Torture is Still Torture

If there is more illustrative recent example of the importance of language than the choice between "enhanced interrogation techniques" or "torture," it eludes me.

Some among us are inclined to say the questionable "techniques" employed against our prisoners are mere scare tactics; others claim the techniques are harsh (even torture), but justified given the evil of those to whom they are applied; still others claim the techniques are torture.

However, as talking heads pimp their moral and ethical casuistry in the unflagging pursuit oversimplified answers to oversimplified questions, there still exist easily accessible moral guideposts.

"Do unto others as you would have them do unto you." This simple formulation, tested and effective, helps to disambiguate the morality and language of how our prisoners should be treated. Would we (as either individuals or as a Republic) ever tolerate another state treating our citizens this way, regardless of our citizens' actual guilt? The concept of such tolerance is almost inconceivable.

Some may try to cobble some perverse syllogism out of the Golden Rule and Hammurabi's Code to justify revenge or harsh responses: morally depraved vigilantes killed thousands of our innocent countrymen, we are therefore morally entitled to take the fight to our enemy prisoners. Others may adopt an Orwellian principle that the security of the state or the prevention of some possible future attack justifies even torture. Still others may claim that harsh techniques are used to train our own soldiers, so if we have tortured our prisoners, then we have tortured our soldiers.

We are tempted to hesitate to call "enhanced interrogation techniques" torture because they lack the savagery typically present in the Hollywood concocted depictions of torture. But even the brutal torture of 18th century France was not unrestrained savagery. Michel Foucault describes it as:

...a regulated practice, obeying a well-defined procedure; the various stages , their duration, the instruments used, the length of the ropes and heaviness of the weights used, the number of interventions made by the interrogating magistrate, all this was, according to the different local practices, carefully codified.

-Discipline & Punish: The Birth of the Prison, p. 40

Our country's techniques (and they are now ours, if only because they were done in all of our names) differ from those of the rack, wheel, and pillory only by degree of brutality. The U.S.'s waterboarding is no less torture than when waterboarding was used by Khmer Rouge.

Call or write your Congressional Representative and Senator and tell them to investigate torture and hold the responsible to account.

The Dark Pall of Gitmo Just Got Darker

My previous post may have been too generous to our government's treatment of detainees at Gitmo and elsewhere. 

In testimony this week before the House Judiciary Subcommittee on Civil Rights, Col. Lawrence Wilkerson testified that over 100 detainees have died while in U.S. custody, more than 25 of those have been identified as murder.

The McClatchy news service released a report detailing detainee treatment at Kandahar, Bagram, Guantanamo Bay, and elsewhere. 

Several key points from the piece: a multitude of aggressive interrogation techniques were used that in conjunction (if not individually) constitute torture; many intelligence officials admitted that very little quality intelligence was being acquired overall due to the fact that many of those captured had tenuous connections to Al Qaida or were mere foot soldiers; of the over 700 people passing through Gitmo only 6 people have been charged, that's a 99% failure rate; and finally, a small cadre of lawyers referring to themselves as the "war council" provided the legal reasoning (however specious) to underwrite the administration policy and eschew future legal culpability.

RADM Mark Buzby was quoted as saying, "It's all about developing the [intelligence] mosaic...there's value at both ends of the spectrum..." A sagacious observation.

The mosaic that is developing shows a small circle of federal officials who view our country's laws and the principles on which they are based as impediments to executing a Global War on Terrorism. These men are anathema to our constitution and our democracy.