the norm. On the other hand, if he's right that regular interrogation tactics work on everyone who knows anything, then there would never be a reason to use torture under my guidelines. Problem solved.

Again, Ragusa, you really need to read my posts before you criticize them. I myself said that torture is unlikely to work in a ticking timebomb scenario. Therefor, whether or not those scenarios actually exist is moot. Further, if you really think the Russians never thought of deploying nukes on US soil, or that the US didn't consider the same thing, then you have no idea whatsoever what actually happened there. More to the point, though, was that the question of torture came about after the determination of involvement, as your ravings at the time were all about how torture must assume guilt.

Now, your new arguement is that torture could only be considered useful in timebomb scenarios. It would seem you believe that, in any other scenario, we have the luxury to wait and see how things play out. This is, frankly, naive in the extreme. Your own FBI Interrogator said that all information is time sensitive and, to be more practical, the situations where torture may be useful are the same as the situations where harsh interrogation may be useful. If you think we can find out everything we need to know about the enemy dedicated to killing us simply by asking nicely, you don't know what you're talking about.

And if I believed that the United States was the infallable be-all and end-all of goodness and righteousness, then I may agree with him. Unfortunately, his arguement boils down to two points:
1.) We don't torture because we don't like it, and we're American.
2.) We don't torture because we can't guarantee the accuracy of the information, and other methods may work better.

#2 is a good point, but I've already addressed it. To say this again (this is what, the third or fourth time I've told you this? What's the definition of insanity again?) you do not begin torture until all other information procurement methods have been exhausted and you act to verify the information you recieve before you act on it.

His statement works if you ask pointed or leading questions. Part of an effective torture program would be training the people to ask open-ended questions in order to avoid exactly that. I'm sure there are 100s of other ways to avoid or identify guess-answers, too.

I think all of these are addressed above.

 

I prefer to do something pleasant this evening. It is not my job to cure your ignorance, or to change your sentiments or Weltanschauung. I can't do that. You continue to be dead wrong in your current comments, and that isn't going to change in the next ones. Another reply on my part would be a waste of time. Let's leave it at that.

 

No, he isn't. I don't mean to speak for Ragusa, but that is just the easy way out from trying to dismiss someone's point of view without finding any supporting evidence for your own opinions. I believe your remarks are patronizing and ill-suited for the discussion at hand. We don't need an evaluation of Ragusa's emotional state from you, but a critical anaylsis of the facts.

Ragusa is basing his views upon experts who have actually dealt with real-life situations, rather than the conservative bloggers and talking heads, whose idea of "fact finding" is seeking out those who agree and then telling each other what it is they want to hear in the conservative echo chamber.

Ragusa's sources are impeccable. The only thing he needs to "take a deep breath" from is the amount of good work he had to do because you couldn't find a worthwhile source of your own.

 

Chandos, I provided a point-by-point response to Ragusa's comments, providing a logical counter-arguement when I saw one and accepting the points when I didn't. My comment that he seemed to be more emotion-driven than logic-driven was based on the fact that he repeatedly pointed out facts that had no bearing on the current discussion.

For example, any blanket criticism of GTMO or the actions of US soldiers in Iraq and Afghanastan is pointless, not because it is ill-founded, but because I have already conceeded that those actions were wrong. In essense, he was agreeing with me, yet doing so in a manner as if he were presenting new evidence.

Likewise, I find any assessment based purely on personal experience to be questionable at best (no matter what the conclusion) and any assessment based purely on US actions in the last 8 years or so to be limited in the extreme. It's like saying cancer can't be cured because you're uncle couldn't do it with a high-school chemistry set in his basement. From everything I have heard and seen, the US actions that border on, or delve into, torture are done with all the care and know-how of an alcoholic wife-beater. It's no surprise that they don't result in information.

On top of that, it would seem that the soldiers in question didn't even bother to investigate the individuals before hand, but rather assumed guilt, exactly what both Ragusa and I have criticized.

My comment is based far less on his points than you seem to think. I actually agree with a number of them. It is rather based on the way he presents them, as if they're new and damning evidence, when in fact they're items I considered and included in some of my first posts.

As for my search for 'worthwhile sources', the only statistics I can find on torture are not at all related to it's results in information, but rather it's rates in various engagements throughout the world, it's psychological impacts, WHO assessments of it, etc. Such things are not exactly useful for our discussion at hand. We all recognize that torture is a terrible thing with terrible consequences. So is war. So is prison. So are most psychopharmaseudicals. So is nuclear power. Drug trials, even careful ones, can easily become this. The simple fact that something is terrible, and has terrible consequences, does not mean we should ignore it or bar it outright simply for that. The usefulness of a thing must first be assessed, and it must be determined if the benefits are worth the risks and consequences. That is what I wish to do, if only for my own benefit.

Now, to Ragusa, I also said I could be wrong about that impression. If I was, I apologize. Please forgive me. Your comments did not seem to be centered on the actual salient points of the discussion at all. Given the topic at hand, and the fact that I know emotion can quite easily overwhelm logic, I thought that the most likely cause. I know you are not stupid, in fact you seem to be one of the more intelligent posters on this forum, but I have also seen you do the same thing in several other discussions that got heated.

 

NOG, in deciding whether or not torture is justified, looking at real world examples of torture and its results is most assuredly valid. That GITMO has been a debacle yielding little to no actionable intelligence despite rampant use of torture is very valid here, regardless of whether or not you agree that it was "wrong". You can't argue in defense of torture while ignoring GITMO.

The experience of the experts in the field of military intelligence who know firsthand about the procedures employed and their relative levels of successes, failures, and backfires* is a whole lot more than just simple "personal" experience. This is the product of education, training, real legitimate knowledge, and yes, experience. Such a voice carries quite a lot more weight than, say, a loudmouth college dropout who's never even served in the military, much less the intelligence community, like Sean Hannity.

NOG, soldiers follow orders. The guy assigned to interrogate a suspect is neither expected, authorized, or capable of conducting his own investigation. It's not like an interrogator would be able to hop a flight to Afghanistan before performing his interrogation. Why do you even feel it necessary to make such a point, knowing that this will always be the case? Given that this will always be the case, wouldn't that mean that torture will always be unjustified?

* Backfires are the really important part, here. Torture doesn't usually "just" fail. It usually backfires, yielding false information. In the intelligence community, yielding false information is even worse than yielding none, since false information can cause the community to divert resources away from good information sources in favor of bad ones, or to close off new, potentially viable avenues of information in favor of pursuing false leads. Our resources are far more limited than our information sources, and following new leads always means abandoning existing ones.

 

Drew, I will say it again. GITMO is to torture what your crazy uncle in his basement is to cancer research. Yes, I'll readily admit that it can be abused, and that's something to be aware of and work to prevent, but it's no more abusable than police interrogations, medical liscences, firearms, cars, fraternities, or alcohol. GITMO does NOT represent the results of a carefully planned and controlled torture program initiated by those with training and experience. It represents a complete breakdown of military protocol and discipline.

Oh, I don't listen to Hannity. As to the 'experts' in the field, I have yet to hear from one who's experience dates back before 9/11. In that light, it would seem all the 'torture experts' today are drawing their 'expertise' from similarly ill-trained and ill-equiped (and probably mostly ill-monitored or controlled) programs to GITMO. It's like asking a wife-beater, or the wife-beater's wife, for martial arts instruction. They may be an 'expert' on violence and pain, but not in the controlled art of killing or disabling an enemy. Likewise, while I'll admit these people may be experts on intelligence gathering and interrogation, I really doubt they could legitimately be called experts on torture.

Drew, unless there was an outside organization making the assessments (like the FBI), it was a soldier, whether private or general, that was deciding who get's tortured and who doesn't. How much power they have to investigate entirely depends on the system that is set up. They very well could have the power to fly over to Afghanistan first.

Who says that this will always be the case? You? I don't see any requirement of it. In fact, I'd say that any system that does this is botched from the beginning.

This is true, though I'm not sure that it is always true that information sources outnumber resources. This is a valid criticism.