Interrogation, Torture, and My Growing Apathy

Every day we hear more and more about memos that defended or proposed or found legal basis for torture of inmates. In the minds of most Americans, though, there is something that isn't quite torture, but is far more aggressive than your typical police interrogation--and that something in between is really nothing to get upset about.

What we really need is a "Thou Shalt" and "Thou Shalt Not" list of actions that are acceptable in interrogating enemy combatants. The first thing to realize is that these are enemy combatants. They didn't just knock over a local 7-11, and the way we treat them shouldn't necessarily reflect the way we treat citizens who are petty criminals. Still, there is a line where interrogation becomes torture, and that torture becomes unacceptable abuse.

So when I read that a member of the administration allowed for the use of dogs in questioning, I ask my own questions: did he allow for the biting, eating, and mutilating of the combatants? Or just for angry dogs to be present to scare the bejesus out of the subject? If this is just a scare tactic, I can't find it in myself to get worked up.

That leaves us ready to tackle the question of what is permissible. Feel free to leave suggestions and critiques.

1. Extended periods of isolation.
   
2. Sleep deprivation.
   
3. Severe food rationing to include short periods of food deprivation.
   
4. The use of threats to include the threats of bodily harm, bodily harm by an attending animal, humiliation, long-term imprisonment, and forcible re-location.
   
5. Truth serum.
   
6. Limited rewards systems to encourage cooperation.
   

I don't find any of the above to be objectionable, especially if military doctors who also have access to the subjects to ensure their safety approve the regimens. A limited use of position, strength, and authority to gain important information from our enemies is entirely defensible. But, like any authority that we cede to the government, there needs to be a list of unacceptable behaviors that acts as a border between right and wrong actions.

1. Sexual abuse to include rape by the interrogators, forcing the subjects to rape each other, and using foreign object (ie, glow sticks) to rape or sodomize the subjects. We don't do that.
   
2. Physical abuse producing long-lasting physical effects. Saddam's torturers routinely cut out portions of tongues, chopped off fingers, and had hands surgically removed. Actions like this are completely beyond the pale of a civilized society and are used not to gain information but to cow a populace into submission. We don't do that.
   
3. The physical abuse of subjects’ family members in an attempt to gain cooperation. Again, Saddam's intimidation techniques sometimes involved using professional rapists to rape a subject's family members to force the subject to talk. We don't do that.
   

Once the hysteria has died down a bit, we can dispassionately analyze the memos and the directives and find out what was and was not authorized. And we can apportion blame and praise appropriately.

Until that time, though, there does need to be a publicly stated policy on what is and is not acceptable when interrogating enemy combatants. I don't pretend that what I've presented is nearly exhaustive or specific enough to stand as that policy--but I would be willing to bet that it is reasonably representative of what the typical American would find both acceptable and unacceptable in questioning enemies.

President Bush and his administration need to put their list on the table, too. Trying to decipher intent and meaning from these memos is not an acceptable replacement for a well-stated policy.

Posted by zombyboy at June 23, 2004 09:27 AM | TrackBack