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| Limitations on Interrogation Methods Naive at Best, Dishonest at Worst |
| 2004-06-27 |
| From The Washington Post, an opinion article by Tom Malinowski, Washington advocacy director for Human Rights Watch "I stand for 8-10 hours a day. Why is standing limited to four hours?" .... With his characteristic cut-through-the-bull bluntness, Rumsfeld raised a valid question. If interrogators can use methods designed to inflict pain on prisoners, why should they be made to stop before the pain becomes difficult to bear? After all, forcing a prisoner to stand, so long as it’s only for a short time, is a bit like allowing the use of hot irons, so long as they’re only slightly above room temperature. The contradiction Rumsfeld noticed may help us understand how decisions made by senior officials and military commanders led to the abuse of prisoners in Abu Ghraib. The policymakers apparently tried to have it both ways, approving highly coercive interrogation techniques, but with limits designed to assuage their consciences and satisfy their lawyers. They authorized or proposed painful "stress positions," but said that no one position could be used for more than 45 minutes. They allowed forced standing, but only for four hours; sleep deprivation, but only for 72 hours; exposure to heat and cold, but with medical monitoring; hooding, but not in a way that limits breathing; and nudity, but not the stacking of nude bodies. Once these methods were applied in the field on prisoners considered to be hardened terrorists, however, interrogators did not respect the lawyers’ boundaries. Indeed, they could not have respected them while still achieving their aim of forcing information from detainees. For by definition, these methods, euphemistically known as "stress and duress," can work only when applied beyond the limits of a prisoner’s tolerance. Torture works only (if ever) when it truly feels like torture. Perhaps one reason these stress and duress techniques were approved at all is that they sound innocuous. But as anyone who has worked with torture victims knows, they are the stock in trade of brutal regimes around the world. For example, the Washington Times recently reported that "[s]ome of the most feared forms of torture cited" by survivors of the North Korean gulag "were surprisingly mundane: Guards would force inmates to stand perfectly still for hours at a time, or make them perform exhausting repetitive exercises such as standing up and sitting down until they collapsed from fatigue." Binding prisoners in painful positions is a torture technique widely used in countries such as China and Burma, and repeatedly condemned by the United States. Stripping Muslim prisoners nude to humiliate them was a common practice of the Soviet military when it occupied Afghanistan. As for sleep deprivation, consider former Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin’s account of experiencing it in a Soviet prison in the 1940s: "In the head of the interrogated prisoner a haze begins to form. His spirit is wearied to death, his legs are unsteady, and he has one sole desire: to sleep, to sleep just a little, not to get up, to lie, to rest, to forget. . . . Anyone who has experienced this desire knows that not even hunger or thirst are comparable with it. . . . I came across prisoners who signed what they were ordered to sign, only to get what the interrogator promised them. He did not promise them their liberty. He promised them -- if they signed -- uninterrupted sleep!" Rumsfeld eventually rescinded his approval of these cruel methods for Guantanamo. But they still ended up being authorized by commanders and used on prisoners throughout Afghanistan and Iraq. Former detainees report being forced to stand, sit or crouch for many hours, often in contorted positions, deprived of sleep for nights on end, held nude, doused with cold water and exposed to extreme heat. It’s not likely anyone was holding a stopwatch during this treatment or making sure that only "mild" pain and suffering resulted. Why would they have? For the limits that might have made the treatment more humane would also have rendered it ineffective in the eyes of interrogators. Stress and duress interrogation techniques were invented in the dungeons of the world’s most brutal regimes for only one purpose -- to cause pain, distress and humiliation, without physical scars. When Bush administration officials and military commanders told soldiers to use methods designed for that purpose, while still treating detainees "humanely," they were being naive at best and dishonest at worst. They should have known that once the purpose of inflicting pain is legitimized, those charged with the care and interrogation of prisoners will take it to its logical conclusion. |
| Posted by:Mike Sylwester |
| #14 Mike, if you hadn't established a record of dishonesty on this issue, people would take you more seriously. |
| Posted by: Robert Crawford 2004-06-27 8:46:52 PM |
| #13 Did any of the mainstream media give 1/50th the coverage to these as they did the Prisoner mistreatment? The mainstream media (and Human Rights Watch) have reported plenty about problems in Iran, North Korea, Sudan, etc. Right now the issue of prisoner mistreatment is prominent. At other times, other issues have been and will be prominent. Before the photographs of the Abu Ghraib prisoners were published, the mainstream media reported relatively little about the treatment of prisoners. Back then, it was HRW reports about prisoner treatment that were buried back on page 20. . |
| Posted by: Mike Sylwester 2004-06-27 2:01:22 PM |
| #12 Ok Mike, perhaps not 'completely ignoring' but they do their best to 'bury' it in paragraph 20 on some obscure page in the neither regions... I'm sorry but having some prisoner wear women's panties on their head (while quite bad - on the other hand some guys might like it.. no accounting for taste...) is not equal to gang rapes, murders, and the killing of newborn babies in front of their mother (N. Korea). Did any of the mainstream media give 1/50th the coverage to these as they did the Prisoner mistreatment? |
| Posted by: CrazyFool 2004-06-27 1:49:33 PM |
| #11 while completely ignoring the real torture and pain and death dealt out on a daily basis by Iran, North Korea, Sudan, etc.... Whatever you say, CrazyFool. . |
| Posted by: Mike Sylwester 2004-06-27 12:11:21 PM |
| #10 Jen, I didn't know there was a difference between the BBC and Al--Jitzz. I guess you learn something more everyday. Its organizations like HRW (and the media) who also enable the terrorist organizations with their weeping and gnashing of teeth over every little inconvience the prisoners of the west endure (Oh my! This soldier farted the the presence of a murdering terrorist! The soldier must be punished!) while completely ignoring the real torture and pain and death dealt out on a daily basis by Iran, North Korea, Sudan, etc.... |
| Posted by: CrazyFool 2004-06-27 11:56:32 AM |
| #9 That's not going to happen, Mike, and there are lots of clear-thinking right-minded people that share my views of the BBC and the WaPo. Plus, they go beyond mere accusations. The BBC was proven to have lied in the Andrew Gilligan/David Kelly case as an attempt to bring down Blair's government. The WaPo brought us the bloodless coup that took down Nixon and it's clear that they'd like to do the same to Bush if they try hard enough. If either media wants to sue me for my "accusations," I'm not that hard to find. |
| Posted by: Jen 2004-06-27 11:54:30 AM |
| #8 they have an agenda that the Islamofascists would appreciate, what's to moderate? |
| Posted by: Frank G 2004-06-27 11:52:57 AM |
| #7 BBC has done more than their share of carrying the water for the IslamoFacists I don't agree with your judgement about The Washington Post or about the BBC. You ought to moderate your accusations. . |
| Posted by: Mike Sylwester 2004-06-27 11:45:20 AM |
| #6 Uh, Mike, that wouldn't be me on Gen. Karpinski. But yes, the BBC has done more than their share of carrying the water for the IslamoFacists. In fact, they're starting a new Arabic channel to compete with Al Jazeera. And you're quite right about Zhang Fei and I--we're doing our bit for the war effort, on the Right side. |
| Posted by: Jen 2004-06-27 11:15:22 AM |
| #5 Human Rights Watch .... objectively on the side of the terrorists; Mike Sylwester ... a jihadi lover; WaPo ... the terrorists' enabler. Last Sunday it was the BBC and Gen Karpinski who were on the side of the terrorists who behead Americans. This Sunday the focus shifts to other traitors. We should all be glad, I suppose, that there are at least a few people, such as Zhang Fei and Jen, who truly oppose terrorism while so many other people are on the terrorists' side and love and enable them. . |
| Posted by: Mike Sylwester 2004-06-27 11:06:51 AM |
| #4 Frank G - works for me. Really, I wonder how much useful intelligence we're getting out of these guys. Except in (possibly) a few cases, it might just be better to help them to their 72 raisins and get it over with. It's not like they'd show any mercy if the tables were turned. |
| Posted by: Barbara Skolaut 2004-06-27 10:59:00 AM |
| #3 OK HRW - we'll just shoot them with our Jooooo bullets. Happy? |
| Posted by: Frank G 2004-06-27 10:50:28 AM |
| #2 Zhang Fei, Too right. But don't forget the WaPo's role in all this as the terrorists' enabler, too. |
| Posted by: Jen 2004-06-27 10:47:21 AM |
| #1 Once again, Human Rights Watch shows that it is objectively on the side of the terrorists. And Mike Sylwester validates my opinion of him as a jihadi lover. |
| Posted by: Zhang Fei 2004-06-27 10:42:31 AM |