If Enhanced Interrogation is not Torture...

My last post discussed the reasons why, in my opinion, Bush & Chaney Should Be Behind Bars today for the crimes they committed against captured suspected terrorist detainees following the infamous World Trade Center and Pentagon attacks of September 11, 2001. They’re the culprits who authorized the CIA to conduct a top secret program involving so-called “enhanced interrogation techniques” for the purpose of gleaning information from the captives.

In short, according to the recently released Senate report concerning the matter, President George W. Bush and his Vice President Dick Chaney illegally authorized the U.S. government to abuse and torture captured prisoners.

Oh, no they didn’t! scream the many pundits and politicians who defend the use of enhanced interrogation procedures on prisoners. First of all, they insist that the enhanced interrogation techniques carried out by the CIA, which included, among many other brutal practices, water boarding, for example, is not torture. Enhanced interrogation is legal, they say; it’s necessary; it saved many lives; it’s effective; and it works. 

In the same breath, however, these defenders of enhanced interrogation uniformly maintain that the Senate should not have released the report about it. Because that report is going to seriously endanger the lives of Americans, they warn. It’s going to make America look bad in the eyes of the rest of the world. It’s going to cause our enemies to become even angrier at Americans and thereby increase the likelihood of more terror attacks. And, oh yes, we’re not going to do it anymore?

But if the enhanced interrogation techniques, which were authorized by Bush and Chaney, and carried out by the CIA upon captive suspects in the so called War on Terror, is not torture... then intentional infliction of physical pain and suffering upon a person by the authorities for the purpose of coercion, i.e., to extract vital  information or a confession, for example, is not torture, a conclusion which flies in the face of the very definition of the word “torture.” Calling torture “enhanced interrogation” is simply calling torture by another name.

To be sure, the enhanced interrogation methods employed by the CIA and authorized by Bush and Chaney consisted of a lot more than simply the interrogators raising their voice during the questioning. It was a lot more than subjecting them to the 3^rd degree as it were. It was punching and slapping them; throwing them against concrete walls; drowning them to near death; and in some cases even killing them. I’ll spare you the rest of the gory details which you can read for yourself in the report.

If all of that is not torture... 

What then is the law that allows it? The defenders never cite any law.

Why isn’t it lawful and proper to conduct the same enhanced interrogation methods on domestic criminal suspects? If the cops want to know who the accomplices of a kidnapping or bank robber suspect are, for example, why not employ a few enhanced interrogation methods on the detainee to get that important information by coercion? It’s legal; it’s necessary; it saves lives; it’s effective; and it works, doesn’t it?

Why can’t we Americans use enhanced interrogation methods as a lawful and proper means to discipline our children? After all, it’s not torture, right? Isn’t it perfectly OK to use a little physical pain and suffering to make our kids better citizens if it works? Spare the rod and spoil the child, right? That’s what the Bible says.

Why didn’t Americans use the exact same enhanced interrogation methods on the German and Japanese prisoners of war during WWII? If such methods are lawful and proper, shouldn’t it have been routinely done during that horrible war when our country truly was in dire danger? The Japs and the Germans were using it on Americans. Why didn’t we do it to them?

Why does Senator John McCain, who suffered terribly from the same kind of enhanced interrogation methods as a POW at the hands of our Viet Cong enemies during the Vietnam War call it torture if it’s not torture? If anyone should know what torture is its John McCain and he calls what Bush and Chaney authorized torture, plain and simple.

If it’s not torture, then why do the defenders argue that the report about it should not have been released? Why should it endanger American lives any more than our lives are endangered now unless it reveals something about our government that is really bad; something for which all Americans should be ashamed?

If it’s not torture, then why should the report make America look bad in the eyes of world opinion? Why should it make our enemies angrier at us than they already are? Why are we not going to do it anymore if it’s not torture?  What’s the problem if it didn’t reveal that laws were violated and our nation should be ashamed?

Obviously, there is no reason for the defenders to be alarmed if indeed enhanced interrogation is not torture.