We Don't Torture!

(Originally written in 2007)
Americans are a decent and compassionate people; we believe in treating people fairly, humanely, and with respect. We aren't the kind of people who torture our enemies as so many others have throughout history and even in modern times. So the question of "water-boarding", which has been outlawed under international agreements as a form of torture and banned by the US government, would seem to be moot. Yet the current Attorney General nominee's Senate approval has been held up because of his refusal to categorically disavow our government's use of this technique. What's up with that?

Apparently, our government HAS used water-boarding in recent years, specifically at Abu-Ghraib and with high profile terrorist suspects at Guantanamo Bay, such as senior al-Qaeda operative Khaled Sheikh Mohammed. I guess the rationale is that if it doesn't happen in the US, then it's OK. Not really sure how that rationale works, but just add it to the long list of things that I don't quite understand. At any rate, it seems that the A.G. nominee (Michael Mukasey) doesn't want to leave CIA agents who used the technique open to prosecution, and also that he doesn't want to totally preclude water-boarding's use in possible extraordinary future circumstances. We can all see where he's coming from, but still - if it's torture and it's illegal, why are we having this discussion at all?

Well here's why. Like just about everything else, torture and the use thereof is hardly a black or white issue. In the case of water-boarding, it imitates the sensation of drowning and causes extreme horror and fear in its victims. One imagines that very real, temporary psychological damage may result, but apparently there is little or no significant permanent physical harm done. It's torture, but barely so, by my way of thinking. Here's what I mean.

In wartime, enemy combatants and, in this age where warfare often takes the form of terrorism, suspected terrorists, are interrogated to gain information designed to save lives. That's the way it works and the way it's always been. The question is: what kinds of interrogation are acceptable? Let's invision a simplistic scale that goes from 1 to 100, where 1 is very clearly OK and 100 is very clearly unacceptable. Inviting a captured soldier for tea and cookies and a very friendly discussion in a pleasant, comfortable setting with no pressure applied might count as a 1, for example. On the other hand, hanging an enemy naked by meathooks run through his shoulders, while touching live electrical wires to his testicles as his wife and 8-year old daughter are repeatedly raped and his son slowly strangled to death in front of him - that, I would suggest, is a 100 and REAL torture. That kind of thing has happened, by the way, in Saddam Hussein's Iraq, Idi Amin's Uganda, and assorted other ugly places.

Playing loud rock 'n roll 24 hours a day, forcing Muslims to eat pork and look at porn, keeping room temperatures uncomfortably hot or cold, stressful, threatening interrogation sessions that might include angry German shephard dogs and smacking someone around a little - combinations of things like these might rate a 20, a 45, maybe a 70 on our little imaginary scale. Trying to keep things numerical, let's just say for the sake of argument that actual torture begins at 70, and that water-boarding is perhaps a 75 or an 80. So it IS torture, but not quite in the same league as the really nasty stuff.

The fact is that we lose a great deal by using torture. The USA, the great shining light on the hill, leader of the free world, the most democratic of all nations - using illegal torture techniques! What could be more discrediting and give our enemies more reason to berate us as hypocrites? Furthermore, our use of torture, if found out, makes it much more likely that the bad guys will use even worse torture techniques on our soldiers and on innocent civilians.

Fair enough. But now let's look at the other side of the equation. What could be gained from any interrogation or torture? Consider, please, this extreme and unlikely hypothetical situation: Somehow or another, the bad guys have acquired 10 fully functional nuclear bombs, and they have a plan in place and ready to go to drop those on the 10 largest U.S. cities. (Updated note: The Washington Post published an article on November 11th which identified concerns about the possibility of terrorists acquiring Pakistani nuclear weapons if the situation continues to deteriorate there.) We are somehow 100% certain that they have these bombs and are capable of using them. We conservatively estimate that these bombs will immediately kill at least 10 million people, with many more dying eventually. That 10 million dead would include you, your entire family, and all your friends, by the way. Additionally, the bombings would certainly send the nation and its economy into chaos and a collapse that would make the Great Depression look like a good time. America, as we know it today, would cease to be. But here's the thing: we have the head terrorist and he has information that will allow us to prevent any of these bombs from being used. But time's really short; we have only a few hours, and he's not talking so far. What would you NOT be willing to do to get that information from him?

Well of course anyone who says they wouldn't use the most extreme methods available is just plain lying. Protect one brutal terrorist who we KNOW has committed previous deadly attacks, or 10 million innocent people and the fate of our nation? There is no question of what is right in this situation. So there it is: torture CAN be justified, at least in this very specific and unlikely case. But what if we were only 98% sure of our information, instead of 100% sure? What if our confidence level was 80%? 60%? Would extreme torture still be justified, if you could ensure that the rest of the world wouldn't know you'd done it? At what level of certainty might we back off on the amount of torture we'd use? What if we were "only" talking about 100,000 people dead instead of 10 million? Only 5000 people? 200 people? Would you still insist on the authorities using extreme torture if need be? How about milder torture - say, water-boarding ? Would that be OK?

And so: surprise, surprise. The torture question isn't quite that simple. You and I and Mukasey and the local rabbi will disagree on when torture might be appropriate and what degree of torture would be acceptable. We'd ALL - if given truth serum - agree to use it in the extreme scenario painted above, but after that we're just not sure. Different values, different perspectives - the whole issue becomes very gray.

A final thought: in surveys of Americans following 9/11, something like 80% said they expected another major terrorist attack on America within 6 months. We know that Al-Qaeda has been trying their darndest to do just that. We know that they canceled a major subway attack in the US a couple of years ago because they wanted to go ahead with a "much more deadly" attack instead. What might that have been, by the way? But here we are, 6 YEARS later, and no new attacks on the US (knock on wood). We don't hear a lot about that fact, and I suppose most Americans just kind of figure that we've lucked out since 2001, that it just kinda worked out that way. But do you think that maybe um..... "aggressive" interrogation techniques might be part of the reason we've been able to fend off new attacks? And if that is the case, if those interrogations included some forms of torture, would you rather have had another 9/11 or something much worse? Really? Would you be willing to explain to the victims' families that you were in a position to prevent the THOUSANDS OF DEATHS, but didn't because you would have had to use a technique that was illegal???

Each of us has to answer that question for ourselves, but it seems to me that the whole torture thing is anything but black or white. In a calm, sterile, environment we proudly and categorically condemn torture, smug in our moral superiority to those cretins who would argue otherwise. In a real live situation, with thousands or millions of lives hanging in the balance, I bet most of us would think differently, however. That, I suppose, is the point Mukasey must keep in mind as part of his job. And that is also the point that those who say "no torture under any circumstances!" haven't bothered to think through all the way.